Historica Wiki
Advertisement
Juan Alvarez

Juan Nepomuceno Alvarez Hurtado de Luna (27 January 1790 – 21 August 1867) was President of Mexico from 4 October to 11 December 1855, succeeding Romulo Diaz de la Vega and preceding Ignacio Comonfort. He was a laeder of the Liberal Party of Mexico.

Biography[]

Juan Nepomuceno Alvarez Hurtado de Luna was born in Atoyac, Guerrero, Mexico in 1790 to a criollo father and a pardo (part-African) mother. He worked as a vaquero before fighting under Jose Maria Morelos' command during the Mexican War of Independence. After Morelos' capture and execution in 1815, he served under Vicente Guerrero, and, on 15 October 1821, he captured Acapulco from the royalists. He distrusted Agustin de Iturbide and the criollo elite, giving a speech to his Afro-Mexican troops and decrying the criollo elite's racism and soliciting of Afro-Mexicans' extermination. In 1822, he joined with Guerrero and Anastasio Bustamante in fighting against Iturbide's monarchy, and he later served under Guerrero during the civil wars of the late 1820s and failed to prevent Bustamante from having Guerrero executed. He later fought against the French invaders in the 1838 Pastry War and led a cavalry division in defense of Mexico City during the Mexican-American War, and, in 1854, he took part in the overthrow of Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna. He was installed as interim President of Mexico in October 1855, and he supported a liberal, republican, and federalist system which would dismantle corrupt centralism and give stolen lands back to the Native Americans. Due to conflict within his cabinet and opposition from Mexico City's elites, Alvarez decided to hand over power to his subordinate Ignacio Comonfort, and he remained a leader of the Liberal Party of Mexico during the Reform War and commanded the Division del Sur during the French Intervention. He died in 1867.

Advertisement