Following Morelos’s death, the nature of the independence struggle changed dramatically. No formal structure united the rebel groups. After the rebel Congress arrived in Puebla, the local rebel commander refused to accept its authority and simply dissolved it. The movement became more atomized, more rural, and lost its appeal to the urban elite. Guadalupe Victoria, in the Puebla-Veracruz area, and Vicente Guerrero, in Oaxaca, commanded the most substantial rebel forces. In 1818, royalist commanders still reported that bands of 200 or 300 insurgents attacked Queretaro haciendas daily. Other small units operated in Veracruz, Michoacan, Guanajuato, Puebla, the Mexico City area, and in the Pacific lowlands in the modern states of Michoacan and Guerrero.94
Rebels employed guerrilla tactics and took advantage of terrain to avoid royalist soldiers. They attacked, withdrew, and then hit another place. In each locale, if the royalist army showed signs of weakness, guerrilla bands would reemerge and operate again. Due to both geography and the aspirations of local leaders, the rebels never managed to coalesce over large areas. This weakened them militarily, but made it impossible to snuff out the insurgency.95
After 1815, royalist officers assumed de facto control of many areas, displacing civilian officials. As historian Virginia Guedea commented, “Civil order ceased to exist and the armed struggle, the guerrilla war, became the new way of life for everyone.” Legality became a victim of the war effort. The viceroy tolerated royalist officers who confiscated and sold property of supposed rebels, keeping the proceeds for themselves. Others traded with insurgents and pocketed special taxes they levied. Authorities tolerated all but the most egregious cases of royalist enrichment. By the end of the decade, this process resulted in regional commanders having created a series of semi-autonomous military satrapies.96
The number of unemployed increased as commercial traffic and industrial output declined during the war. Many who lost their jobs joined the rebel cause. Others joined the insurgents after fleeing royalist tax collectors who were desperately attempting to finance the war effort. De facto redistribution of land abandoned by hacendados repeatedly occurred as individuals moved into rebel zones to be able to farm and raise stock. The expulsion of wealthy hacendados and their overseers did not always result in declining production. Royalist officers on long-range patrols expressed shock at reentering insurgent-controlled districts and finding the countryside well ordered and sometimes apparently more prosperous than before 1810.97
Many observers dismissed the remaining insurgents as “bandits.” As historian Eric Van Young noted, “In the revolutionary period, the rather fluid boundary between crime and rebellion was continually crossed back and forth by thousands of Mexicans.” The elite considered any act of collective appropriation, destruction of property, or violence against royalists as “banditry.” In contrast, when viewed from below, in social terms, vague but discernible notions of social justice, retributive or redistributive in nature, generally sustained these attacks.98
World History
