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NOTE: This blog entry was started in February 2024 but backdated to 2009.
This is a more unusual blog post because while the Herrera Leiva family, an elite lineage of Cartagena, Colombia, contributed to my ancestral DNA, and their family history stretching back to 17th-century Spain, 15th-century Canary Islands, and beyond is incredibly fascinating, I don't feel a familial connection.
I first learned in 2018 about my great-great-great-grandparents, Andrea Herrera de Cohen (c.1827-1856) and Juan Agustín Cohen (c.1827-1878), who married in 1847 in Cartagena. Juan Agustín Cohen and his father, Juan Bautista Cohen, lived eventful lives that reflect the larger story of Jewish immigration to the Caribbean and Latin America.
Andrea Herrera is listed in her marriage record as a foundling daughter (hija espósita) of Francisco de Paula Herrera Leiva y Paniza (born 1795). At first I assumed that Andrea was unrelated to her adoptive family. But then I found among my DNA matches no fewer than 10 descendants of the Herrera Leiva family, and a triangulation in my DNA with three people descended from Lázaro María Herrera y Paniza (1786-1859), Francisco's older brother.
Given all this DNA evidence, I believe that Andrea was somehow related to the Herrera Leiva family. Andrea Herrera is also listed in at least two Cartagena notarial records, from 1847 and 1848, as buying property in her own name, hinting that she received financial support from the Herrera Leiva family, in addition to legal adoption.
Was Andrea the daughter of Francisco? Was Andrea the daughter of Lázaro? And an even more intriguing and mysterious question, who was Andrea's mother?
Lázaro María de Herrera y Paniza (1786-1859), from "La historia de Santa Marta a través de la fotografía."
Cartagena had a tradition since colonial times of free women of color (mainly Black) running many of the city's businesses, and even today Cartagena's palenqueras follow in the footsteps of that Afro-Colombian entrepreneurial tradition. Maybe Andrea's unknown mother had been of some means, or was a shopkeeper, or a domestic of the Herrera Leiva household.
I'm also reminded of Gabriel García Márquez's description of the parents of Florentino Ariza, one of the protagonists of his cartagenera novel, Love in the Time of Cholera:
"[Florentino] lived with his mother, Tránsito Ariza, in one half of a rented house on the Street of Windows, where she had kept a notions shop ever since she was a young woman, and where she also unraveled shirts and old rags to sell as bandages for the men wounded in the war. He was her only child, born of an occasional alliance with the well-known shipowner Don Pius V Loayza, one of the three brothers who had founded the River Company of the Caribbean and thereby given new impetus to steam navigation along the Magdalena River.
"Don Pius V Loayza died when his son was ten years old. Although he always took care of his expenses in secret, he never recognized him as his son before the law, nor did he leave him with his future secure, so that Florentino Ariza used only his mother’s name even though his true parentage was always common knowledge."
Juan Agustín Cohen's daughter, Cándida Amelia Cohen, aka "Tía Memé," (1873-1968), wrote in her invaluable memoir that Andrea Herrera de Cohen had a sister, Eloisa Herrera, who was the director of a Cartagena school. It's unknown whether Andrea and Eloisa were literal sisters. In 1839 Eloisa married the widower José María del Castillo y Alarcón (1781-1847). She is described in the marriage record as a foundling (espósita) in the household of the lawyer Lázaro María Herrera y Paniza (1786-1859), and interestingly Lázaro is listed as a witness.
José María del Castillo, the husband of Eloisa and a witness at Andrea Herrera de Cohen's wedding, was born in Tunja and signed Cartagena's Declaration of Independence in 1811. He joined the group of independistas who fled to Jamaica in 1815 to escape the Spanish reconquest. His first wife's brother, Manuel Rodríguez Torices (1788-1816), stayed behind in Bogotá, briefly served as the president of Nueva Granada in 1815, and was executed alongside Camilo Torres by Spanish authorities the following year.
Andrea Herrera de Cohen died an untimely death on October 7, 1856. Her eldest child, Ana Manuela Cohen, was then raised by the aunt, Eloisa Herrera (who was also Ana Manuela's godmother). Andrea's younger children, José Cohen and Mercedes Cohen (my great-great-grandmother), went their "grandmother," but it's unclear if this was Andrea Herrera's biological mother, the wife of Francisco de Paula Herrera, the spouse of the elder Juan Cohen, or someone else. Juan Agustín Cohen eventually settled in the Dominican Republic, and while he wrote his aging father and sister-in-law Eloisa, he never returned to Colombia and his Colombian children never joined him.
So due to unkind fates and the prejudices of history, Andrea Herrera and her mother remain shadowy figures. What can be recovered is the story of the Herrera Leiva men: centuries' worth of soldiers, smugglers, corrupt politicians, nobility of dubious origins, and even a couple officials of the Spanish Inquisition. It's a wild history, so buckle up!
Herrera Leiva families of Spain, Canary Islands, Mexico, and Colombia. Click for larger view.
HERRERA LEIVA: HOW A FAMILY WON THE INQUISITION'S APPROVAL
Genealogies of Lázaro María Herrera and his wife María Teresa Paniza, compiled by the Spanish Inquisition (1786).
When the briefly independent city of Cartagena fell to the Spanish "reconquista" in December 1815, the Spanish commander, General Pablo Morillo, chose to stay on Calle de Don Sancho, near the city walls, in the house of the father of Lázaro María and Francisco de Paula Herrera y Paniza. Lázaro María Herrera Leiva y Cornelis was also a white Spaniard, born in the port city of Cádiz, Spain in 1755. Lázaro returned to his father's native city of Cartagena de Indias, where he topped the city's racial pecking order, and became a merchant whose business probably included the official sale and undercover smuggling of African slaves.
Lázaro made a crucial career move in 1786, successfully applying to be the alguacil mayor (great bailiff) of Cartagena's Holy Office of the Inquisition. He held this position for decades, leading arrests, seizures of property, and imprisonments. Many lives became ruined at Lázaro's commands, but his contemporaries viewed him as a prestigious official.
