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Giving Peru a Voice: Federico Larrañaga and El Canal de Panamá

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

C. Norman Guice
C. Norman Guice*
Affiliation:
Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan
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Extract

Although he lacked express authority to do so Federico Larrañaga used official funds to create, and then sustain, a newspaper in Panamá. He was then the Peruvian Consul General and his journal, named El Canal de Panamá in honor of the then-current effort of De Lessups and his company to open a route across the Isthmus, first appeared in early 1881 and continued to be published under his management until April 1883. Originally designed to be a tri-weekly, published in three languages (Spanish, English, and French), it offered, first in a tri-weekly form and then later in weekly and daily versions, a vigorous rivalry to the long-established Panama Star and Herald, at that time basically an English-language daily with a Spanish section.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 39 , Issue 1 , July 1982 , pp. 85 - 106
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1982

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References

1 Biographical data on Larrañaga is difficult to come by, and the usual sources, including military and consular records, have produced very little. He apparently came from a prominent Lima family, had attained a colonelcy in the Peruvian army, and was, by the early 1870’s, an ardent follower of Nicolas de Piérola, participating in the Talisman expedition in 1874 and in the capture of the Huascar in 1876 (for brief accounts of these abortive revolutionary enterprises, see Jorge, Basadre. Historia de la Republica del Perú (6th edition), Vol. 6, 401–416 Google Scholar; Vol. VIII, 237–245.) He had, at some point, been retired from the army, either because of his political acts or because of injuries or wounds suffered, and had been in exile on at least two occasions, most notably so after the Huascar episode. He had returned to Peru, in spite of his proscription, in mid 1879, bent on offering his services in the war against Chile. Although he had been jailed briefly, he had been freed, then, shortly afterwards had been named, probably because of Piérola, Consul General in Panamá. He occupied, in that position, a key post, in that it was through Panamá that Peru maintained its contacts with the outside world and received its supplies of arms and munitions. And it was in Panamá too that the colonel, lame in one leg and frequently ill, but daring, outspoken and bitterly partisan, quick to note and answer any slight or slur, willing to personally escort cargoes through the blockade if necessary, and constantly seeking to advance the causes he favored, would add to his reputation as a Peruvian and pierolista. The Panama Star and Herald, still in existence today as the Estrella de Panama, had been founded as an English-language paper in 1849 by California-bound gold seekers and had proved to be so profitable that they had chosen to remain in Panamá. For a brief, somewhat chatty, history, see Niemeeir, , Gilbreath, Jean. The Panama Story, Metropolitan Press, Portland, Oregon, 1968 Google Scholar. The Canal appeared in tri-weekly form only until June, 1881, when a weekly edition (later called the “steamer edition”) began to appear as well. That latter edition would continue to appear through the rest of the paper’s life, but the tri-weekly form was replaced with a daily “evening edition” in mid 1882. Insofar as can be determined no complete file of any of these editions survive. The National Library in Lima, in its Sección de Investigaciones Bibliográficas, has a nearly complete file for 1881 and the early months of 1882, though this represents a somewhat mixed bag of tri-weekly and weekly editions. Bancroft Library of the University of California, Berkeley, has microfilm runs for portions of 1881,1882, and 1883. The American Antiquarian Society, Worcester, Massachusetts, has an almost complete file of the “steamer” edition, though only those sections that were in English and French, for the months from March through August, 1882. Finally, the Estrella de Panamá is reported to have a considerable run of the Canal, though the present writer has yet to gain access to these materials.

2 Larrañaga to Nicholas de Piérola, Panamá, January 12, 1881; Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, January 26,1881 ; Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, February 9,1881, all in Vol. 19, Archivo de Piérola (hereinafter cited as A de P), Biblioteca Nacional, Lima. The news of the Peruvian defeats and the occupation of Lima did not reach Panamá until approximately February 1st, see Panama, Star and Herald, February 1, 1881.Google Scholar

3 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, January 12, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 19.

4 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, January 26, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 19.

5 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, February 9, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 19.

6 Star and Herald, February 28, 1881.

7 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, March 2, 1881, and March 15, 1881, in A de P, Vol. 19. He also indicated that he had used his salary funds to guarantee a portion of the press repair costs.

