January 18, 1914
Emiliano Zapata signs a treaty with
Julián Blanco, the rebel chief in
Guerrero.
March 9, 1914
The allied rebel force, led by Julián Blanco,
Jesús
Salgado, and Heliodoro Castillo, surround the city of
Chilpancingo.
March 14, 1914
Emiliano Zapata and his men close in on
the city of Chilpancingo.
March 16, 1914
Pancho Villa
advances from Chihuahua City toward Torreón, which had
been reoccupied by the federals. Riding among Villa's outfit was
General Felipe Ángeles, now a commander of Villa's Division
of the North.
Yes, but after
Francisco I. Madero's assassination,
Victoriano Huerta let Felipe go and sent him to Europe, to France of all
places. Felipe sneaked back into Mexico and joined
Venustiano Carranza's rebel
army. In fact, Carranza made Felipe Secretary of War. Also fighting
for Carranza was Pancho Villa. Pancho and Felipe became close
friends. So close, that one day in the future Pancho
will say about Angeles that "he taught me there was such a thing as
mercy."
Anyway, that's the reason why they are
riding together today.
March 17, 1914 Agustín
Breton succeeds Adolfo Jiménez Castro as governor of
Morelos.
March 22 - 26, 1914 Battle of Gómez Palacio.
Pancho Villa takes
Gómez Palacio,
a city in the state of Durango. About
1,000 men are dead and 3,000 wounded. Villa is on the roll and sends
his troops direction Torreón.
April 8, 1914
Rebel leader Jesús Salgado and his men take Iguala.
Zapata
moves headquarters to Tlaltizapán. Zapata's permanent problem is the lack
of arms and ammunition.
April 9, 1914
For years, the U.S. maintained warships in the Mexican Gulf. Today,
a party of US sailors including their captain went
ashore at the port of Tampico to purchase oil for their gunboat
USS Dolphin.
As they had landed in a restricted dock area, the federal
commander of the town Pablo González decides to detain the
Americans for an hour and a half. He then escorts them back to their
whaleboat. He apologizes for the incident but Rear Admiral
Henry
T. Mayo and later US President
Woodrow Wilson demand a formal
apology in the form of a hoisted U.S. flag accompanied by a 21 gun salute.
Mexican president
Victoriano Huerta refuses and US
president Wilson tells his Marines to pack their bundles and get ready for a
little excursion.
April 14, 1914
Woodrow Wilson orders the rest of the U.S. Atlantic Fleet to Tampico.
April 15, 1914
Pancho Villa
enters San Pedro De Las Colonias.
April 21 - November 14, 1914 Veracruz Incident. American
forces occupy the Mexican port of Veracruz, Mexico's principal port.
AMERICAN TROOPS IN VERACRUZ Library of Congress
(?)
April 22, 1914
The port of Veracruz is firmly in American hands. Nineteen people
killed, 70 wounded. Hundreds of Mexican casualties.
The US Embassy
in Mexico was closed at the request of the Mexican authorities.
Nelson O'Shaughnessy sticks around
in his function as chargé d'affaires for the US, which
basically means temp ambassador.
April 24, 1914 Pablo González takes Monterrey without any resistance.
US President
Woodrow Wilson authorizes mobilization of the regular army 54,000 troops
strong and 150,000 National Guards.
As a result, a huge anti-American wave
sweeps throughout Mexico. All totalitarians, revolutionaries, and
counter revolutionaries, no matter how hostile towards each other,
make collectively known that they'd rather kiss
Huerta
on the lips
than sit back and let the U.S. invade their country.
American properties are burnt
everywhere. This is not a good time for American honeymoons in
Cancun.
End of April 1914
Only Jojutla and Cuernavaca are left as federal strongholds in
Morelos.
Emiliano Zapata besieges Jojutla with a troop ratio of 3 to 1. The
1,200 federal troops are defeated and Zapata takes the town.
June 2, 1914 Zapata
starts
the Siege of Cuernavaca. The
surrounded federal troops are led by General Romero.
June 9, 1914
About 2,000 men under Colonel Hernandez manage to force
their way
through to and into the besieged city of Cuernavaca.
June 10, 1914 Zapata
orders to pull back
and to retreat into the hills. Only a few troops are to remain there for the siege, the
rest moves direction Mexico City.
June 13, 1914
Pancho Villa resigns
his post in
Venustiano Carranza's
army. Carranza is happy and asks his generals to
pick Pancho's successor.
June 14, 1914
Carranza's generals
declare that they are not content with
Pancho Villa's
leaving.
June 17, 1914
Without consulting
Carranza,
Pancho Villa moves on with his men toward Zacatecas.
