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Ciudad Viva - Néstor Ganduglia nos cuenta la historia de la Guerra Grande y el Sitio de Montevideo
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Ladies and gentlemen murmur of the city
we are pleased to welcome Professor
Cand as always how are you how are you well very
very
well Where are you going to walk us today I do
n't know if a few talks
ago we were talking about the history of the
main square and I was telling you that right
in front of the Cabildo building
the first Constitution of the
Republic had been signed and presented, the one with the picture of the
very elegant people throwing their hats
in the air as a sign
of... the truth is that that Constitution did
n't make us very independent to
begin with it had to be approved first
by Argentina and then by Brazil and
then only by us if they didn't
let us start. But it was also
written in the image, likeness and
convenience of the
families let's say that several
generations had been in the Cabildo eh
eh
And many of whom we said
last time got rich to the point of
delirium buying selling and exploiting
black people
let's say at the same time in the campaign
eh of course there were the people from the campaign
the grandfather the parents had accompanied
Artigas they themselves had left
life shaking off the yoke of the
Portuguese who were called to
invade by the same Patricio of
Montevideo So they did not want a country
centralized in Montevideo because it was going to
be a yoke even worse than that of the
Spanish the Portuguese the
porteños So the tension began to
rise and of course a few years later war broke out in
this country too how can we
talk about a war between the patricians
let's say in Montevideo and the rest is
a way of seeing it this in reality
you know what happens is that first of all
the majority of the newly
independent countries end up deciding with
violence what model of country they are going to
be in the future But also in
Uruguay we have this bad habit of
seeing our history as if we were a
planet part let's say in reality what we
call the big war was part
of an even bigger war
so without going any further it pitted
federalists and unitarians against each other in Argentina
for many years every
European power that was around
came to get involved both here each one
defending their own little farm let's say
no So
if you look at it from here, things
started when General Rivera,
Fructuoso Rivera, staged a coup d'état,
removed the constitutional president, who
was Manuel Ori at the time, from the
presidency, and sat in his chair.
Manuel Oribe went to Argentina and
allied himself with Juan Manuel de Rosas, who was
a dictator, but represented the
federalists, let's say, a kind of strange
federalist dictator. But this is full of
contradictions, so the point is that
Ah or did quite well for him for 3
years, won a few battles in favor
of the
federalists, and then he came here and in
Arroyo Grande he confronted
Rivera's army and gave them a tremendous performance. So,
Orive came to Montevideo and
laid siege, he stationed himself on what people
called the little hill because there was the
hill and then the little hill, since
then they began to call it El Cerrito de
la Victoria, that the siege was established, from
from
there it was the longest siege in the entire
history of this country, for more than a
decade it was two-headed. Imagine if it had
two governments, of course, two governments,
customs too. Exactly, of course, the government,
look the the the army was
mostly stationed on the Cerrito de la
Victoria then they had the restoration in the village
which is now the union this
had the most political apparatus and the
port in diving that's why the customs thing let's
customs thing let's
say the question is that eh there were two
governments two presidents two
armies eh one inside the city and
the other in the countryside and in the small towns
eh the people here inside the thing became
militarized to the Mango inside the city
people were terrified at first let's
say because this clear many of those
who were fighting outside let's say
on the other side of the walls were
their relatives their children this were
bursting gunshot and fall
eh it was it was very hard that moment and on top of that
look hold on to this but like Montevideo of
course it was oppressive 15 days
after the site was installed
a comet appeared in the sky do you mean a
UFO already expensive no no no no and this no no a
comet the people for the people it was not very
different imagine they had never seen
anything like that it seems that it was enormous
that the cabbage a tail that crossed half the sky
sky
eh you could see it there was no way to miss it you could
see it starting Exactly east to the
west you could see it as if pointing at the hill and of
course you could see people from all sides
terrified V You know that for millennia
especially in the Old World many people
saw Comets as a
terrible omen of bloodshed
diseases horrible things and in that
context of course no one could see that as
an omen
Well that was what they took advantage of
imagine a few a few
people who were left who
actually sympathized with him with him with
Oribe's army eh with the
federals but they hadn't had time
to leave Montev they were
locked in the city they started to give a
handle let's say this idea spread that
the sky was announcing that this was going to
end badly that the best thing was to leave
that this one doesn't see that the signs from heaven are
are
saying Of course that this is going to end in
a horrible carnage better is this
shooting So it was that people began
to take advantage of any distraction to
leave the city and that's when a very strange thing happened
or rather that Of those who were
killed and who died in the
clashes in Montevideo,
people also began to leave for the L de
cl with the fear that
it would truly end in a massacre.