8 Larrañaga to Piérola, March 23, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 19. The monthly subsidy to the Star and Herald was $500, and a similar amount had been paid to the Hispano Americano, so that the amounts saved could be turned to the support of the new paper. El Orden was the official organ of the Magdalena or “provisional” government of Francisco García Calderon, the Civilista party successor, in Lima and its environs, to Piérola, which the Chilean conqueror had permitted to appear. La Actualidad was a Chilean occupation force newspaper then appearing in Lima. Larrañaga said that he had also utilized the Sanz funds to move the munitions he was holding to new and cheaper storage facilities and to prepare himself to ship them on the Peru when opportunity offered.

9 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, April 6 and April 7,1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 20. Perhaps as evidence to support his statement about the newsworthiness of any items from Piérola, he referred to the world wide coverage he had gotten by paying the Star and Herald to publish Piérola’s letter to him from Canta of January 21st, in which he had announced his move to the sierra and his continued fight against the Chileans. Larrañaga did not say then, though he would do so in a later letter, that had been the only message he had received from Piérola since the fall of Lima.

10 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, April 13, 1881, in A de Ρ Vol. 20.

11 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, April 20, and April 27, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 20. Apparently neither the French editor or Merchant Cuba ever arrived, but Polo, already established as a Peruvian newspaperman and widely known as a pierolista, became the general editor almost immediately upon the paper’s establishment, and remained in that position until he was replaced in early 1882.

12 Larrañaga to Piérola April 27, and May 4, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 20. Shortly after the second of these letters had been written Larrañaga received a Piérola letter, but from the younger brother, Carlos, convalescing from battle wounds in Lima, rather than Nicholas. While this served momentarily to satisfy him it did not provide the support he felt he needed, so that, within a few days he was again writing to ask the authority he sought. His “more than twenty” letters were, he said, unanswered, and he was “like a mariner without a compass, without directions.” He had asked for orders from “you, from Montero, from Solar, but nothing, nothing” had come back. Larrañaga to Caros Piérola, Panamá, May 10, and Larrañaga to Piérola, May 12, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 20.

13 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, July 27, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 20.

14 While the subject is somewhat in dispute, the Star and Herald claims to have been a member of the Associated Press from its date of origin in 1848. It certainly belonged to the organization by 1853. Niemeier, op cit., 20. Star and Herald, May 28, 1881, said, upon the Canal, after commending it for its improved quarters, “we note decided evidence of enterprise since the removal. Instead of confining itself to the publication of news by mail, sometimes a month or so old, the Canal now actually gives its readers the benefit of the Star and Herald cable dispatches, with a delay of a day or two after they have appeared in this paper. This is a step in the right direction, and could only be improved by that journal obtaining these dispatches in a way which would be more pleasing to the W.I. & P.T. Company, viz. by paying for them.” This was but the first of such comments, and seem to have ultimately driven the Canal to enter into an agreement to pay the cable company its toll charges, for by early 1882 the paper began to indicate its obligation to the Cable Company, rather than to its rival, for the cable dispatches carried.

15 Canal, May 17, 1881.

16 Canal, August 30, 1881.

17 El Canal, September 28,1881. The date cited in the epitaph was that judged to represent the fall of the “Provisional” government because the Chileans had, on that occasion, disarmed the “celadores,” the armed guards created by the García Calderon government. A somewhat similar “epitaph” would be printed in the Canal (October 15,1881) to celebrate the fall of its hated rival El Orden, the civilista newspaper which was forcibly closed by the Chileans on October 6th.

18 Ricardo Palma to Piérola, Lima, June 27, 1881, in A de P, Vol. 20. This “cronica,” along with a series of others which Palma directed to Piérola, have been published by Ugarte, Ruben Vargas under the title of Richardo Palma: Cartas inéditas, Lima, 1964 Google Scholar. Larrañaga would later tell Carlos De Piérola that he was shipping 525 copies of the Canal to Lima, to be sold or distributed there. Larrañaga to C. Piérola, Panamá, August 31, 1881 in A de Ρ, Vol. 21.

19 José Toribio Polo to Piérola, Panamá, October 5, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 21.

20 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, October 5, 1881, in A de P. Vol. 21. The García Calderon government had already attempted to force Larrañaga’s retirement when, in June, it had notified him that it was cancelling his appointment. He had answered, according to the published version, that he didn’t consider the “provisorio” more “than a phantom of a government, formed by a handful of traitors and with no authority whatever …” El Canal, June 30, 1881.

21 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, November 16, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 22.