Unknown to the Zapatistas, the
Congress of the Union dissolves the state of Morelos and establishes
it in the Federal territory under the same name.
June 21, 1914
Pan American Union director
John Barrett
attends conference with several "Mexicans of prominence,
representing both sides of the present controversy" of finding a new
leader for Mexico.
In a New York Times article the next
day, Barrett comments on "finding a suitable man for provisional
President - one whom both sides cannot successfully prove to be
unsatisfactory. It may be difficult to find one whom both sides will
readily accept without any question, but eventually one will be
found against whom valid and final objections cannot be logically
maintained in the face of the demand of all America for peace.
Certainly such a man exists, and I believe that the mediators will
be able to name him within the next three weeks."
June 23, 1914 Battle of Zacatecas.
Pancho Villa takes Zacatecas. He claims that only 200 of the 12,000
defenders of the city managed to escaped.
End of June 1914 Zapata's army moves into the Federal District.
July 4, 1914
Villa-Carranza peace conference at Torreon. See photo below.
Villa-Carranza peace conference, Torreon Left to right: Miguel Silva, Antonio J.
Villarreal, Isabel Robles, Rogue
Gonzalez Garza, Ernesto Meade Fierro, Yngeniero Manuel Bonilla,
Cesareo Castro, Luis Caballero
July 9, 1914
Huerta
begins to prepare his escape. He makes Chief Justice
Francisco S. Carvajal Secretary of Foreign Relations.
July 15, 1914
Huerta
submits his resignation to the Chamber of Deputies and flees to
Puerto México.
July 17, 1914
Huerta
boards the German cruiser Dresden and sails into exile
in Spain.
July 18, 1914
Huerta's resignation didn't change a thing for
Zapata. He keeps on
going and attacks Milpa Alta.
In the north, the
Constitutionalists defeat the government forces and capture San
Luis Potosí.
July 19, 1914 Zapata
issues the
Act of Ratification of the Plan of Ayala.
The essential points being:
The agrarian provisions
of the
Plan
of Ayala must become constitutional.
The campaign will not end until all
characters of the old regime are thrown out and replaced by a
new government consisting of men devoted to the Plan of Ayala.
July 28, 1914
Carranza's representatives visit
with
Zapata. Zapata sticks to his
Plan
of Ayala and doesn't accept deviations.
August 11, 1914
Carranzatakes the train to Teoloyucan to chat with the enemy. Teoloyucan
is located only 20 miles north of Mexico City. The interim president
Carvajal
had already fled into exile on Huerta's heels.
Carranza reaches agreement that his
constitutionalist forces, led by
Alavaro Obregón, would take over Mexico
City without bloodshed. The federal troops would stay put until the
last minute to prevent Zapata's troops to enter the city first. When
Carranza's men will be in position, the federal troops will withdraw
direction Puebla, which is in other words direction
Zapata.
Obregon insists that the Feds must leave
arms and ammunition behind.
August 13, 1914
The War Department surrenders the federal army to
Obregon at Teoloyucan. On the same day,
Zapata's
troops enter
Cuernavaca, state capital of
Morelos.
August 14, 1914 Lorenzo Vázquez is the new governor of
Morelos. He will remain
as such until May 2, 1916.
August 15, 1914
Obregon enters Mexico City meeting no opposition. The Federal Army
was disbanded by the Convenios de Teoloyucán (Treaty of Teoloyucan).
August 16, 1914
Carranzawrites
Zapata, grants him a personal interview. Zapata
writes back to meet at Yautepec.
August 21, 1914 Emiliano
Zapata
writes to Lucio Blanco "that this
Carranzadoes not
inspire much confidence in me. I see in him much ambition, and an
inclination to fool the people."
Zapata writes to
Pancho Villa, warning him that
Carranza's ambitions were very dangerous and likely to precipitate
another war.
Last week of August 1914
Venustiano Carranzasends an envoy to meet with
Zapata
and his men at
Cuernavaca. Carranza's agents indicate Carranza's refusal of the
agrarian policies insisted upon by Zapata and his men. They are
subsequently made hostages to guarantee safe transit of
Pancho Villa's
emissaries through Mexico City.
August 25, 1914 Pancho Villa's
representatives meet with
Emiliano
Zapata. Zapata gives them a letter
to Villa, stating that the "time has come for a provisional
government to be established."
Late in August 1914 Emiliano
Zapata publishes another manifest, showing his disappointment, and
declaring that he won't yield to the false promises of the
Constitutionalist leaders.
Historian John Womack notes that
"Carranza was politically obsolete. ... In
Morelos now allegiance to
a man like Carranza was impossible. ... Villa felt the same and he
received Zapata's letter with sympathetic agreement."
