Hispanic Confederate Heritage
The Cuban patriot Narciso López approached Mexican War heroes
Jefferson Davis and Robert E. Lee in 1848 with the request to
head a liberation army to free Cuba from Spain -- Lee seriously
considered the offer, but turned it down.
José Agustín Quintero, a Cuban poet and revolutionary, ably
served Confederate President Jefferson Davis as the C.S.
Commissioner to Northern Mexico, ensuring critical supplies from
Europe flowed through Mexican ports to the CSA.
Santiago Vidaurri, governor of the border states of Coahuila and
Nuevo León, offered to secede northern Mexico and join the
Confederacy; Jefferson Davis declined, afraid the valuable
"neutral" Mexican ports would be then blockaded.
The Spanish inventor Narciso Monturiol offered the Confederacy
his advanced submarine Ictineo to smash the Federal blockade.
Never purchased, Jules Verne apparently based the Nautilus on
this, the world's most advanced vessel of the day.
Ambrosio José González, a famous Cuban revolutionary, served
Confederate general P.G.T. Beauregard as his artillery officer in
Charleston; earlier, in New York, he helped design the modern
Cuban and (inversed) Puerto Rican flags.
The Mexican Santos Benavides, a former Texas ranger, commanded
the Confederate 33rd Texas Cavalry, a Mexican- American unit
which defeated the Union in the 1864 Battle of Laredo, Texas. He
became the only Mexican C.S. colonel.
Thomas Jordan, a Confederate general responsible for early codes
used in spying on Washington, after the war led the Cuban
revolutionary army as Commander-in-Chief, training its generals
and in 1870 routing the Spaniards at two-to-one odds.
Lola Sanchez, of a Cuban family living near St. Augustine, had
her sisters serve dinner to visiting Federals, while she raced
out at night and warned the nearest Confederate camp. The Yankees
thus lost a general, his unit and a gunboat the next day.
Loretta Janeta Velazquez, a Cuban woman, claimed to have fought
in the war disguised as a Confederate soldier, Lt. Harry Buford.
She chronicled her amazing and harrowing adventures in an account
called The Woman in Battle.
James Hamilton Tomb, a Confederate engineer on the innovative
semi-submarine ship David, accepted a post-war offer from the
Brazilian emperor as technical expert on torpedoes (submarine
mines) in the Paraguayan War of 1865-1870.
Hunter Davidson, a Confederate torpedo (submarine mine)
scientist, assumed the head of the Argentine Torpedo and
Hydrographic Bureau for some years, training its leadership, and
retired to Asunción, Paraguay, where he is buried.
John Randolph Tucker, head of the Charleston Confederate Naval
Squadron, accepted a post-war position as Vice-Admiral heading
the combined Peruvian-Chilean fleets in a Pacific conflict
against Spanish coastal incursions.
John Newland Maffitt, who before the war captured illegal
slave-trading ships, served the Confederacy as the CSS Florida's
commander. Afterwards, he served in the Paraguayan war and
commanded the Cuban gun-runner Hornet.
Thomas Jefferson Page, a Confederate naval commander who learned
of the war's end in Cuba after sailing the ironclad CSS Stonewall
from Spain, settled in Argentina, his son becoming an Argentine
naval commander, his grandson an admiral.
Mexican service influenced Confederate general Stonewall Jackson;
he often spoke Spanish endearments to his wife, Anna.
After the war, many prominent governors and other Confederates
established a colony, Carlotta, in Mexico.
The information on this page was obtained from the Sons of Confederate Veterans a non-political Heritage organisation and it's use in no way implies that they endorse the philosophy of the Southern Party of Catawba County North Carolina.
We suggest you read the book below to learn more on the subject of Hispanic Confederates
» John O'Donnell-Rosales, Hispanic Confederates, list of several thousand who served the Confederacy, 8 1/2 x 11, 90 pp., paper, (1997), reprint 1998. cost is $18.00. order: item #9362, Clearfield Publishing Co., 200 E. Eager St., Baltimore, MD. 21202
31 Aug 2009