William Walker (filibuster)

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William Walker (filibuster) bigraphy, stories - President of Nicaragua

William Walker (filibuster) : biography

May 8, 1824 – September 12, 1860

William Walker (May 8, 1824 – September 12, 1860) was an American lawyer, journalist and adventurer, who organized several private military expeditions into Latin America, with the intention of establishing English-speaking colonies under his personal control, an enterprise then known as "filibustering." Walker became president of the Republic of Nicaragua in 1856 and ruled until 1857, when he was defeated by a coalition of Central American armies, principally Costa Rica’s army. He was executed by the government of Honduras in 1860.

Influence and reputation

William Walker convinced many Southerners of the desirability of creating a slave-holding empire in tropical Latin America. In 1861, when U.S. Senator John J. Crittenden proposed that the 36°30′ parallel north be declared as a line of demarcation between free and slave territories, some Republicans denounced such an arrangement, saying that it "would amount to a perpetual covenant of war against every people, tribe, and State owning a foot of land between here and Tierra del Fuego."

Before the end of the American Civil War, Walker’s memory enjoyed great popularity in the southern and western United States, where he was known as "General Walker" and as the "grey-eyed man of destiny." Northerners, on the other hand, generally regarded him as a pirate. Despite his intelligence and personal charm, Walker consistently proved to be a limited military and political leader. Unlike men of similar ambition, such as Cecil Rhodes, Walker’s grandiose scheming ultimately failed.

In Central American countries, the successful military campaign of 1856–1857 against William Walker became a source of national pride and identity, and it was later promoted by local historians and politicians as substitute for the war of independence that Central America had not experienced. April 11 is a Costa Rican national holiday in memory of Walker’s defeat at Rivas. Juan Santamaría, who played a key role in that battle, is honored as one of the two Costa Rican national heroes, the other one being Juan Rafael Mora himself.

Although Walker is far better known today in Central America than he is in the United States, he does have a number of interesting ties to Nashville, Tennessee, the city of his birth. Locally, Walker is remembered as the only native Nashvillian ever to become a head of state, and a historical marker commemorates his birthplace, downtown not far from Second Avenue.

Early life

Walker was born in Nashville, Tennessee, in 1824 to James Walker and his wife Mary Norvell. His father was a son of a Scottish immigrant. His mother was a daughter of Lipscomb Norvell, an American Revolutionary War officer from Virginia. One of Walker’s maternal uncles was John Norvell, a US Senator from Michigan and founder of the Philadelphia Inquirer. GenForum

William Walker graduated summa cum laude from the University of Nashville at the age of fourteen. He spent the next two years in Europe, studying medicine at the universities of Edinburgh, Heidelberg, Göttingen, and Paris. The revolutions of 1848 took place during his stay in Europe; the political minds of the time, which include Garibaldi, Marx, Mazzini, Feuerbach, Engels, and Blanc, influenced his filibustering aspirations. At the age of 19, he received a medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania and practiced briefly in Philadelphia before moving to New Orleans to study law.

He practiced law for a short time, but quit to become co-owner and editor of the New Orleans Crescent. In 1849, he moved to San Francisco, California, where he was a journalist and fought three duels, in two of which he was wounded. Walker now conceived the idea of conquering vast regions of Latin America, where he would create new slave states to join the federal union. These campaigns were known as filibustering or freebooting.

Conquest of Nicaragua

Since there was no inter-oceanic route joining the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans at the time, and the transcontinental railway had not been completed, a major trade route between New York City and San Francisco ran through southern Nicaragua. Ships from New York would enter the San Juan River from the Atlantic and sail across Lake Nicaragua. People and goods would then be transported by stagecoach over a narrow strip of land near the city of Rivas, before reaching the Pacific and being shipped to San Francisco. The commercial exploitation of this route had been granted by Nicaragua to the Accessory Transit Company, controlled by Wall Street tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt (see also Nicaragua Canal).