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Bulwarks of Patriotic Liberalism: the National Guard, Philharmonic Corps and Patriotic Juntas in Mexico, 1847–88

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

Guy P. C. Thomson
Guy P. C. Thomson
Affiliation:
Lecturer in History at the University of Warwick.
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Extract

In the archive of the now disbanded jefatura política of Tetela de Ocampo is an account of the funeral ceremony of the Puebla State deputy and school teacher, Ciudadano Miguel Méndez, only son of General Juan Nepomuceno Méndez, caudillo máximo of the State of Puebla between 1857 and 1884. The Velada Fúnebre was held in 1888 in the cabecera of Xochiapulco (alias ‘La Villa del Cinco de Mayo’), a municipio of nahuatl speakers on the southern edge of Mexico's Sierra Madre Oriental, adjoining the cereal producing plateaux of San Juan de los Llanos. The ceremony took place in the ‘Netzahualcoyotl’ municipal school room and was organised by the municipality's Society of Teachers. The description of the elaborately decorated room and baroque ceremony fills several pages.1 The teachers had decked the school room (normally adorned by ‘sixty-two great charts of natural history, twenty Industrial diagrams, large maps of Universal Geography, and diverse statistical charts and many engravings related to education’) with military banners and weapons, masonic trophies, candelabra, floral crowns and yards of white and black ribbon. In the centre of the room stood the coffin on an altar, itself raised upon a platform, guarded by four National Guard sentries and attended by the philharmonic corps of Xochiapulco and all the public officials of the cabecera and its dependent barrios. For nine days preceding the ceremony this band had played funeral marches, between six and eight in the evening, on the plaza, in front of the house of the deceased. The service was taken by Mr Byron Hyde, a Methodist minister from the United States. Accompanied by his wife at a piano, Hyde gave renderings (in English) of three Wesleyan hymns.2 There followed three eulogies of Miguel Méndez, extolling his services to the Liberal cause and on behalf of the ‘desgraciada nación azteca’. These speeches were infused with extreme anticlerical and anti-Conservative sentiments, a martial patriotic liberalism, a reverence for the principles of the French Revolution, an admiration for Garibaldi and Hidalgo (in that order), and an obsession with the importance of education as the only means for emancipating the indigenous population from clerical subjection.

Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Latin American Studies , Volume 22 , Issue 1-2 , March 1990 , pp. 31 - 68
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1990

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References

1 A.M.T. de O., Box 14 (1888), Bis Correspondencia Xochiapulco, ‘Crónica de las honras fúnebres que el Ayuntamiento de Xochiapulco hizo el día dos de mayo de 1888 al finado Diputado C. Miguel Méndez’.

2 Himnos para uso de la Iglesia Metodista del Sur de México (Nashville, 1875).Google Scholar

3 Bastian, Jean Pierre, Protestantismo y Sociedad en México (Mexico, 1983)Google Scholar; ‘Metodismo y clase obrera en el Porfiriato’, Historia Mexicana, vol. 33 (1983), pp. 39–71Google Scholar; ‘Metodismo y Rebelión Política en Tlaxcala, 1874–1920’, unpublished paper, Congreso de Historia de Tlaxcala, 1984.Google Scholar

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5 Bastian, Jean Pierre, Protestantismo y Sociedad, p. 87.Google Scholar

6 For my preliminary findings on this process, Thomson, G. P. C., ‘Movilización Conservadora, Insurrección Liberal y Rebeliones Indígenas, 1854–76’, in Annino, Antonio et al. , America latina: Dallo Stato Coloniale allo State Nazione (Turin, 1987), vol. 2, pp. 592–614.Google Scholar

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8 The National Guard is not even mentioned in Lozoya's, Jorge Alberto otherwise useful ‘Un guión para el estudio de los ejércitos mexicanos en el siglo XIX’, Historia Mexicana, vol. 17 (1967), pp. 553–63.Google Scholar

