Vergara Echeverez, José Francisco (1833–1889)

José Francisco Vergara Echeverez (b. 10 October 1833; d. 15 February 1889), late nineteenth-century Chilean statesman. A prominent politician, Vergara, the son of an army officer, was educated as an engineer. While holding public office, including a ministerial portfolio, he was particularly recognized for his service during the War of the Pacific. Beginning his career as a nursemaid for an indecisive and perhaps senescent general, Vergara, a colonel of a National Guard cavalry unit, first served in the Tarapacá campaign. Landing with the troops at Pisagua, he fought at San Francisco and participated in the ill-fated attack on Tarapacá.

Although Vergara resigned from active military service, he continued to advise the army's general staff, often suggesting well-conceived plans which, unfortunately, the military commander rejected. Vergara subsequently held the post of minister of the interior in the Domingo Santa María government. Although he was a brilliant and dedicated administrator, he failed to win the Conservative Party's nomination for the 1886 presidential campaign. Upon retiring to his farm in what is now Viña del Mar, he unexpectedly died.

See alsoWar of the Pacific .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

William F. Sater, Chile and the War of the Pacific (1986), pp. 21, 23, 27, 32-34, 37-38, 47-51, 54-56, 182-185.

José Francisco Vergara, "Memorias," in Guerra del Pacífico: Memorias de José F. Vergara y diario de campaña de Diego Dublé Almeida, edited by Francisco Ruz Trujillo (1979).

                              William F. Sater