Spanish Prime minister, general and statesman
In this
Spanish name
, the first or paternal
surname
is
Prim
and the second or maternal family name is
Prats
.
Juan Prim y Prats, 1st Count of Reus, 1st Marquis of los Castillejos, 1st Viscount of Bruch
(
Spanish pronunciation:
[?xwam
?p?in
i
?p?ats]
;
Catalan
:
Joan Prim i Prats
[?u?am
?p?im
i
?p?ats]
; 6 December 1814 – 30 December 1870) was a Spanish general and
statesman
[2]
who was briefly Prime Minister of Spain until his assassination.
Biography
[
edit
]
Juan Prim, Spanish general and statesman. Painting by
Antonio Maria Esquivel
Born in
Reus
on 6 December 1814,
Prim was the son of lieutenant colonel Pablo Prim.
[n. 1]
He entered the free corps known as the
tiradores de Isabel II
and met his
baptism of fire
on 7 August 1834, during the
First Carlist War
, facing the Carlist party of Triaxet.
Over the course of the war he rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel and had two orders of
knighthood
conferred upon him. After the pacification of 1839, as a progressist opposed to the dictatorship of
General Espartero
, he was sent into exile. However, in 1843 he was elected deputy for
Tarragona
, and after defeating Espartero at Bruch he entered Madrid in triumph with
General Serrano
. The regent
Maria Christina
promoted him major-general, and made him
conde de Reus
(Count of
Reus
) and
vizconde del Bruch
(Viscount of
Bruch
).
General Narvaez
, the prime minister, failed to understand what constitutional freedom meant, and General Prim, on showing signs of opposition, was sentenced to six years' imprisonment in the
Philippine Islands
. The sentence was not carried out, and Prim remained an exile in England and France until the
amnesty
of 1847. He then returned to Spain, and was first employed as captain-general of
Puerto Rico
(
Governor of Puerto Rico
) and afterwards as military representative with the sultan during the
Crimean War
. In 1854 he was elected to the cortes, and gave his support to
General O'Donnell
, who promoted him lieutenant-general in 1856. In the
war with Morocco
he did such good service at
Castillejos
(Fnideq), Cabo Negro, Guad al Gelu and Campamento in 1860 that he was made
marques de los Castillejos
(Marquess of los Castillejos) and
Grande de Espana
(
Grandee
of Spain).
Prim commanded the Spanish expeditionary army in
Mexico
in 1862, when Spain, Great Britain, and France sought forced payment from the liberal government of
Benito Juarez
for loans. Prim was a sympathizer with the
Mexican liberal
cause, thus he refused to consent to the ambitious schemes of French emperor
Napoleon III
, and withdrew Spanish forces following a meeting with
Manuel Doblado
.
[7]
Prim was a staunch supporter of the Union in the
American Civil War
and on his trip to the
United States
, where he visited
New York
and
Philadelphia
, he met with
Lincoln
in Washington.
Photograph of General Prim,
c.
1861-65
On Prim's return to Spain he joined the opposition, heading
pronunciamentos
in Catalonia against generals Narvaez and O'Donnell. All his attempts failed until the death of Narvaez in April 1868, after which Queen Isabella became increasingly tyrannical, until at last even Serrano was exiled. In September 1868 General Serrano and General Prim returned, and
Brigadier Topete
, commanding the fleet, raised the standard of
revolt
at
Cadiz
. In July 1869 General Serrano was elected regent,
[9]
and Prim became president of the council and was made a marshal.
On 6 November 1870 Amadeo, Duke of Aosta, was elected king of Spain, but General Prim, on leaving the chamber of the Cortes on 28 December, was shot by unknown assassins and died two days later.
[10]
The Cortes took his children as wards of the country; three days afterwards King
Amadeo I
swore in the presence of the corpse to observe the new Spanish constitution.
This is due to the fact that Prim had searched all the European courts of the time trying to find a monarch who was not opposed to being democratically elected. He is quoted for saying that "looking for a democratic monarch in Europe is like trying to find an atheist in heaven".
[
citation needed
]
After France had rejected the almost elected
Leopold of Hohenzollern
because of their fear that
Prussia
might thereby become more powerful, Amadeo of Savoy was the most fitting who consented.
[
citation needed
]
The workshop of metalworker
Placido Zuloaga
was commissioned to make a monumental
sarcophagus
for Prim. Completed in 1875 in
Eibar
, this now resides in the cemetery at
Reus
.
[11]
Gallery
[
edit
]
See also
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- Informational notes
- ^
According to W.O. Cavenagh (1898), writing for
The Genealogical Magazine
, Juan Prim was a descendant of John Prim, of Johnswell, county Kilkenny (d. 1755), an Irish descendant of a family of Dutch settlers originally surnamed
Prime
, established in England during the reign of
Elizabeth I
and a branch of which relocated to Ireland during the reign of
Charles I
. A descendant of Mark (d. 1782)?eldest son of John and his first wife Miss Rodgers?would have migrated to Spain, made a fortune and founded the Spanish branch.
[4]
- Citations
- Bibliography
- Further reading
- Blairet, Louis (1867).
Le General Prim et la situation actuelle de l'Espagne
. Paris.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link
)
- Guillaumot (1870).
Juan Prim et l'Espagne
. Paris.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link
)
- Guited, Gimenez y (1860).
Guited, Historia militar y politica del General Don Juan Prim
. Barcelona.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link
)
- Leonardon, Henri (1901).
Prim
. Paris.
{{
cite book
}}
: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link
)
(in French, contains a useful bibliography).
- Schurz, Carl
(1907). "VI. Spain".
Reminiscences
. Vol. II. New York: McClure Publ. Co. pp. 293?300.
Schurz was the United States' ambassador to Spain in 1860. In his
Reminiscences
, he gives a short biography of Prim as well as his recollections of his own talks with Prim and the Spanish court.
External links
[
edit
]
Wikimedia Commons has media related to
Juan Prim
.
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