9 For the French precedents: Lynn, John A., The Bayonets of the Republic: Motivation and Tactics in the Army of Revolutionary France, 1791–94 (Chicago, 1984)Google Scholar; Cobb, Richard, The People's Armies (New Haven, 1987).Google Scholar For hispanic precedents in the ‘civic militia’: Archer, Christon I., The Army in Bourbon Mexico, 1760–1810 (Albuquerque, 1977)Google Scholar; McAlister, Lyle, The ‘Fuero Militar’ in New Spain, 1764–1800 (reprinted Boulder, 1974).Google Scholar For Liberal Mexican thinking on militia and a national guard: Hale, Charles, Mexican Liberalism in the Age of Mora, 1821–1853 (New Haven, 1968), pp. 141–4Google Scholar; Sinkin, Richard, The Mexican Reform, 1855–1876. A Study in Liberal Nation-Building (Austin, 1979), pp. 101–2Google Scholar, and the recent pioneering article by Santoni, Pedro, ‘A Fear of the People: The Civic Militia of Mexico in 1845’, Hispanic American Historical Review, vol. 68 (1988), pp. 269–88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Santoni, Pedro, ‘A Fear of the People’, pp. 270–1.Google Scholar

11 The National Guard law, decreed by President José Joaquín Herrera on 31 July 1848 from Saltillo (Coahuila), is reproduced in Fentanes, Luis Ramírez, Zaragoza (Mexico, 1962), pp. 23–31.Google Scholar

12 Ibid., p. 30.

13 ‘Ley Orgánica de las Fuerzas de Seguridad Pública, del Estado’, in Periódica Oficial, vol. VI, no. 27, 12 05 1875, p. 2.Google Scholar

14 Palacios, Vicente Riva saw the National Guard as ‘el único sostén de la independencia y soberanía de los estados contra las tendencias del centro, y contra todo conato de tiranía y despotismo’, ‘Los Gobernadores y la Guardia Nacional’, El Siglo XIX, 28 02 1874, p. 2.Google Scholar

15 For a detailed description of the Ejército de Oriente: Santibañez, Manuel, Reseña histórica del Cuerpo de Ejército de Oriente, 2 vols. (Mexico, 1892).Google Scholar

16 Portilla, Anselmo, Méjico en 1856 y 1857, Gobierno del General Comonfort (New York, 1858)Google Scholar and Bazant, Jan, Antonio Haro y Tamariz y sus aventuras políticas (Mexico, 1985), pp. 105–38.Google Scholar

17 ‘Reglamento para la Guardia Nacional de Estado’, Ibarra, Gobernador Francisco, La Razón, Puebla, vol. 1, no. 20, 20 11 1855.Google Scholar

18 For a contemporary report of the unpopularity in the Sierra of forced recruitment by the Liberal commanders Ramon Márquez Galindo and Miguel Negrete in 1862: Flores, Ramón Sánchez, Zacapoastla Relación Histórica (Puebla, 1984), p. 175.Google Scholar

19 The hojas de servicio of national guardsmen are kept in the Archivo de Cancelados of the Ministerio de la Defensa Nacional (Lomas de Sotelo, Mexico City). Examples of long-serving guardsmen: Simon Cravioto (Huauchinango) served 1863–76, Caja 103 D/111/4/1593; Ramon Márquez Galindo (Zacatlán) served 1855–77, Caja 67 D/111/2/442; Lauro Luna (Tetela) served 1862–76, Caja 227 D/111/4/3671; Luis Antonio Díaz (Xochiapulco) served 1858–92, D/111/4/1767; José María Maldonado (Totimehuacan) served 1844–67, Caja 100 D/111/3/1021; Ignacio Sosa (Ahuacatlan) served 1847–96, Caja 382 D/111/4/6081; Macario González (Zacatlán) served 1847–81, Caja 49 D/111/2–315.

20 For the first state decree (8 June 1859) on the rebajado tax, ADN XI/481–3/8505, fo. 1.

21 La Razón, vol. I (2), 20 11 1855, p. 2.Google Scholar

22 ADN XI/481–3/8505, fo. 1.

23 In 1869, 27,137 (20.5 %) of the State's 128, 158 males enlisted for service in the national guard. In the cereal-growing district of San Juan de los Llanos, where estate resident jornaleros de campo made up the bulk of the population, only 293 (6.43 %) of the district's 4,550 males of serving age enlisted. In the neighbouring district of Zacapoastla, a largely Indian, small farming area, 1,319 (22.68 %) of the district's 5,814 men enlisted. Publicación Oficial, vol. I (10), 25 12 1869, p. 2.Google Scholar

24 The State Government's decree of 15 Nov. 1870 had exempted from payment of the tax: ‘a los peones de fincas rústicas, acorterados, casilleros y calpaneros’. A.M.T. de O. (Archivo Municipal de Tetela de Ocampo), Box 14 Bis. (1871).

