José de San Martín fought for Spain for two decades, then freed its colonies
Before he became Liberator of Argentina, Chile and Peru, José de San Martín spent over twenty years as an officer in the Spanish army, winning a gold medal against Napoleon's forces at Bailén. Then he resigned, sailed for Buenos Aires, and turned his experience against the empire he had served.
San Martín was born in Yapeyú, a Guaraní mission settlement in today's Corrientes province, around 1778; no baptism record survives, so the year is disputed. His Spanish father governed the district. In 1783 the family returned to Spain, settling in Málaga, and at 11 he joined the Regiment of Murcia as a cadet. He fought in North Africa, was made sub-lieutenant at 15, was briefly held prisoner by the Royal Navy after his ship was captured, and absorbed Spanish Enlightenment ideas in Cádiz.
During the Peninsular War he led volunteers in Andalusia, survived a near-fatal moment at Arjonilla thanks to a sergeant named Juan de Dios, and was promoted lieutenant colonel after the victory at Bailén in July 1808. He fought again at Albuera in 1811 under William Carr Beresford. Why he then quit is still argued: homesickness, British encouragement, or a belief that the struggle of Enlightenment against absolutism was the same on both sides of the ocean. He joined the Lodge of Rational Knights, met South American exiles at Francisco de Miranda's London house, and reached Buenos Aires on 9 March 1812.
The city's leaders asked him to create a cavalry force, and he organized the Regiment of Mounted Grenadiers. In 1812 he married María de los Remedios de Escalada. His first battle in the Americas, at San Lorenzo, nearly killed him when his horse fell on him; two soldiers, Juan Bautista Cabral and Juan Bautista Baigorria, saved him, and Cabral died of his wounds. After briefly commanding the Army of the North, he devised a bold alternative route to Spanish Peru: raise the Army of the Andes in Cuyo, cross the mountains into Chile, and strike by sea.
The plan worked. Victories at Chacabuco and Maipú in 1818 freed Chile, and he sailed on to Lima, becoming Protector of Peru in July 1821. After a private meeting with Simón Bolívar at Guayaquil on 26 July 1822, whose details historians still debate, he handed over the campaign, withdrew from public life and moved to France in 1824. He died on 17 August 1850. Argentina's highest decoration is named after him.
Source: José de San Martín