September 3, 1914 Pancho Villa meets with
Alavaro Obregón, the leader of the
Constitutionalist
advance into Mexico City on August 15, at Chihuahua City. As a
result, the men came up with a 9-point plan designed to eliminate
the danger of further war.
One stipulation was that
Venustiano Carranzashould
be interim president and charged with arranging presidential
elections, which would exclude Carranza himself.
In the meantime, Carranza felt that the
presidential chair was rather comfy. Why move.
September 5, 1914
Carranzapress interview. He refuses to accept the
Plan of Ayala. He
refuses to agree that a revolutionary convention assembles to name
an interim president. But he says he is willing to discuss an
agrarian reform and he invites
Zapata's
Army of the South to send
a delegation to do so.
The occasional
shooting breaks out between Constitutionalists and Zapatistas.
September 8, 1914 Zapata
issues a decree from Cuernavaca, stating that it is time for
Article 8 of the
Plan of Ayala, which refers to total
nationalization of goods belonging to the landlords who oppose the
Plan of Ayala. Rural property taken in this way will be handed to
pueblos or widows and orphans of the revolution who are in need of land.
Early October 1914
Alavaro Obregón and his men confer with
Pancho Villa
emissaries at Zacatecas. It is
decided to hold a full convention representing all elements of the
revolution on October 10 at Aguascalientes (Aguas Calientes) with the objective to
restore unity and to plan Mexico's future.
October 10, 1914
Revolutionary Convention of Aguascalientes.
The revolutionary convention commences at the
Morelostheater in
Aguascalientes. Zapata does not attend personally but sends an
observer, later a delegation. See October 23. This convention will
last until November 13, 1914.
October 12, 1914
Third day of the revolutionary convention. General
Felipe Ángeles
proposes to send once more a formal invitation to the Zapatistas.
October 14, 1914
The Conventionalists declare themselves the sovereign authority in
the country.
October 15, 1914
Felipe Ángeles
agrees to go to Cuernavaca himself and to persuade the
Zapatistas to attend.
October 20, 1914
Felipe Ángeles
meets with
Zapata. Zapata explains his predicament.
The revolutionary convention has yet to accept the
Plan of Ayala.
October 22, 1914
Top level conference at the
Zapata
headquarters. Also attending is
Felipe Ángeles. A compromise is reached: Not the complete
Plan of Ayala as such, but
merely the principles of the Plan need to be
recognized by the convention.
October 23, 1914
A delegation of Zapatistas, 26 men, leaves for Aguascalientes.
Zapata
stays at Cuernavaca. Leader of the delegation is
Paulino
Martínez.
Zapatista delegation - the Convention
of Aguascalientes Front, second from left: Paulino Martinez.
Third
from left: Antonio Diaz Soto y Gama
October 24, 1914
The
Zapata
delegation reaches Mexico City.
October 25, 1914
The
Zapata
delegation boards a train for Aguascalientes where a
welcome committee expects them. BUT the train doesn't stop there. It
runs all the way to Guadalupe,
Pancho Villa's
headquarters.
The Zapata delegation double checks that
Pancho Villa still got the interests of the southern movement at
heart. Reassured, they shuffle on back towards Aguascalientes. This time
the train stops at Aguascalientes.
October 26, 1914
The
Zapata
delegation arrives at Aguascalientes.
October 27, 1914 Paulino Martínez speaks well at the revolutionary convention.
He mentions Land and Liberty, Land and Justice, and Land for All! He
is not interested in riches or the presidential chair. He points out
that all this is probably not going to happen with
Carranzain the
lead. The only true direction would be to accept the
Plan of Ayala.
Next speaker is Soto y Gama, a
Zapatista, 33 years old, a lawyer. His speech is a
disaster. He tries to point out that individual honor is more important than
mythical honor to a symbol, and to underline his point he seizes the
flag, at which point the entire house starts to freak.
Eduardo Hay, a
Carrancista and a
very smart man, takes advantage of Soto's mistake and gets the people
revved up against the Zapatistas.
Quarrels continue for the next four days
between the Carrancistas, the Zapatistas, and the Villistas.
The formerly moderates are drawn to the Carrancistas after Soto's
blunder.
Pancho Villa announces that he is ready
to retire if Carranza would do so as well.
October 29, 1914
Alavaro Obregón reads a message from
Carranzato the Convention.
Carranza agrees to retire if simultaneously
Villa
and
Zapata
retire.
October 30, 1914
The Conventions excludes the general public and votes overwhelmingly
in favor of
Villa's and
Carranza's retirement.
November 1, 1914
Carranzais not going to retire as
he claims his conditions haven't been
complied with and
Villa
is not going to retire as Carranza is not gonna.