25 ADN XI/481.3/8157 fo. 6.

26 The distribution of land of the Hacienda of Xochiapulco and Manzanilla among the national guardsman is the best known example of this. Jaramillo, Ana María D. Huerta, ‘La descomposición y formación de grupos sociales en Zacapoastla (a propósito de la sublevación 1868–1870): los Salgado y los Molina’, in Centro de Investigaciones Históricas y Sociales, Instituto de Ciencias, Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, Puebla en el Siglo XIX Contribución al estudio de su historia (Puebla, 1983), p. 259.Google Scholar For an example of a land dispute arising from General Juan N. Méndez's donation of land in exchange for military (field hospital) service to a citizen of Tuzamapa: A.M.T. de O. Box 12 bis. (1871), Expediente 1.

27 For an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of the National Guard component of the Constitutionalist army by Pascual Miranda, the military governor of Puebla in July 1860: ADN XI/481.3/8057 fols. 134–5.

28 ‘Ce “peuple armé” accepte mal, la paix revenue, de voir des civils restés à l'écart de la lutte mimer par des élections manipulées un peuple silencieux. La loyauté à l'égard des chefs militaires apparaît ainsi comme une affirmation des droits des citoyens armés qui s'expriment non pas à travers celui qu'ils ont élu, mais à travers celui qui a donné la victoire à la “nation”.’ Guerra, François-Xavier, Le Mexique. De l'Ancien Régime à la Révolution (Paris, 1985), vol. 1, p. 132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

29 On resistance to the state government's attempt to demobilise the Guard in 1887: Archivo de Porfirio Díaz (APD) (Universidad Iberoamericana, Mexico City), L12 C25 012411, General Juan Francisco Lucas to Porfirio Díaz, 23 Dec. 1887.

30 Franco, Felipe, Indonimía Geográfica del Estado de Puebla (Puebla, 1976), p. 89.Google Scholar

31 AMCh. (Archivo Municipal de Chignahuapan) Boxes 1–3 ‘Padrón de Milicianos’.

32 For an historical account of the municipality of San Francisco Ixtacamastitlan, to which Cuahuigtic was attached as a barrio: ‘Expediente relativo a que los terrenos de Cuayuca que hoy están agregados a Aquiztla vuelvan a pertenecer a Istacamastitlan’. AMCh, Box 2. For the Olmec past, see Mártinez, Bernardo García, Los Pueblos de la Sierra: El poder y el espacio entre los indios del norte de Puebla hasta 1700 (Mexico, 1987), p. 49.Google Scholar

33 Beaucage, Pierre, ‘Comunidades indígenas de la Sierra Norte de Puebla’, Revista Mexicana de Sociología, vol. 36 (1974), pp. 111–47.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

34 AMCh. Box 2 ‘Expediente relativo a que los terrenos de Cuayuca…’

35 Cuahuigtic was the only barrio to refuse to recognise the authority of the newly constituted District of Alatriste. AMCh. Box 1 Pablo M. Urrutía, Secretary of State Government, Tezuitlan, to José María Bonilla, Jefe Político, Chignahuapan, 5 July 1870, and José María Leal et al., Alcalde of Cuahuigtic, to State Governor, 26 July 1870.

