Background
José Miguel Carrera Verdugo was born in Santiago on 15 October 1785.
José Miguel Carrera Verdugo was born in Santiago on 15 October 1785.
As a youth, he was sent by his father to Spain, where he came to know the young Argentine captain in the Spanish Army, José de San Martín. In September 1808 Carrera himself joined the Spanish Army and fought against the Napoleonic armies. He returned to Chile on July 25, 1811.
On September 4 of that year Carrera led a military coup against the government junta then controlling Chile, forcing reorganization of Congress and establishment of another government junta. However, on November 15, after a further coup, he himself became a member of a new government junta together with Bernardo O’Higgins and Gaspar Marin and Congress was dissolved. When O’Higgins and Marin resigned shortly afterward, Carrera was left in complete charge of the government.
In March 1813 Carrera was named general-in-chief to face an invasion of Spanish troops. With his defeat at the siege of Chillán in August 1813, the government junta then in charge ordered his replacement by Bernardo O’Higgins. Carrera resisted, provoking a deep enmity between the two men.
Carrera returned to Santiago, carried through a coup d’état, and again took power. O’Higgins thereupon marched on the capital from the South. When news was received of the arrival of a new Spanish expedition from Peru, O’Higgins recognized the government of Carrera and turned over the post of commander- in-chief of the army to him.
On October 1 and 2, 1814, Chilean forces suffered a disastrous defeat at the Battle of Rancagua. Spanish power was restored in the country for almost two and a half years, and all independence leaders had to flee, most of them going to Mendoza, Argentina.
José Miguel Carrera and his two brothers were coolly received by the governor of Mendoza, José de San Martín, in contrast to the warm welcome of O’Higgins. Ordered to leave the Mendoza region, the Carreras went to Buenos Aires. In November 1815 José Miguel Carrera left for the United States, where he acquired two small warships. He returned to Buenos Aires in February 1817 and again quarreled bitterly with San Martin, who had just returned from his own and O’Higgins' decisive victory over the Spaniards in the Battle of Chacabuco which assured Chile’s independence.
Carrera then moved to Montevideo. There he published a newspaper and carried on vehement polemics against San Martin and Bernardo O’Higgins. He finally organized an invasion of Argentina and was captured near the city of San Juan. Taken to Mendoza, he was tried and condemned to death on September 3, 1821, the sentence being executed on the following day.