Cinco de Mayo, the Real Story
The Battle of Puebla and its link to American Independence

Many Americans think that the festivities of Cinco de Mayo, held each May 5th, are in celebration of the independence of Mexico. Few know the real connection between the battle of that day and the preservation of American, not Mexican, independence.

Cinco de Mayo does not celebrate Mexico's independence from Spain, as many Americans assume. But it does celebrate how the Mexicans beat the French (and influenced the American Civil War), before the French roared back and put an Austrian emperor in Latin America.

In May, 1862. President Abraham Lincoln had much to worry about. The United States was on the verge of self-destruction by its own hand. Lincoln had the vast industrial resources of the Northern states at his disposal, but the Confederate forces of the South were fierce fighters in their quest for secession. The opposing armies were slaughtering each other by the tens of thousands with no clear victor at the moment. If someone from the outside would have allied with the South, that might have been just enough to tip the balance and divide the country forever. Worse, such an ally was making its way through Mexico. It was the army of Napoleon

Lincoln had good reason to be worried. Before the Civil War, America was a rising power in the world. Other nations, including France, considered this young country a potential world threat if it continued to grow at the rate it had been since winning its own independence. What would happen if Napoleon's army conquered Mexico, installed their own emperor, Maximilian of Hapsburg, and then proceeded to come north and help the Confederates divide the United States into two weaker and less threatening nations?

In a sense, the U.S. had helped to create this situation, by acquiring half of Mexico's territory in the Mexican-American War of 1846 to 1848. Mexico had been struggling financially from the time it won its own independence in 1821 from Spain. The Mexican-American War pretty much sank the Mexican treasury and led to financial crisis, culminating in the suspension of foreign debt payments that opened the door for French occupation. Now Lincoln was depending on his country's former adversary to keep Napoleon's troops at bay and buy him time to defeat the South so he could re-deploy troops and in turn, support Juarez.

The French Army of Emperor Napoleon III, nephew of Napoleon Bonaparte, was thought to be the premier army in the world. It had not suffered defeat in 50 years and had enjoyed recent victories throughout Europe and Asia. But what were they doing in this hemisphere? The French had landed at the port of Veracruz along with troops from Queen Isabella II of Spain and Queen Victoria of Great Britain. They were there to collect payments on the foreign debt of Mexico, payments suspended by Mexican President Benito Juarez because the Mexican treasury was all but bankrupt. Juarez promised to restart payments in two years, but France, Spain and Great Britain wanted their money now and took over the customhouse at Veracruz to get the customs payments applied to their debts. Eventually, the representatives of Spain and Great Britain came to an agreement with Juarez and went home. But Napoleon stayed. In fact, he landed 4500 troops and set off for Mexico City.

On the morning of May 5, 1862, General Lorenz led a combined force of French and sympathetic Mexican troops toward Puebla, Mexico, 100 miles east of their destination of Mexico City. He had believed that he would be welcomed with open arms and that the local clergy would shower them with magnolia blooms. Waiting for him was Texas-born General Ignacio Zaragoza under orders from President Juarez to defend the city with a much smaller force of 2,000 troops along with Puebla citizens who brought their own farm tools as weapons. Brigadier General Porfiro Diaz, destined to later become president of Mexico, took his cavalry out to engage the French horsemen and eliminate them. The bulk of the invading force attacked across a battlefield made muddy by a recent thunderstorm and were met by hundreds of stampeding cattle stirred up by Indians armed with only their machetes.

The victory at Puebla wasn't decisive.   One year later, The French got 30,000 reinforcements from across the sea.  This time they made their way to take the capital of Mexico City and install Emperor Maximilian of Hapsburg as the reining monarch of Mexico. President Juarez fled north to establish a provisional government in various parts of Mexico. His loyalist troops did manage to keep the French at bay long enough to prevent them from supporting the Confederate states in the U.S. Civil War.  In fact, the Mexicans got the better of Napoleon III and his puppet just a few years later, in 1867, when a defeated Emperor Max faced a firing squad.

With the North and South reunited, Lincoln ordered the French out of Mexico and sent a military force to the Texas/Mexican border under General Phil Sheridan. Napoleon potentially faced 2 million battle hardened U.S. veterans if he persisted in the occupation of Mexico. In early 1867, Napoleon made the decision to withdraw his troops. Maximilian surrendered his Mexican Imperial Army on May 15. The sovereignty of Mexico was returned to the Mexicans.

Many historians believe that had the French achieved quick victory at Puebla, they might have supported the South in the American Civil War. And who knows how history might have changed.

So, if Cinco de Mayo really celebrates the victory of Mexico in the battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, then what is Mexico's Independence Day? It is September 16, 1810. On that day, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla issued a proclamation that united many different local rebellions into one cohesive struggle, which eventually led to Mexico's actual independence from Spain in 1821.

Cinco de Mayo is not celebrated in México to the same extent that it is by Chicanos in the U. S., mainly because El 16 de Septiembre is seen as the more important holiday.

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