Lázaro's brother-in-law, Fermín Paniza y Navarro de Azevedo, also joined the Inquisition in 1792, and his various titles included secretario honorario (honorary secretary) and "Alcalde de cárceles de penitencia y Portero de Cámara. Contador, Consultor y Abogado de reos." (Administrator of the prisons of penance and Manager of the [judicial?] Chamber. Accountant, Consultant, and Lawyer for inmates.)
The dungeon of Cartagena's Palacio de la Inquisición, 2015.
The return of Spanish rule in Cartagena also revived the Inquisition, and in 1816 Lázaro's son, the younger Lázaro María Herrera, came on the other side of "justice," facing interrogation from the Inquisition on whether he had aided the independistas. The case cites the elder Lázaro's dutiful work from the Inquisition and claims the younger Lázaro never renounced his Spanish citizenship! Both Lázaros survived into the days of Gran Colombia with reputations intact, and in 1827 the elder Lázaro briefly served as the Intendente of Magdalena.
When Lázaro María Herrera Leiva first applied to join the vile circle of the Holy Inquisition, the organization demanded sufficient "proof" that he was a racially pure Catholic born solely to "old Christian" ancestors. Today we can view the time and effort creating the illusion of racial and religious "purity" as boggling and pathetic, but Lázaro and the inquisitors were dead serious. Spain's Archivo Histórico Nacional has digitized the invaluable and unsettling results: Over 200 manuscript pages on the family history of Lázaro and his wife, María Teresa Paniza. First inquisitors investigated Lázaro's family in 1786-1787, and then María Teresa's family went under the microscope in 1791.
The documents claim that Lázaro and María Teresa are "limpios de toda mala raza" (clean of all bad race), and list all the "bad races": heretics, Jews, Moors, Romani, blacks, "mulattoes," Indians, Lutherans, and anyone who converted to Catholicism. Yet even though Lázaro María Herrera Leiva and María Teresa Paniza were deemed sufficiently Catholic, this genealogical file still noted unseemly rumors and speculations about their ancestors raised by witnesses. Inquisitors needed copies of documents from Antwerp to prove that Lázaro's Flemish grandfather really was Catholic. Witnesses noted repeatedly that María Teresa's father started his career at a pulpería (small grocery store). María Teresa's great-grandmother may have been illegitimate because she did not name her parents in her last will and testament.
From this noxious, quixotic attempt to legally prove racial purity, I have gleaned valuable transcriptions of baptismal and marriage records dating back to 1663, which helped me piece together a genealogy of the Herrera Leiva y Paniza family, the adoptive ancestors of my Cohen Herrera family. It's fascinating to note how trading cities — Cartagena de Indias, Cádiz, Antwerp, Genoa — play a major role in this family history.
An etching of the British siege of Cartagena in 1741. The walled city is seen to the left.
HERRERA LEIVA GENEALOGY
Herrera Leiva direct ancestors. Click for larger view.
The Herrera y Paniza children
These children with fabulously baroque names were born and baptized in Cartagena de Indias:
1. Lázaro María de Herrera y Paniza (1786-1859)
2. Josef María Guadalupe Antonio Ramón de los Dolores de Herrera y Paniza (born 1789)
3. Miguel María Estanislao Pedro Juan Nepomuceno de Herrera y Paniza (born 1790)
4. Ana María Secundina Vicenta Francisca de Paula Raphaela Rita Ramona de la Trinidad de Herrera y Paniza (born 1792)
5. Simón de Herrera y Paniza (1794-1850)
4. Ana María Secundina Vicenta Francisca de Paula Raphaela Rita Ramona de la Trinidad de Herrera y Paniza (born 1792)
5. Simón de Herrera y Paniza (1794-1850)
6. Francisco de Paula Antonio Félix Rafael Serapio de los Dolores de Herrera y Paniza (born October 12, 1795; baptized October 16, 1795)
7. Antonio Joaquín Donato Félix Vicente de Herrera y Paniza (born 1796)
8. María de los Dolores Saturnina Andrea de la Zinta de Herrera y Paniza, a twin (born 1798)
9. Vicenta Candelaria Saturnina de la Trinidad de Herrera y Paniza, a twin (born 1798)
10. María Andrea Pantaleona Ignacia del Carmen de Herrera y Paniza (born 1799)
11. Ignacio María Vicente Cayetano del Carmen de Herrera y Paniza (born 1801)
12. Manuel Eusbeio Asunción Roque de la Trinidad de Herrera y Paniza (born 1802)
Parents of the Herrera y Paniza family
2. Lázaro María Herrera Leiva y Cornelis (born August 28, 1755; baptized August 29, 1755 in Cádiz, Andalucía, Spain). Full name: Lázaro María José Vicente Ramón Agustín Cayetano de Herrera Leiva y Cornelis. Merchant belonging to the Universidad de Cargadores a Indias. Alguacil mayor (chief bailiff) of the Holy Office of the Inquisition of Cartagena, Conjuez of the Tribunal del Comercio of Cartagena.
~ Married on April 19, 1784 in Cartagena:
3. María Teresa Paniza y Navarro de Acevedo (born October 17, 1767; baptized October 24, 1767 in Cartagena). Full name: María Teresa Luisa Florentina del Carmen Paniza y Navarro de Acevedo.
The house of Lázaro María Herrera, when it was the Colegio Pio X, on Cartagena's Calle de Don Sancho [Carrera 4 #36-116], 1907 (source)
4. Simón Antonio Agustín de Herrera Leyva González de la Torre García de Labarcés (baptized August 10, 1708 in Cartagena; died 1757? in Cádiz, Spain). Simón de Herrera Leyva was a ship captain in the Spanish Armada. He helped defeat the English during the naval Battle of Cape Sicié (1744) aka Battle of Toulon, then escorted Viceroy Sebastián de Eslava back to Spain in 1749. He wrote his will in Cádiz in 1757. Simón's brothers were accomplished military men: Juan Toribio de Herrera Leyva (c.1700-1760) served as governor of Santa Marta from 1753-1760 and Manuel de Herrera Leyva (c.1716-1781) served as governor of Santa Marta from 1767-1772. Manuel and his nephew, Lázaro de Herrera Leyva y la Rocha (Juan Toribio's son), defended Cartagena during the British siege in 1741.
