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8 BOLIVAR Y PONTE Marta he was hindered by the refusal of Cas- tillo, the commander of Cartagena, to furnish the munitions of war ordered from the citadel there. Bolivar led his troops against Carta- gena in the hope of reducing Castillo to sub- mission, and the season for action against the Spaniards was wasted by an indecisive siege of that city which lasted until May. Mean- while a great Spanish expedition from Cadiz had arrived, March 25, 1815, under Gen. Mo- rillo, at the island of Margarita, and had been able to throw powerful reinforcements into Santa Marta, and soon after to take Cartagena itself. Previously, however, Bolivar, seeing the hopelessness of the struggle there, had em- barked for Kingston, Jamaica, with about a dozen of his officers, on an armed English brig. During his eight months' stay at King- ston Morillo was overrunning New Granada almost without opposition; but the generals Bolivar had left in Venezuela, and Gen. Aris- mendi in the island of Margarita, still held their ground against the Spanish arms. From Kingston Bolivar repaired to Port-au-Prince, where, on his promise of emancipating the slaves, Petion, the president of Hayti, offered him four negro battalions for a new expedition against the Spaniards in Venezuela. At Cayes he met Brion, who had sailed from London with a corvette, arms, and stores for the re- publicans, and some patriot refugees from Car- tagena. ILaving united these forces, he sailed for Margarita April 1C, 1816, to aid Arismendi, who had already reduced the Spaniards to the single spot of Pampatar. On Bolivar's formal promise to convoke a national congress in Venezuela as soon as he should be master of the country, Arismendi summoned a junta in the cathedral of La Villa del Norte, and pub- licly proclaimed him the commander-in-chief of the republics of Venezuela and New Grana- da. On June 1, 1816, Bolivar landed at Ca- rupano, but here Mariflo and Piar separated from him to carry on a war against Cumana under their own auspices. Weakened by this separation, he set sail for Ocumare with 13 vessels, of which 7 only were armed. His army mustered but 650 men, swelled by the enrolment of negroes, whose emancipation he had proclaimed, to about 800. While advanc- ing toward Valencia with this force, he was attacked and defeated by the Spanish general Morales not far from Ocumare. Compelled to reembark, he went first to the small island of Buen Ayre, and afterward joined the other commanders on the coast of 'Cumana ; but be- ing harshly received, he quickly retraced his steps to Cayes. After some months a majority of the Venezuelan military chiefs recalled him as their general-in-chief. He went first to Margarita with the arms, munitions of war, and provisions supplied by Petion, and was joined Jan. 2, 1817, by Arismendi; but five days later, when Arismendi had fallen into an ambush laid by the Spaniards, Bolivar escap- ed to Barcelona. The troops rallied at the latter place, whither Brion sent him guns and reinforcements, so that he soon mustered a new corps of 1,100 men. Here on Fob. 16 he met the Spanish forces under Morillo and de- feated them, after an obstinate battle lasting three days. On April 5 Bolivar left Barce- lona, and on the 15th the town was taken by the Spaniards and the garrison slaughtered. Piar, a man of color and native of Curacao, designed and executed the conquest from the Spaniards of the provinces of Guiana, Admi- ral Brion supporting that enterprise with his gunboats. On July 20, the whole of the prov- inces being evacuated by the Spaniards, Piar, Brion, Zea, Mariflo, Arismendi, and others, assembled a provincial congress at Angostura, and put at the head of the executive a trium- virate, of which Bolivar was appointed a mem- ber, notwithstanding his absence. On these tidings Bolivar went to Angostura, and, sup- ported by Brion, dissolved the congress and the triumvirate, to replace them by a "su- preme council of the nation," with himself as the chief, and Brion and Antonio Francisco Zea as the directors, the former of the military, the latter of the political section. Piar was arraigned on a charge of conspiracy before a war council under the presidency of Brion, convicted, and shot, Oct. 16, 1817. The con- quest of Guiana was a great aid to the patriots; and a new campaign, announced by Bolivar through a proclamation, was generally expect- ed to result in the final expulsion of the Span- iards. Nevertheless, toward the end of May, 1818, he had after several battles lost all the provinces lying on the northern side of the lower Orinoco, while on the affluents of the upper, Paez, the leader of the patriot llaneros, was constantly victorious. At this critical mo- ment he met with San tender, a native of New Granada, and furnished him with the means of invading that territory, where the population were prepared for a general rise against the Spaniards. Powerful succor in men, vessels, and munitions of war began to arrive from England, and English, French, German, and Polish officers flocked to Angostura. Finally Bolivar was induced to convene a national con- gress, Feb. 15, 1819, the mere name of which proved powerful enough to create a new army of about 14,000 men, so that he found himself enabled to resume the offensive. He now form- ed the plan of making a feint toward Caracas, and, when Morillo should have concentrated his forces in Venezuela, suddenly turning to the west, uniting with Santander's guerillas, and marching upon Bogota. To execute this plan, he left Angostura Feb. 24, 1819, made a most extraordinary march across the Andes, and, aided by Santander and the foreign troops, consisting mainly of Englishmen, decided the fate of New Granada by repeated victories in July and early in August in the province of" Tunja. On Aug. 10 Bolivar made a triumphal entry into Bogota, amid the acclamations of the inhabitants, who hailed him as their libe-