Francisco Ignacio Madero González was a Mexican businessman, revolutionary, writer and statesman, who served as the 37th president of Mexico from 1911 until he was deposed in a coup d'état in February 1913 and assassinated. He came to prominence as an advocate for democracy and as an opponent of President and de facto dictator Porfirio Díaz. After Díaz claimed to have won the fraudulent election of 1910 despite promising a return to democracy, Madero started the Mexican Revolution to oust Díaz. Madero supposedly initiated the Mexican Revolution with guidance from spirits The Mexican revolution would continue until 1920, well after Madero and Díaz's deaths, with hundreds of thousands dead.
Francisco "Pancho" Villa was a general in the Mexican Revolution. He was a key figure in the revolutionary movement that forced out President Porfirio Díaz and brought Francisco I. Madero to power in 1911. When Madero was ousted by a coup led by General Victoriano Huerta in February 1913, he joined the anti-Huerta forces in the Constitutionalist Army led by Venustiano Carranza. After the defeat and exile of Huerta in July 1914, Villa broke with Carranza. Villa dominated the meeting of revolutionary generals that excluded Carranza and helped create a coalition government. Emiliano Zapata and Villa became formal allies in this period. Like Zapata, Villa was strongly in favor of land reform, but did not implement it when he had power. At the height of his power and popularity in late 1914 and early 1915, the U.S. considered recognizing Villa as Mexico's legitimate authority.
The Mexican Revolution was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from 20 November 1910 to 1 December 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It resulted in the destruction of the Federal Army and its replacement by a revolutionary army, and the transformation of Mexican culture and government. The northern Constitutionalist faction prevailed on the battlefield and drafted the present-day Constitution of Mexico, which aimed to create a strong central government. Revolutionary generals held power from 1920 to 1940. The revolutionary conflict was primarily a civil war, but foreign powers, having important economic and strategic interests in Mexico, figured in the outcome of Mexico's power struggles; the U.S. involvement was particularly high. The conflict led to the deaths of around one million people, mostly noncombatants.
José Victoriano Huerta Márquez was a general in the Mexican Federal Army and 39th President of Mexico, who came to power by coup against the democratically elected government of Francisco I. Madero with the aid of other Mexican generals and the U.S. Ambassador to Mexico. His violent seizure of power set off a new wave of armed conflict in the Mexican Revolution.
José Venustiano Carranza de la Garza was a Mexican land owner and liberal politician who served as President of Mexico from 1917 until his assassination in 1920, during the Mexican Revolution. He was previously Mexico's de facto head of state as Primer Jefe of the Constitutionalist faction from 1914 to 1917, and previously served as a senator and governor for Coahuila. He played the leading role in drafting the Constitution of 1917 and maintained Mexican neutrality in World War I.
The Tampico Affair began as a minor incident involving U.S. Navy sailors and the Mexican Federal Army loyal to Mexican dictator General Victoriano Huerta. On April 9, 1914, nine sailors had come ashore to secure supplies and were detained by Mexican forces. Commanding Admiral Henry Mayo demanded that the U.S. sailors be released, Mexico issue an apology, and raise and salute the U.S. flag along with a 21 gun salute. Mexico refused the demand. U.S. President Woodrow Wilson backed the admiral's demand. Mexicans of all factions of the Mexican Revolution united against the U.S. demands. The conflict escalated when the Americans took the port city of Veracruz, occupying it for more than six months. This contributed to the fall of Huerta, who resigned in July 1914. Since the U.S. did not have diplomatic relations with Mexico following Huerta's seizure of power in 1913, the ABC Powers offered to mediate the conflict, in the Niagara Falls peace conference, held in Canada. The American occupation of Veracruz resulted in widespread anti-American sentiment.
Francisco León de la Barra y Quijano was a Mexican political figure and diplomat who served as the 36th President of Mexico from May 25 to November 6, 1911 during the Mexican Revolution, following the resignations of President Porfirio Díaz and Vice President Ramón Corral. He previously served as Secretary of Foreign Affairs for one month during the Díaz administration and again from 1913 to 1914 under President Victoriano Huerta. He was known to conservatives as "The White President" or the "Pure President."