~ Married 1752 in Cádiz, Spain:
5. Vicenta de Cornelis y Soroa (born in Cádiz).
6. Antonio María Laurencio Paniza y Pallares (born June 13, 1705; baptized June 17, 1705 in Cádiz; died June 7, 1775 in Cartagena). While Antonio Paniza was born in Spain he identified strongly with his parents' Genoese heritage, and some of the Inquisition's witnesses in 1791 thought Antonio was born in Genoa. Around 1730, Antonio sailed to Cartagena aboard the warship El Fuerte. He started his career as a pulpero (grocer) but eventually became one of the wealthiest merchants in Cartagena. Around 1750 Antonio faced legal proceedings in Santa Fé (now Bogotá) over the serious charge of deserting the Spanish navy, and he even moved back to Spain in 1752 to pursue the trial. He was allowed to return to Cartagena in 1755, married two years later, and his ill fortune reversed. Antonio's trading business had clients throughout the coast and interior of Nueva Granada and as far as Havana and Madrid. The historian Anthony McFarlane notes that Antonio's testament lists his personal estate as worth 150,000 pesos, and his company's assets included four houses in Cartagena and an "hacienda and its small slave force."
~ Married December 14, 1757 in Cartagena:
7. María Andrea Eulalia Navarro de Acevedo (born February 11, 1736; baptized February 17, 1736 in Cartagena). Her brother, Francisco Navarro de Acevedo, served as bishop of Santa Marta from 1775-1788.
5. Vicenta de Cornelis y Soroa (born in Cádiz).
6. Antonio María Laurencio Paniza y Pallares (born June 13, 1705; baptized June 17, 1705 in Cádiz; died June 7, 1775 in Cartagena). While Antonio Paniza was born in Spain he identified strongly with his parents' Genoese heritage, and some of the Inquisition's witnesses in 1791 thought Antonio was born in Genoa. Around 1730, Antonio sailed to Cartagena aboard the warship El Fuerte. He started his career as a pulpero (grocer) but eventually became one of the wealthiest merchants in Cartagena. Around 1750 Antonio faced legal proceedings in Santa Fé (now Bogotá) over the serious charge of deserting the Spanish navy, and he even moved back to Spain in 1752 to pursue the trial. He was allowed to return to Cartagena in 1755, married two years later, and his ill fortune reversed. Antonio's trading business had clients throughout the coast and interior of Nueva Granada and as far as Havana and Madrid. The historian Anthony McFarlane notes that Antonio's testament lists his personal estate as worth 150,000 pesos, and his company's assets included four houses in Cartagena and an "hacienda and its small slave force."
~ Married December 14, 1757 in Cartagena:
7. María Andrea Eulalia Navarro de Acevedo (born February 11, 1736; baptized February 17, 1736 in Cartagena). Her brother, Francisco Navarro de Acevedo, served as bishop of Santa Marta from 1775-1788.
Great-grandparents of the Herrera y Paniza family
8. Lázaro de Herrera Leiva (born May 11, 1663; baptized May 17, 1663 in El Coronil, Sevilla, Spain; died c.1745). A career military man, Lázaro joined the royal Spanish infantry at age 13, served in Flanders starting in 1682, and was a captain by the time he sailed to Cartagena in 1699. Lázaro also was a widower when he married María Teresa de la Torre in 1699. He served as Sargento Mayor of Cartagena from 1699-1736 and interim governor of Cartagena in 1705-1706. During Lázaro's time as interim governor the galleon San José docked in Cartagena, two years before it famously sank with a cargo now worth billions. In 1741, the 78-year-old came out of retirement to help defend Cartagena during the English siege led by Vice-Admiral Vernon, and then retired for good the following year.
~ Married October 15, 1699 in Cartagena:
9. María Teresa Josefa de la Torre y Labarcés (baptized May 29, 1675 in Cartagena). She wrote her last will and testament in 1742. Her brothers Juan Damián and Antonio de la Torre y Labarcés became respectively the 2nd and 3rd Counts of Santa Cruz de la Torre. Antonio de la Torre was the grandfather of the 5th count, the military architect Antonio de Narváez.
10. Juan Francisco Cornelis (baptized May 20, 1687 in Sint Joriskerk, Antwerp, Flanders, now Belgium). Baptismal name: Joannes Cornelissen. He was born out of wedlock in Habsburg-controlled territory and was legitimized by his parents' marriage in 1689. As a young boy, Juan Francisco came to Cádiz, Spain with his father, and he stayed in the city throughout his life.
~ Married April 9, 1720 in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Cádiz, Spain:
11. Francisca de Soroa y Arostegui (born in Cádiz, Spain).
12. Jacome Paniza (born in Villanova d'Albenga in the Republic of Genoa, now Italy). By 1703 he lived in Spain and was a widower.
~ Married January 14, 1703 in Cádiz, Spain:
13. Blanca Pallares (born in "Cheve," which is probably Civezza in the Republic of Genoa, now Italy). Her last name is also spelled as Pallar and Pagliari.
14. Antonio Navarro de Acevedo (born in Sevilla, Spain). The Inquisition determined that Antonio was baptized on September 28, 1675 in Sevilla's Church of María Magdalena, but his parents have completely different names on that record than what is given on his daughter's baptismal record. Antonio came to Cartagena at the age of 16 (so probably around 1691), and eventually held a number of prestigious government positions, including Official Royal Treasurer of the Reales Cajas, Official Royal Treasurer of the Real Hacienda, Regidor, and Alcalde Ordinario.
~ Married May 15, 1723 in Cartagena:
15. Petrona María de Monte y Miranda (baptized July 18, 1706 in Cartagena).
9. María Teresa Josefa de la Torre y Labarcés (baptized May 29, 1675 in Cartagena). She wrote her last will and testament in 1742. Her brothers Juan Damián and Antonio de la Torre y Labarcés became respectively the 2nd and 3rd Counts of Santa Cruz de la Torre. Antonio de la Torre was the grandfather of the 5th count, the military architect Antonio de Narváez.
