Why did the pastuses not wanted to become independent from Spain?

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200 years ago the rumor ran that the pastusos were people with little understanding.That rumor ran to this day and the inhabitants of the capital of Nariño became protagonists of hundreds of stories and jokes in which they do not go very well freed.

¿Pero qué hay detrás de esta situación? Los pastusos no creían en la causa libertadora, poco les importaba el sueño de libertad de unos criollos intelectuales y, bajo ningún motivo, pretendían traicionar a los reyes, a quienes les juraron lealtad.For them the word was just as important as their volcano.Simon Bolivar came to qualify them as "damn men".For the Pastuses there was no possibility of betraying the king, since "Grass had committed his word and had sworn to loyalty," said Lydia Inés Muñoz Cordero, president of the Nariñense Academy of History.

And, according to Muñoz, the foundations of that society were the loyalty to the word committed and loyalty to their oaths. “The worst for a pastus was to retract from his word”, dijo la historiadora y agregó que en San Juan de Grass vivían satisfechos con el gobierno del rey.Several wars had to pass that left hundreds of dead so that San Juan de Grass, that key province to connect what Gran Colombia would be, because it was an important corridor to get to Quito, it became part of the New Granada and Jurara Lealtadto the patriots and the nascent nation.“We managed, in short, to destroy the pastusos.I don't know if I'm wrong as I was wrong other times with those damn men, but it seems to me that for now the dead will not raise their head, ”Simon Bolivar told General Francisco de Paula Santander in a letter sent from Quito on 21 ofJuly 1823.Muñoz Cordero narró que la disputa entre sureños y patriotas duró más de 12 años, pues la resistencia Pastusa comenzó en 1809 cuando desde Quito fue invitada a formar parte de la junta de Gobierno.They were convinced that sovereignty was for the kings and not for the people.From there, several battles occurred in which the pastusos came winners, because all, the people, the natives, the oligarchs and the church remained united to honor their oath of loyalty to the Spanish crown.The support of the natives was key, explained historian Felipe Arias Escobar, because they felt safer with the crown: “The social mobility that war gave, or the threat that meant that ascent, was a decisive factor to become realistic orpatriot. La mitad de la provincia de Grass eran indígenas, quienes veían amenazados sus intereses por el ascenso criollo y el fin de la autoridad del Rey y sus leyes, quienes protegían al indio de los abusos de los terratenientes españoles y criollos, tal como se verificó después”.

Those battles left hundreds of dead from each side, but also left prisoners, and some of them very famous, such as General Antonio Nariño, who fell into a battle in 1814 but, because of his courage and honor, the southerners forgave his life.Even Grass was a forty of the Spanish crown.After the battle of Boyacá, on August 7, 1819, when the patriots defeated the Spaniards.The king's troops took refuge in the capital of Nariño to regroup and resist the new clashes.But after several attempts from the Liberating Army to adhere to Grass to the Patriotic Cause, by force or by agreements, - even in 1811 they respect the Board of Santa Fe de Bogotá - it was in April 1822 when after a bloody battle inCariaco, Bomboná, Simon Bolivar defeated the Pastuse for a technical issue.Although Bolívar's army lost about 300 men, Muñoz said, for the war codes the winner was the army that remained on the battlefield. Y fue el ejército de Bolívar el que permaneció en el terreno, pues los hombres comandados por el español Basilio García tuvieron que regresar a Grass por una amenaza que recibió la ciudad.When Bolívar demanded to be received as the winner, Basilio García opposed, because the victory had not been total.Thus, they made some capitulations in which they accepted that Grass would no longer be with the Spaniards, but they would not be subjected.“While in Grass I take the pen and write full of joy, because we have ended the war with the Spaniards forever ensuring the fate of the Republic. En primer lugar, la capitulación de Grass es una obra extraordinariamente afortunada para nosotros, porque estos hombres son los más tenaces, más obstinados, y lo peor es que su país es una cadena de precipicios donde no se pueda dar un paso sin derrocarse”, escribió Bolívar a Santander el 9 de junio de 1822.

But after the capitulations, which were not approved by the entire town, a small rebellion emerged, under the command of the Spanish Benito Boves.This unleashed the fury of Bolívar, who decided to send to Marshal Antonio José de Sucre to take the city in blood and fire and thus submit once and for all the southerners. Un ejército de unos 3.000 men, in December 1822, arrived in Grass and, Muñoz said, some 400 civilians were killed, a significant number of the population. Esa es la famosa Navidad Negra de los pastusos, pues, agregó la historiadora, allí no hubo combate, sino un asalto.“They could not afford to lose a key city on the way to Quito and Peru, in the middle of the continental war.Three days of looting, deaths and rapes that marked the city and its inhabitants in charge of the Rifles Battalion, more months of reprisals throughout the region in charge of Salom, Flores and Bolívar himself, ”said Arias.The Liberator could not allow the pastuses to have the intention of being against him again and once and for all they joined the patriotic cause.“From the conquest here, no town has been more tenacious than that.Remember what I said about the grass capitulation, because since then I knew the importance of winning those evil. Ya acá visto que no se pueden ganar, por lo mismo es preciso destruirlos hasta en sus elementos”, le escribió a Santander en julio de 1823.

And he succeeded, those "evil" did not fight again against the patriotic cause.They stayed from that moment on the side of Simon Bolivar, but the memory of December 1822 was preserved. De hecho, se convirtió en un patrimonio cultural de Grass cuando, en el carnaval de Blancos y Negros, rememora esa noche de Navidad.However, over the years the fidelity that the pastusos had to the Kings passed to Colombia.Therefore, Muñoz said, the best definition of Pastuso was made by Roberto María Tisner, of the Colombian Academy of History, when he said that the inhabitant of the capital of Nariño is “patriot and faithful like none throughout history, first withThe King and then with the Liberators ".MATEO GARCÍARDACIACIÓN POLITICO EL TIEMPOMATGAR@el eltiempo.com

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