José Benítez (c. 1760 – 1832) was mayor of
Ponce, Puerto Rico in 1800. He is best remembered for the creation of the
Fuerte de San José in 1760 in
Playa de Ponce
Barrio Playa, also known as Playa de Ponce, Ponce Playa, or La Playa, is one of the thirty-one barrios that comprise the municipality of Ponce, Puerto Rico. Along with Bucaná, Canas, Vayas, and Capitanejo, Playa is one of the municipality' ...
. The fort was in operation until the 1890s.
Background
Benítez is best remembered as the military commander who led a group of urban militiamen from Ponce in their defense of
San Juan San Juan, Spanish for Saint John, may refer to:
Places Argentina
* San Juan Province, Argentina
* San Juan, Argentina, the capital of that province
* San Juan, Salta, a village in Iruya, Salta Province
* San Juan (Buenos Aires Underground), ...
during the British invasion of 1797.
Family life
Benítez married Juana Constanza Batista Rodríguez, and was the father of
María Bibiana Benítez, considered the first Puerto Rican female poet.
Mayoral term
As a result of an attempted attack by the English navy, in 1802 Benítez established a shoreline
lookout, and set up an
artillery battery
In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, etc., so grouped to fac ...
at ''
El Peñoncillo'' in
Barrio Playa, Ponce, to prevent further attempts by the English from dropping anchor and staging an attack from that area. On 1800, Benítez reported that the municipality of Ponce (then called ''"Partido de Ponce"'') measured 200 ''"
caballería
The () was a unit of land measurement in the Spanish viceroyalties in the Americas during the times of the Spanish Empire in the 16th through 19th centuries Spanish West Indies. The unit was widely used in Puerto Rico, where it was equivalent t ...
s"'', that is, . He categorized the jurisdiction into ''cotos'', ''hatos'', ''criaderos'', ''monterías'', and ''terrenos realengos''. ''Cotos'' were lands awarded to residents as reward for their services to the king. They were developed into
estancias or lands apt to be cultivated for agricultural use. ''Hatos'' were lands not granted to anyone in particular, but available for communal use where cattle could roam at will. ''Monterías'' were hilly areas located next to ''hatos'' were cattle could be reigned in or gathered together with the help of trained dogs. ''Criaderos'' were lands were cows could be herded for milk production. Goats, sheep, pigs, asses, and mares were also herded in ''criaderos''. ''Terrenos realengos'' were lands that belonged to the state (to the king).
[Eduardo Neumann Gandia. ''Verdadera y Autentica Historia de la Ciudad de Ponce.'' Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña. 1913. pp. 67-68.]
Controversies
In 1805, Benítez was accused of financial improprieties by a political rival and although a criminal investigation led nowhere, by 1825 the accusations were enough to reduce the war hero to a customs agent in
Guayama
Guayama (, ), officially the Autonomous Municipality of Guayama ( es, Municipio Autónomo de Guayama) is a city and municipality on the Caribbean coast of Puerto Rico. As of the 2020 U.S. Census, the city had a population of 36,614. It is the c ...
. After his death in 1832, his family's fortunes were further diminished, but his daughter was able to successfully petition the government for a
land grant, which kept them from becoming insolvent.
Legacy
In Ponce, there is a street in ''Urbanización Las Delicias'' of Barrio
Magueyes named after him.
See also
*
List of Puerto Ricans
*
List of mayors of Ponce, Puerto Rico
This is a list of mayors of Ponce, Puerto Rico's southern economic center, the island's second largest and second most important city.
From 1692 to 1840, the office of mayor in Ponce was filled either by local hacendados or by military offi ...
Notes
References
Further reading
* Fay Fowlie de Flores. ''Ponce, Perla del Sur: Una Bibliográfica Anotada.'' Second Edition. 1997. Ponce, Puerto Rico: Universidad de Puerto Rico en Ponce. p. 210. Item 1078.
* Juan Jose Barragán Landa. ''Los Benitez: raíces de una familia hacedora de historia.'' Rio Piedras: Puerto Rico. 1996. (Colegio Universitario Tecnológico de Ponce, CUTPO).
{{DEFAULTSORT:Benitez, Jose
1760s births
1832 deaths
Mayors of Ponce, Puerto Rico
Year of birth uncertain