Don José: the strange cacique who signed the petition of the May Revolution

The night of May 24, 1810 in Buenos Aires must have been hectic. Different papers, pens and inkwells circulated through the streets of the city to stamp signatures on a popular petition to the Cabildo.

Militia commanders, militiamen and other mobilized stakeholders collected the names of those who wanted the junta presided over by Viceroy Cisneros -appointed by the Cabildo without respecting the majority vote of the Open Cabildo of May 22- to be deposed, and a board of government without the viceroy.

In this petition presented to the Cabildo, the names of those who should integrate that board were proposed. The Cabildo, under military and popular pressure - this document is an indication of that street pressure - appointed the proposed board on the morning of May 25, in which signatures continued to be collected.

Will the commissioners have gone door to door? Or will there be meetings? Will there be a moon? Was there enough lighting? Will they need candles? Was there fog early in the morning? River mist? Dew?

The document already stated the principle of representation: "The residents, commanders and officers of the volunteer corps of this capital of Buenos Aires that we sign below for us and on behalf of the people."

This request - which is preserved in the National Historical Museum - is an exceptional document. It is an initiative that sought to personify a new political subject: the people. The people who signed it demanded that from that moment on, the government would not be occupied by colonial authorities.

The names of the militia commanders are listed first, as a warning that their force could be activated if their demands are not met.

They demanded that "with the people being able to resume the authority and powers that it had conferred" a local government board be appointed because "this is the manifest will of the people."

They also demanded the sending of a military expedition to the North. And that it be financed with the salaries of the deposed viceroy. 409 signatures were collected.

The names of the militia commanders are listed first, as a warning that their force could be activated if their demands are not met. But there are two who multiply their representation, Commanders Domingo French and Antonio Beruti, who signed twice, and the second time, they affixed their signature "for me and on behalf of 600."

Having a signature was an indication of literacy, and the majority of the population was illiterate, therefore in these characters, as militia officers, a principle of representation is also followed.

This document exceeded the residents who had attended the open Town Hall on May 22, who in order to be summoned as "neighbors" must also be owners. Juan Manuel Beruti, Antonio's brother, described the day of May 25, 1810 in his personal diary titled Curious Memories: “On the 25th, on the occasion of a performance by a considerable number of neighbors, the commanders and several officers of the volunteer corps on their own behalf and on behalf of, asking not to be to their liking the choice made by the excellent Cabildo of the subjects that make up the Board (...). After the members of the Board had sworn their jobs, President Saavedra went out to the balcony of the Cabildo, harangued the people to fidelity, peace and harmony, and what he finished off was the people shouted long live the Board. The satisfaction was general with this election because it was made to the liking of the people, and contrary to the first one that caused the greatest displeasure, which exposed the city to being lost.

In addition to French and Beruti, another person signed twice: a chief from Lima who was in Buenos Aires, conspicuously reproducing the royal formula, given that the kings signed “Yo El Rey”: he signed “Yo el Cacique Don José Minoyulle”.

His father was probably Don Francisco Humac Minoyulle, notary public of the indigenous communities of Lima. This character was appearing in different documents. In 1806, he was arrested in Córdoba for being considered suspicious for his extravagant and luxurious clothes for the condition of an “Indian”.

In 1810 his signature appears on the petition. In 1812 he also signed as cacique of the "Viceroyalty of Lima" the petition demanding the change of government led by Monteagudo, the appointment of a new Triumvirate and the call for a Constituent Assembly.

And in 1819, faced with the threat of the arrival of a Spanish expedition to the Río de la Plata, the cacique offered 30,000 Indians to fight. Ángel J. Carranza recounts, “José Manuel de Minoyuye, Atahuallpa, Huascaringa cacique of royal blood (...) presented himself to the Directory on September 10, 1819, offering to 'place at their command, in Ensenada, Quilmes and Conchas, to 30,000 Indians from the southern pampas, with the weapons that they are used to (...) to go out in front of the Huerakocha' (Spaniards), 'without the State Funds spending anything for it'".

Carranza concludes that "this patriot, who died miserably among us and whose name should not be forgotten, is the same one who in the first days of the Revolution (July 9, 1810) offered to raise a squadron of veteran cavalry titled 'de la Homeland and America'”.

what happened in 1806

The 1806 episode is quite curious. Between June and August they had been the First English Invasion. In December of that year, a captain from Tulumba, Córdoba, filed a complaint with the governor of the province, saying: “In this Curato, a royal road to Peru called El Simbolar, home of Don Ramón Bustamante, there is an Indian who he is Cacique, as he says. Which came from Buenos Aires for a long time losing its ways, after the Reconquest. "

The cacique, the letter recounted, claimed to have links with the English, who had invaded Buenos Aires: "He manifests in his conversations that he is very addicted to that nation and contrary to ours. They say he was associated with the English Major General in Buenos Aires Aires. He says he is the nephew of Tupamaro, who has command of all the Indians, and that near their towns he has trade with the English."

Minoyulle exhibited links and a prominent place: "He has manifested a Royal Certificate in which His Majesty has made him a Knight Crusader; he brings the insignia or his badges in a pair of flasks, where he wears very decent clothes, three hats with braided plumage and a button gold and several gold jewels. All this has made me malign as well for his outer dress with which he walks so vile and despicable, as for his stay in this place (...)".

The letter attached by the captain followed the same tone: “His destiny says it is to go to Spain to see the King in person; but having learned that the English had taken the Capital, he did indeed alight there. And there are those who say they saw him communicate with Beresford."

The Mayor of the Cabildo de Córdoba, Ambrosio Funes, ordered that the cacique be interrogated and an inventory of his assets and papers be made. The commissioner who carried out this task found nothing suspicious.

But in any case, Funes ordered the cacique's imprisonment, for which he was reprimanded by the Governor, who considered this action an excess and Minoyulle was released. Probably fed up with the persecution to which he was subjected by a regime based on inequality, this cacique left Lima and supported any possibility of changing the order of things.

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