Juan Moreira (? - April 1874) is a well-known figure in the history of

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

. An

outlaw An outlaw, in its original and legal meaning, is a person declared as outside the protection of the law. In pre-modern societies, all legal protection was withdrawn from the criminal, so that anyone was legally empowered to persecute or kill them ...

, gaucho and folk-hero, he is considered one of the most renowned Argentinian rural bandits.

Early life

Moreira was born in the administrative area of La Matanza, in the

Province of Buenos Aires Buenos Aires (), officially the Buenos Aires Province (''Provincia de Buenos Aires'' ), is the largest and most populous Argentine province. It takes its name from the city of Buenos Aires, the capital of the country, which used to be part of th ...

. The first thirty years of his life were relatively uneventful, working in rural areas until he could buy his own ranch, some cattle, and land for farming. One characteristic that set him apart from others was that he rarely drank. Moreira devoted his free time to perfecting his skill on the guitar, which attracted the attention of Vicenta, the daughter of a local rancher. She fell in love with Moreira and eventually married him, with the full consent of her father. Shortly after Moreira married Vicenta, his troubles began. The Deputy Mayor of the area, known as Don Francisco, had also fallen in love with La Vicenta, so as a form of vengeance he began charging Moreira fines for everything he could think of, real or imaginary. The first thing he did was charge Moreira 500

peso The peso is the monetary unit of several countries in the Americas, and the Philippines. Originating in the Spanish Empire, the word translates to "weight". In most countries the peso uses the Dollar sign, same sign, "$", as many currencies na ...

s for having his wedding celebration without proper authorization. About that time, Moreira had lent Mr. Sardetti, a grocery-store owner, the sum of 10,000 pesos to buy merchandise. Fed up with asking for his money back, Moreira went to the Deputy Mayor, without any documentation, as was the custom at that time between men of their word, and reported what had happened in hopes that the Deputy Mayor would insist that Sardetti pay him back. It is unclear if Sardetti and Don Francisco were conspiring against Moreira, but Sardetti denied the story, and Moreira was thrown in jail for 48 hours for a form of attempted robbery.

Point of no return

This situation made Moreira so angry that he swore that he would stab Sardetti for every single peso he had lost. Moreira fulfilled his oath when he killed Mr. Sardetti in a facon duel at Sardetti's grocery store. Returning home after a night of wandering, he found Don Francisco and four other soldiers waiting to arrest him. He resisted, and during the fight, Don Francisco and two soldiers were killed. Extremely able in knifefights, Moreira won them all, even against more than one person. He gained such fame for this that men looked for him and picked fights with him to gain the glory of defeating him, but he never lost. He avoided fights whenever he could, and only killed after repeated provocation and in self-defense. Eventually, he served as a bodyguard for powerful politicians who promised to clean Moreira's reputation, but they never did so. It is said that Moreira never took the saddle off his horse, just in case he had to make a quick escape. He spent much of this part of his life wandering through different towns and cities of the Province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, including Navarro, Las Heras,

Lobos Lobos is the headquarters city of the Lobos Partido in Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. It was founded on 2 June 1802 by José Salgado. Background Located 100 km from Buenos Aires, Lobos is currently a fertile agricultural area known ma ...

, Veinticinco de Mayo and the lands of the Indian Cacique Coliqueo.

Death

In April, 1874, Casimiro Villamayor, the justice of the peace in Lobos, was ordered by Mariano Acosta, governor of the

, to send a posse led by Commander Bosch from the police department in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

to arrest Moreira. They surrounded the grocery and saloon (''pulpería'') named ''La Estrella,'' where Moreira was holed up. Moreira fought like a wild animal against the police, and he was at the point of leaping over the wall which separated him from his horse when he was

bayonet A bayonet (from French ) is a knife, dagger, sword, or spike-shaped weapon designed to fit on the end of the muzzle of a rifle, musket or similar firearm, allowing it to be used as a spear-like weapon.Brayley, Martin, ''Bayonets: An Illustr ...

ed in the left lung by one of the officers, Sergeant Chirino. Moreira managed to shoot at Chirino, who lost an eye, as well as to injure one other officer before he died. He was survived by his wife and a child, also named Juan. He was buried at the Lobos cemetery.

Legacy

Juan Moreira is one of the most important figures in the popular history of

. His life was laden with the violence and injustice which typified the unfair treatment received by the gauchos, treatment which led to his death. His skull and some personal belongings can be seen at Juan Domingo Perón Museum. His life inspired a very popular novel by

romantic Romantic may refer to: Genres and eras * The Romantic era, an artistic, literary, musical and intellectual movement of the 18th and 19th centuries ** Romantic music, of that era ** Romantic poetry, of that era ** Romanticism in science, of that e ...

author

Eduardo Gutiérrez Eduardo Gutiérrez (15 July 1851 – 2 August 1889) was an Argentine writer. His works of gauchoesque nature acquired great popularity, specially ''Juan Moreira Juan Moreira (? - April 1874) is a well-known figure in the history of Argentina. A ...

, which in turn inspired at least four biographical films entitled ''Juan Moreira''.Argentine films based on works by Eduardo Gutiérrez (in Spanish)
/ref> The most important of these films, ''Juan Moreira'' was directed by Leonardo Favio in 1973, starring Rodolfo Bebán as the title character. The night of his death was fictionalized by

Jorge Luis Borges Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo (; ; 24 August 1899 – 14 June 1986) was an Argentine short-story writer, essayist, poet and translator, as well as a key figure in Spanish-language and international literature. His best-known bo ...

in a short story, ''La noche de los dones''.

References

External links