MARFIL MASSACRE AT GUANAJUATO CALLEJA. 285 



entirely unknown to them. Their effort was simply to overwhelm 

 by superiority of numbers. But the cool phalanx of Creoles stood 

 firm, until the Indian disorder became so great, and their strength 

 so exhausted by repeated yet fruitless efforts, that the regulars 

 commenced the work of slaughter with impunity. Calleja boasts 

 ihat Hidalgo lost " ten thousand men, of whom five thousand were 

 put to the sword. " It seems, however, that he was unable to 

 capture or disband the remaining insurgents ; for Hidalgo retreated 

 to Guanajuato, and then fell back on Guadalaxara, leaving in the 

 former city a guard under his friend Allende. 



Calleja next attacked the rebel forces at the hacienda of Marfil, 

 and having defeated Allende, who defended himself bravely, rushed 

 onward towards the city of Guanajuato. This place he entered as 

 conqueror. " The sacrifice of the prisoners of Marfil, " says Ro- 

 binson, " was not sufficient to satiate his vindictive spirit. He 

 glutted his vengeance on the defenceless population of Guanajuato. 

 Men, women and children, were driven by his orders, into the 

 great square; and fourteen thousand of these wretches, it is alleged, 

 were butchered in a most barbarous manner. Their throats were 

 cut. The principal fountain of the city literally overflowed with 

 blood. But, far from concealing these savage acts, Calleja, in his 

 account of the conflict, exults in the honor of communicating the 

 intelligence that he had purged the city of its rebellious popula- 

 tion. The only apology offered for the sacrifice was that it would 

 have wasted too much powder to have shot them, and therefore, 

 on the principle of economy he cut their throats. Thus was this 

 unfortunate city, in a single campaign, made the victim of both 

 loyalists and insurgents. 



Hidalgo and his division were soon joined by Allende, and al- 

 though they suffered all the disasters of a bad retreat as well as of 

 Spanish victories, he still numbered about eighty thousand under 

 his banners. He awaited Calleja at Guadalaxara, which he had 

 surrounded with fortifications and armed with cannon, dragged by 

 the Indians, over mountain districts from the port of San Bias, on 

 the Pacific ; but it is painful to record the fact, that in this city Hi- 

 dalgo was guilty of great cruelties to all the Europeans. Ward 

 relates that between seven and eight hundred victims fell beneath 

 the assassin's blade. A letter, produced on Hidalgo's trial, writ- 

 ten to one of his lieutenants, charges the officer to seize as many 

 Spaniards as he possibly can, and, moreover, directs him, if he has 

 any reason to suspect his prisoners of entertaining seditious or 

 restless ideas, to bury them at once in oblivion by putting such 



