Don Antonio De Úlloa

Antonio de Ulloa y de la Torre-Guiral (12 January 1716 – 3 July 1795) was a Spanish Navy officer. He spent much of his career in the Americas, where he carried out important scientific work. As a scientist, Ulloa is regarded as one of the major figures of the Enlightenment in Spain. As a military officer, Ulloa achieved the rank of vice admiral. He also served the Spanish Empire as an administrator in the Viceroyalty of Peru and in Spanish Louisiana.

At the age of nineteen, Ulloa joined the French Geodesic Mission to the Equator, which established that the shape of the Earth is an oblate spheroid, flattened at the poles, as predicted by Isaac Newton. The mission took more than eight years to complete its work, during which time Ulloa, in close collaboration with his fellow naval officer Jorge Juan, made many astronomical, natural, and social observations in South America. Ulloa and Juan also helped to organize the defense of the Peruvian coast against the English squadron of Commodore Anson, after the outbreak of the War of Jenkins' Ear in 1739.

The reports of Ulloa's scientific findings during his time in South America earned him an international reputation. Notably, Ulloa published the first detailed observations of platinum, later identified as a new chemical element. Ulloa returned to Europe in 1745. He was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society of London in 1746, and as a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in 1751.

From 1758 to 1764, Ulloa served as governor of Huancavelica, in Peru, and as superintendent of the mercury mines of the region. There he fought unsuccessfully against the corruption of the local administration. Following the Seven Years' War, Ulloa became the first governor of Spanish Louisiana in 1766. His rule was strongly resisted by the French Creoles of New Orleans, who expelled him from the city during the Rebellion of 1768. Despite some controversies, Ulloa continued to serve in the Spanish Navy and ended his career as its chief of operations.

Life

Family background and education

Antonio de Ulloa was born in Seville, Spain, into a socially prominent and intellectually distinguished family. His father, Bernardo de Ulloa y Sousa, was noted for his writings on economics. His brother Fernando would become an engineer and the chief of works of the ''Canal de Castilla''. Another brother, Martín, became a jurist, historian, and member of the Royal Spanish Academy.

The young Antonio was tutored in grammar and science by a priest and learned mathematics at the ''Colegio de Santo Tomás'' in Seville. At the age of thirteen he embarked from Cádiz on the galleon ''San Luis'', bound for the port of Cartagena de Indias (in present-day Colombia). After returning to Cádiz, Antonio entered the ''Real Compañía de Guardias Marinas'' (the Spanish Naval Academy) in 1733. Soon thereafter he sailed to Italy, where the Spanish navy was fighting to wrest control of Naples and Sicily from the Habsburg monarchy.

South American expedition

At that time the French Academy of Sciences was organizing a major scientific expedition to Quito, in present-day Ecuador, in order to measure the length of a degree of meridian arc (i.e., latitude) near the equator. This was part of an effort to determine in the precise figure of the Earth in order to settle the scientific debate between the defenders of René Descartes's physics and those who advocated the newer Newtonian mechanics. By comparing the length of a maridian arc at two very different latitudes, scientists would be able to determined whether the Earth is a prolate spheroid (i.e, flattened around the equator), as the Cartesians claimed, or whether it is instead an oblate spheroid (i.e, flattened at the poles), as predicted by Newtonian theory. The determination of the precise figure of the Earth was also regarded as being of practical importance for navigation.

When Ulloa returned from Naples to the Cádiz naval academy in 1734, he learned that a recent graduate of the academy, Juan García del Postigo, and one of his fellow cadets, Jorge Juan, had been chosen by the Spanish Crown to accompany the French geodesic mission to Quito. However, García was soon dispatched to Naples in the context of the War of the Polish Succession and therefore had to withdraw from the geodesic expedition. Perhaps through the influence of his father, Ulloa (who was only nineteen years old) was then chosen to replace García. This was a sensitive assignment, both politically and scientifically. Juan and Ulloa were selected on the strength of the recommendations of the king's chief minister, José Patiño.

