Luís Alves de Lima e Silva, Duke of Caxias (; 25 August 1803 – 7 May 1880), nicknamed "o Pacificador" ("the Peacemaker") and "o Duque de Ferro" ("the Iron Duke"), was an army officer, politician and monarchist of the Empire of Brazil. Like his father and uncles, Caxias pursued a military career. In 1823 he fought as a young officer in the Brazilian War of Independence against Portugal, then spent three years in Brazil's southernmost province, Cisplatina, as the government unsuccessfully resisted that province's secession in the Cisplatine War. Though his own father and uncles renounced Emperor Dom Pedro I during the protests of 1831, Caxias remained loyal. Pedro I abdicated in favor of his young son Dom Pedro II, whom Caxias instructed in swordsmanship and horsemanship and eventually befriended.
During Pedro II's minority the governing regency faced countless rebellions throughout the country. Again breaking with his father and other relatives sympathetic to the rebels, from 1839 to 1845 Caxias commanded loyalist forces suppressing such uprisings as the Balaiada, the Liberal rebellions of 1842 and the Ragamuffin War. In 1851, under his command, the Brazilian army prevailed against the Argentine Confederation in the Platine War; a decade later Caxias, as army marshal (the army's highest rank), led Brazilian forces to victory in the Paraguayan War. As a reward he was raised to the titled nobility, becoming successively a baron, count, and marquis, finally becoming the only person created duke during Pedro II's 58-year reign.
In the early 1840s Caxias became a member of the Reactionary Party, which evolved into the Party of Order and finally the Conservative Party. He was elected senator in 1846. The Emperor appointed him president of the Council of Ministers (prime minister) in 1856; he briefly held that office again in 1861, but fell when his party lost its parliamentary majority. Over the decades Caxias witnessed the growth and zenith of his party, then its slow decline as internal conflict divided it. In 1875, he headed a cabinet for the last time, and after years of failing health he died in May 1880.
In the years after his death and mainly following the downfall of the Brazilian monarchy, Caxias's reputation was initially overshadowed by that of Manuel Luís Osório, Marquis of Erval, but with time surpassed even Erval's renown. In 1925 his birthday was established as the Day of the Soldier, a day of honor for the Brazilian army. On 13 March 1962 he was officially designated the army's protectorits soldierly ideal and the most important figure in its tradition. Historians have regarded Caxias positively, several ranking him as the greatest of Brazil's military officers.
Early years
Birth Luís Alves de Lima e Silva was born on 25 August 1803 on a farm called São Paulo (today within the city of Duque de Caxias) located in Rio de Janeiro, then a captaincy (later province) of the Portuguese colony of Brazil. He was the first son and second of ten children of Francisco de Lima e Silva and Mariana Cândido de Oliveira Belo. His godparents were his paternal grandfather, José Joaquim de Lima da Silva, and his maternal grandmother, Ana Quitéria Joaquina. Luís Alves's early years were spent on the São Paulo farm owned by his maternal grandfather and namesake, Luís Alves de Freitas. The young boy may have initially been schooled at home, as was common then. He may have been taught to read and write by his grandmother, Ana Quitéria.
Luís Alves's grandfather, José Joaquim, was a Portuguese military officer who had emigrated in 1767 to Brazil. He settled in the city of Rio de Janeiro, capital of both the Rio de Janeiro captaincy and of Brazil. He had neither noble rank nor noble ancestry and lacked patrons in an environment in which advancement depended upon exchanges of favors and family connections. Having fought against the Spaniards on Brazil's southern frontiers, he secured a place for himself in Rio de Janeiro's upper class when he married a member of a local and influential family.
The arrival of the Portuguese Royal Family in Rio de Janeiro in 1808 changed the lives of the Lima family. King Dom João VI embarked upon a series of wars of conquest which resulted in the expansion of Brazil's territory with the annexation of Cisplatina to the south and of French Guiana to the north. By 1818, Luís Alves's relatives, who were military officers and had served in the wars, had been ennobled. His grandfather, José Joaquim, became a member of the Order of Christ and Fidalgo Cavaleiro da Casa Real (Knight Nobleman of the Royal House). His father, Francisco de Lima, and uncles were also granted honors. Within two generations, the Lima family had risen from mere commoners to the ranks of Portugal's untitled nobility.
Military education
On 22 May 1808, Luís Alves was enlisted at the age of five as a cadet in the 1st Regiment of Infantry of Rio de Janeiro. Historian Adriana Barreto de Souza explained that this did "not mean that he began to serve as a child, the connection to the regiment was simply honorific", his perquisite as the son of a military officer. This infantry regiment was informally known as the "Lima [family] Regiment" because so many members of the family served in it, including his father and grandfather.