36 AMCh. Box 2, ‘Expediente relativo a que los terrenos de Cuayuca…’, Galindo, Miguel Galindo y, La Gran Década, vol. 1, p. 165.Google Scholar

37 APD, L12 C25 012411, Juan Francisco Lucas to Porfirio Díaz, 23 Dec. 1887.

38 Viqueira, Carmen and Palerm, Angel, ‘Alcoholismo, brujería y homicidio en dos comunidades rurales de México’, América Indígena, vol. 14 (1954). pp. 7–36Google Scholar; Wolf, Eric and Hansen, Edward, The Human Condition in Latin America (Oxford, 1972), pp. 95–9Google Scholar; Wolf, Eric, ‘Closed Corporate Communities in Mesoamerica and Central Java’, Southwestern journal of Anthropology, vol. 13 (1957), pp. 1–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

39 A.M.T. de O., , Borrador de Oficios, Jefe Político (1866), 10 08 1866.Google Scholar

40 For example, in November 1862, the Jefe Político of Zacapoastla ordered the Alcalde of Nauzontla to return a piece of common land to María Josefa Sánchez, required for her son, at that time ‘prestando sus servicios en el ejército de Oriente’. AMZ, (de Zacapoastla, Archivo Municipal) (Correspondence of Jefe Político, 1862).Google Scholar

41 For example: Friedrich, Paul, The Princes of Naranja. An Essay in Anthrohistorical Method (Austin, 1986).Google Scholar

42 Protection of the Sierra National Guard from military service beyond the region was perhaps the chief source of legitimacy of the central Sierra's principal cacique, General Juan Francisco Lucas. LaFrance, David and Thomson, G. P. C., ‘Juan Francisco Lucas, Patriarch of the Sierra Norte de Puebla’, in Beezley, William H. and Ewell, Judith et al. , The Human Tradition in Latin America (Wilmington, Del. 1987).Google Scholar

43 For an early mention of the force of ‘indios cuatecomacos’, led by José Manuel Lucas, which would form the core of the Liberal national guard of the central Sierra during the 1860s and 1870s: ADN, XI/481 3/5321 fo. 11.

44 A.M.T. de O. Box 15 Bis. (1871), ‘Lista de Contribuyentes de la Guardia Nacional, 1 February, 1871’.

45 Guy P. C. Thomson, ‘Movilización Conservadora’; LaFrance, David, ‘Puebla: Breakdown of the Old Order’, in Benjamin, Thomas and McNellie, William et al. , Other Mexico: Essays on Regional Mexican History, 1876–1911 (Albuquerque, 1984), pp. 77–106.Google Scholar

46 A.M.T. de O., Box 9, Expediente 4, Alcalde of Tuzamapa to Jefe Político, Tetela.

47 Kelly, Isabel and Palerm, Angel, The Tajín Totonac, vol. 1 (Washington, D.C., 1952)Google Scholar, Smithsonian Institution, Institute of Social Anthropology, Publication no. 13.

48 Viqueira, Carmen and Palerm, Angel, ‘Alcoholismo, Brujería y Homicidio’, pp. 18–19.Google Scholar

49 Reina, Leticia, Las Rebeliones Campesinas en Mexico (1819–1906) (Mexico, 1980), pp. 325–9.Google Scholar

50 In January 1914, Huerta's Minister of War specified that the ‘Brigada Serrana’ be placed entirely under Indian officers, under the command of General Juan Francisco Lucas: ‘Que los Jefes y Oficiales de los destacamentos sean indios, de preferencia vecinos de Xochiapulco’, ADN, Cancelados, Box 64 D/111/2/425 fo. 324.

51 In May 1872, General Juan Crisóstomo Bonilla, commander of the Sierra rebels backing Díaz's Plan de la Noria, when advising on the appointment of commanders for the national guard of Otlatlán (Zacatlán), argued that Indian commanders were acceptable, indeed preferable, providing they were in favour of the cause, otherwise ladino commanders would be necessary. A.M.T. de O., Box 439, Expediente 4 (La Noria correspondence from Tascantla).

52 AMZ (Correspondence of Jefe Político with pueblos sujetos (1862)), 1 Feb. 1862, Octaviano Pérez, Cuetzalan, to Jefe Político, Zacapoastla.

53 AMZ, Ibid., 17 June 1862, Juan Jiménez, Tzicuilan, to Jefe Político.

54 Thomson, G. P. C., ‘Movilización Conservadora’, p. 602.Google Scholar

55 One such ‘conservative’ national guard cacicazgo in the district of Tlatlauquitepect was described in 1873:

En cada pueblo y hasta en cada barrio hay un individuo que se denomina comandante, y que en realidad es una especie de cacique que gobierna a su arbitrio y sin respetar ni tener en cuenta constitución, ley ni disposición alguna, y se mezcla hasta en la administración de justicia; de manera que allí hay palos, cepo, azotes y multas, y lo único que no hay es con quien quejarse.