10. Juan Francisco Cornelis (baptized May 20, 1687 in Sint Joriskerk, Antwerp, Flanders, now Belgium). Baptismal name: Joannes Cornelissen. He was born out of wedlock in Habsburg-controlled territory and was legitimized by his parents' marriage in 1689. As a young boy, Juan Francisco came to Cádiz, Spain with his father, and he stayed in the city throughout his life.
~ Married April 9, 1720 in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, Cádiz, Spain:
11. Francisca de Soroa y Arostegui (born in Cádiz, Spain).
12. Jacome Paniza (born in Villanova d'Albenga in the Republic of Genoa, now Italy). By 1703 he lived in Spain and was a widower.
~ Married January 14, 1703 in Cádiz, Spain:
13. Blanca Pallares (born in "Cheve," which is probably Civezza in the Republic of Genoa, now Italy). Her last name is also spelled as Pallar and Pagliari.
14. Antonio Navarro de Acevedo (born in Sevilla, Spain). The Inquisition determined that Antonio was baptized on September 28, 1675 in Sevilla's Church of María Magdalena, but his parents have completely different names on that record than what is given on his daughter's baptismal record. Antonio came to Cartagena at the age of 16 (so probably around 1691), and eventually held a number of prestigious government positions, including Official Royal Treasurer of the Reales Cajas, Official Royal Treasurer of the Real Hacienda, Regidor, and Alcalde Ordinario.
~ Married May 15, 1723 in Cartagena:
15. Petrona María de Monte y Miranda (baptized July 18, 1706 in Cartagena).
Great-great-grandparents of the Herrera y Paniza family
16. Juan de Herrera Leiva (born in Antequera, Málaga, Spain). He was the son of Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva and Isabel Padilla. Gerónimo de Herrera was described in the Inquisition's file as coming from a "very noble family in Antequera," a typically Spanish assertion. A 1792 book on Canarian genealogy by the priest Antonio Ramos lists Don Juan de Herrera Leiva as a "Regidor y Alcalde Ordinario de la Santa Hermandad," and lists Juan's parents as Don Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva and Doña Isabel de Arroyo, his paternal grandparents as Don Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva and Doña Ana de Gadea, and his maternal grandparents as Alonso Ruiz de Arroyo and Doña María de Padilla.
~ Married:
17. Elvira Jiménez, whose name appears as Elvira Campero Gallinato on her son's 1699 marriage record.
18. Juan Toribio de la Torre, who bought the title of contador of Cartagena in 1680 and then was granted the title of 1st Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre in 1690 by King Carlos II of Spain. Juan Toribio's life and genealogy are discussed further down the page.
~ Married:
19. Catalina de Labarcés y Pando, the daughter of Antonio de Labarcés, a treasurer of Cartagena since 1653, and probably the niece of Governor Juan de Pando y Estrada of Cartagena (the secondary sources are unclear). Juan de Pando y Estrada (c.1635-1688) was baptized on December 23, 1635 in the Church of San Ginés in Madrid, Spain, and his parents, Juan de Pando and Ana de Mora y Estrada, were from Asturias.
17. Elvira Jiménez, whose name appears as Elvira Campero Gallinato on her son's 1699 marriage record.
18. Juan Toribio de la Torre, who bought the title of contador of Cartagena in 1680 and then was granted the title of 1st Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre in 1690 by King Carlos II of Spain. Juan Toribio's life and genealogy are discussed further down the page.
~ Married:
19. Catalina de Labarcés y Pando, the daughter of Antonio de Labarcés, a treasurer of Cartagena since 1653, and probably the niece of Governor Juan de Pando y Estrada of Cartagena (the secondary sources are unclear). Juan de Pando y Estrada (c.1635-1688) was baptized on December 23, 1635 in the Church of San Ginés in Madrid, Spain, and his parents, Juan de Pando and Ana de Mora y Estrada, were from Asturias.
20. Eduard Cornelissen (or Eduardo Cornelis), who lived in Antwerp, Flanders and then settled in Cádiz, Spain.
~ Married January 13, 1689 in Sint Joriskerk, Antwerp, Flanders:
21. Anna Portiers, who married 20 months after the baptism of her son, Juan Francisco Cornelis.
"Interior of Saint George's Church in Antwerp" (aka Sint Joriskerk) by Pieter Neeffs the Elder, 17th century (Source)
22 & 23. José de Soroa y Arostegui & Laura González Bustos de Lara.
26 & 27. Lorenzo Pallares & Magdalena Pallares. Natives of the Republic of Genoa. The genealogist Flavio Álvarez Ángel gives their names as Lorenzo Pagliari and Magdalena Boneli.
28. Nicolás Navarro de Acevedo. He first lived in Sevilla, then settled in Cartagena, and served as Oidor of the Real Casa de Contratación. His name appears on his son's supposed 1675 baptismal record as Rodrigo Navarro y Mendoza.
~ Married:
29. Juana Jacinta Páez. She first lived in Sevilla, then settled in Cartagena. Her name appears on her son's supposed 1675 baptismal record as Beatríz María de Arrista.
30. Andrés de Monte y Miranda, whose name appears as Francisco in some records. A resident of Cartagena, he served as Oficial mayor of the Real Hacienda and Contador (an accountant).
~ Married:
31. Rosa María de Torregrosa (born in Cartagena). As said above, she did not name her parents in her testament, which some Inquisition witnesses thought meant she was illegitimate.
OVER A CENTURY OF MILITARY SERVICE
In 1796, Lázaro María de Herrera Leiva once again submitted a lengthy petition, in the hopes of securing the Cross of the Order of Carlos III, the highest civilian award in Spain. While Lázaro María did not get the award, his application provided crucial details about his grandfather Lázaro's army service, his father Simón's naval service, and his own more mundane service for Cartagena's treasury.
Thankfully, other 17th- and 18th-century documents are preserved and digitized by Spain's Archivo Histórico Nacional and Colombia's Archivo General de la Nación, which further flesh out the Herrera Leiva family's military service to the Spanish crown, dating back to Lázaro de Herrera's astounding 63 years of service in the Spanish military — from 1682 to 1745!
