THE PARAGUAYAN WAR
Although four States were involved in the struggle, South American
historians are unanimous in giving the strife which broke out in 1864
the name of the Paraguayan War. This is appropriate enough, for a number
of reasons, one of them being that, after the first invading expedition
on the part of the Paraguayan armies, the war was fought out on
Paraguayan soil.
The capture by the Paraguayans of the Brazilian steamer _Marques de
Olinda_ demonstrated to South America that the moment of contest had
arrived. The position of the neighbouring States was far less
satisfactory from a military point of view than that of Paraguay. During
the two years of his reign Lopez had steadily continued to prepare his
forces for this event. At the time the Paraguayan army was, numerically,
the most formidable in South America. It had, moreover, been brought to
an unusual degree of efficiency.
The condition of the Brazilian forces was very different. In the first
place, little heed had been taken to make ready for anything of the
kind, and another factor which proved greatly to the disadvantage of the
fighting material involved lay in the difficulty of communication
between Rio de Janeiro and those portions of the great Empire which
bordered on Paraguay. Thus Lopez's invading army, when it swept through
the Brazilian province of Matto Grosso, met with practically no
resistance worthy of the name, and, in the absence of defending troops,
it might, undoubtedly, have taken possession of vast tracts of country,
and have continued to hold these indefinitely.
It was Lopez's bizarre and wild ambition which frustrated his own
schemes. A single tide of invasion was not sufficient to satisfy a mind
such as his. Gathering together a second powerful army, he determined to
strike at the south-eastern portion of Brazil in addition to its
province of Matto Grosso. In order to effect this he demanded in
arrogant tones from Argentina permission for his troops to cross the
Argentine province of Corrientes. To this, as neutrals, it was
impossible for the Argentines to consent. As a result, Lopez in a fury
declared war upon Argentina, and, as though even this did not suffice,
he next found himself at grips with the Uruguayan forces.
Thus Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay were now leagued together against
the armies of the despot Lopez. With a view of alienating the sympathies
of the oppressed subjects of the Dictator from their tyrannical leader,
the allies caused it to be widely proclaimed that the war they were
waging was not directed against the Paraguayan people in general. It was
against Lopez alone that they were fighting, they asserted. The claim
was true enough, since this was in reality the position of affairs.
Nevertheless, owing to the methods of Lopez, the proclamation carried
far less weight than had been anticipated.
The Paraguayan forces now penetrated into the Argentine province of
Corrientes, seized the capital, Corrientes itself, and took possession
of a couple of steamers--the _Gualeguay_ and the _25 de Mayo_--which
were anchored in the river opposite to that town. The Paraguayan fleet
now held command of the river system up-stream of Corrientes. On June
11, 1865, the allied naval forces, steaming up the Parana, came into
contact with the hostile fleet. A battle was fought, which ended in the
defeat of the Paraguayan squadron, which was forced to retreat, crippled
and damaged, to the north.
A succession of actions now took place on land, and the Paraguayans,
although fighting with a desperate heroism, were gradually beaten back
and driven across their own frontiers. At the same time, the army which
had invaded Brazil retired in sympathy, and the scene of the war changed
to Paraguay itself, which was in its turn invaded by the forces of the
triple alliance. One of the most sanguinary battles of the war was
fought on May 24, 1866--very nearly a year after the first naval action
off the river port of Corrientes.
At this Battle of Tuyuti the Paraguayans lost no fewer than 8,000 men,
and the casualties of the allies amounted to an equal number. Another
important action was fought at Curupaiti two months later, when the
progress of the allies was abruptly checked, and they were compelled to
retire to some distance with a loss of 9,000 men. This was only one of a
fair number of Paraguayan victories, for the defenders, although in the
main they preserved an attitude of strenuous resistance, were
occasionally enabled to exchange this for active aggression.
The history of this war, which lasted for four years, is one of the most
remarkable in the whole category of struggles of the kind. Undoubtedly
one of the most extraordinary features to be met with is the tremendous
courage and grim determination with which the Paraguayans opposed the
forces of the allies. Every yard of the country was contested with a
fierceness which left the entire countryside covered with dead and
wounded. When, moreover, the modern arms in the possession of which the
Paraguayan armies had commenced the war had become lost and depleted in
numbers, their place was taken by improvised weapons of all kinds, and
it was frequently with the crudest firearms and lances that these
devoted armies continued to fight.
