Cevallos Mutiny

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Historic sites · Year: 1720

The society of Santa Cruz throughout its history has not been prone to major riots, revolutions, or mutinies against the established authority. Perhaps the most serious incident of collective popular anger in the city occurred in 1720 against the figure of the general intendant of the islands, Juan Antonio de Cevallos.

The administrative figure of the general intendant was created by the government of Philip V by decree of 4 July 1718. Within the general scheme of the Bourbon monarchy to centralise administration, the intendant appeared as the official of the central power responsible for controlling local aspects of finance, justice, and matters related to war, thus coming into direct conflict with the local entities that exercised these functions: the Audiencia, the corregidor, and the general commanders.

Perhaps what was least liked in the Canary Islands about this new figure was the centralisation of royal revenues, putting not only the military and judicial officials against him, but also merchants and small property owners who were now subject to oversight, especially in a business as prosperous at that time as the tobacco revenues.

The first general intendant assigned to the Canary Islands was Diego Navarro, who arrived in La Laguna in 1718. In his assigned role, he showed some harshness in the exercise of his office, resulting in great popular unrest, to the point that he had to be guarded by the authorities for his embarkation back to the peninsula. 

His successor was Juan Antonio de Cevallos, who arrived the same year as the departure of the former, but with broader powers and attributions, so the opposition here was even stronger. To make matters worse, Cevallos seems to have been a stern and inflexible man. He settled in Santa Cruz, in a house on Calle de la Caleta, opposite the building that had begun to be constructed for the Real Aduana. From here he could control all commercial transactions taking place in the nearby port.

On 19 July 1720, the intendant surprised a slave of his in his own house having sexual relations with a woman who appears to have been of ill repute. The two escaped his anger and took refuge in Güímar, her place of origin. The mayor of that place detained them and returned them to Santa Cruz, where the intendant, without awaiting any sentence, took justice into his own hands and ordered the prisoners to be whipped and exposed to public shame. The punishment was carried out on one of the walls of the Aduana under construction. The news spread quickly throughout Santa Cruz and caused great popular indignation. During the night, about thirty people gathered in that part of the town. The protesters argued that the intendant could do as he pleased with his slave, but not with a woman who had been born free and therefore had the right to a fair trial. The tumult broke out unexpectedly, with stones being thrown at the window of the intendant's house. One of them injured Cevallos in the head, though not seriously. Then they invaded the ground floor, freeing the slave. The intendant's carriage was destroyed and thrown into the sea. Neither the mayor nor the beneficiary could do anything to calm the crowd, which began to destroy and throw all the furniture and belongings they found into the street. Finally, invading the room where Cevallos was, the intendant was dragged by the feet down the stairs to the street, where he arrived half dead. The rumour of the arrival of the troops of the captain general from La Laguna caused the street to clear in a moment, with only the body of the dying intendant on the road. When the highest military authority arrived, the only thing he could do was order the body of the intendant to be transported to the nearby Castillo de San Cristóbal, where he finally died.

Although relations between Cevallos and the military commander were never good, the military undertook a repression against the suspects of the mutiny that was unusual in the Canary Islands. He blamed " the riffraff of the place and port of Santa Cruz, the lowest of them, not their honourable neighbours but only nameless, coarse and newcomer people called from the beach and palanquines, mostly mulattoes and blacks ".

Eight days after the attack, twelve of the main suspects of having participated in the revolt were sentenced to death by hanging, their bodies left hanging from the battlements of the castle as a public warning. Another five were sentenced to life in the galleys, two to exile, and others imprisoned awaiting further sentences. The matter had ended in a bloodbath.

The intendancy of the Canary Islands was definitively abolished in 1724 and its powers entrusted to the general commander, as they had been before the arrival of the royal officials.

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