Bravo, Leonardo (1764–1812)

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Bravo, Leonardo (1764–1812)

Leonardo Bravo (b. 1764; d. 14 September 1812), Mexican insurgent leader. The Chilpancingo-born patriarch of a large family, Bravo joined the insurgent movement in May 1811, along with his son Nicolás and his brothers Miguel, Víctor, and Máximo, when Hermenegildo Galeana came to his hacienda of Chichihualco. Bravo became one of José María Morelos's most distinguished officers. He played a major role, first in the fortification, and later in the defense, of Cuautla, where the insurgents, besieged by the royalists, held out for seventy-two days despite a lack of supplies. When the siege was lifted at the beginning of May 1812, Bravo traveled to the hacienda of San Gabriel, where he was captured by partisans of the colonial regime. He was taken to Mexico City, where he was tried and executed despite the efforts of his relatives, and even of Morelos, to obtain a pardon in return for the exchange of a sizable group of royalist prisoners.

See alsoMexico: 1810–1910 .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

José María Miquel I Vergés, Diccionario de insurgentes (1969), 85-86.

Virginia Guedea, José María Morelos y Pavón: Cronología (1981).

Ernesto Lemoine, Morelos y la revolución de 1810 (1984).

                                  Virginia Guedea