The encouragement these troops received from their leaders--or, rather,
from Lopez--was in one sense of a negative order. Rewards for valour
were unknown, but punishments for defaults, on the other hand, whether
real or imaginary, were abundant and terribly severe. Men were shot for
having in the course of private conversation uttered words which the
suspicious mind of Lopez classed as discouraging. Thus a trooper was on
one occasion executed for having ventured the remark that, although the
Paraguayans rejoiced over the numbers of their enemies who were slain,
they invariably forgot to count their own dead. A second soldier met
with a similar fate for having, on his return from a reconnaissance,
stated that the enemy lay in great strength to the front. Lopez
conceived that a report such as this could serve no good end, and
ordered its maker to be executed forthwith.
It is curious to remark that even with the astonishing proofs of their
bravery and devotion which the army had shown, Lopez could never bring
himself to repose any real confidence in his troops. The tasks which
were set them were frequently superhuman. Indeed, as a rule they
received the treatment of beasts rather than of men, and in order to
insure the winning of his battles Lopez encouraged his officers to treat
their men in a fiendish manner. Thus, when a body of men had been placed
face to face with an infinitely superior force of the enemy, and were
being mowed down in hundreds by deadly volleys at close range, a line of
Paraguayans were frequently stationed at the rear of their own fighting
forces, with the strictest orders to pour a volley into their comrades
should they show any signs of retreat.
In circumstances such as these it is not to be wondered at that the
ranks of the sublime Lopez dwindled and became thin to the point of
extermination; nevertheless, the gaps were caused by death and disease
rather than by desertion. One of the most pathetic circumstances of the
campaign was the deep fidelity of the Paraguayans. This was as a rule
sufficiently ill-requited, as will be evident from the fate of a number
of troops who, having been made prisoners by the allies, succeeded after
a time in escaping and in rejoining their suffering and starving
comrades. In order to keep faith in this manner they had left a
neighbourhood of peace and comparative plenty. But Lopez gave them no
thanks. On the contrary, he ordered them to be executed for not having
returned to their regiments before!
Towards the end of the war scarcely a man of mature age and whole body
was left in the ranks. These were filled largely now by youths and,
indeed, mere boys. Many children of twelve and fourteen were to be found
in the later stages of the war carrying their rifles and fighting with
the rest, while the women of the country, including in their numbers all
those of good estate and of gentle birth were, under the guardianship of
lancers, set to march through the desolate forest tracts and over the
countryside in order to establish new agricultural colonies. Here they
were made to dig the soil and to plant cereals and sweet potatoes in
order that the armies might be fed; and should any one of these women on
the march fall by the wayside, her body was transfixed by the spear of
one of the escort as an example to the rest. Thus the roadway was
littered with the corpses of these slain women.
All this while Lopez was sufficiently busy in his own way. His dreams of
Empire appear to have died hard, and not until the very end came could
he be brought to believe that his armies could effect no more. He
permitted his own comforts to be very little affected by the dire
hardships which his troops--and, indeed, the entire nation--were
undergoing. Although he refrained as much as possible from entering into
the neighbourhood of the battles themselves, he took an important share
in the direction of the campaign, and it was undoubtedly owing largely
to his crass ineptitude in all strategical matters that many of the
disasters came about. Although some of his moves were of the nature to
render surrender or death inevitable to the actual combatants engaged in
the grim struggle, a capitulation on the part of one of his officers
was, in the eyes of Lopez, an unpardonable crime, and not only was the
offending officer himself wont to be executed on account of the deed,
but on several occasions his family was made to share his fate.
Seeing that the male members and connections of his own family had
suffered tortures and execution at his hands, and that even his sisters
had been flogged by his orders, it was not to be expected that the
average Paraguayan would meet with mercy from Lopez. Certainly it is no
exaggeration to say that none was ever shown unless with some special
object in view. There is no doubt that a Paraguayan field-officer had,
if anything, rather more to dread from his own Dictator than from his
official enemy.