On May 23, 1682, 19-year-old Lázaro de Herrera became an infantryman in the Spanish Netherlands, under the command of the Marquis de Bedmar. The following year, King Louis XIV of France renewed his efforts to expand France's northern and eastern borders, resulting in the War of the Reunions (1683-1684). This conflict resulted in Spain ceding Luxembourg to France, but Lázaro did his best to aid Spanish defense of the tiny province.
Lázaro testified that on October 17, 1683, as Spanish troops took over Grevenmacher in eastern Luxembourg, he was one of the first soldiers to break through the palisade and take French soldiers as prisoners. Following further combat in December, Lázaro was named an infantry captain by royal decree on January 3, 1684.
However, the French troops under French Marshal François de Créquy who laid siege at Luxembourg gained the upper hand as the year wore on. In April, Lázaro injured his right arm due to a grenade explosion, and in late May he was one of the last Spanish soldiers to retreat from Berlaymont, a bastion in Luxembourg. Lázaro also said he had a nephew, Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva, who died while fighting in the siege.
After the fall of Luxembourg, Lázaro went to the Canary Islands in 1685 to raise another infantry company to lead as captain in Flanders. This same company reformed and fought in the Nine Years' War (1688-1697), another conflict between a "Grand Alliance" and Louis XIV over territorial grabs. Then on February 5, 1692, the governor of Spanish Netherlands, the Marquis of Gastañaga, named Lázaro the captain of a company of "dragones arcabuceros a caballo" — mounted infantrymen named "dragoons" or "harquebusiers" who carried firearms. In this capacity, Lázaro took part in the second Siege of Namur (1695), a major defeat for the French.
A modern depiction of a Spanish arcabucero a caballo.
With the end of war in Flanders, Lázaro decided to go to the New World. In 1697 he requested a transfer to Veracruz, Mexico, but on September 12, 1698, the Spanish Council of the Indies issued a patent naming Lázaro as the Sargento Mayor de la Plaza y Presidio de la Ciudad de Cartagena y su Provincia, commanding 500 soldiers.
Lázaro reached Cartagena in December 1698, and on October 15, 1699, he married the daughter of a prominent cartagenero, the Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre. Then in early 1700, Lázaro served as the acting governor of Cartagena while Juan Díaz Pimienta y Zaldivar besieged the weakened Scottish colony in Darien. Fever and disease killed both sides, before the Scots were allowed to abandon the settlement with their guns. Of 2,500 Scottish settlers, only a few hundred survivors returned to Scotland.
From April 1705 to December 1706, Lázaro served once again as the acting governor of Cartagena, and fended off an English pirate attack in August 1706. As Lázaro was rewarded with the rank of coronel in 1711, he also prepared for his young sons to become military men as well.
Lázaro's son Simón de Herrera Leiva joined Cartagena's troops as a soldier de menor edad on February 17, 1712, following a decree issued by King Felipe V the previous year. What's shocking is how young Simón must have been, as he was baptized in August 1708. Simón then left for Cádiz, Spain in 1721 to become a naval cadet. He steadily rose in King Felipe V's navy, being promoted to alférez de fragata (1728), alférez de navio (1732), teniente de fragata (1737), and teniente de navio (1740).
Simón's finest hour came in the Battle of Cape Sicié (February 21-22, 1744), where he took part in a Spanish and French naval defeat of the British. In turn, King Felipe V named Simón a capitán de fragata in May 1744, and then Simón became a capitán de navio in 1754. In all, Simón de Herrera Leiva served 43 years in the Spanish military, according to his son Lázaro María.
Map of the Battle of Cape Sicié (1744)
Back in Cartagena, the old coronel Lázaro de Herrera Leiva continued to have sons and grandsons enter the military. His son Manuel de Herrera Leyva (c.1716-1781) became a cadet in 1721 at around age 5! Manuel steadily rose in the ranks: subteniente (1735), teniente de Alabarderos (palace guard, 1750), capitán (1754), governor of Santa Marta (1767-1772), teniente coronel (1773), and then filing for retirement in 1777.
The biggest conflict came in 1740-1741, as the British twice attacked Cartagena by sea, and then a third combination naval and land attack. Three generations of the Herrera Leiva family came to the defense during this Battle of Cartagena de Indias. Lázaro de Herrera was now 77, and in 1740 his request for a military transfer to Santo Domingo was rejected, due to his advanced age. But this aged veteran of the Siege of Namur came out of semi-retirment to fight back the British.
The British attempted to storm the castillos of Bocachica and Cerro de San Lázaro on the dawn of April 20, 1741. Among the Colombian defenders were Manuel de Herrera Leiva and his nephew, Lázaro de Herrera Leyva y la Rocha (son of Juan Toribio, grandson of the elder Lázaro), who had also fended off the previous two British naval attacks. Within a few hours, about 30% of the British troops suffered casualties before they retreated. On April 25, Admiral Vernon started to move his troops to Jamaica, and Cartagena was never again threatened by British invaders.
The Castillo del Cerro de San Lázaro, now known as the Castillo de San Felipe de Barajas
The younger Lázaro de Herrera Leyva y la Rocha went on to have a 52-year military career (1737-1789), mostly in Spain. By 1755, he served as teniente in the Regimento de Burgos, and two years later he served as a capitán as his regiment was transferred to Ceuta, the Spanish military outpost on the northern Moroccan coast, nearly opposite Gibraltar. There, his regiment fought off an attack by the "Emperor [sultan] of Morocco" in 1757. Lázaro then served for four years in Oran, Algeria, which at the time was under Spanish control.
Returning to Spain, Lázaro served as the sargento mayor of Alburquerque, Spain (1768), then the teniente coronel (1769), and then the sargento mayor of Ayamonte, Spain (c.1773) After 13 years at Ayamonte, Lázaro transferred to the port city of Cádiz in 1786, as he became increasingly debilitated by palsy and required constant care from two servants. In 1789, Lázaro requested to be transferred back to his hometown of Cartagena, to breathe once again his aires patricios ("patrician airs"). King Carlos IV granted that transfer on January 1, 1790, and awarded Lázaro a monthly pension of 54 pesos. A sickly man afflicted with palsy sailing back to Cartagena closed a century of military service by the Herrera Leiva family.
