
Manuel Gonzalez Flores (18 June 1833 – 8 May 1893) was President of Mexico from 1 December 1880 to 30 November 1884, interrupting Porfirio Diaz's terms. He went on to serve as Governor of Guanajuato from 1885 to 1893, when he died. He was a member of the Liberal Party of Mexico.
Biography[]
Manuel Gonzalez Flores was born in Matamoros, Tamaulipas, Mexico in 1833, and he served as a Mexican Army lieutenant during the Mexican-American War, during which his father was killed by the US Army. He fought for Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna and the Conservative Party of Mexico during the civil wars of the 1850s and the Reform War, although he defected to the Liberal Party of Mexico during the French Intervention and fought under Porfirio Diaz. He was wounded and captured at the 1862 Battle of Puebla and again in 1865, but he escaped both times. He served as military governor of the National Palace from 1871 to 1873, and he supported Diaz in both of his coup attempts, with the latter succeeding in 1876. He served as commander of Michoacan from 1877 to 1879 and Secretary of War and the Navy from 1879 to 1879, and Diaz made him his puppet president in 1880. He did Diaz's bidding in every respect, but Gonzales took the blame for the government profligacy and financial incompetence of 1880-1884, leading to Diaz being re-elected in 1884 with popular support. Gonzalez went on to serve as Governor of Guanajuato from 1885 until his death in 1893.