General Horacio Vasquez was born in Moca and was a ranchman, merchant and planter. He possessed military capacity and took a minor part in several revolutions. At first a friend of Heureaux, he afterwards became one of his bitterest enemies, and for a number of years lived as an exile in Cuba and Porto Rico, returning to Moca shortly before the death of Heureaux to remain in retirement on his plantation. The Vasquez administration had as much difficulty with financial matters as that of his predecessor, but the president had little opportunity to show what he could do. Local outbreaks began in Monte Cristi and became general in October, 1902. Disturbances continued until March 24, 1903, when, during the absence of President Vasquez in the Cibao, the political prisoners in the fort of Santo Domingo City, through connivance with the general in charge, broke out, took the fort, liberated the convicts, threw the city into a panic with a continued fusillade, and proclaimed a revolution. They were for the most part Jimenistas and "Lilicistas," or members of the old Heureaux party, and their candidate for the presidency would probably have been Jimenez; but in Jimenez' absence the presidency was offered to Figuereo and others, who declined, and was finally accepted by Alejandro Woss y Gil, who had only the week before been liberated from the same political prison. General Vasquez returned with an army, arriving before Santo Domingo City at the end of March. The ensuing siege was one long battle, during which a portion of the suburban town of San Carlos was destroyed by fire. On April 18, 1903, Generals Alvarez and Cordero, the best generals of the besiegers, made a violent attack on the city and effected an entrance, but fighting continued in the streets and these leaders and most of the storming party were killed. Vasquez thereupon fled to Santiago, resigned his post, and left the country for Cuba. On the triumph of his party a year later, he returned to Santo Domingo and retired to his plantation in Moca. Woss y Gil, who thus became president of the provisional government, called a session of Congress and by appointments favorable to his interests so intrenched himself that his continuance as president became assured. Jimenez, who arrived shortly after, advanced the claim that he was still president de jure, since the constitutional term of four years for which he had been elected had not expired, and he denominated the Vasquez government a temporary and illegal usurpation of power. In his efforts to regain office he sent his friend Eugenio Deschamps to treat with Gil, but Deschamps, seeing Gil obdurate, made an agreement by which Woss y Gil was to become president and Deschamps vice-president, Jimenez was obliged to yield to the inevitable and returned to Porto Rico in the hope of eventually succeeding Woss y Gil. An election was held in which Woss y Gil and Deschamps were the only candidates and on June 20, 1903, they were inaugurated.