The broader Herrera Leiva family also had a multigenerational legacy in the Spanish military. The elder half-brothers of the first Lázaro, Simón (c.1629-1693) and Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva, natives of El Coronil, Spain and sons of Juan de Herrera Leiva and Elvira Francés Altamirano, settled in the Canary Islands and became merchants/smugglers. One of Simón's sons, Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva y Urtusáustegui, joined Spanish forces in Flanders, fought alongside his uncle Lázaro, and died in 1684 during the siege of Luxembourg.
Another son of Simón's, Juan de Herrera Leiva y Urtusáustegui, was an infantry colonel and maestre de campo who served as the governor of the port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife in 1706. Juan's son, Simón de Herrera Leiva y Lercaro (1697-1782), was also a colonel who led the militia at Güímar, Tenerife. The story goes that Juan had asked La Virgen de los Remedios for a son, and marked little Simón's birth in 1697 by financing an altar to St. Joseph in the Cathedral of San Cristóbal de La Laguna.
Altar to San José, commissioned by Juan de Herrera Leiva, in the Cathedral of San Cristóbal de La Laguna. (source)
A daughter of Simón de Herrera Leiva y Lercaro became the mother-in-law of the 5th Marquis of Guisla-Ghiselin, and the 4th-great-grandmother of the 9th Marquis of Guisla-Ghiselin, who is still a Canarian. Simón also had two sons, Pedro de Herrera Leiva y Sotomayor and Simón de Herrera Leiva y Sotomayor (c.1754-1813), whose military careers led to their taking colonial administrative positions in Mexico.
Simón de Herrera Leiva y Sotomayor joined his father's regiment in Güímar at age 9 and became a captain by age 15. He took part in a failed Spanish Siege of Gibraltar in 1781 and then from 1782-1783 joined the forces of Bernardo de Gálvez, who aided the American Revolution by routing the British from West Florida. Simón then married an Englishwoman, Josefa Brickdale, and met the first president of the United States, George Washington.
Following further military service in Mexico, Simón de Herrera Leiva became the governor of Nuevo León from 1795-1810. His most notable act as governor, the "Neutral Ground" agreement in 1806, kept the peace between Spanish-owned Texas and the United States through 1819. Around this time, Simón met the U.S. military commander Zebulon Pike, who was leading illegal campaigns through Mexican territory, and Pike described Simón in his diary:
"Don Simon de Herrera is about 5 feet 11 inches high, has a sparkling black eye, dark complexion and hair. He was born in the Canary islands, served in the infantry in France, Spain, and Flanders, and speaks the French language well, with a little of the English. He is engaging in his conversation with his equals; polite and obliging to his inferiors, and in all his actions one of the most gallant and accomplished men I ever knew. He possesses a great knowledge of mankind from his experience in various countries and societies, and knows how to employ the genius of each of his subordinates to advantage. He had been in the United States during the presidency of General Washington, and had been introduced to that hero, of whom he spoke in terms of exalted veneration. He is now lieutenant colonel of infantry, and governor of the kingdom of New Leon. His seat of government is Mont Elrey [Monterrey]; and probably, if ever a chief is adored by his people, it is Herrera. When his time expired last, he immediately repaired to Mexico, attended by 300 of the most respectable people of his government, who carried with them the sighs, tears, and prayers of thousands that he might be continued in that government. The viceroy thought proper to accord to their wishes pro tempore, and the king has since confirmed his nomination. When I saw him he had been about one year absent, during which time the citizens of rank in Mont Elrey had not suffered a marriage or baptism to take place in any of their families, until their common father could be there, to consent and give joy to the occasion by his presence. What greater proof could be given of their esteem and love?"
Pike continued, "Herrera married an English lady in early youth, at Cadiz; one who by her suavity of manners makes herself as much beloved and esteemed by the ladies as her noble husband is by the men. By her he has several children, one now an officer in the service of his royal master."
Pike also praised Simón and another Mexican colonial governor, Manuel Antonio Cordero, for their "hatred to tyranny of every kind" and "secret determination never to see that flourishing part of the New World subject to any other European lord except him whom they think their honor and loyalty bound to defend with their lives and fortunes. But should [Napoleon] Bonaparte seize on European Spain, I risk nothing in asserting that those two gentlemen would be the first to throw off the yoke, draw their swords, and assert the independence of their country. Before I close this subject, it may not be improper to state that we owe it to Governor Herrera's prudence that we are not now engaged in a war with Spain."
Napoleon did wage a losing war in an effort to make his brother the king of Spain, but unlike the independence leader Miguel Hidalgo, Simón remained a Bourbon royalist until the bitter end. He fought Hidalgo's independistas until he was defeated and executed by republican forces in 1813. Simón's body is now buried in the crypts of San Fernando Cathedral in San Antonio, Texas, near the ashes of the racist U.S. filibusters who later died at the Alamo in 1836.
The Cathedral of San Fernando in San Antonio, Texas, burial place of Governor Simón de Herrera Leiva
POWER CORRUPTS: SLAVERY, SEX, SMUGGLING, AND OTHER HERRERA LEIVA FAMILY SHAME
Sometimes people look at ancestors who lived several centuries ago with too much reverence, when they were just ordinary people with too human flaws. My Herrera Leiva ancestors provide historians with a glimpse into how a 17th- and 18th-century Iberian family used colonial exploitation, smuggling, and slave-trading to raise their social clout.
Historian Pablo Emilio Pérez-Mallaina-Bueno writes how Simón and Gerónimo de Herrera Leiva, residents of La Laguna in the Canary Islands and likely half-brothers of the elder Lázaro de Herrera Leiva, were charged with smuggling in 1665. Simón, as Gerónimo's business representative, sailed from Tenerife in 1663 in a Dutch fishing vessel (pingue) to Holland and then England to sell wine and collect payments for two previous shipments of wine. Simón enlarged his coffers with some Dutch loans for the official purpose of buying merchandise, but then bought a British ship named El rey Carlos, which is what tipped off authorities. The verdict of this case is unknown, but Simón went on to become a wealthy landowner and wine producer on Tenerife and his former estate is now the Casa del Vino museum/winery in El Sauzal, Tenerife.