Carranza leaves the capital for
Tlaxcala.
November 2, 1914
The anti-Carranza part of the Convention chooses
Eulalio
Gutiérrez as the new presidential candidate instead of
Carranza.
November 10, 1914 Villa
writes to
Zapata
that "the time for hostilities has come."
November 13, 1914
Final session of the Revolutionary Convention in Aguascalientes.
Everyone clammed up. No compromise anywhere close.
Now the Revolutionaries are divided
into Constitutionalists
and Conventionalists. To keep them apart: The
Constitutionalists are the Carrancistas, also called
Moderates. The Conventionalists are
everybody who at the revolutionary convention at Aguascalientes was
against the Constitutionalists, i.e. the Villistas and the
Zapatistas, henceforward still called Revolutionaries.
November 19, 1914
Alavaro Obregón formally declares war on
Pancho
Villa and
prepares for it while in Mexico City.
November 20, 1914
Obregón and his troops move out of Mexico City.
Villa
is the
appointed commander-in-chief of the Conventionalist forces.
November 23, 1914
The Americans start evacuation from the port of Veracruz and
Carranzaprepared to move in. Meanwhile,
Villa
and
Zapata
prepare to
enter Mexico City.
November 24, 1914 Zapata's troops enter Mexico City.
November 26, 1914 Zapata
arrives by train in Mexico City. Instead of staying at the
National Palace, he takes a room at a small hotel, ironically named San Lázaro.
November 27, 1914
Press interview with
Zapata. The poor reporters didn't get more than
a few muttered sentences. Zapata declined an invitation to attend
ceremonies at the palace.
Villa stays outside Mexico City
at the nearby village of Tacubya.
November 28, 1914 Zapata
back to Cuernavaca. His troops move out of Mexico City soon
after.
December 4, 1914
First historic meeting between
Zapata
and
Villa
at the municipal
school of Xochimilco, 12 miles south of the capital.
With Emiliano Zapata came his brother
Eufemio, Zapata's cousin
Amador Salazar, Zapata's sister
María de
Jesús, and Zapata's small son Nicolás.
With Pancho Villa came his elite troops,
the Dorados, or the Golden Ones, so called because of
the gold insignia they wore on their khaki uniforms and Stetsons.
They agreed to collaborate in the new
campaign against
Carranzawith the following strategy: Zapata and his Army of
the South was to drive on Puebla while Villa and his Division
of the North was to move on Veracruz via Apizaco.
An official and joint occupation of
Mexico City was scheduled for December 6, 1914.
Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa
are
leading
their troops into Mexico City
Hugo Brehme fotografias
December 6, 1914
Interim President Eulalio Gutiérrez throws a banquet at the
National Palace. Group photo shooting session.
PANCHO VILLA AND EMILIANO ZAPATA
DECEMBER 6, 1914
AT THE PRESIDENTIAL PALACE IN MEXICO CITY. With bandaged head:
Otilio E. Montano
Upper right corner:
Rodolfo Fierro
PANCHO VILLA, EULALIO GUTIÉRREZ, AND EMILIANO ZAPATA
Banquet at the Presidential Palace in Mexico City -
December 1914
Someone captured the event on video.
Watch Villa and Zapata munching away:
Here's one more. Click to enlarge.
Note the kid center
top row with large hat and enormous bow.
You're looking at the gunner Don Antonio Gómez Delgado
at age 14,
and here is an interview with him after the make-up guys went home:
December 7, 1914 Villa and
Zapata
explain their campaign plans to interim president
Eulalio Gutiérrez.
December 9, 1914 Zapata
leaves Mexico City to start his campaign. He is not going to
see
Villa
again.
Together, Villa and Zapata had approx
60,000 men at this point.
December 13, 1914 Zapata
hears reports of fighting between
Villa's officers and his
officers in Mexico City. Apparently ex-federal agents are
infiltrating the ranks of the revolutionaries, spreading distrust.
December 15, 1914 Zapata
captures Puebla City. The garrison abandons their defenses
and flees to Veracruz.
December 16, 1914 Zapata
writes to
Villa
that "our enemies are working very actively
to divide the North and South".
Zapata abandons his campaign. Instead of
advancing further toward Veracruz and keeping Puebla City under
control he goes back to
Morelos.
Round about this time Villa and
Gutiérrez find out that they disagree on several points. Gutiérrez
starts to negotiate with
Obregón, the Carrancista general at
Veracruz.
Also called the
Persian Wars, the Greco-Persian Wars were
fought for almost half a century from 492 BC -
449 BC. Greece won against enormous odds. Here
is more:
