Maximilian in Mexico

Chapter XVII
Death of Maximilian and his Generals

The news that the Emperor and his two generals, Mejia and Miramon, had been sentenced to death, aroused widespread sympathy and Juarez was besieged with petitions for mercy, even Garibaldi, who certainly was no friend to the house of Hapsburg, being among the pleaders. The Prussian ambassador, Baron von Magnus, hastened to Potosi to intercede personally in behalf of Maximilian, and used every effort to secure a pardon, but in vain. All that he was able to obtain was a reprieve of two days, the execution of the sentence being postponed till seven o’clock on the morning of the nineteenth.

Prince Salm being still a prisoner and powerless to act, his wife made one last desperate attempt to bring about the Emperor’s escape by flight, but again the plan was frustrated by the fatal treachery that seemed to pursue Maximilian at every turn in Mexico. The Princess Salm was put into a carriage and sent out of Querétaro under a military guard, while all the diplomatic representatives were ordered by Escobedo to leave the city at two hours’ notice. Meanwhile the Emperor and his companions prepared for death. They received the sacrament from Father Soria and spent their last hours communing with the confessors who were to accompany them on their last journey. Maximilian, calm and serene as in happier days, conversed cheerfully with Dr. Basch and his lawyers, Ortega and Vazquez, who had come to bid him farewell. On parting with the physician he charged him to carry back to his friends and family in Vienna a report of the siege and of his last days.

“Tell my mother,” he said, “that I have done my duty as a soldier and die a good Christian.”

At three o’clock, the time originally set for the execution, all was ready for the last march to the Cerro de la Campaña. The officer in command of the firing squad begged for forgiveness with tears in his eyes, but the Emperor calmed him, saying: “You are a soldier and must obey your orders.” For a whole hour they waited for the summons, but none came. At last, about four o’clock, an officer arrived with the announcement that the execution had been postponed till the nineteenth, the order having only just arrived by wire from Potosi an hour before.

“This is hard,” exclaimed Maximilian, “for I had already finished with the world.”

He availed himself of the delay, however, to dictate several farewell letters to his physician, among them one of thanks to his captive officers for their loyalty and a touching appeal to his implacable enemy, Juarez, to prevent further bloodshed and let his death serve to promote the peace and welfare of his adopted country. Even now Baron von Magnus made one more effort to save the Emperor’s life. On the eighteenth of June he sent a telegram to the Juarist minister, Lerdo de Tejada, offering to secure guarantees from all the leading sovereigns of Europe that none of the three prisoners should ever again set foot on Mexican soil or disturb the country in any way. But Juarez was inexorable. In reply to the Baron’s despatch Minister Tejada stated that the President of the Republic was convinced that the cause of justice and the future peace of the country required the death of the prisoners.

At last the fatal morning of Wednesday, June 19, 1867, dawned. At five o’clock Father Soria came to celebrate mass, and at half past six the republican officer who had charge of the execution arrived. The three prisoners, dressed in black, entered carriages, each with his confessor, and were driven slowly to the place of execution, which was surrounded by a guard of four thousand men. On alighting, the Emperor embraced his two companions, promising they should soon meet in another world, and then walked with dignity to the spot assigned at the foot of a hill in front of a shattered wall. Here he placed Miramon in the centre, saying, “A brave soldier is respected by his sovereign; permit me to yield you the place of honor.” Turning to Mejia, who had been unnerved by the sight of his wife running through the streets frantic with grief, he said: “General, what has not been rewarded on earth will certainly be in heaven.” After distributing some gold pieces among the soldiers who were to do the firing, he said in a firm voice: “May my blood be the last shed in sacrifice for this country, and if more is required, let it be for the good of the nation, never by treason.”

The signal to fire was then given and the three fell simultaneously, Maximilian’s body pierced by six bullets. The Mexican Empire had ceased to exist, and the noble Hapsburger had laid down his life for the welfare of an ungrateful people.

General Escobedo had promised the Emperor before his death that his body should be delivered to Baron von Magnus to be taken back to Europe, yet in spite of this the ambassador had much trouble in obtaining possession of it. He was ill himself for a time with fever and had to be taken to Potosi. After many delays, however, the remains were finally given into his custody on November twelfth and, attended by Vice-admiral von Tegetthof, his two adjutants, and Doctor Basch, were taken to Vera Cruz with a cavalry escort of one hundred men, and placed on board the Novara, the same vessel which but three years before had conveyed Maximilian to his adopted country and to his doom. On the fifteenth of January, 1868, the Novara arrived at Trieste. A special train conveyed the coffin to Vienna, where, three days later, the body of Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian of Austria was buried in the imperial vault in the Capuchin church.

Chapter XVIII
Conclusion

As there may be some curiosity as to the later history of those who so shamefully betrayed the Emperor Maximilian, a word as to their fate may not be amiss.

His murderer, Juarez, proved himself unable to restore peace and tranquillity in the country. He attained his ambition, however, when he was again made President, and this sufficed for him. He did not long survive the victim of his cruelty and revenge, dying, in Mexico, July 18, 1872. His friend, Escobedo, received from General Mejia his only son as a legacy—one that was to prove a constant reminder of his treachery. Twice the Juarist chief had owed his life to Mejia’s generosity, yet he had not hesitated in turn to sign the latter’s death-warrant.

Napoleon Third’s subsequent career has passed into history. Losing battle after battle, and finally his throne, in the war of 1870, he surrendered his sword to King William First of Prussia on the second of September of that year and was taken to Wilhelmshöhe at Cassel as a prisoner of war, where he received very different treatment from that accorded the captive Emperor in Querétaro. After the conclusion of peace he retired to England, where he died at Chiselhurst.

A yet more tragic fate befell Marshal François Achille Bazaine. During the Franco-Prussian War he was besieged in Metz by Prince Friedrich Karl and forced to surrender with about one hundred and seventy thousand men. He was taken to Cassel, where he shared Napoleon’s imprisonment. Accused by the French not only of cowardice and incapacity but also of treason, he was tried by court-martial and condemned to death. There being no bloodthirsty Juarez in France, however, the sentence was commuted to twenty years’ imprisonment on the Island of Sainte Marguerite, near Cannes. He succeeded in escaping, with the help of his wife, and fled to Madrid, where he lived in poverty and obscurity and died in 1888, forgotten by the world and deserted by his wife, who returned to her native Mexico.

Marquez escaped from the city of Mexico, hiding the first night, it is said, in a coffin, and, continuing his flight at daylight toward the north, succeeded in reaching Texas. His subsequent history is unknown. After betraying the imperial army, Lopez prepared to enjoy the reward of his treason, but it was flatly refused him. Despised alike by friend and foe, and even by his own wife, he led a wretched existence, employing himself in vain attempts to vindicate his treachery.

* * * * * * * *

Doubtless Maximilian made many grave mistakes, but from the foregoing pages it is plain that both he and his wife went to Mexico with the noblest aims and full of enthusiasm for the mission, to the difficulties of which they finally succumbed. Yet the sacrifice was not wholly in vain, for the last struggle has served to embalm the memory of the Emperor Maximilian First of Mexico as a brave and chivalrous prince, while that of his enemies is held in merited contempt.

On the spot where Maximilian and his two generals so gallantly met their fate on the nineteenth of June, 1867, a memorial chapel has been erected, to which throngs of Mexicans of all classes annually make a pilgrimage on the anniversary of that day, as indeed they did previously, when only a simple gravestone marked the place of death.

Appendix

The following is a chronological statement of important events connected with Maximilian:

Transcriber’s Notes

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• Silently corrected palpable typos; left non-standard spellings and dialect unchanged.