Look, boats full of
Europeans would arrive to get involved in the
war and there was everyone there, this
Italians, French, English,
Portuguese, everyone came here to get
involved. So a
very strange paradox arose, look, eh, during all that time,
time,
eh, less than a third of the people
who lived in Montevideo were from the
east, they were the vast
majority, Europeans, they came from all over, and there were
a few Argentines
escaping the Rosas government who were
caught in the war here. There were a few
black men and women who came
because they had no other choice, they were brought here
by force, and the rest were from the east, the
people of the eh, from the besiegers
sang a song that I brought here to
share with you. It says, whoever wants to
speak French, in Catalan,
Basque, every language crossed and who
doesn't know who they are. and find yourself in an
interlude or in a strange museum go
to Montevideo today these things
people sang look at you and of course it was very strange
Sunday Faustino Sarmiento who couldn't
be more this European the guy protested he
said that in Montevideo they were neither
oriental nor Argentine it was they were the
Europeans had already taken a
little bit of America with the aspiration to
expand from there the question
is that we are going to dedicate a couple of
this murmur more F Montevideo maybe we
weren't very Montevideoan erd no no no no
this this defense thing wasn't gr
majority wasn't This is a period that they
don't tell us much about they don't tell us
too much This but it was the capital it lasted more
than a decade people At first they were
terrified inside the city
but then the weeks
months years began to pass and people recomposed
as best they could a normal life there are some there are
some scenes [ __ ] clear hallucinatory
that story inserted by Maria of people
drinking tea in the balconies of the
most elegant houses and next door two
three blocks let's say passing the
walls people bursting with bullets and
cannon fire and people drinking tea they didn't
even look at if there was a
way to live I don't know Well and
this one we're going to dedicate a few
more talks to but now before we go it
lasted a decade this now before we go
I'd like to tell you something that you believe it did
n't really happen AC it seems like something out of
a science fiction novel
a comedy yes I don't know how nobody thinks of
making a movie with these
things but I swear it happened and it happened
here a few blocks from where we are now
the tele city studio it turns
out that in the middle of the great war
in the year 44
1844 two Frenchmen arrived in Montevideo they
were businessmen and one was an engineer
I don't know to knock on President
President
Lamas's door they came with a folder a
top secret military project
the folder was signed by
General Paz himself who was at that
time the Minister of War and
Defense So we had to pay
attention he recommended that construction begin
immediately the project was for a they
were the plans for a lethal weapon a state-of-the-
art device that was going to
end the war in a matter of
days because it was going to be able to
take the battle directly to the
Sadores' camp
eh That was it It was an
indestructible device But it had to be
built in the strictest secrecy
sec Well the most firm released the
resources despite the
horrible hardships that the city was experiencing
at that time and the construction began
in some sheds that the army had
between you that I had told you that between the
city walls and the cordon in
a line that had been drawn which was
where the cannonballs arrived
nothing could be built but
military installations more or less
where the Plaza Libertad is now there were
some sheds and there they surrounded everything
with wood and inside the
construction began when all this began everyone
knew that something was being
done inside but nobody knew what it was
Eh So imagine the gossip
spread like flies in a jar it was one
thing and people swirled
around the the of the rescue that they
had put up to see if they could see something to the
point that the militia
to disperse three or four times a day
parents would send their children to
climb the walls to see if they could
see something and then tell them what it was Since
no one knew what was going on
in there people started
calling it this as it occurred to them the
the
flying canton Ori's hammer the
infernal machine no one knew what it was about the
curiosity was so great that the soldiers
of the cadores would come from the east of the of the
place of course to drink there they would ask
the neighbors take it out or take it out and it
seems that tomorrow they don't say that
next week it seems that it was delayed a little
because of the storm but they will take it out eh
At any
moment like that the days passed the week
the months
when they were already heading into the fourth
month finally one morning early
