| Capture of Mexico City | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Part of the Second French intervention in Mexico | |||||||
 Entrance of the French Expeditionary Corps into Mexico | |||||||
| |||||||
| Belligerents | |||||||
 Mexican Republic |  French Empire  Mexican Empire | ||||||
| Commanders and leaders | |||||||
| Élie Frédéric Forey | |||||||
French-led forces captured Mexico City on 10 June 1863. It was part of the Second French intervention in Mexico.
With the French victory at the Siege of Puebla, the position of the Mexican Republic government was untenable and Benito Juárez decided to abandon the capital and continue the war through guerrilla warfare.
As soon as the federal government left the capital, General Bruno Martinez, commander of the garrison of the town, issued a manifesto in favor of intervention, recognizing French commanding general Élie Frédéric Forey as the highest authority in Mexico.
On June 10, the bulk of the French army entered Mexico City under the direct command of General Forey, and captured it for the Second French Empire. Soon after, the French established a puppet state in the form of emperor Maximilian. The war continued however as French forces continued to secure the country and as Mexican guerillas continued to harass the invaders. [1]
The Pastry War, also known as the first French intervention in Mexico or the first Franco-Mexican war (1838–1839), began in November 1838 with the naval blockade of some Mexican ports and the capture of the fortress of San Juan de Ulúa in the port of Veracruz by French forces sent by King Louis Philippe I. It ended in March 1839 with a British-brokered peace. The intervention followed many claims by French nationals of losses due to unrest in Mexico. This would be the first of two French invasions of Mexico; a second, larger intervention would take place in the 1860s.
José de la Cruz Porfirio Díaz Mori, was a Mexican general and dictator who served on three separate occasions as President of Mexico, a total of over 30 years, from 28 November 1876 to 6 December 1876, 17 February 1877 to 1 December 1880, and 1 December 1884 to 25 May 1911. The period from 1876 to 1911 is often referred to as the Porfiriato, and has been called a de facto dictatorship.
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The Battle of Puebla, also known as the Battle of May 5 took place on 5 May 1862, near Puebla de los Ángeles, during the second French intervention in Mexico. French troops under the command of Charles de Lorencez repeatedly failed to storm the forts of Loreto and Guadalupe situated on top of the hills overlooking the city of Puebla, and eventually retreated to Orizaba in order to await reinforcements. Lorencez was dismissed from his command, and French troops under Élie Frédéric Forey would eventually take the city, but the Mexican victory at Puebla against a better equipped force provided patriotic inspiration to the Mexicans.
Miguel Gregorio de la Luz Atenógenes Miramón y Tarelo, known as Miguel Miramón, was a Mexican conservative general who disputed the Mexican presidency with Benito Juarez at the age of twenty seven during the Reform War, serving between February 1859 and December 1860. He was the first Mexican president to be born after the Mexican War of Independence.
The Second Mexican Empire, officially known as the Mexican Empire, was a constitutional monarchy established in Mexico by Mexican monarchists with the support of the Second French Empire. This period is often referred to as the Second French intervention in Mexico. French Emperor Napoleon III, with backing from Mexican conservatives, the clergy, and nobility, aimed to establish a monarchist ally in the Americas as a counterbalance to the growing power of the United States.
Juan Nepomuceno Almonte Ramírez was a Mexican soldier, commander, minister of war, congressman, diplomat, presidential candidate, and regent. The natural son of Catholic cleric José María Morelos, a leading commander during the Mexican War of Independence, Almonte played an important role as a conservative in the Mexican Republic. He served as Minister of War during multiple administrations as well as in various diplomatic posts in the United States and in Europe. In 1840 he led government forces in an attempt to rescue president Anastasio Bustamante after the president was taken hostage by rebels in the National Palace. Almonte was minister to the United States in the years leading up to the Mexican American War and lobbied against its interference in Texas, which Mexico considered a rebellious province. Almonte was a leading figure in conservative efforts to re-establish monarchy in Mexico, supporting the French imperial forces during the Second French Intervention in Mexico and the establishment Second Mexican Empire under Maximilian I of Mexico. Almonte was serving as a diplomat in France when France withdrew military support of the Empire, which fell in 1867. He died two years later in 1869.
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The second French intervention in Mexico, also known as the Second Franco-Mexican War (1861–1867), was a military invasion of the Republic of Mexico by the French Empire of Napoleon III, purportedly to force the collection of Mexican debts in conjunction with Great Britain and Spain. Mexican conservatives supported the invasion, since they had been defeated by the liberal government of Benito Juárez in a three-year civil war. Defeated on the battlefield, conservatives sought the aid of France to effect regime change and establish a monarchy in Mexico, a plan that meshed with Napoleon III's plans to re-establish the presence of the French Empire in the Americas. Although the French invasion displaced Juárez's Republican government from the Mexican capital and the monarchy of Archduke Maximilian was established, the Second Mexican Empire collapsed within a few years. Material aid from the United States, whose four-year civil war ended in 1865, invigorated the Republican fight against the regime of Maximilian, and the 1866 decision of Napoleon III to withdraw military support for Maximilian's regime accelerated the monarchy's collapse.
The Reform War, or War of Reform, also known as the Three Years' War, and the Mexican Civil War, was a complex civil conflict in Mexico fought between Mexican liberals and conservatives with regional variations over the promulgation of Constitution of 1857. It has been called the "worst civil war to hit Mexico between the War of Independence of 1810–21 and the Revolution of 1910–20". Following the liberals' overthrow of the dictatorship of conservative Antonio López de Santa Anna, liberals passed a series of laws codifying their political program. These laws were incorporated into the new constitution. It aimed to limit the political power of the executive branch, as well as the political, economic, and cultural power of the Catholic Church. Specific measures were the expropriation of Church property; separation of church and state; reduction of the power of the Mexican Army by elimination of their special privileges; strengthening the secular state through public education; and measures to develop the nation economically.
Élie Frédéric Forey was a Marshal of France.
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The Commemorative medal of the Mexico Expedition was a French commemorative campaign medal established by decree of French Emperor Napoleon III on 29 August 1863 to recognize military service during the 1862-1863 French intervention in Mexico.
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A referendum on Maximilian becoming Emperor was held in Mexico on 4 December 1863. The proposal was supposedly approved by 100% of voters, with not a single vote cast against. Maximilian subsequently took the throne on 11 April 1864, starting the era of the Second Mexican Empire.
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