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General Don Simon Jose Antonio de la Santisima Trinidad Bolivar Palacios Ponte
y Blanco (1783-1830), universally known as Simon Bolivar, was also known by
his honorific El Libertador for leading present day Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador,
Panama, Peru, and Venezuela to independence during the Spanish American Wars
of Independence. He was descended from the Spanish aristocracy and born in
Venezuela. He lost both of his parents before he was ten years old and traveled
to Spain at the age of sixteen to complete his studies. In Europe, he was highly
influenced by the great minds of the Enlightenment as well as the French
Revolution and Bonaparte and was particularly interested in the British system of
governance. His first wife was from the Spanish nobility and died less than a year
into their marriage. Bolivar vowed to liberate Spain’s colonies in the Americas and
returned to South America determined to earn glory in the battle for freedom
in 1807. Following his capture of Caracas on August 6, 1813, he was declared El
Libertador, but the fight was far from over, and he went on to help liberate much
of the Spanish Empire in South America. The Spanish were certainly unwilling to let
go of their valuable colonies in the Americas which contained vast deposits of gold
and silver, and King Ferdinand VIII sent a massive force led by Captain General Pablo
Morillo, Count of Cartagena and Marquess of La Puerta, to regain control. Bolivar
and the revolutionaries had some support from the Haitians as well as thousands
of foreign soldiers and officers seeking their own glory and wealth following the
conclusion of the Napoleonic Wars, and soon multiple former Spanish colonies had
declared and tenuously secured their independence though conflict continued both
between the former colonies and within them among competing factions.
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