Five Little-Known Facts About Cinco de Mayo

By Paloma Celis Carbajal, Curator, Latin American, Iberian and Latino Studies
May 5, 2020
Stephen A. Schwarzman Building

[Lea este post en español]

The way we celebrate history has a fascinating way of changing over time. These changes can give us insight into our collective imaginaries. For instance, let’s take Cinco de Mayo. It is common knowledge in the U.S. that the name of this celebration is Spanish for the fifth day of May. Some people might know it commemorates a battle that took place on that date a long time ago (1862). Some might also know it happened in the outskirts of Puebla, and that Mexican Liberals defeated the French, who were trying to invade the country for the second time in less than 50 years. 

In Mexico, schoolchildren are taught about the brave people who fought in this battle. In particular, we learn about General Ignacio Zaragoza, who led the troops of the Ejército de Occidente to victory on that day. Unfortunately, the victory was short lived. Months later Napoleon III successfully instituted a European monarchy in Mexico with Maximilian of Habsburg as the Emperor.  Nevertheless, the May 5th victory provided a sense of dignity to an impoverished, fragmented, and exhausted nation. Let’s not forget, Mexico had only just officially become an independent country some four decades earlier in 1821 and was forced to surrender over half its territory in 1848 to the U.S. after the Mexican-American War.

As we approach this holiday, I began looking through the over 935,000 items in the NYPL’s Digital Collections for holdings that related to Cinco de Mayo. In the course of my research, I came upon images of uniforms used by some of Zaragoza’s troops. What I found in volume 472 of the Vinkhuijzen Collection of Military Uniforms, especially that of General Zaragoza, stopped me in my tracks. Interestingly, the image on page 32 shows a light skinned man with snow white facial hair in a heavily gold-embroidered uniform reminiscent of dictator Santa Anna’s army from decades prior. The handwritten caption in this original watercolor reads “Il Generale Saragozza, 1862, dall: “Illustration Francaise” and signed “Q. Cenni, 1906” (Figure 1).

Il generale Sagagozza. 1862. dall'

Figure 1: Il generale Sagagozza. 1862. NYPL Digital Collections, Image ID: 76663

An image such as this becomes utterly intriguing when compared to the portraits of Zaragoza found in history books: a youngish man with mestizo features, wearing small rimmed glasses and well-known for the austerity of his outfits (Figure 2).

In contrast, the other images of his troops, such as Sargente di Fanteria or Primo Caporale d'Artiglieria, show dark skinned young men in modest uniforms wearing sandals or going barefoot (Figures 3-5). 

Lanciere. 1862. Dall'

Figure 5: Lanciere. 1862. NYPL Digital Collections ID: 76662

Primo Caporale d'Artiglieria. 1982. dall'

Figure 4: Primo Caporale d'Artiglieria. 1862. NYPL Digital Collections ID: 76660

Sergente di Fanteria Divisione Saragozza. 1862. dall'

Figure 3: Sergente di Fanteria Divisione Saragozza. 1862.NYPL Digital Collections ID: 76657

I couldn’t help but speculate that, perhaps, Quinto Cenni, the Italian artist who created the decidedly European depiction of General Zaragoza was capturing his interpretation of the archetypical victor in the collective western imaginary of that time. On the other hand, maybe this inconsistency was a mere clerical mix-up of names and illustrations at the time it was bound or captioned. Perhaps, some day, one of our library users will solve this enigma.

Coming upon this unique image got me thinking about what other curious facts I could share about this holiday, which is so often misunderstood (it is not, I repeat, not, Mexican Independence Day) and commercialized (see Corona beer’s ad campaign: “Corona de Mayo, Summer’s First Fiesta!”). I also wanted to share these facts with an eye toward the question of what makes us engage with history? Why do we see ourselves in the past and how do we identify with it? With that in mind, and without further ado, here are five surprising facts about Cinco de Mayo