The early work of the geodesic mission, led by Charles Marie de La Condamine, was delayed and hindered by lack of cooperation from the local Spanish authorities. Indeed, in 1737 a personal dispute between Ulloa and the president of the ''Real Audiencia de Quito'', Joseph de Araujo y Río, reached such a pitch that Araujo ordered the arrest of Ulloa and Juan, announcing his intention to have them killed. Juan and Ulloa took refuge in a church and Ulloa then escaped through the cordon of Araujo's men, reaching Lima and obtaining the protection of the Viceroy of Peru, the Marquis of Villagarcía. When war between Spain and Great Britain broke out in 1739, Juan and Ulloa, as naval officers, actively participated in the defense of Peru.

Ulloa traveled throughout the territories of the Viceroyalty of Peru from 1736 to 1744, making many astronomic, natural, and social observations. In one of his reports he described, for the first time in the European scientific literature, some of the properties of a metal that he called ''platina'' ("little silver") and which he encountered during his inspection the gold panning operations in the Chocó region of what is now Colombia. This metal would later be identified as a new chemical element, now known as platinum. Ulloa is therefore often credited as the discoverer of platinum.

Both Ulloa and another member of the French Geodesic Mission, Pierre Bouguer, reported that while walking near the summit of Mount Pambamarca they saw their shadows projected on a lower-lying cloud, with a circular "halo or glory" around the shadow of the observer's head. Ulloa noted that

This has been called "Ulloa's halo" or "Bouguer's halo". It is similar to the phenomenon that later came be known as the "Brocken spectre" after the Brocken, the highest peak in the Harz mountains in central Germany. Ulloa reported that the glories were surrounded by a larger ring of white light, which would today be called a fog bow. On other occasions, he observed arches of white light formed by reflected moonlight, whose explanation is unknown but which may have been related to ice-crystal halos.

The final results of French Geodesic Mission, published by La Condamine in 1745, combined with the measurements of French Geodesic Mission to Lapland that had been published in 1738 by Pierre Louis Maupertuis, decisively vindicated the predictions first made by Newton in Book III of his ''Principia Mathematica'' of 1687. These results greatly contributed to the triumph of Newtonianism over Cartesianism among Continental European savants.

Return to Spain

In 1745, having finished their scientific labours, Ulloa and Jorge Juan prepared to return to Spain, agreeing to travel on different ships in order to minimize the danger of losing their important samples and records. The ship upon which Ulloa was travelling was captured by the British Royal Navy, and he was taken to England as a prisoner of war. There, he was soon befriended by leading British scientists, and was elected as a fellow of the Royal Society in December 1746. Thanks in part to the intervention of Martin Folkes, the president of the Royal Society, Ulloa was released from British custody and allowed to return to Spain.

In 1749, Ulloa published his ''Relación histórica del viaje a la América Meridional'' (Madrid, 1748), which contains a full, accurate, and clear description of the greater part of South America geographically, and of its inhabitants and natural history. It was translated into English and published in 1758 as ''A Voyage to South America'' (1758).

Shortly after their return to Spain, Juan and Ulloa penned a confidential report to their political patron, the Marquess of Ensenada, on the state of the defenses and administration of the Spanish domains in South America. The document is highly critical of the corruption of both the civil authorities and the Catholic clergy, including their exploitation of the Native American population. That report remained unpublished during the lifetimes of its authors. It only became public in 1826, after the independence of South America from Spain, when it was published in London by an Englishman named David Barry, who had himself returned disillusioned from the newly independent Spanish America.

Ulloa gained an international scientific reputation and was appointed to serve on various important scientific commissions. With Jorge Juan, he is credited with the establishment of the first museum of natural history, the first metallurgical laboratory in Spain, and the astronomical observatory of Cádiz. In 1751, Ulloa was elected as a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. In 1757 King Ferdinand VI appointed Ulloa as Commander of Ocaña (''Comendador de Ocaña'') in the Order of Santiago.

