Pedro Mendinueta y Múzquiz

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Pedro de Mendinueta y Múzquiz (born June 7, 1736 in Elizondo , Navarra region , Spain , † 1825 in Spain) was a Spanish officer and colonial administrator who served as Viceroy of New Granada.

Life

Origin and military career

Medninueta came from a family of Spanish nobility. He began his career in 1756 as a cadet in the Spanish infantry. He was a knight in the Order of Santiago and a knight of the Order of Charles III. .

In 1763 he was transferred to America. He was supposed to set up the newly established militia units in Cuba and Puerto Rico as part of the Spanish army reforms. He stayed in Puerto Rico until 1782, then served a year in Havana and went to Mexico in 1784 to organize the units of the provincial and urban militias there. In 1789 he temporarily returned to Spain.

Tenure as Viceroy of New Granada

At the beginning of 1796 the court appointed him Viceroy of New Granada. He traveled to South America and took over the post in Cartagena from his predecessor José de Ezpeleta . He made his formal entry into Bogotá on March 18, 1797.

During his tenure, the capital's water supply was improved. The road network towards the Caribbean coast has also been expanded and expanded.

At that time, Alexander von Humboldt was touring South America with his companion Aimé Bonpland . The two were received with great interest by the viceroy in July 1801. In his report Relación del estado der Nuevo Reino de Granada , Mendinueta emphasized the need for an exact survey and mapping of the colony as a basis for further improvements to the infrastructure. From 1802 to 1803 Domingo de Petrés built the first astronomical observatory in Bogotá on behalf of José Celestino Mutis.

Mendinueta was interested in medicine and public health was important to him. He founded a hospital in Bogotá, had the faculty at the local university reorganized and allowed the first mortuary sections in the colony. In Madrid he also asked permission to introduce the newly discovered smallpox vaccination in New Granada .

During Mendinueta's tenure, too, there were several uprisings by local population groups against the taxes and levies of the colonial rulers.

In terms of ecclesiastical politics , he applied for the establishment of new dioceses in Antioquia , Vélez and Llanos and urged better ecclesiastical care for the areas that had remained without significant pastoral care and educational institutions due to the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1767.

Return to Europe

In 1803 he handed over his office to Antonio Amar y Borbón and returned to Spain. In Spain he was appointed Inspector General of the Militias, and in 1807 he was appointed to the Supreme War Council and the Council of State. The French held him prisoner during the Napoleonic occupation of Spain.

After King Ferdinand VII returned , he was appointed Dean of the Supreme War Council. He died in 1825.

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predecessor Office successor
José de Ezpeleta Viceroy of New
Granada 1797–1803
Antonio Amar y Borbon