Historical and descriptive narrative of twenty years' residence in South America (Vol 3 of 3): Containing travels in Arauco, Chile, Peru, and Colombia; with an account of the revolution, its rise, progress, and resultsStevenson, William Bennet, active 1803-1825
History
Historical and descriptive narrative of twenty years' residence in South America (Vol 3 of 3): Containing travels in Arauco, Chile, Peru, and Colombia; with an account of the revolution, its rise, progress, and results
Stevenson, William Bennet, active 1803-1825
Chile -- Description and travel; Ecuador -- Description and travel; Peru -- Description and travel; Peru -- History -- War of Independence, 1820-1829; South America -- History -- Wars of Independence, 1806-1830
the barracks, which firing was returned by the opposite party. This
lasted about ten minutes, when, all being silent, an officer ran to the
barracks to inquire into the cause of the disturbance: on being informed
of what had taken place, as well as that all was then safe, he returned
with the report to his commandant, Arredonda. Another officer was
immediately sent to inquire into the state of the prisoners, and he as
briefly returned with the news, that they were all dead. Some had been
shot during the uproar by the sentries placed over them, and many had
been murdered by a zambo boy, one of the cooks to the soldiers, who had
entered their cells, and despatched them with an axe. Terror and
consternation for a moment were visible in the countenances of the
president and officers, when, on a sudden, the Spanish soldiers rushed
from the barracks into the streets, shouting revenge! revenge! our
captain is murdered. Scarcely was the alarm given, when the infuriated
soldiers abandoned their posts, and running up and down the streets,
murdered every individual they met with, without distinction either of
age or sex: the drums in different parts of the city beat an advance,
and murder and pillage raged in this horrid manner till three o'clock,
all the officers standing on the esplanade of the palace, without making
any effort to check the massacre: at length, the soldiers having
expended their stock of cartridges began to return to the barracks, some
of them so laden with plunder, that they had left their arms they knew
not where.
The number of prisoners confined in the cells, many of whom were secured
with irons, and who fell a sacrifice to the insubordination of the
soldiery, and the imbecility of the officers, was seventy-two; a
clergyman of the name of Castelo, and an individual of the name of
Romero, were the only prisoners that escaped, and they saved their lives
by feigning to be dead. Morales, Quiroga, Riofrio, and Salinas perished;
but to the memory of these, and their fellow sufferers, the government
of Venezuela ordered a day of mourning to be kept annually; thus paying
to them the greatest possible respect; they also afterwards determined
to call them the martyrs of Quito. In the streets of Quito about three
hundred individuals perished, including seven of the Spanish soldiers,
who were killed by some indian butchers, whom they had repeatedly
insulted. Such was the fury displayed by the pacifying troops, that a
party of them having met a captain in his uniform, who belonged to the
Guayaquil cavalry, a soldier seized the sword of his captain, and ran
him through the body with it, laying him weltering in his gore not fifty
yards from the door of the barracks.
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