The end of the war, unduly protracted, came at last. The capital,
Asuncion, had fallen into the hands of the allies, and Lopez, failing
any other refuge, had taken his place with the last remaining body of
the defenders--a ragged and tragic army, many of whom were practically
nude, and very few of whom could boast anything beyond the remnants of a
shirt or a hide loin-cloth. Others flaunted a crude poncho or a leather
cap, while many possessed no weapons but an old flint-lock rifle or a
worn lance. Although nominally an army of a thousand and odd men
composed this last hope, they were little more than fugitives.
Nevertheless, these last atoms of the once great Paraguayan host turned
and resisted grimly each time the pursuing forces came within reach of
them and delivered an attack.
[Illustration: THOMAS COCHRANE, TENTH EARL OF DUNDONALD, G.C.B.,
Who reorganized the Chilian and Peruvian navies and destroyed Spanish
naval power in the Pacific.
_A. Rischgitz._]
At last the few remnants of even this remnant found themselves at a
spot--Cerro Cora, in the forests of Paraguay--where they were overtaken
and brought to bay. There, in the face of an attack on the part of
overwhelmingly superior Brazilian forces, the little party finally lost
its grim determination and broke up, leaving Lopez, Madame Lynch, and
their family to shift for themselves.
Madame Lynch escaped for the time being in a carriage. She had not,
however, travelled far before her pursuers came up with her, and she was
eventually brought back to Asuncion. Lopez, attempting to follow her
from the battle-field on horseback, became bogged in the midst of some
treacherous country. Here he was overtaken and, showing resistance, was
slain by the pursuing Brazilians. With his death ended the first and
last reason for the invasion of Paraguay.
The condition of Paraguay at the conclusion of the war was utterly
deplorable. Indeed, the state of the country was one which very few
lands have experienced since the beginning of history. The natural
resources of Paraguay lay in agriculture. Since all the men had been
engaged in fighting, and merely a few itinerant bands of weak women had
been employed in this occupation in the meanwhile, the cessation of
hostilities disclosed the fact that agriculture was to all practical
purposes no more.
One of the few really wise moves which Lopez had made during the war was
the wholesale planting of orange-trees, the growth of which was wont to
flourish to an extraordinary degree in Paraguayan soil. The numerous new
groves now proved, to a certain extent, the salvation of the
population, and the fruit was eagerly devoured. For the time being there
was little else upon which the unfortunate people could live. It is true
that there were fewer mouths to feed, since the population of the land
at the close of the war was insignificant compared to that which the
country had supported at its beginning. Thus, in 1863, the people of
Paraguay had been estimated roughly as numbering 1,340,000 souls. When
peace was declared there were less than a quarter of a million
Paraguayans left to enjoy its benefits, and of these only 28,000 were
men!
A holocaust such as this would scarcely seem to come within the range of
sane and modern history. When it is realized that, roughly, only one
Paraguayan out of five was left of the entire population at the end of
the five years' war, the extent of the deep horrors of that period may
begin to be understood, although its full tragedy can scarcely be
imagined by the dwellers in more settled and peaceful countries.
It was the women of Paraguay who, having been driven at the point of the
lance to labour in the fields in order to feed the army, now came
forward of their own free-will in the time of peace and utter need, and
heroically set themselves to agricultural toil. After a while the rich
soil of the Republic yielded sufficient harvest to satisfy the
attenuated population of the land, but it was many years ere anything
approaching a normal state of affairs was able to assert itself.
The war, indeed, had caused every nation involved a heavy amount of
blood and treasure. In some respects it is said to have served a useful
purpose. The Argentines, for instance, claim that this struggle
intensified the national spirit of the Republic, since it was the first
modern war on a large scale in which the South American States had been
concerned. It seems likely enough that there is some justification for
this claim. The result was, perhaps, evident in a rather lesser degree
in the case of both Brazil and Uruguay.
The political effect of the campaign upon Paraguay was, of course, still
more important. The allies had announced that they were fighting, not
against the Republic, but against the personality of its despot, Lopez.
His death marked the end of the despotic era, and, although Paraguay has
suffered greatly from revolutions from that day to this, there has been
no attempt at a repetition of a reign of terror.