The United States occupation of Veracruz began with the Battle of Veracruz and lasted for seven months. The incident came in the midst of poor diplomatic relations between Mexico and the United States, and was related to the ongoing Mexican Revolution.
Felipe Ángeles Ramírez (1868–1919) was a Mexican military officer and revolutionary during the era of the Mexican Revolution. Having risen to the rank of colonel of artillery in the Federal Army of the Porfiriato, Ángeles was promoted to general during the brief presidency of Francisco I. Madero. After the Ten Tragic Days, he became unique in the history of the revolution by becoming the only Federal general to join the revolutionary cause in northern Mexico, serving with General Pancho Villa's División del Norte.
In the history of Mexico, the Plan of Guadalupe was a political manifesto which was proclaimed on March 26, 1913, by the Governor of Coahuila Venustiano Carranza in response to the reactionary coup d'etat and execution of President Francisco I. Madero, which had occurred during the Ten Tragic Days of February 1913. The manifesto was released from the Hacienda De Guadalupe, which is where the Plan derives its name, nearly a month after the assassination of Madero. The initial plan was limited in scope, denouncing Victoriano Huerta's usurpation of power and advocating the restoration of a constitutional government. In 1914, Carranza issued "Additions to the Plan of Guadalupe", which broadened its scope and "endowed la Revolución with its social and economic content." In 1916, he further revised the Plan now that the Constitutionalist Army was victorious and revolutionaries sought changes to the 1857 Constitution of Mexico. Carranza sought to set the terms of the constitutional convention.
The Mexican Federal Army, also known as the Federales in popular culture, was the military of Mexico from 1876 to 1914 during the Porfiriato, the long rule of President Porfirio Díaz, and during the presidencies of Francisco I. Madero and Victoriano Huerta. Under President Díaz, a military hero against the French Intervention in Mexico, the Federal Army was composed of senior officers who had served in long ago conflicts. At the time of the outbreak of the Mexican Revolution most were old men and incapable of leading men on the battlefield. When the rebellions broke out against Díaz following fraudulent elections of 1910, the Federal Army was incapable of responding. Although revolutionary fighters helped bring Francisco I. Madero to power, Madero retained the Federal Army rather than the revolutionaries. Madero used the Federal Army to suppress rebellions against his government by Pascual Orozco and Emiliano Zapata. Madero placed General Victoriano Huerta as interim commander of the military during the Ten Tragic Days of February 1913 to defend his government. Huerta changed sides and ousted Madero's government. Rebellions broke out against Huerta's regime. When revolutionary armies succeeded in ousting Huerta in July 1914, the Federal Army ceased to exist as an entity, with the signing of the Teoloyucan Treaties.
The United States involvement in the Mexican Revolution was varied and seemingly contradictory, first supporting and then repudiating Mexican regimes during the period 1910–1920. For both economic and political reasons, the U.S. government generally supported those who occupied the seats of power, but could withhold official recognition. The U.S. supported the regime of Porfirio Díaz after initially withholding recognition since he came to power by coup. In 1909, Díaz and U.S. President Taft met in Ciudad Juárez, across the border from El Paso, Texas. Prior to Woodrow Wilson's inauguration on March 4, 1913, the U.S. Government focused on just warning the Mexican military that decisive action from the U.S. military would take place if lives and property of U.S. nationals living in the country were endangered. President William Howard Taft sent more troops to the US-Mexico border but did not allow them to intervene directly in the conflict, a move which Congress opposed. Twice during the Revolution, the U.S. sent troops into Mexico, to occupy Veracruz in 1914 and to northern Mexico in 1916 in a failed attempt to capture Pancho Villa. U.S. foreign policy toward Latin America was to assume the region was the sphere of influence of the U.S., articulated in the Monroe Doctrine. However the U.S. role in the Mexican Revolution has been exaggerated. It did not directly intervene in the Mexican Revolution in a sustained manner.