In 1811, Luís Alves moved with his parents from his grandparents' farm to Rio de Janeiro and was enrolled at the Seminário São Joaquim (Saint Joachim School), which became Pedro II School in 1837. On 4 May 1818, he was admitted into the Royal Military Academy. The entire course (which ran from the first to seventh year) was mandatory for artillerymen and engineers but infantrymen were only required to take first- and fifth-year classes. Luís Alves took the first- and fifth-year classes in 1818 and 1819, respectively. Though he could have skipped the other years, he chose to take second-year classes in 1820 and third-year classes in 1821. The subjects he studied in the Royal Military Academy ranged from arithmetic, algebra and geometry to tactics, strategy, camping, fortification in campaign and terrain reconnaissance. He was promoted to alferes (equivalent to a modern-day second lieutenant) on 12 October 1818, and to lieutenant (modern-day first lieutenant) on 4 November 1820.
Though an accomplished student, Luís Alves was often reprimanded for bullying new students. With time, he matured, eventually being regarded by his peers as a very reasonable and honest person. He had an ordinary appearance, with a round face, brown hair, brown eyes and average height. Luís Alves's unremarkable features were compensated by his bearing. Historian Thomas Whigham described him as someone who "learned the art of giving orders early in life. Immaculate in his dress, he was soft spoken, polite, and smoothly in control of himself. He seemed to radiate calm composure and authority."
Wars and military crises
Independence of Brazil
Luís Alves would normally have begun the fourth-year classes at the Royal Military Academy in March 1822. Instead, he dropped out in December 1821 and enlisted in the 1st Fusilier Battalion. Prince Dom Pedro, son and heir of King João VI, had just embarked upon the struggle against Portugal that would lead to the independence of Brazil on 7 September 1822. The prince was later acclaimed Dom Pedro I, the first Brazilian emperor, on 12 October. Those Brazilian and Portuguese forces who remained loyal to Portugal refused to accept this outcome, which led to a war fought on several fronts across Brazil.
On 18 January 1823, Pedro I created the Emperor's Battalion, a handpicked elite infantry unit that included Luís Alves, who was named as adjutant to the company's commander, his uncle, Colonel José Joaquim de Lima e Silva. The Emperor's Battalion was sent to the province of Bahia in the northeast on 28 January and placed, along with other troops, under the command of French Brigadier Pierre Labatut. The Brazilian imperial forces besieged Bahia's capital, Salvador, which was held by the Portuguese. During the siege, Luís Alves fought in at least three attacks (on 28 March, 3 May and 3 June) against Portuguese positions around Salvador, all successful. In the engagement on 28 March, he led a charge on an enemy bunker.See:
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During the Bahia campaign, high-ranking officers mutinied against Labatut, who was taken prisoner and sent back to Rio de Janeiro. It is unlikely that Luís Alves was involved, but his uncle, Joaquim de Lima, was almost certainly part of the conspiracy and was chosen by the officers to replace Labatut. The campaign resumed, and the Portuguese withdrew from Salvador and set sail back to Portugal. On 2 July, the victorious Brazilians entered the city. The Emperor's Battalion returned to Rio de Janeiro, and Luís Alves was later promoted to captain on 22 January 1824.See:
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Cisplatine War and the abdication crisis
The Portuguese garrison in Montevideo, the capital of Cisplatina (then Brazil's southernmost province), was the last to surrender. In 1825, secessionists in the province rebelled. The United Provinces of the Río de la Plata (later Argentina) attempted to annex Cisplatina. Brazil declared war, triggering the Cisplatine War. The Emperor's Battalion, to which Luís Alves was attached, was sent to guard Montevideo, then besieged by rebel forces. Luís Alves fought in engagements against the insurgents during 1827 (7 February, 5 July, 7 July, 14 July, 5 August and 7 August).
The war came to a disastrous end in 1828, as Brazil relinquished Cisplatina, which became the independent nation of Uruguay. Nonetheless, Luís Alves was promoted to the rank of major on 2 December 1828 and made second-in-command of the Emperor's Battalion in early 1829. During his stay in Montevideo, he met María Ángela Furriol González Luna. How far their relationship progressed is unknown, but there may have been a failed engagement. He returned to Rio de Janeiro and witnessed the increasing deterioration in Emperor Pedro I's political position. A growing opposition to Pedro I's policies eventually erupted into mass protests at the Field of Santana in downtown Rio de Janeiro on 6 April 1831. The situation became more ominous when several military units, led by Luís Alves's father and uncles, joined the protests.
The Emperor considered appointing Luís Alves to command the Emperor's Battalion and asked him which side he would choose. According to historian Francisco Doratioto, Luís Alves answered that "between the love of his father and his duty to the crown, he would stay with the latter." Pedro I expressed gratitude for his loyalty, but instead ordered him to take the Emperor's Battalion to the Field of Santana and join the rebels, preferring abdication to bloodshedding. Decades later, Luís Alves said in the Brazilian Senate: "I marched along with the Emperor's Battalion to the Field of Santana, out of devotion to competent orders [from Pedro I]. I was not a revolutionary. I esteemed the Abdication. I judged that it would be of advantage to Brazil, but I did not concur directly or indirectly with it."
Era of troubles