Battle of Puebla (1862): The Real Story of Cinco de Mayo

The Battle of Puebla, fought on 5 May 1862 outside the city of Puebla in central Mexico, was a victory for Mexican republican forces under General Ignacio Zaragoza over an invading French army. The French assault on the hill forts of Loreto and Guadalupe failed with heavy losses, delaying France’s advance on Mexico City by a year. The anniversary, Cinco de Mayo, became a symbol of Mexican resistance and, especially in the United States, a celebration of Mexican heritage.

Background: debt and empire

Mexico emerged from the Reform War of 1857-1861, a civil war between liberals and conservatives, exhausted and nearly bankrupt. In July 1861 the liberal government of President Benito Juárez suspended payments on its foreign debts for two years.

Britain, France and Spain responded with the Convention of London of October 1861, agreeing to occupy Mexican ports to force payment. Their forces landed at Veracruz in December 1861 and January 1862. Britain and Spain soon reached terms with Mexico and withdrew in April 1862, when it became clear that France had larger aims.

The French emperor Napoleon III hoped to create a Catholic, Latin monarchy in Mexico that would check the growing power of the United States, then occupied with its own Civil War, and open markets for French trade. Mexican conservatives exiled in Europe encouraged him, assuring him that Mexicans would welcome foreign intervention. The plan eventually led to the offer of a Mexican throne to Archduke Maximilian of Austria.

The French advance on Puebla

The French commander, Charles Ferdinand Latrille, Count of Lorencez, marched inland from the coast with about 6,000 men. His troops included experienced soldiers who had served in Algeria, the Crimea and Italy, and Lorencez was confident. He wrote to Paris that the French were so superior to the Mexicans in race, organisation and morale that he was already master of Mexico, a remark that later became notorious.

Puebla, about 130 kilometres (80 miles) south-east of Mexico City, stood on the main road from Veracruz to the capital. Zaragoza, commander of the Mexican Army of the East, gathered roughly 4,000 to 5,000 men there, many of them poorly equipped volunteers and National Guard troops, including indigenous soldiers from the Sierra Norte de Puebla. He fortified the two hilltop forts of Loreto and Guadalupe north of the city and dug trenches between them.

The battle on 5 May

Rather than attacking the city from the south or east, where its defences were weaker, Lorencez chose to strike directly at Fort Guadalupe around midday on 5 May. His artillery opened fire from too great a distance to do much damage and began to run short of ammunition.

The French infantry, including Zouaves and marines, then advanced uphill across open ground in the face of Mexican musketry and cannon fire. They made three assaults; some soldiers reached the ditch below the walls, but none broke in. Mexican infantry and cavalry counterattacked the exhausted attackers on the slopes. A heavy rainstorm in the afternoon turned the ground to mud and further hampered the French.

On the plain below the forts, a brigade led by the young general Porfirio Díaz repelled a French column moving against the city’s approaches. By late afternoon Lorencez withdrew. He waited for a renewed Mexican attack that never came, and on 8 May he began to fall back towards Orizaba.

Zaragoza reported the victory to the government in Mexico City with a now-famous line: the national arms have covered themselves with glory (“Las armas nacionales se han cubierto de gloria”).

Why the French lost

Historians usually point to Lorencez’s overconfidence. He rejected advice from Mexican conservative allies to attack the city from a weaker side, launched his infantry uphill against the strongest points of the defence, and began the assault before his artillery had done serious damage. His soldiers, though brave and experienced, were exhausted by the climb and exposed to fire from both forts at once.

Zaragoza, by contrast, made good use of the ground. He placed his best troops in and between the forts, kept cavalry ready to strike at the attackers’ flanks and avoided an unnecessary pursuit that might have exposed his own smaller army in the open.

Key people

• Ignacio Zaragoza: Mexican commander, born in 1829 in Texas, then part of Mexico; he died of typhoid fever on 8 September 1862, only four months after his victory.
• Charles de Lorencez: French commander whose frontal attack failed; he was recalled later in 1862.
• Porfirio Díaz: brigade commander at Puebla who later ruled Mexico as president for more than three decades.
• Benito Juárez: liberal president of Mexico, who led republican resistance throughout the French intervention.
• Napoleon III: French emperor who launched the intervention.

By the numbers

Casualty figures differ between French and Mexican accounts.

Consequences

Puebla was a tactical victory rather than a decisive one. Napoleon III, embarrassed by the defeat, sent around 30,000 reinforcements under General Élie Forey. They besieged Puebla again from March 1863, and the city surrendered on 17 May 1863 after a two-month siege. The French entered Mexico City in June 1863, and Juárez’s government retreated northwards.

In 1864 Maximilian accepted the crown and arrived in Mexico as emperor. The republicans fought on, and after the end of the American Civil War the United States pressed France to leave. With war threatening in Europe, Napoleon III withdrew his troops in 1866-1867. Maximilian, left with only Mexican conservative forces, was captured at Querétaro and executed on 19 June 1867, a story told in the execution of Emperor Maximilian.

Some historians argue that by tying down French forces, the Mexican resistance that began at Puebla also made a French intervention in the American Civil War on the Confederate side less likely, although this is debated.

Cinco de Mayo: memory and myths

Juárez’s government made 5 May a national commemoration soon after the battle. In Mexico it remains a civic holiday celebrated most of all in Puebla, with parades and re-enactments, but for most Mexicans it is not a day off work.

• Myth: Cinco de Mayo is Mexican Independence Day. Independence is celebrated on 16 September, recalling the Grito de Dolores of 1810.
• Myth: the holiday was invented by advertisers. Historian David Hayes-Bautista has shown that Mexicans in California celebrated the victory from 1863, seeing it as a defence of democracy against foreign monarchy. Its popularity grew with the Chicano movement of the 1960s and 1970s and later with commercial promotion from the 1980s.

Timeline

• 1861, 17 July: Juárez suspends payments on foreign debts.
• 1861, 31 October: Britain, France and Spain sign the Convention of London.
• 1861, December - 1862, January: Allied troops land at Veracruz.
• 1862, April: Britain and Spain withdraw; France begins its advance inland.
• 1862, 5 May: Mexican victory at the Battle of Puebla.
• 1862, 8 September: Zaragoza dies of typhoid fever.
• 1863, 17 May: Puebla surrenders to French forces after a two-month siege.
• 1867, 19 June: Maximilian is executed at Querétaro.

Why it matters

The Battle of Puebla showed that a hastily assembled Mexican army could defeat one of the most respected armies in the world. Although France went on to occupy much of Mexico, the victory became a lasting symbol of national pride and resistance to foreign intervention, celebrated today on both sides of the US-Mexico border.