El Monitor Republicano, vol. 23, no. 282, 25 11 1873, p. 2.Google Scholar The Liberal National Guard commander, General José María Maldonado, described the district capital of Tlatlauquitepec as ‘este pueblo mí’stico que da idea de monasterio, más bien que sociedad civil’. Flores, Ramón Sánchez, Zacapoastla Relación Histórica (Mexico, 1984), p. 174.Google Scholar

56 I have, preliminarily, traced this process in a paper given at a workshop on ‘Regional Power Groups in Mexico in the Inter-War Years’, CEDLA, Amsterdam, in June 1987: ‘“Montaña”’ and “Llanura” in the politics of south-eastern Mexico: the case of Puebla, 1820–1920', in Ouweneel, Arij and Pansters, Wil (eds.), Region, State and Capitalism in Mexico: Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, CEDLA (Amsterdam, forthcoming, 1989).Google Scholar

57 Thomson, G. P. C., ‘Movilización Conservadora’, pp. 595–8.Google Scholar

58 Gamboa, Jesús Ferrer, Los Tres Juanes, pp. 64–5Google Scholar; for a short, official biographical sketch, see also: Periódico Oficial, vol. IX, no. 55, 10 07 1878, p. 2.Google Scholar

59 A.M.T. de O., Box 7, Expediente 4, March–Dec. 1855, Correspondence between Juan Méndez, Comisario in Tuzamapa, and the Subprefect in Tetela.

60 A.M.T. de O., Box 6 (1853–5) Expedientes 4–6, for affairs relating to support for the Plan de Ayutla and opposition to the Plan de Zacapoastla.

61 ADN, Archivo de Cancelados, XI/III/I-31, 2 vols., for Méndez's hojas de servicio.

62 Daniel Cosío Villegas refers to Méndez as ‘Hombre recto y de valor, pero de escasa inteligencia e instrucción, era poco versado en política…’ (the worst crime for Don Daniel), Historia Moderna de México. La República Restaurada. La Vida Politico (Mexico, 1955), p. 168.Google Scholar Porfirio Díaz held a higher opinion of Méndez: ‘es un indio de pura sangre, que hace honor de su raza y que por su honradez y firmeza de principios, tiene muchos puntos de semejanza con Juárez. Es un hombre muy patriota, que se ha consagrado por completo al servicio del país.’ Carreño, Albert María, Archivo del Porfirio Diaz. Memorias y Documentos (Mexico, 1950), vol. 3, p. 76.Google Scholar

63 Periódico Oficial, vol. VIII, no. 66, 14 07 1877.Google Scholar

64 A.M.T. de O. (Correspondence between Juan N. Méndez and Juan Francisco Lucas 1866–7). One of the first acts of Juan N. Méndez, on becoming governor, was to abolish forced military recruitment, Diccionario Porrúa de Historia, Biografía y Geografía de México (Mexico, 1964), p. 984.Google Scholar

65 AGN, Ramo Archive de Leyva, Legajo XLV, Letter from Juan N. Méndez, Tetela de Ocampo, to General José María Maldonado.

66 APAL (Archivo Particular de Aurora Lucas, Puebla) Letter from Juan N. Méndez to Juan Francisco Lucas, April 1862. Porfirio Díaz confirms Méndez's concern with improving the condition of the Indian population of the Sierra.

67 A.M.T. de O., , 1866, borrador de Oficios 22 03 1866Google Scholar, Reglamento de las fábricas de aguardiente (Juan N. Méndez); and Box 36, Borrador de Oficios 1876, Duenìos de fábricas de aguardiente (Miguel R. Méndez).