the moment that everyone was waiting for arrived
those enormous gates
opened and people held their
breath the thing began to advance through
what would now be July 18th straight to the
to the
cordon You'll have to imagine the people
people too
too
imagine it was some kind of giant box
turned around inside There were floors with soldiers, these
these
were worn out, something similar, let's say more
crude, let's say more like a fairground con,
inside there were floors, the people, the
soldiers were floured in there with this
with weapons, ammunition, all of that mounted on
eight wheels made of wood and iron
and all that giant contraption, imagine 15
meters long by height, it was a
giant thing, all of that pulled by a
few mules that were inside the box, they
and of course the people started to
swirl around it was the people, some
shouted long live the country, others laughed out
loud, others cursed it was
chaos, it was unbelievable as they
advanced. Of course, imagine,
July 18th, it wasn't July 18th, it was an
Avenue, it was nothing, a dirt road
with potholes, stones, there were giant swamps,
one in front of what is now
the Montevideo City Hall and another in
front of the firefighters' plaza,
swamps that went in and they could
never get it out again and so they had to
avoid them as best they could, the wheels got
stuck on the stones. The mules
Imagine the poor creatures locked up in there,
completely dark, they couldn't see a
thing. And on top of that, every time a
wheel got stuck, they had to lift it with
levers and break the poor mules,
whiplash, it was something like that, some of them got really
tired and didn't want to go any further, and that was it. I ca
n't believe it. Every meter he
advanced was
painful. Finally, he managed to arrive
slowly, let's say, he passed the cordon, he passed
where the gaucho is now, let's say, and this one,
yes, but the idea, look, was to get
there, victory. No, no, not only that, it wasn't, it
wasn't a matter of cutting across the countryside. It
couldn't be done. They had to take him to the
road of the three crosses where
the obelisk is now, over there, and from there take
the road that led
directly to the hill. Because the idea
was to take the war to Camp Cadori,
Cadori,
cl. But of course, after he went in a
couple of blocks, let's say more or less
where the church is now, the cordon
stopped, and it became
clear that getting there, at that
pace, it was going to take him two weeks.
In that time, the people inside were dying.
dying.
The mules were dying of exhaustion, poor thing.
the decision that was made after this I'm
reading it to you directly from the uh from the
uh from the
Field Diary of General
Ventura Rodriguez who was there
protagonist says the machine was
stopped for two days in front of the gate of the center
at the end of which the government
convinced of the uselessness of the
prodigious invention ordered that
ridiculous contraption to be taken off the streets to
put it back in the Corral where it
had come from dismantle it and turn it into
firewood for the battalions don't you can't don't piss
me off that a miniseries isn't on I
can't believe you but pil I had no idea no no
what do I know I did what I could look at the
French you saw with not a project of
this ultra secret ultra modern I s
well the point is that this is how it was uh
before we go I want to tell you
two things this Friday there are two things to
tell you this Friday we have the
last themed dinner of the year the last
dinner the last supper do you want to be there really let me
this is going to be at the castle pamigo no
more no less with
perfect gastronomy and the theme is Christmas solstices
and other spirits there We bring with us myths
legends popular stories from many
cultures around the world that explain
why for millennia before the
birth that we believe we are
celebrating this we were already clinking glasses
in these last days of the year
I told you who knows why precisely Well
that is the moment fun
and something more and on Sunday Sunday at
5 in the afternoon we do the last Walk of the
year which is precisely Montevideo
secret cordon where we are going to tell this
story and a lot more we are going to pass through
the middle of the bullring we are going
to this to uh to focus in the middle of the
battle against the English in the
invasion of the English we are going to talk
about we are going to talk about a Christ
that terrorized people for 50
years unmissable there this Friday at the
Pitam Millio Sunday at 5 in the afternoon
in the municipal plain we get together
to walk Together along the cordon
Friday this now This Friday yes yes yes
this Friday very correct and on Sunday
and already there We finish for the moment yes it is
want to continue doing work some
more meetings we are going to have here by Of
course, thank you very much. See you in
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