Five Surprising Facts About Cinco de Mayo

  1. The causes for the French invasion were pretty iffy: The French were originally in alliance with Britain and Spain to invade Mexico. The three were claiming a national debt to the current Mexican government after its president called for a two-year moratorium to recover from a three-year-long civil war (Guerra de Reforma)Such debt was questionable since it was mostly negotiated and spent by previous spurious administrations. President Juárez convinced Britain and Spain to desist on the occupation yet France persisted despite its balance representing only 4% of said debt. 
  2. It was the first telegraphed battle between the cities of Puebla and Mexico (live-streamed, as we would say now): On May 5, between 10:45 AM and 7:03 PM, Zaragoza sent six telegrams to the Minister of War and President Benito Juárez narrating the events. The last one being a short modest report of victory:

“Mr. President. I am very pleased with my Generals and soldiers’ performance. They have all behaved well. The French have learned a very severe lesson. But in honor of truth I will say that they fought like braves, most dying on the trenches. I hope it has all been for good, Mr. President. I wish that our dear homeland (patria), presently so disgraced, can now be happy and respected by all nations.” (For original text in Spanish see Figure 6) ​

 

  1. The Mexican side overcame severe disadvantages: President Benito Juárez’s army was formed from the Liberals’ faction of the War for Reform, which was made up mostly by volunteers, fierce and resolute, but with no military training, old weapons, and very few supplies. The Ejército de Oriente, a division of the Mexican Army, was expressly put together from several regional divisions to face the well-oiled war machine of the Napoleonic forces. Evidence of its huge disadvantage is seen in Zaragoza’s request to a fellow general for 2,000 pairs of sandal soles (suelas de huarache), which leads us to assume that 2,000 of his 5,000 men were barefoot. Another example was the Ministry of War’s solution to borrow shovels from the locals to dig up trenches after Zaragoza had asked for these tools (Taibo, 2012, p. 515).
  2. The general was a man of the people: General Ignacio Zaragoza was born in 1828 Espiritu Santo Bay, in what was then the Mexican State of Coahuila and Texas. Like many officers in the Liberal Army, he was not a career military man but rather someone who had cut his teeth on the battleground. His formal education came from his years as a seminarist. He was loved and highly respected by fellow army men and civilians for his empathy, humility, and constant demand for better living conditions and training for his troops. As a consequence of his regular visits to his wounded and sick men, he died of typhus fever in Puebla four months after his victorious battle. In his honor, President Juárez decreed that same year to change the city’s name to Heroica Puebla de Zaragoza. In 2002, some politicians proposed to walk back this decree but were unsuccessful.
  3. Cinco de Mayo has been celebrated by Mexican Americans long before it was commercialized: It is true that the Chicano movement began commemorating Cinco de Mayo in the second half of the twentieth century. However, according to Hayes-Bautista, there is evidence that the Mexican community in California started celebrating the victory of Cinco de Mayo the very same year it took place. Several Mexican American newspapers, such as La Voz de Méjico in San Francisco, California, published detailed accounts of the feat. The same newspaper reports on June 7 that a Cinco de Mayo celebration took place on May 22 in the town of Columbia, California. Attendants toasted to their fellow Mexican’s victory and sang patriotic songs (Hayes-Bautista, 2012, p. 61-64). It’s easy to understand why Cinco de Mayo appealed and was a source of pride to a community who had been not long ago part of the same country and also very understandable the appeal among other Americans, Latinos or not, who were in favor of legitimate democratic governments, against monarchic rule, and in favor of liberty, all fundamental values in the founding of both countries, and perhaps even more significant at that moment when the U.S. was in the middle of the Civil War.

In Mexico, sometimes we scratch our heads wondering why Cinco de Mayo is such a big celebration among our brothers and sisters in the U.S. Looking at these facts and the holdings of NYPL, I was able to begin to answer the question for myself. As I wrote, we engage with history when we can see ourselves as part of it. Despite the rampant commercialization of the holiday, the recounting of the struggles against the powerful and the privileged, the defiance of expectations, and the triumph over those who held you in contempt are narratives that resonate on both sides of the border. Ultimately, it is a holiday about the value of understanding and identifying with our ancestry, our story, and our history. 

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