Bolívar's campaign to liberate New Granada, also known as the Liberation Campaign of 1819, was part of the Colombian and Venezuelan wars of independence and was one of the many military campaigns fought by Simón Bolívar. In 1819 Bolívar led a combined New Granadan and Venezuelan Army in a campaign to liberate New Granada which had been under Spanish control since 1816.
Bolívar marched his army through the flooded plains from Venezuela and entered the Casanare Province with his army in June 1819, combining his forces with those of Francisco de Paula Santander at Tame, Arauca, on 11 June. The combined Patriot force reached the Eastern Range of the Andes on 22 June and began a grueling crossing. On 6 July, the Patriots descended from the Andes arriving at Socha and into the valleys of central New Granada. After a brief convalescence, the Patriots fought a series of battles against the III Division of the Royalist army of Spanish colonel José María Barreiro Manjón, with the campaign culminating at the decisive Battle of Boyacá, where Bolivar's forces routed and dismantled the Royalist Army entering Santa Fe de Bogotá triumphantly 3 days later.
Bolivar's victory in New Granada (today: Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador and Panama) secured the eventual independence of northern South America. It provided Bolívar with the economic and human resources to complete his victory over the Spanish in Venezuela and Colombia.
Bolívar's New Granada campaign is considered one of the most daring in military history, compared by contemporaries and some historians to Hannibal's or Napoleon's crossing of the Alps in 1800 and José San Martín's Crossing of the Andes in 1817.Masur, Gerhard. Simon Bolivar, 273.Mijares, Augusto. The Liberator, 354.
Background During the years 1815 and 1816, Spain had reconquered most of New Granada, after having deployed the Expeditionary Army of Costa Firme under the command of General Pablo Morillo from Spain in early 1815. This effort was also aided by General Juan de Sámano and his royalist forces in the south of New Granada. After five years of de facto and official independence, Morillo reestablished Royalist government in Santa Fe, leaving Juan de Sámano as Viceroy, and returned to Venezuela with the bulk of his army in late 1816. By 1817, Bolívar had set up his headquarters in the Orinoco region in southern Venezuela. It was an area from which the Spaniards could not easily oust him. There he engaged the services of several thousand foreign soldiers and officers, mostly British and Irish, set up his capital at Angostura (now Ciudad Bolívar) and established liaisons with the revolutionary forces of the Llanos. This included one group of Venezuelan llaneros (cowboys) led by José Antonio Páez and another group of New Granadan exiles led by Colonel Francisco de Paula Santander, who was the commander of the remnant forces that made up the army of the United Provinces of New Granada and would join Bolivar's army.
With these forces he began a campaign from Guayana, pushing Morillo westwards where his forces would reach the gates of Caracas, only to be turned back by Morillo at the 3rd Battle of La Puerta. With this defeat Bolívar retreated to the safety of Llanos of the Apure region. In early 1819, Morillo's forces penetrated the Llanos of the Apure region with the goal of finishing off Bolívar. Bolívar defeated him at the Battle of Las Queseras del Medio in April, forcing Morillo to retreat to Calabozo, where he would stay to wait out the rain season.
After the failure of the Center Campaign a change in strategy was needed, thus the possibility of launching a military campaign to liberate New Granada was not a far-fetched idea.Thibaud, Clément. Repúblicas en armas, 684 On August 15, 1818, in a proclamation Bolivar announced to the peoples of New Granada his intention to launch a military campaign in their country. However, most of his army was in tatters as a result of the Center Campaign, if there was any hope of carrying out this plan a new army would need to be raised, organized, and trained in order for any chance of success.Thibaud, Clément. Repúblicas en armas, 682 The man for the job would be none other than Colonel Francisco de Paula Santander, who Bolivar had just promoted to Brigadier General on August 12, this would be followed by naming him Commander of the Vanguard of the Liberator Army of New Granada and dispatching him to the Llanos of the Casanare Province along with 1,200 muskets, uniforms, and other supplies, with the mission of creating and training a New Granadan army for a future campaign to liberate New Granada.Vanegas, Isidro. Las batallas de Boyacá: 21Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 25 Casanare was one of the few areas of New Granada that was free of Spanish presence, it harbored many of the New Granadans who had fled Morillo's reconquest.Lynch, John. Bolívar, A Life, 124-125
Santander along with four other officers departed Angostura on August 27 arriving in Casanare on November 28,Santander, Francisco de Paula (1838). Apuntamientos para las memorias sobre Colombia i la Nueva Granada (1st ed.). Bogotá: L.M. Lleras. p. 26. upon arriving he found the small Patriot forces in the region in a state of anarchy with their leaders Juan Galea, Antonio Arredondo, Ignacio Mariño, and Ramón Nonato Pérez constantly fighting each other.Thibaud, Clément. Repúblicas en armas, 686 It would be here that Santander's organizational and leadership skills would shine, as upon arriving to the region he was able to calm the tensions amongst the military leaders in the region and impose his authority to get them to work towards a common goal.
Through the implementation of his military regulations, strict discipline, and knowledge of infantry tactics, over the course of several months Santander was able to transform a band of irregular guerrilla patriot forces into a disciplined fighting force of around 1,200 men composed of 2 line infantry battalions the first being the Cazadores Constantes Infantry Battalion and the First of the Line New Granadan Infantry Battalion along with a cavalry squadron.Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 57 He would also implement a wide variety of strategies to prevent desertion, such as implementing a permit system to allow some of his men to return to their farms so that they could tend and herd cattle. This also served as a means to bolster the army's food supply given the scarcity his army suffered.
Politically he worked with the main stakeholders in the region to reestablish the defunct United Provinces through a provisional government. He also had his troops recognize the authority of Bolivar as President of Venezuela and Captain-general of the New Granadan and Venezuelan armies for the eventual union between the two's forces. He also sent 5 delegates to represent Casanare in the Congress of Angostura. While Santander did not discard the possibility of a permanent union between the two countries like the one Bolivar proposed, as Venezuelan support would be a necessity in order to liberate New Granada from the Spanish, he sought emphasize New Granadan autonomy and that the union be of two equals.Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 51-52
By early 1818, artillery Colonel José María Barreiro was the military commander of all royalist troops in New Granada, and counted with at least 4,500 trained soldiers of the III Division of the Expeditionary Army of Costa Firme scattered throughout the Kingdom. Since assuming command, he had been tasked with both to attacking and defending the kingdom against any rebel threat. He would soon have to deploy his army as both Viceroy Sámano and General Morillo through their intelligence service began to receive word of Santander's efforts to organize an army in Casanare, with the first reports detailing his presence in the region arriving in November 1818. Come early 1819 when Morillo penetrated the Apure region in Venezuela, Barreiro was instructed by him to attack Santander in Casanare. Barreiro then organized a force of 1,200 men and 540 cavalry in March 1819, crossing the Andes and arriving in the llanos and capturing Pore in early April.Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 40-41
This campaign was unsuccessful:Albi de la Cuesta, Julio (2019) p.383 the Royalist Army became exhausted as it was badly prepared for the campaign and began to stretch their supply lines thin as Santander withdrew deeper into the llanos, eventually forcing Barreiro to withdraw to the other side of the Andes and garrison his forces in Tunja as the rainy season set in. The failure of this campaign destroyed Spanish hopes for the destruction of the rebel threat in Casanare, from now on the III Division of the Royalist Army would limit itself to defending central New Granada from the potential threat of invasion.Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 42
The campaign
Bolívar conceived of the operation in late 1818 and early 1819 after the Congress of Angostura began its deliberations and had reappointed him president of Venezuela. If Bolívar could liberate New Granada, he would have a whole new base from which to operate against General Pablo Morillo, head of the royalist forces in the area and end the stalemate in Venezuela. Central New Granada held great promise since, unlike Venezuela, it had only been recently conquered by Morillo and it had a prior six-year experience of independent government. Royalist sentiment, therefore, was not strong. But it would be hard to take the initiative against the better prepared and better supplied royalist army.
To surprise it, Bolívar's proposed plan would be to move during the rainy season, when the Llanos flooded up to a meter which usually forced both sides to their winter quarters, and penetrate Central New Granada by crossing the Cordillera Oriental at the Salina pass through the Tunja Province and from there and march on the capital Santa Fe. Success depended on the rapid penetration of the central New Granada. This would be done in tandem with a diversionary effort led by Paez to invade New Granada near Cucuta in order to distract both the II Division of the Royalist Army based in Barinas, Venezuela as well as the III Division based in New Granada. Also included in the proposed plan would be a naval landing near Santa Marta or Riohacha led by Scottish adventurer Gregor MacGregor.Gutiérrez Ardila, Daniel. 1819: campaña de la Nueva Granada: 57-58 The proposed route, however, was considered impassable, and therefore the plan understandably received little support from the Congress or from Páez.