22 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, November 24, 1881, in A de Ρ, Vol. 22. No other accounts have been discovered that would give a similar breakdown for the remaining months of Canal’s life. Larrañaga would, upon his return to Lima in 1883, turn all of his accounts over to the government then existing, that of Miguel Iglesias, but it is doubtful that these had been entirely cleared or approved by the time of Larrañaga’s death in May, 1884. See, Larrañaga to Piérola, Lima, September 14, 1883 and May 3, 1884, in A de P, Vols. 31 and 32, asking Piérola’s help in getting his accounts through the special accounting office created by the government. See also, Panama Star and Herald, December, 14, 1883, for its despatch on that tribunal, mentioning the consideration by that body of Larrañaga’s accounts.

23 For the brief accounts of the events leading to Piérola’s retirement to Lima, see Basadre, op. cit., VIII, 325-364. For accounts on Polo’s dismissal, see Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, January 24, 1881, and Polo to Piérola, Panamá, January 25,1881, both in A de Ρ, Vol. 28, El Canal, in its issue of January 26, 1882, carried a brief announcement of Polo’s departure. San Juan’s succession was not announced until the issue of March 1, 1882, which said that beginning with the next issue he would be in charge.

24 Larrañaga to Sr. Armando Reclus, Agente Superior de la Companía del Canal Interoceánico, Panamá, March 2, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28; Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, March 8, 1882, in A de P, Vo. 28. The large masthead map would continue to appear on all editions for a short time but would, within a few months, disappear from all editions except the weekly or steamer ones, though a much smaller version of the map would be carried in a box atop the left side of the first page of the other editions.

25 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, April 12, 1882, and Manuel A. San Juan to Piérola, Panamá, April 15, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28. In another letter, Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, April 15,1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28, Larrañaga asked Piérola then on his way to France, to attempt to take his request for support directly to De Lessups, in order to bypass Reclus. The April 15th letters also told of Larrañaga’s recent duel with “un tal” Sempé, whose public challenge to Larrañaga had appeared in the Star and Herald on April 12, 1882.

26 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, May 6, Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, May 20, and Larrañaga to Piérola, May 21, 1882, in A de P, Vol. 28. James Boyd’s brother, his principal heir, was described as “hare-brained and vicious,” and his other heirs, his mother and sisters, wished to sell so that they could go back to live in Ireland. Larrañaga also estimated that the Star was producing, in the last three years, $15,800.00 in advertising, $8,000.00 in subscriptions, odd job printing $11,000.00 and Central American subventions some $13,000.00 Both San Juan and Neto added their voices to the plea for the Star’s purchase. San Juan to Piérola, Panamá, May 6, and Neto to Piérola, Panama, May 20, 1882, in A de P, Vo. 28. Piérola’s notes on all of the above indicate that he answered them, from Paris, on June 6th, though there is no indication of his exact answers. In any case, the Boyd family decided to keep the paper in its hands, where it remained until it was finally sold in 1894.

27 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, June 7, 1882, in A de P, Vol. 28. Palma, too, had begun to doubt that Piérola would do anything to save the paper and culminated a series of pessimistic statements about Piérola by saying in a letter to Larrañaga in July, that “our friend” was “indolent and forgetful, to the ninth degree.” Palma to Larrañaga, Lima, July 5, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28.

28 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, June 11, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28. He said that he could have, somewhat earlier, sold the munitions to two commisioners from Lima for $10,000.00 “en oro.” He also asked Piérola to see if “García” could discover what was happening to his attempt to sell some of his wife’s jewels through a Bordeaux agent—he had gotten 4000 francs, with the remaining 8000 to be paid after the sale. But he had heard nothing more. He added that he had “only $200 and his furniture left and that would be gotten rid of if the situation called for it.”

29 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, July 8, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28. He said that the new agent was somewhat noncommital, but had turned over a good bit of job work to him. For comments in the Star and Herald on the situation see the issues of July 7th and 8th. For later developments with regard to the canal company see below p. 20.

30 Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, July 14, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28.

31 El Canal, Oct 25, 1882. If a formal agreement between Larrañaga and the Canal Company existed no copy of it seems to have survived, nor, for that matter, has any report from Larrañaga to Piérola directly touching upon the matter seem to have survived. Soteldo’s name was carried on the masthead as the editor from that issue until the one of January 23, 1883, when San Juan’s name reappeared as that of the director. The monthly review of Canal Company operations promised seemed to have appeared only once, in the issue of December 22nd. In general too, the pro-Peruvian slant was present at all times, in spite of the promises made.

