In the history of Mexico, there have been many revolutionaries, most of them are considered heroes. These revolutionaries brought hope and faith to their people with the promise of finding freedom from their oppressive officials and poverty conditions. Among these, Francisco Villa stands out for becoming an important figure during the Mexican Revolution for his leadership skills, and knowledge of the territory. Francisco Villa, also known as “Pancho” Villa, was a common bandit who had no education, became a powerful and famous man after taking part in several events throughout Mexican history. His career in the military began when he was inspired by Francisco I. Madero. His career grew after he attacked Ciudad Juarez against Madero. I believe it is interesting and important for El Pasoans to know about this Mexican rebel because he not only helped lead the Mexican Revolution, he was a part of the creation of a new government in Mexico. My goal is to let El Pasoans gain insight into an important figure in the borderlands' history and how although not an American citizen his fight for freedom and justice was important to both the United States and Mexico.
The Mexican rebel was born on June 5, 1878. His name was Jose Doroteo Arango Arambula, but later changed it to Francisco "Pancho" Villa. Villa was born in the town of San Juan Del Rio in the state of Durango. He was the oldest of four children, three boys and one girl. His father's name was Agustin Arango, and his mother’s name was Micaela Arambula. Both of his parents worked as sharecroppers on one of the largest haciendas of Durango. While growing up, he experienced the harshness of peasant life. At a very young age, his father died, Villa became the man of the house and started working as a sharecropper to help and provide for his household. During this period of time, rich people were becoming richer. They grew more powerful and were taking advantage of poor people and almost treating them like slaves. One day, after Villa was coming home from his daily labor, he found one of the owners of the hacienda intending to assault his sister. Villa took justice in his own hands and shot the owner, and he ran away becoming a fugitive during his adolescence. In a matter of time, he was caught and sentenced to serve prison time. But Villa escaped again.
Image caption: Courtesy of Bain News Service, Wikimedia Commons
While being a renegade, Villa had to spend most of the time running away from the law. For a period of time, Villa was by himself and he had to do unimaginable things to be able to survive on his own but that changed after he joined a group of bandits. They would steal money from wealthy people and share their spoils with the poor. Even though he was breaking the law in many ways, he was seen as a sign of hope, and support to the needy. Villa among others fought for the freedom of the poor working class which he was also a member of. According to Jennifer Rosenberg in her biography of Villa says, “His actions could not atone for any previous felonies in his life, but his tactics as a revolutionary war commander made him an unstoppable warrior when it came to fighting". At this point, he decided to change his name, and there are different rumors on why he decided to operate under the alias of Francisco "Pancho" Villa. He did not want to be known by his real name due to his past criminal records or simply wanted to have a new beginning. Villa’s abilities of escaping and his fame as a bandit caught the attention of powerful men.
The intentions of such men were to begin a fight against the Mexican government at the time, due to major disagreements on how the government was being led. These influential men had the belief that creating a group of guerrilla fighters with the help of Francisco Villa would make their army strong enough to bring down Porfirio Diaz. The Mexican Revolution was essentially an attempt to oust Dictator Porfirio Diaz due to unsatisfactory and strong disagreements with his oligarchical policies. Porfirio Diaz's dictatorship served only to benefit the wealthy and himself by getting richer and gaining more power. At this point, Porfirio Diaz had established a centralized government for almost three decades. To be more clear, Porfirio Diaz’s presidency was based on an orderly and systematic government. He destroyed local and regional leadership until he had absolute direct control of such, and all at once this event created problems for the poor. When Diaz announced his seventh reelection, Francisco I. Madero, a reformist politician and a recognized writer, made clear his viewpoint on his reelection and became the leader of the “Antireeleccionistas” and challenged Porfirio Diaz by promising a change to the lower classes. Diaz realized Madero was a threat to him at the moment he became a candidate because he had strong proposals and ideas for a new change in the government and the support from the poor. Diaz found the best opportunity to get rid of his rival and he put Madero in prison and declared himself the winner of the election. As Jennifer Rosenberg states, “After Madero came out with a plan that later he published it and called it San Luis Potosi which was a call for a revolt. The revolt was a failure but kindled revolutionary hope.”
Francisco Villa decided to join Madero’s side and agreed to become one of his guerrilla fighters who later was made the leader. During the rebellion, lacking formal education, Villa was recruited into the revolution forcing him to learn how to read and write. Villa evolved from being one of the peasants he represented to a respected guerrilla war strategist. This motivated peasants who were willing to risk their lives against the corruption of the Mexican government to join Villa in his cause. Villa was a very effective military leader. He was feared for commanding one of the most powerful militaries. He was recognized to be an outstanding horseman and general. Because he could easily outsmart troops and take advantage of his popularity, he was able to recruit other peasants to fight for his cause. His high intelligence when executing skills to attack his enemies made him an exceptional leader and made his followers put faith in his plans. During battles, Villa would personally fight next to his soldiers and guide them through the battle. Although he was seen as merciless, Villa could not afford to show forgiveness toward traitors under his command or rivals.
