Irisarri, Antonio José de (1786–1868)

Antonio José de Irisarri (b. 7 February 1786; d. 10 June 1868), Spanish-American patriot, diplomat, historian, and journalist. Born in Guatemala, Irisarri settled in 1809 in Chile, where he played a prominent part in patriot politics during the Patria Vieja, among other things as editor of El Semanario Republicano from 1813 to 1814. His pen rarely idle, he also wrote many political works. Obliged to leave Chile in August 1814 because of his opposition to José Miguel Carrera, he went to England, where, together with Andres Bello, he published the pro-independence El Censor Americano. Upon his return to Chile in 1818, he was appointed a diplomatic agent by Bernardo O'Higgins and sent back to Europe, where he contracted the £1 million Chilean loan of 1822. In 1826 he moved back to his native Guatemala, but in 1830 resettled in Chile. He was appointed Intendant of Colchagua in November 1835. He accompanied the first Chilean expedition to Peru in 1837, during the war against the Peru-Bolivia Confederation, and negotiated the Treaty of Paucarpata (17 November 1837) with Andrés de Santa Cruz. Seen as ignominious in Chile, the treaty was repudiated.

Finding it inadvisable to return to Chile, Irisarri spent the remainder of his life in Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, and the United States, finally settling in New York in November 1849. In 1855 he became ambassador of Guatemala and El Salvador to the United States, and was named as plenipotentiary for Nicaragua at the time of William Walker's filibustering incursions. Irisarri died in Brooklyn.

See alsoWalker, William .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

John D. Browning, Vida e ideología de Antonio José de Irisarri (1986).

Ricardo Donoso, Antonio José de Irisarri, 2d ed. (1966).

Additional Bibliography

García Bauer, Carlos. Antonio José Irisarri: Insigne escritor y polifacético prócer de la independencia americana. Guatemala: Tipografía Nacional de Guatemala, 2002.

Perdomo Interiano, Claudio Roberto. Pensamiento positi-vista y liberal de Ramón Rosa. Tegucigalpa: "Mejores Ideas," 1994.

                                        Simon Collier