32 The events of the Venezuelan trip are covered in a series of letters written by Larrañaga to Piérola between July 21st (when he told of his intention to leave Panamá) and September 30th (from New York, en route back to Panamá), with interim reports from Caracas on July 31st, August 4th, August 5th, and August 27th. The entire series are to be found in A de Ρ, Vol. 28. While he was absent from Panamá, Β. Neto reported to Piérola from Panamá on August 5th and 16th. Also, Vol. 28 of A de P. Larrañaga’s return to Panamá was noted in the October 9th issue of the Star and Herald.

33 Carlos de Piérola to Piérola, Panamá, October 29, 1882, and Larrañaga to Piérola, Barranquilla, November 1, 1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28.

34 Larrañaga to Piérola, Havana, November 11,1882; Larrañaga to Piérola, Veracruz, November 15, 1882; Larrañaga to Piérola, Veracruz, December 30,1882, in A de Ρ, Vol. 28; he also sent Piérola, a “memorandum de mi viaje á Mexico” which contained his letters to Mariscal, plus other materials, see A de Ρ, Vol. 29. He would, at a much later date, publish an account of his Mexican venture, plus his experiences in Central America, in pamphlet form, under the title of Viaje á Méjico y CentroAmerica por Federico Larrañaga, Consul General del Perú en Panamá, using his own press at El Canal. He had gone to Mexico convinced not only in the justice of his cause but also hopeful that González, crippled by the loss of an arm, would look with special favor upon a fellow sufferer, but he left with a feeling that Prado “that supreme nullity” was a collosus when placed alongside the Mexican president. Larrañaga to Piérola, St. Thomas, January 15, 1883, in A de Ρ, Vol. 30.

35 Larrañaga, Viaje, op. cit.; Neto to Piérola, Panamá, March 24, 1883, in A de Ρ, Vol. 30. President Rufino Barrios of Guatemala, though he had once been active in supporting the Peruvian cause, refused to help Larrañaga and, according to Neto, was active in persuading Salvador to join him in that refusal.

36 El Canal, April 19, 1883. Apparently Miguel Marisca, who was already on the Canal’s staff, took over the management and renewed its operations, for he is listed as Director in the one copy published after April 19th which this writer has seen to this time, that is an issue of the weekly edition published on June 2nd, 1883, which is in the possession of the American Antiquarian Society. The November 20th, 1883, issue of the Star and Herald states that Marisca had left Panama on that day’s steamer, taking with him to Callao the Canal press and its equipment.

37 San Juan to Piérola, Panamá, April 26th, 1883, in A de Ρ, Vol. 30. Larrañaga learned of these comments, along with others of a like character which he charged that San Juan had made. Upon confronting San Juan he was told that the statements were made “jokingly,” but Larrañaga did not believe him. He also reported that he had managed to settle all his accounts, in part with the five thousand pesos he had received as a personal loan from the president of El Salvador. He was left with $870.00. “Which was what he had gotten from the sale of his furniture” and that would be used to pay the pasages of all the Canal’s employees who wished to return to Lima. He also reported that he had received instructions from the Iglesias government to be prepared to ship the munitions and the press to Lima. Larrañaga to Piérola, Panamá, June 20th, 1883 in A de P. Vol. 30.

38 He did not manage to leave Panamá until early August, when he was finally relieved. He was offered a position in the government by Iglesias, but refused to accept it after consulting with friends in Lima. He would soon, however, become the publisher of a pierolista journal in Lima, El Bien Público, which made its appearance in early September, 1883, and Neto was soon with him on that journal (and similarly employed, apparently, in writing near-libelous doggerel,) for the two of them were arrested and briefly jailed in late January, 1884, after publishing “some observations in verse respecting the prefect of Lima, Don Ignacio de Osma, that were calculated to wound the honor and excite the indignation of that distinguished official,” reported the Star and Herald on February 12th). He would also be named senator for the southern province of Islay in the national congress called by Iglesias to ratify the Treaty of Ancon, which would finally bring a formal end to the War of the Pacific. While still serving in those capacities and just after he had been named Counsul General in New York City (one of the four filltime consular posts created) he died on May 28th, 1884. In eulogizing him apparently little was said of his labors to create and maintain the Canal, though, as the Star and Herald reported it “Great demonstrations of respect were paid to his memory. The flag in the municipal building was half masted, and in the funeral cortege were represented the Government, the courts, and the most distinguished inhabitants of the capital. The eminant and more than valuable service of Colonel Larrañaga during the war, in supplying his country with material of war despite the vigilance of the Chilean cruisers, are still remembered with gratitude.” Star and Herald, June 17, 1884.