The Casa del Vino in El Sauzal, Tenerife, former estate of the Canarian smuggler Simón de Herrera Leiva (casadelvinotenerife.com)
As Lázaro de Herrera Leiva emigrated to Colombia and his family joined the ranks of Cartagena's rulers, they also took part in the city's rampant corruption. Cartagena was a crucial linchpin for Latin America's economy and a major strategic outpost, but it took months for any Spanish administrative efforts to cross the Atlantic. The small local elite could collect profits from the slave trade, constricted legal exports and imports, widespread illegal smuggling, and baldfaced stealing from the government with little consequences.
Historian Lance Grahn described Cartagena's endemic issues of smuggling and corruption in his essay "Political Corruption and Reform in Cartagena Province, 1700-1740," saying Lázaro de Herrera Leiva stole gunpowder from Cartagena's reserves to sell in Portobelo, an old port just northeast of Colón, Panama. Grahn also wrote:
"Illicit trade was, in the 1710s, an established way of economic life that linked administrators, military officers, and merchants into a powerful, obdurate clique. Moreover, family ties reinforced the commercial bonds. For example, the father-in-law of Sergeant Major Herrera y Leyva--the Count of Santa Cruz de la Torre--was the mayor of Cartagena and the leading slave smuggler in the city."
Further juicy, scandalous details about my ancestors can be found in "The Politics of Government in the Audiencia of New Granada, 1681-1719" (2000), a PhD thesis by Synnøve Ones. They include:
➼ Lázaro de Herrera Leiva (1663-c.1745) was accused of having an affair in 1718-1719 with a married Spanish woman, Clara Guerra aka "La Chapetona" (related to "chapetones," colonial slang for new arrivals from Europe). Lázaro's wife, María Teresa de la Torre, complained to the governor of Cartagena about her husband's "loose appetites" and asked that La Chapetona and her husband be sent back to Spain. Instead, La Chapetona moved to Santa Marta and presumably cut off the relationship.
➼ Governor Juan de Pando y Estrada of Cartagena (c.1635-1688) started out as a military man who investigated smuggling in Bilbao, Spain but once he served in Cartagena became involved in contraband with Dutch slave traders. He also had an affair with Francisca Portillo, who was previously the mistress of the dean of the cathedral of Cartagena. Pando was investigated, removed from office, and imprisoned in the Castillo de Santa Cruz, where he died penniless.
➼ Isabel de Labarcés y Pando, the sister-in-law of the 1st Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre and probably a niece of Governor Pando, had an affair with Francisco Carcelén, the oidor of the Real Audiencia in Santa Fé (now Bogotá).
Portrait of a Lady, in the style of Juan Carreño de Miranda, late 1600s.
A COUNT IN CARTAGENA AND KINGS OF THE CANARY ISLANDS
The coat of arms of the Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre: "En sable, un castillo, de oro, acompañado de dos tortillos, de azur, perfilados de oro, cargados ambos de una flor de lis del mismo metal. Bordura de gules con ocho aspas, de oro."
When King Carlos II decreed in 1690 that Juan Toribio de la Torre would become the Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre, it capped off the cartagenero's long career of service to the Spanish crown. Juan Toribio de la Torre had been an enslaver and military captain who battled the Chimila Indians, served as chief justice of Tamalameque and alcalde ordinario of Cartagena and Santa Marta, and then served as factor and veedor of the Real Hacienda of Cartagena until ill health forced him to step down in 1680.
The Conde de Santa Cruz's wife, Catalina de Labarcés y Pando, was closely related to Juan Pando de Estrada, the governor of Cartagena who on Christmas Eve of 1683 tried to fend off an attack from Dutch pirate Laurens de Graaf. Pando de Estrada lost three ships to de Graaf, including his flagship San Francisco, which de Graaf renamed The Fortune. A few years later, Pando de Estrada attempted to destroy the region's palenques, settlements founded by runaway slaves and other Africans, but the palenqueros fended off the racist Spaniards, and as mentioned above, their settlements survived for nearly another century.
Piracy and threat of invasion always hounded Cartagena, a main trading port rich from the exploitation of African slaves. The 1st Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre gave up living on the Caribbean coast and became the first of the many creole nobles who lived inland at the riverside city of Mompox, according to Genealogías de Santa Fé de Bogotá.
The count's great-grandson Antonio de Narváez y La Torre (1733-1812), the 5th and last Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre, tackled these issues by becoming an engineer and the disciple of Antonio de Arévalo, the architect of Cartagena’s greatest defense and later its greatest tourist attraction: seven miles of impenetrable stone walls. Antonio de Narváez helped the plans for the walls become a reality and also worked on the Canal del Dique, which connected Cartagena with the Magdalena River. As a military commander, Antonio de Narváez served as the governor of Panamá and then Santa Marta, and finally became commanding general of Cartagena. In his last years, Antonio de Narváez served on the revolutionary junta that declared Cartagena’s independence from Spain on November 11, 1811.
The house of Antonio de Narváez on Plaza Santo Domingo in Cartagena. In the foreground is Fernando Botero's sculpture "La gorda Gertrudis."
Antonio’s son, Juan Salvador Narváez Latorre (1788-1827), fought the royalists of Santa Marta (1812-1813) and joined Bolívar’s army in Magdalena and Venezuela (1813). He took part in Cartagena’s defense from the Spanish siege led by General Pablo Morillo in 1815, then after the city’s loss fled to Jamaica with his wife, Ana Herrera.
Juan Salvador Narváez returned to Colombia in 1820, but the Spanish captured and imprisoned him in Santa Marta. Amazingly, as Juan Salvador Narváez faced the firing squad he gave a Masonic hand signal and the platoon officer, who was also a Mason, immediately released him. Again Juan Salvador fought the Spanish, helping liberate Riohacha and Valledupar. After settling in Bogotá in 1824, Juan Salvador served in many government positions, including governor of Cartagena and a negotiator for Great Britain’s diplomatic recognition of Gran Colombia.
