Bartolomé Mitre

Bartolomé Mitre (26 June 1821 – 19 January 1906) was an Argentine general, statesman and author. He was President of Argentina from 1862 to 1868 and the first president of unified Argentina.

Mitre is known as a versatile statesman, military man, politician, journalist, historian, writer and poet. He was a major figure in the history of Argentina during the second half of the 19th century.

He was the figure that best characterized liberalism in Argentina, but he was a moderate and flexible liberal, not dogmatic.

Early life

Mitre was born on 26 June 1821 in Buenos Aires. His father was of Greek descent, and the family name was originally Mitropoulos.

In 1831, his family settled in Uruguay. He became a soldier and graduated in 1839 from the Military School of Montevideo, with the rank of second lieutenant of artillery. Also, a journalist, his writings supported Fructuoso Rivera, who, in 1846, made him a lieutenant colonel in the Uruguayan Army.

Later, he joined the Colorado Party in the civil wars against the Blancos, in the Banda Oriental (Uruguay). This closeness with the Colorados led him to support the unitario faction of Argentina, which simultaneously fought against the Rosista regime in Buenos Aires, ally of the Uruguayan Blancos.

His first poems and journalistic publications in the Uruguayan media date from that time.

He then moved to Bolivia, and later to Chile, where he met fellow Argentine exile Juan Bautista Alberdi. Both wrote for the Valparaíso newspaper El Comercio. Later, he wrote in El Progreso, in Santiago, under the direction of Domingo Faustino Sarmiento.