Upon the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution, Francisco I. Madero was serving his administration under the Mexican general Victoriano Huerta, who later sentenced Madero to death for insubordination. Rather than executing Villa, Madero sent Villa to prison. Villa knew he had attracted attention in the United States, so he escaped from prison and ran away to the United States. Jeff Wallenfeldt explains, "The president of the United States Woodrow Wilson thought the U.S should support Pancho Villa because he considered he could become the next “George Washington '' of Mexico." After an important meeting the president had with his generals, they decided to have their first meeting with Villa. This event took place in El Paso, Texas in August 1914, where General Pershing met Villa for the first time. After Madero’s assassination, he returned to Mexico to recruit soldiers for his new military band. Villa’s military grew in size by recruiting thousands of men who supported Villa and named it Division Del Norte. At this point, Villa decided to combine forces with other revolutionaries, Venustiano Carranza and Emiliano Zapata, who had participated in the overthrow of Porfirio Diaz and wanted to continue with the rebellion by going after the new dictator, Victoriano Huerta.
However, this alliance did not last long. They were not able to work together due to disagreements and differences, and this created a rivalry between Pancho Villa and Venustiano Carranza. They divided their forces and created their own militaries against each other, but they still had a common purpose to remove Huerta from power. Christopher Minster says "Villa revolted against the increasingly repressive and inefficient dictator Huerta. Once again, proving his military talents by winning several victories." After these victories, Huerta went into exile, and Carranza named himself the new president of Mexico. When Carranza became president in 1914, Villa led his military and started to guide the rebellion against Carranza. Villa came to an agreement with Alvaro Obregon and Emiliano Zapata to combine forces to fight their hatred against Pascual Orozco and Venustiano Carranza. After a bloody and intense battle against both Orozco and Carranza, they turned on one another after realizing Villa as the most powerful and strongest of the three by having the strongest army, weapons, military knowledge and important connections with the United States. After Villa had planned the attack on the Carranza military forces, the battle of Celaya took place. The battle was not set up with military strategies. It was meant to be a fight with hatred that caused a large loss of soldiers and ended with the Division Del Norte military.
Pancho Villa always made it clear that he was never interested in assuming the presidency or any other political power. But the support of his followers and his ambitions for a better government pushed him to be involved in public administration and he became the Governor of Chihuahua during the election of 1913-1914. Villa became a successful governor by keeping control with the help and support of the generals Porfirio Talamantes, Calixto Contreras, and Toribio Ortega. He collected funds from the rich people to be able to improve the city, he ordered the repair of schools, hospitals, roads, telegraph lines and railways. He took over the land of rich people who had stolen that land from the poor and lent it back to the original families. He created a new currency and provided its value and announced that such currency should be accepted as the new legal currency. Villa proposed a new code of law and order to be able to keep control between civilians and the military troops. Even though Villa served in the political field for a short term, he proved his interest and concern about his people by improving their lives and safety.
Pancho Villa met his first wife Luz Corral in 1910, in San Andres, Chihuahua. Villa was in town to get supplies for its people. He went to Corral’s mother’s store and realized how poor her family was and he decided to help by buying supplies such as tobacco, coffee, and corn. After the first encounter with Corral, Villa kept going to their store when he needed to replenish supplies and that is how Villa and Corral kept seeing each other. Villa fell in love with Corral and asked her to marry him. After Corral’s mother found out they were getting married, she intervened because she did not approve of her daughter becoming the woman of a machista who had asked other women to marry him. Luz Corral went against her mother’s wishes, and she married Villa on May 29, 1911. They had a child together who died as an infant. Villa was known to have several other women in Mexico and in the United States. Villa would escape and hide in the United States through the border of Ciudad Juarez to El Paso. Villa would stay at several brothels where he would sleep with different prostitutes. According to Eric Aguilar, local Texas history teacher, “Pancho Villa even frequented what is now known as the house on Silver Street, which is now known as a haunted house in El Paso but was once rumored to be a brothel.” Even though he had relationships with other women, Luz Corral was his first wife, and the only one who supported him and helped him grow in his political career.
Image caption: Courtesy of Everett Raymond Kinstler, Wikimedia Commons
On March 9, 1916, a few years after Villa’s retirement from politics Villa and his military were looking to take revenge on the United States. After Villa found out that his request for support during the rebellion against Venustiano Carranza was rejected after the United States agreed on Carranza being the President of Mexico, they took his side and got involved. The revenge first took place in Santa Isabel in Northern Mexico by killing sixteen U.S citizens. A few months later, Villa and his men continued the revenge in Columbus, New Mexico. They robbed banks and munitions from the U.S army and started a battle, killing seventeen Americans. Villa and his military failed to keep on with the battle. They were easily taken down and after their defeat Villa was forced to escape back to Mexico. But this time Villa would not escape easily as usual. The United States had decided Villa was a threat to the country and they started an expedition. General John Pershing was led in charge to track down Pancho Villa. As Christopher Minster states, “Under Pershing's command, American soldiers were sent to Northern Mexico to look for and capture Pancho Villa, dead or alive.” The unsuccessful search took months, and the American soldiers had to go back to the United States with empty hands. The United States ended the expedition for the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa.
Villa was always successful from escaping from death in several attempts to be assassinated by his enemies and traitors. On multiple occasions, Villa proved his talented soldier skills and his intelligence to plan escapes. He was a step ahead by having leadership and control over the most powerful cavalry at the time. His soldiers were committed and loyal to Villa and their country and were willing to risk their own lives to protect their leader. For a number of years, Villa had been involved in many violent events that created trouble between Mexico’s military and the U.S troops. Villa did not want to escape anymore, and he wanted to retire from criminal life. Villa reached out to Adolfo De La Huerta and had a meeting where he requested to be pardoned. De La Huerta agreed to pardon Villa, but in exchange he had to leave his hatred toward enemies and keep peace in Mexico by ending his military activities and announced his retirement as the leader. Villa had finally gained freedom and he did not have to run from the government. He wanted to become a better man and wanted to have a new beginning. This event pushed him to want to start a new lifestyle and he decided to move to a hacienda with his family and his people away from his military life and criminal past.
Three years after Villa’s retirement from the military, he was assassinated on July 20, 1923. Villa was outsmarted, and his death was a collaboration planned by some of his many enemies. When Villa would leave his ranch, he would leave with a companion or he would take his fifty bodyguards, a group of men who were fully loyal to him and knew their job was to keep Villa alive, risking their own lives. But this time Villa made a mistake that later would result in tragedy. Villa started his journey to Parral by his car with fewer bodyguards than usual as protection. On July 10, 1923, Villa had arrived in town; he had been asked to be the godfather of one of his man’s children. After the baptism ceremony, Villa left with his mistress and stayed with her for a few days. On July 20, Villa returned to Canutillo. Villa’s assassins had been planning his death for several months and they were waiting for the best opportunity to make a move. They had been observing Villa’s moves and his people and they were able to track their way to them. They knew the path Villa was going to take on his return to Canutillo and they were waiting on the side of a street that connects Parral with Canutillo. The assassins had a signal to start the gunfire. As Villa drove past the street a man gave the signal “Villa, Villa", and they started to shoot Villa’s car. Villa and the other three men that were in his car at the time of the shooting died almost instantly. Only one of his bodyguards was able to escape with a few injuries. Villa and his men were buried the next day and people started wondering who gave the order.
It did not take long for people to realize that the assassination had to be well planned and had to be done by someone who was as powerful as Villa, someone who had to hire people who were willing to do the job for him. An interesting coincidence was that at the time of Villa’s visit to town, the Federal troops were sent away for a vague mission. This made it easy for the killers to perform the hit and escape without being caught. The telegraph lines were shut down, meaning there was no communication available. This issue is why it took longer for Villa’s family and his men to know Villa was killed until hours after it had already been officially announced in Parral town. The news that the Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa had died spread quickly. People who supported and followed him were seeking an explanation and wanted to find the guilty, but no one had an idea who it could have been. After a few investigations had been performed, Jesus Salas Barraza claimed to be responsible for planning Villa's death. Owing to his higher rank as a congressman, he had immunity. But Obregon sent Salas to court and was given a sentence of twenty years. Salas only served prison time for a few months because the governor of Chihuahua had let him free. Salas was never found to be guilty, and this fact makes people think that it was just a cover up and a distraction from the real head of the assassins.
The Mexican Revolution made Pancho Villa a wealthy man. The military life gave Villa experience and knowledge and the loyalty of many people who had faith in him, making a change in the government and keeping them safe. Villa was the leader of the most powerful cavalry at the time, and he and his men risked their lives for their country. Even though he had a criminal past that made him a fugitive for a few years, his recruitment into the army made him a successful warrior and hero. After years of his military career, he retired to a ranch, and was provided with a very generous pension. Even though it was well known that Villa had enemies, he was also famous and followed by even more people. The brave Mexican revolutionary, Pancho Villa, is a very intriguing and legendary character in the history of the borderlands
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