Back when the 1st Conde de Santa Cruz de la Torre purchased his noble title, he filed paperwork to prove his ancestors' "nobility" as well, focusing on their military service. Juan Toribio de la Torre said his maternal grandfather, Antonio López de Francia, was descended from the conquerors of the Canary Islands, and his maternal great-grandfather Pedro Alvarez Perdomo, a "close relative" of the Conde de la Gomera, had military service first in the Canary Islands and then Colombia. Pedro Alvarez Perdomo sailed to Santa Marta and became a "capitán comandante in the conquest of the Río Negro" (1545?), where he died battling Indians.
The genealogist Julio Hardisson y Pizarroso found no "Pedro Alvarez Perdomo" in the annals of the Canary Islands, but he found a possible line of descent from the Canarian Perdomo family. A Canarian named Pedro Perdomo de Cubas was the son of Luis Perdomo, who migrated from the Canary Islands to Latin America and died "in the war of [Gonzalo] Pizarro" (1546-1548). This Luis Perdomo may be the same as Luis Perdomo de Aday (born 1484), the great-grandson of the founders of the Canarian Perdomo family, the Frenchman Jean Arriete Prud'homme and his wife Inés Margarita de Béthencourt (c.1415-c.1480). In turn, Inés was the daughter of Maciot de Béthencourt (c.1390-c.1456), the ruthless "king" of the Canary Islands, and Teguise, the daughter of Guadarfía, the last indigenous king of the island of Lanzarote. Even if Pedro Alvarez Perdomo's family tree does not exactly match the seven generations from Pedro Perdomo de Cubas to the Canarian king Guadarfía, he was likely a descendant of this French-Canarian Perdomo family. Also note that the Conde de la Gomera mentioned above was the great-great-nephew of Maciot de Béthencourt.
Page from "Le canarien," an account of the first French-Iberian invasion of the Canary Islands in 1402-1404.
Maciot de Béthencourt was probably the nephew of Jean de Béthencourt (1362-1425), the French nobleman who led the 1402 expedition that began the Spanish conquest of the Canary Islands and the conversion of its natives to Catholicism. When Jean de Béthencourt returned to France in 1406, Maciot ruled in his name over a realm rife with enslavement, squabbles over land, and military ventures against the "heathen," reminiscent of the rule of Caribbean conquistadors of a century later. From 1414 onward Maciot was repeatedly forced to give up his claims to the Canary Islands. He sold his "kingly" title in 1418, but remained governor of Lanzarote until he sold the island to Portugal's Prince Henry the Navigator in 1448.
Maciot's ancestors were minor noblemen in Normandy, France, stretching back to his 5th-great-grandfather Jean de Béthencourt (fl.1200). Maciot's chivalric grandfather and great-grandfather Béthencourt survived the Black Death and then died on the battlefield. The great-grandfather died during the 1357 English siege of Honfleur and the grandfather was killed fighting for the French king in the Battle of Cocherel (1364).
As a sidenote, genealogy snobs like to claim that Maciot's parents were Regnault de Béthencourt (Jean's brother) and his second wife, Philippote de Fayel, who through her mother is a "gateway ancestor" to medieval royal family trees and bloodthirsty notables like Thibaut V, Count of Blois, who organized the first blood libel against Jews in medieval Europe. This is an impossibility, since multiple sources show Regnault married Philippote in 1422, by which time Maciot was a petty warlord exploiting the island of Lanzarote.
Juan Toribio de la Torre's family history, stretching back to his Perdomo ancestors in the Canary Islands and probable Béthencourt ancestors in France, is an example of how many Hispanic families took part in several waves of brutal conquest, first in Spain and other parts of Europe, then in the Canary Islands, and finally in Latin America.
Two subjugated native Canarians carry the Bethencourt coat of arms.
Teguise, the indigenous princess and mistress of Maciot de Béthencourt, was one of the Guanches, the native people who had lived on the Canary Islands since 1000 BC or earlier. Genetic and linguistic evidence show that the Guanches are related to the Berbers, and the Guanches kept a certain level of contact with North Africans through the millennia.
Teguise's specific people were called the Majos, and her island of Titerogakaet (or Titeroigatra) was later renamed Lanzarote by the Europeans. Teguise was the daughter of Guadarfía, the last indigenous king of Titerogakaet, and his wife Aniagua. Guadarfía (whose name can be spelled a variety of ways) was either the son of the king Guanarame and princess Ico, or the brother of Guanarame and the son of king Zonzamas (fl.1377) and his wife Fayna.
Statues of Majos by Juan Brito Martín, ethnographer and artisan of Lanzarote, flanked by two forensic reconstructions of Guanches.
Iberians and other European navigators regularly visited the Canary Islands from the 1340s onward, mostly to enslave Guanches. Guadarfía escaped slavers six times before Jean de Béthencourt's expedition reached his island in 1402. Béthencourt's men created and broke a peace treaty within a few months, and even though chroniclers estimate that there were only 200 Majo warriors on Lanzarote at the time, Guadarfía still led armed resistance for over a year. In January 1404 Guadarfía finally surrendered, received baptism, and took the new name "Luis de Guadarfrá."
During the 15th century the Majos were forced into slavery or forced to convert to Catholicism and adopt European customs, and Lanzarote became the first base for the gradual conquest of the Canary Islands. Two more islands fell under Castillian control by 1405, and the last Guanche warriors on the island of Tenerife surrendered in 1496. The Spanish conqueror of Tenerife, Alfonso Fernández de Lugo, had a son, Pedro Fernández de Lugo, who became the governer of Santa Marta in 1535 and appointed Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada to lead a military expedition that invaded and conquered the interior of Colombia.
To trace a Latin American family tree is to be an archaeologist digging through layers of violence and trauma. Colombian civil wars, internal displacement, and diaspora have their origins in the inequalities of the colonial era, and the conquistadors of the 16th century followed in the footsteps of the 15th century invaders of the Canary Islands. The Canarian clash of colonizer and colonized echoes through centuries, in the struggles of distant descendants more than 600 years later.
Questions? Comments? Please email me at ruedafingerhut [at] gmail.com.
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