The Ten Tragic Days during the Mexican Revolution is the name given to the multi-day coup d'état in Mexico City by opponents of Francisco I. Madero, the democratically elected president of Mexico, between 9-19 February 1913. It instigated a second phase of the Mexican Revolution, after dictator Porfirio Díaz had been ousted and replaced in elections by Francisco I. Madero. The coup was carried out by general Victoriano Huerta and supporters of the old regime, with support from the United States.
Paul von Hintze was a German naval officer, diplomat, and politician who served as Foreign Minister of Germany in the last stages of World War I, from July to October 1918.
SS Fürst Bismarck was a Hamburg America Line (HAPAG) ocean liner. She was launched in Scotland in 1905. In 1914 she was renamed Friedrichsruh. In 1919 the United Kingdom seized her as World War I reparations. In 1921 Messageries Maritimes acquired her and renamed her Amboise. She was scrapped in Italy in 1935.
S.S. Ypiranga was a German-registered passenger/cargo steamer owned and operated by Hamburg-America Line (Hapag-Lloyd) shipping company. It was built in 1908 by Germaniawerft and measured 138.2 m × 16.76 m, and measured 8,142 gross register tons. After launch Ypiranga was found to be notoriously unsteady at sea. This was remedied by installing two water tanks near the fore and after masts on the upper deck, connected by a flying bridge. The flow of water between the tanks, controlled by regulating the movement of the air in the side branches, served to steady the ship in rough water, and it gained the reputation of being particularly steady after installation. Ypiranga's sister ship Corcovada was similarly outfitted.
Kronprinzessin Cecilie was a Hamburg America Line (HAPAG) ocean liner. She was launched in Schleswig-Holstein in 1905. Her scheduled route was between Hamburg and Mexico.
Felix A. Sommerfeld was a German secret service agent in Mexico and the United States between 1908 and 1919. He was chief of the Mexican secret service under President Francisco I. Madero, worked as a diplomat and arms buyer for Venustiano Carranza and Francisco "Pancho" Villa, and ran the Mexican portion of Germany's war strategy in North America between 1914 and 1917.
The Pact of the Embassy, also known as the Pact of the Ciudadela, is a February 19, 1913 agreement brokered by U.S. Ambassador to Mexico Henry Lane Wilson during the coup to oust democratically-elected Mexican President Francisco I. Madero. Wilson had been opposed to Madero's government from its beginning and had done everything he could to undermine it. In a period of the Mexican Revolution known as the Ten Tragic Days forces opposed to Madero had bombarded the center of Mexico City with artillery fire, with the loss of civilian life and destruction of buildings. Madero's main military man General Victoriano Huerta put up a desultory effort to combat the rebels, which some see as a "phony war". Ambassador Wilson brought together the two rival generals whose forces were responsible for the destruction, Huerta, head of the Mexican Federal Army, in whom Madero had misplaced his trust, and General Félix Díaz, nephew of Mexican ex-President Porfirio Díaz. Wilson's aim was to broker an agreement to end the bloody violence, which a number of historians see as the pretext for the ouster of Madero. Huerta changed his allegiance, now also plotting to oust Madero. The terms of the pact were that Díaz recognize Huerta as provisional president of Mexico, with Huerta allowing Díaz to name Huerta's cabinet, presumably with his own supporters. They further agreed that rather than holding quick elections, they would be delayed and that Huerta would support Díaz's candidacy. The agreement was concluded while Madero remained President of Mexico, but the U.S. Ambassador's actions strongly influenced Madero's decision to resign. According to Ambassador Wilson's memoirs, he took the action on his own account without consultation, seeing the U.S. embassy as being neutral ground for the rival generals. The signed agreement with the backing of the U.S. Ambassador persuaded President Madero and Vice President José María Pino Suárez to resign. They were arrested and they had the expectation of going into exile, as ex-President Porfirio Díaz had done in May 1911. But the two men were murdered during their transfer from the National Palace to Lecumberri National Penitentiary. Once in power, Huerta reneged on his agreement with Díaz for power-sharing and elections. Díaz went into exile. The elections promised in the pact never occurred.
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