Avelino Arredondo was an Uruguayan assassin of Basque origin.

Background

Arredondo was a strong supporter of a rival faction of the ruling Colorado Party government of Uruguayan president

Juan Idiarte Borda Juan Bautista Idiarte Borda y Soumastre (April 20, 1844 – August 25, 1897) was the 17th President of Uruguay. He is the only Uruguayan president to be assassinated in office. Background Originating from the Uruguayan department of Soriano, ...

. An apparent attempt was made on the life of President Idiarte in April 1897. This was widely publicized, including in ''El Día'', edited by José Batlle y Ordóñez, where Arredondo's name also mysteriously appeared in connection with this incident, although he was ostensibly unconnected with this attempt on Idiarte's life.

Assassination of Uruguayan President

On August 25, 1897 Arredondo assassinated Idiarte in the Uruguayan capital of

Montevideo Montevideo () is the Capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2011 census, the city proper has a population of 1,319,108 (about one-third of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...

as he emerged from a church service. Claiming to have acted alone, he was convicted of the crime and imprisoned. Arredondo's act of shooting Idiarte dead is hitherto the only instance of the assassination of a sitting President in the history of Uruguay.

Place in literature

Arredondo later featured in the writings of the

Argentine Argentines (mistakenly translated Argentineans in the past; in Spanish (masculine) or (feminine)) are people identified with the country of Argentina. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Argentines, s ...

writer Jorge Luis Borges, who was an acute observer of Uruguayan history and politics; the story ''Avelino Arredondo'' appears in Borges's ''

The Book of Sand "The Book of Sand" ( es, El libro de arena, links=no) is a 1975 short story by Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges about the discovery of a book with infinite pages. It has parallels to the same author's 1949 story " The Zahir" (revised in 1974 ...

'' (1975).The Book of Sand and Shakespeare's Memory, Jorge Luis Borges (tr. Andrew Hurley), Penguin Books, 2001, pp. 80-85

References

* :es:Juan Idiarte Borda

1897 murders in South America Uruguayan assassins Uruguayan people of Basque descent People convicted of murder by Uruguay Uruguayan people convicted of murder Assassins of presidents Assassins of heads of government {{crime-bio-stub

Background

Assassination of Uruguayan President

Place in literature

See also

References