Carlos de Montúfar

Carlos de Montúfar
Born	Carlos de Montúfar y Larrea November 2, 1780 Quito, Ecuador
Died	July 31, 1816 Buga

Carlos de Montúfar y Larrea-Zurbano (Quito, November 2, 1780 - Buga, July 31, 1816) was a Creole nobleman and soldier considered one of the liberators of current Ecuador. He fought alongside Simón Bolívar and was nicknamed El Caudillo.^[1]

Carlos was the third son of the marriage of Creole nobles Juan Pío de Montúfar y Larrea, II Marquis of Selva Alegre, and Teresa de Larrea y Villavicencio. His father was a politician in the independence movement developed in Quito between 1809 and 1812, a forerunner to the independence of Ecuador. ^[2]

In 1805 he moved to Spain to begin his military training at the Royal Academy of Nobles.^[3] He fought against the Napoleonic army in the Peninsular War, taking an active part as Aide-de-Camp to General Castaños in the Battle of Bailén.In 1808, considered Napoleon's first military defeat.^[4]

He was appointed in Cádiz by the Supreme Central Board as royal commissioner for the Court of Quito, with broad autonomy from the viceroys of Peru and New Granada, in order to calm the rebel tumults.^[5]

Being informed that his father had taken part in the Quito Independence movement, he decided to join the cause and fight against the Spanish. He participated in the formation of the State of Quito, which declared itself independent from Spain and promulgated its own Constitution, under the Presidency of Bishop José de Cuero y Caicedo. Montúfar took charge of the military defense of the new State and entered into combat with the forces of Toribio Montes, Melchor Aymerich and Juan de Sámano.

On 1 December 1812, the Patriots were definitively defeated in the Battle of Ibarra, but Montúfar managed to flee and after the defeat hid in several haciendas in Cayambe and the Los Chillos valley, near Quito. He was arrested, tried for treason and deported to Spain, via Guayaquil and Panama.

Upon arriving in Panama, he managed to flee and joined the Liberation Army in New Granada, where he reached the rank of colonel and fought in the southern area of present-day Colombia, where the Royalist forces of Toribio Montes and Juan de Sámano sowed death and destruction. He fought in the Pasto Campaign under the orders of General Serviez which ended with the complete defeat of the Patriot army.

On June 29, 1816, he participated in the war of independence of New Granada in the Battle of Cuchilla del Tambo. They were defeated and many independence fighters, among them Francisco José de Caldas, were captured and executed in the following days. Montúfar was also captured and sentenced to death by the Spanish general Juan de Sámano. He was shot in the back, as a traitor, in the city of Buga on July 31, 1816.^[6]