Francisco de Miranda
Francisco de Miranda was the Venezuelan whom Spanish America calls the Precursor, who spent thirty years in Europe and North America campaigning for the independence of the Spanish colonies, fought at Pensacola in the American war and at Valmy as a general of the French Republic, has his name on the Arc de Triomphe, was the lover of Catherine the Great by his own account, led a failed landing in Venezuela in 1806 with a flag he had designed, came home in 1810 to sit in the congress that declared independence in July 1811, was made dictator of the first republic when the royalists advanced, capitulated to them in July 1812, was handed over to the Spaniards by his own officers, Bolivar among them, and died in a prison in Cadiz four years later. He was born in Caracas in 1750, the son of a Canary Islands merchant whose lineage the local aristocracy disputed, bought a Spanish commission, fought in North Africa and in the siege of Pensacola in 1781, and deserted in 1783 with a charge of smuggling behind him. The next twenty years were a tour of every court and salon in Europe with a plan for a Spanish American empire under an Inca, presented to Pitt, to Catherine, who gave him a colonel's commission and the right to wear Russian uniform, and to the French Convention, which made him a general, gave him a division at Valmy and Jemappes, and then tried him twice for the defeat at Neerwinden. He was in London from 1798, at his house in Grafton Street where the young Bolivar and O'Higgins came to him. In 1806 he sailed from New York with the Leander and landed at Coro with the tricolour of yellow, blue and red that is the flag of Venezuela, Colombia and Ecuador, and found no one to rise. Bolivar brought him back in December 1810. He pushed the congress to the declaration of 5 July 1811, took command against the royalists, and after the earthquake of March 1812 had wrecked Caracas and the republic's morale, and Puerto Cabello had fallen through Bolivar's negligence, he signed the capitulation of San Mateo on 25 July. Bolivar and others, thinking it treason, seized him at La Guaira on the night of the 30th as he waited for a ship. The royalist commander Monteverde took him from them and sent him to Spain. He died in the arsenal prison of La Carraca in July 1816 and was buried in a common grave.
- Lived: 1750 CE – 1816 CE
- Nationality: Venezuelan
- Roles: revolutionary, general, statesman