68 Sodí, Carmen Sordo, ‘La música mexicana en la época del presidente Benito Juárez’, in Günther, Robert et al. , Die Musikkultur Lateinamerika inm 19. Jahrhundert (Regensburg, 1982), pp. 299–325.Google Scholar

69 The published history of wind bands in Mexico extends no further, to my knowledge, than the essay by Vázquez, Nabor, ‘Breve Historia de las Bandas de Música en México’, serialised in the review Orientación Musical, Mexico, vols. 3 & 4 (1943–1944).Google Scholar For full reference to this, and other sparse sources on nineteenth-century Mexico: Osorio, Sylvana Young, Guía Bibliográfica, vol. 2Google Scholar of Estrada, Julio, La música de Mexico (Mexico, 1984).Google Scholar

70 Gerónimo Baqueiro Foster's unpublished manuscript, Baqueiro Foster Papers, Expediente 880, pp. 104–6, kept in the Biblioteca del Conservatorio Nacional de Música (Instituto Nacional de Bellas Artes).

71 Vázquez, Nabor, ‘Breve Historia’, Orientación Musical, vol. 3 (25) (07 1943), p. 15.Google Scholar

72 ADN, XI/481–3/ fo. 162.

73 Ibid.

74 Flores, Ramón Sánchez, Relación, p. 155.Google Scholar

75 ADN XI/481–3/ fos. 348–9.

76 Flores, Ramón Sánchez, Relación, p. 153.Google Scholar

77 A.M.T. de O., (Unofficial Correspondence 1866–7), I2 Jan. 1867, Pascual Bonilla, Zacapoastla, to General Juan Francisco Lucas.

78 A.M.T. de O., Box 8 (1864), Expediente ii, ‘Lista de los ingresos…por el ramo de contribución de casas consistoriales…’.

79 For complaints from ‘hijos del pueblo’ against the wanton destruction of common woodlands, for charcoal, by owners of Zapotitlan aguardiente distilleries (including that of the alcalde, Lorenzo Diego, the controversial protagonist of Zapotitlan's cuerpo filarmónico), A.M.T. de O., , Borrador de oficios (1866), 8 10 and 28 12 1866.Google Scholar

80 A.M.T. de O., Box 439, Expediente 4, 18 April 1872, Juan Crisóstomo Bonilla, Tascantla, to Manuel Vázquez, Tetela de Ocampo.

81 Frederick Starr's description of the training of a Mazatec village band in the late 1890s suggests the key importance of the band in village ceremonial and political life:

Just across the way from the town-house, was a large house of the usual fashion, which we quickly learned was the rendezvous and practice-place of the town band. This consisted entirely of boys, none of them more than twenty years of age, and numbered upwards of thirty pieces. The leader was a man of forty, a capital trainer. The daily practice began at 4:30 in the morning, and was kept up until noon; then ensued an hour's rest. At one, they were again practicing, and no break occurred until long after dark. During the days that we were there, a single piece only was practiced. It was our alarm clock in the morning, beat time for our work throughout the day, and lulled us to sleep when we retired for the night. Señor de Butrie (a local French coffee planter) insists that during the year and more that he has lived in the village, several boys have blown themselves, through consumption, into early graves. Starr, Frederick, In Indian Mexico: A Narrative of Travel and Labor (Chicago, 1908), p. 237.Google Scholar

82 Periódico Oficial, vol. XI, no. 51, 26 07 1880, p. 3.Google Scholar

83 For an example of a musical programme accompanying the celebration of the battle of the 5th of May in Tetela de Ocampo in 1879: Periódico Oficial, vol. X, no. 37, 7 05 1879, p. 3.Google Scholar

84 Starr, Frederick, In Indian Mexico, pp. 124–5, and 237.Google Scholar

85 Handbook of Middle American Indians. Ethnology, vol. I, pp. 94, 183, 354, 495, 521, 543, 549, 631, 673–4, 770.Google Scholar

86 Friedrich, Paul, Princes of Naranja, p. 191.Google Scholar

87 Friedrich, Paul, Agrarian Revolt in a Mexican Village (Chicago, 1977), pp. 40, 89.Google Scholar

88 Friedrich, Paul, Princes, p. 191.Google Scholar

89 Handbook of Middle American Indians. Ethnology, vol. I, p. 770.Google Scholar

90 Friedrich, Paul, Princes, p. 191.Google Scholar

91 A.M.T. de O., Box 10 (1867), Expediente 2.

92 A.M.T. de O., Box 439, Exp. 4 Correspondencia Rebelión de la Noria, 3 Aug. 1872, Juan Crisóstomo Bonilla, Tascantla, to Manuel Vázquez, Tetela de Ocampo.