Imperial administrator

Ulloa returned to South America in 1758 as governor of Huancavelica, in Peru, and general manager of the mercury mines in the region. At the time, mercury was of great practical importance because of its use in the extraction of silver and gold (see pan amalgamation). Ulloa fought against the deep-rooted corruption in the local administration and in the miners' guild, but his efforts of reform were strongly resisted by the local authorities, including the new Viceroy of Peru, Manuel de Amat y Junyent. In June 1763, Ulloa wrote to the king complaining of the "horrible storm of persecutions" that he had endured during his five years in Huancavelica, which had turned his "life into a purgatory of continual acrimonies." Ulloa requested to be relieved of his post, which he was finally allowed to do in 1764.

Following Britain's victory of the French and Spanish in the Seven Years' War, France agreed in the 1762 Treaty of Fontainebleau to cede to Spain its colony of Louisiana. The Spanish Crown then appointed Ulloa as the first governor of Spanish Louisiana. Ulloa reached New Orleans, the major city and port of the region, on 5 March 1766. From the beginning, his relations with the local French Creole elite were strained, which caused Ulloa to delay taking formal possession of Louisiana while he awaited military reinforcements. In the meantime, Ulloa resided at the fort of La Balize, near the mouth of the Mississippi River, and issued his orders via the interim French governor Charles Philippe Aubry.

Ulloa contracted marriage in 1768 with Francisca Melchora Rosa Remírez de Laredo y Encalada, daughter of the Count of San Javier y Casa Laredo, who belonged to one of the most aristocratic families of Lima. The fact that the marriage was solemnized in a simple ceremony in La Balize, rather than by a grand affair in New Orleans accompanied by public feasts and gifts as had been the custom of previous governors, further alienated the Creoles. Antonio de Ulloa and his wife Francisca would go on to have nine children, among them Francisco Javier de Ulloa, who became the Spanish Minister of Marine and the 22nd Captain general of the Navy.

On 28 October, 1768, riots broke out in New Orleans in response to Ulloa's promulgation of a decree by King Charles III that opened nine Spanish ports to direct trade with Louisiana, without assurances that the interests of the local Creole merchants would be taken into account in determining the Spanish monarchy's commercial policies. The governor and his pregnant wife were taken to a Spanish vessel, while the Superior Council voted to demand that Ulloa leave Louisiana within three days. Ulloa complied, departing for Cuba on 1 November. The revolt was ultimately crushed in 1769 by forces under the command of the new Spanish governor, Alejandro O'Reilly, who definitively established Spanish control over Louisiana.

After 1776, Ulloa enjoyed the political support of José de Gálvez, the new Minister of the Indies. Between 1776 and 1778, in the context of the Spanish support for the rebellion in North America against British rule, Ulloa helped organize a war fleet in New Spain (present-day Mexico). He also advised the Viceroy Antonio María de Bucareli on the proposed construction of a military shipyard in the Atlantic port of Veracruz.

Later years

In 1778, Ulloa commanded the last great treasure fleet that sailed between Cádiz and Veracruz. During the return voyage, he observed the total solar eclipse of 1778, a subject on which he corresponded with the French astronomer Pierre Charles Le Monnier. Ulloa later published his observations of the eclipse in a book printed in Madrid and, in abbreviated form, in an article in the ''Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society''. In 1779, King Charles III promoted Ulloa to ''teniente general de la Armada'' ("lieutenant general of the Navy", equivalent to the modern rank of vice admiral).

As part of the Spanish campaign against Great Britain during the American Revolution, Ulloa was commanded to sail to the Azores, where he was to protect Spanish vessels and attack British merchant ships passing through the area. Ulloa's fleet met with little success in that mission and he left for Spain ten days earlier than instructed, due to lack to supplies and the poor condition of some of his ships. After Ulloa arrived in Cádiz in October of 1779, he was ordered to help prevent the British navy from relieving the British garrison during the Siege of Gibraltar. After judging that the ships under his command could not endure the prevailing weather conditions, he asked to be relieved of responsibility for that mission.

The previous events in the Azores led to formal charges of dereliction of duty against Ulloa and two captains under his command, Pedro de Leyba and Manuel Núñez Gaona. The drawn-out proceedings ended with their definitive acquittal by the ''Consejo Supremo de Guerra'' (the supreme court of military justice for the Spanish Empire, presided by King Charles III) in February of 1782. Ulloa was later appointed as chief of operations of the Navy, a position that he occupied until his death in 1795.

Legacy and tributes

As a scientist, Ulloa is remembered principally for his role in the determination of the figure of the Earth and for his pioneering reports on platinum. Some historians of science consider him the first discoverer of platinum, even though the material was already known and worked in present-day Colombia before Ulloa documented it. Moreover, Ulloa's reports identified the material as a "stone" with unusual properties, rather than as a distinct metal. He is also credited for his reports of "Ulloa's halo" and other related optical and meteorological phenomena.

The confidential report to the Marquess of Ensenada, written primarily by Ulloa around 1746 and signed jointly with Jorge Juan, remained unknown to the public until long after the death of its authors. The report was finally published in 1826 by an Englishman named David Barry. Barry had spent some time in the newly independent Spanish America seeking opportunities for investment, only to become disillusioned about the prospects for the region. In Madrid, he obtained a manuscript copy of the report by Juan and Ulloa, which he then edited and published in Spanish after his return to London, under the title ''Noticias secretas de América'' ("Secret News from America").

The ''Noticias secretas'' paints a dire picture of the state of the administration of the Spanish dominions in America in the 1730s and 1740s, alleging many instances of corruption and mismanagement by both the civil and the ecclesiastical authorities, as well as by the guilds of merchants and artisans. The report also denounces the exploitation of the Native American population by unscrupulous governors (especially the '' corregidores'') and priests (especially those belonging to the mendicant orders). The publication of the ''Noticias secretas'' generated an enduring controversy among historians of Spanish America concerning its importance and reliability. While some authors, particularly in Spain, have minimized their importance and even dismissed their publication by Barry as an element of the " Black legend" against the Spanish empire, other scholars have regarded the ''Noticias secretas'' as one of the best informed and most interesting first-hand accounts of political and institutional corruption in Spanish America, and as a key source for understanding its persistence in the region after independence.

Ulloa was probably buried in the Military Church of San Francisco, in San Fernando, Cádiz. When Captain Manuel Baturone Santiago inspected the church in 1995, he found a damaged tablet that seemed to be marked "Ulloa", but with no identifiable human remains behind it. The Spanish navy then installed a commemorative plaque in Ulloa's honor in the Pantheon of Illustrious Sailors, also in San Fernando.

The street in which Ulloa was born in Seville, originally named ''Clavel'', was renamed ''Ulloa'' in 1845 and ''Almirante Ulloa'' ("Admiral Ulloa") in 1875. A large bust of Ulloa, together of those of members of the French Geodesic Mission to the Equator, adorns the ''Ciudad Mitad del Mundo'' monument in the outskirts of Quito. In 2013, the University of Seville opened a new Learning Resource Centre named after Antonio de Ulloa. In 2016 the Spanish Postal Service issued a stamp to mark the 300th anniversary of Ulloa's birth.

Major works

In collaboration with Jorge Juan

*
* Published in English as:
*
* Available in a modern, abridged English translation as:
*

As sole author

*
*
*
*
*
*
*
* ''Juicio sobre el metal platino, y el modo más económico de explotarlo en el Virreinato de Santa Fe''; manuscript, Biblioteca del Palacio Real de Madrid (1788)
*

References

External links

Antonio de Ulloa. Polymath Virtual Library, Fundación Ignacio LarramendiAntonio de Ulloa y Jorge Juan Santacilia, Cervantes Virtual

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ulloa, Antonio De
1716 births
1795 deaths
18th-century Spanish astronomers
Discoverers of chemical elements
Fellows of the Royal Society
Governors of Louisiana (New Spain)
Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
People from Seville
Spanish admirals
18th-century Spanish explorers
Spanish meteorologists
Spanish military personnel of the American Revolutionary War
Spanish military personnel of the War of the Austrian Succession
Spanish geodesists