93 Huitzilán's support for the retaking of Puebla from the Austrians on 2 April 1867, A.M.T. de O., Box 10 (1867–9), Expediente 1, 10 April 1867, Miguel Francisco, Huitzilán, to Jefe Político and for Huitzilán's support for the Plan de Tuxtepec, Box 36 ‘Correspondencia Huitzilan’, Feb., March 1876, Apolinario Martínez, Huitzilan, to Jefe Político.

94 A.M.T. de O., Box 10 (1867–9), Expediente 2, 23 March and 14 April Manuel Luis, Zapotitlan, to Jefe Político, and Publicación Oficial, vol. I, no. 114, 27 08 1870.Google Scholar

95 A.M.T. de O., Box corresponding to 1876, ‘Correspondencia sobre el Puente de Tepeapa’.

96 Among contemporary Zapotec and Chinantec villages, band membership still brings exemption from other civil posts or religious offices. H.M.A.I. Ethnology, vol. I, p. 549Google Scholar, and for Mitla's band, “los Juarezcitos”, see Parsons, Elsie C., Mitla: Town of Souls (Chicago, 1936), pp. 154–6, 261.Google Scholar

97 A.M.T. de O., (1876), Gobierno, Box 36, Petition from Rodríguez, Lorenzo, Director del cuerpo filarmónico de Zoquiapa, to Jefe Político, 12 01 1876.Google Scholar

98 Juan José Relvas, Jusgado Primero of Zacapoastla, informed the Jefe Político on 22 Aug. 1862 that Antonio Morales should not have been pressed into military service, for holding the post of alguacil mayor of the barrio of Tatocoac, adding ‘este individuo, así como los demás ministros, regidores y los Ciudadanos que forman el Cuerpo Filarmónico están favorecidos por la Gefatura del digno cargo de U. para no prestar sus servicios en la carrera militar…’. AMZ, Correspondence of Jefatura Política (1862).

99 A.M.T. de O., Correspondence of the command of patriotic forces (1866–7), Pascual Bonilla, Zacapoastla, to Juan Francisco Lucas, 12 Jan. 1867.

100 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1872–3), Box 18, Queja contra el Alcalde de Zapotitlan.

101 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1876), Box 36, Lorenzo Diego, alcalde of Zapotitlan, to Jefe Político.

102 The formation of cuerpos filarmónicos throughout the Sierra coincided with the first major wave of common land adjudication. A portion of the income from the sale of titles to village commons was often invested in musical instruments. For example, Victoriano Juárez, the Comandante Militar of the Pueblo de los Reyes, by 1875, had received 357 pesos from land adjudications which, together with a grant of 200 pesos from the local council, enabled him to buy the instruments necessary for establishing a wind band. A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1876). Box 36 ‘Correspondencia Pueblo de los Reyes’.

103 A.M.T. de O., Box 12 bis. Gobierno (1871), Expediente 1, Vicente María Domínguez, Zapotitlan, to Jefe Político, 13 April 1871.

104 The declared objective of the Tetela junta Patriótica in 1871 was to ‘promover y reglamentar las solemnidades de los días declarados nacionales por la ley’. It had 25 members. The Jefe Político was automatically president. The other positions – vicepresident, secretary, treasurer, guardian of objects belonging to the junta, orator, keeper of the ‘templete’ (national shrine ?), keeper of lighting, keeper of fireworks, etc. – were all elected annually, A.M.T. de O., Box 14, Gobierno, Expediente 1, Reglamento de la junta patriótica de la Villa de Tetela de Ocampo.

105 The Reform Laws prohibited religious processions, festivals or ceremonies, and the wearing of ecclesiastical dress beyond the walls of churches (even ceremonies within atria were forbidden). Regarding bellringing, the jefe político of Zacapoastla specified in January 1863 that the ringing of church bells, forbidden entirely during a period of siege by French forces, could be rung daily only at 12.00 noon and at 3.00 p.m. (oraciones and ánimas). On feast days when a high mass was to be held, bells could also be rung, but for no longer than five minutes. Additionally, a small church bell could be rung in the morning and early afternoon to summon children to school. AMZ, Borrador del Jefe político (1863), 21 01 1863Google Scholar, Jefe político to parish priest.

106 Periódico Oficial, vol. X, no. 37, 7 05 1879, p. 3.Google Scholar

107 In 1870, the district contained 39 schools (36 for boys, but only three for girls) with an enrolment of 1,360 boys and 140 girls. In 1880 alone, 42 new schools were opened in the district, enrolling 1,974 boys and 472 girls. Publicación Oficial, I, no. 154, 19 Nov. 1870, and Periódico Oficial, vol. XI, no. 26, 31 03 1880, p. 2.Google Scholar

108 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno, (1876), vol. 37, Expediente 3, Circulars from the Cuartel General y Comandancia Militar to pueblos sujetos. Porfirio Díaz notes Méndez's passionate interest in education, with, if Díaz is to be believed, some imposing results: ‘en los pueblos de la Sierra de Puebla, lo que en ningún otro lugar del país, esto es, que casí todos los indios jóvenes saben leer y escribir, mientras que muy pocos de los viejos que no disfrutaron en su juventud de la diligente enseñanza de Méndez, disfrutan de esa ventaja’, Carreño, vol. III, p. 76.Google Scholar

109 Personal communication with Mary Kay Vaughan, who is working on education in the Sierra of Puebla in this period.

110 El Progreso de Zacatlán, vol. II, no. 22, 15 01 1884, p. 1.Google Scholar

111 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1869), Box 10, Expediente 10, Correspondencia Oficial. Municipalidad de Tetela de Ocampo, 1869.

112 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1880), Box 55, Expediente relativo a elecciones primarias de poderes generales.

113 AMZ, Correspondencia Jefe Político 1862, 7 10 1862Google Scholar, Pedro Antonio, juez de Ehuiloco, to Jefe Político.

114 A.M.T. de O. (1876), Gobierno, Box 37, 22 residents of Ometepec, 8 June 1876, to Comandante Militar, Tetela de Ocampo.

115 The political sensitivity of the Corpus Christi procession and the conservative disposition of many inhabitants of the district capital are revealed in a discussion held in the Cabildo of Tetela de Ocampo on the eve of the collapse of Maximilian's empire, about whether the Corpus Christi procession should be permitted beyond walls of the parish church. It was argued that to confine the procession to the church: ‘el vecindario (lo) atribuiría a una violación de costumbres tan bien recibid as, y esta circumstancia pudiera ser motibo de un disgusto a la generalidad de los habitantes…’. A majority vote then decided that the procession should be permitted to follow its traditional course. A.M.T. de O. Actas del Cabildo 1866–71. Session of 13 June 1867.

116 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1876), Box 36, 10 June 1876, Apolinario Mártinez, Huitzilán, to Comandante Militar, Tetela de Ocampo.

117 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1876), Box 36, Correspondencia Pueblo de Zoquiapan. Letters of 28 April, 2, 12, 16, and 18 May.

118 Pedro Díaz Cuscat, the leader of the religious separatist movement in Chiapas in 1867, was a fiscal of the parish of Chamula. Jan Rus regards the fiscal as ‘the closest thing to a native clergy’. Jan Rus, ‘Whose Caste War’ Indians, Ladinos, and the Chiapas “Caste War” of 1869', in Wasserstrom, Robert, Macleod, Murdo et al. , Spaniards and Indians in Southeastern Mesoamerica. Essays on the History of Ethnic Relations (Lincoln, Neb, 1983), pp. 144–5.Google Scholar

119 A.M.T. de O., Gobierno (1871), Box 14, Correspondencia de Tuzamapa. 17 July 1871, Antonio Arroyo, Tenampulco, to Jefe político.

120 Ibid., 21 July 1871, Jefe Político to Alcalde of Tenampulco.

121 Knight, Alan, ‘El liberalismo mexicano desde la Reforma hasta la Revolución (una interpretacion)’, Historia Mexicana, vol. 35 (1985) pp. 73–4.Google Scholar

122 Brading, D. A., ‘Liberal Patriotism and the Mexican Reforma’, Journal of Latin American Studies, vol. 20 (1987), p. 40.Google Scholar