MEXICO: FROM EMPIRE TO REVOLUTION
HISTORY
By Charles Merewether, Collections Curator, Getty Research Institute
REVOLUTION
The Revolution Unfolds (1910/1911)
As preparations for the national centenary celebrations progress, Porfirio Díaz’ regime begins to falter.
Many of Díaz’s opponents strongly support the moderate Francisco Madero and a new government, and the
jailing of Madero on the eve of the 1910 presidential election and allegations of widespread electoral fraud
after Díaz’s subsequent victory lead to massive public protest in the streets of Mexico City.
Throughout the countryside the economy turns from bad to worse, as Mexico’s dependence on the
international market and on U.S. interests becomes all too evident. The independence from foreign control
gained one hundred years before, and again in the 1860s, appears insubstantial as the vast U.S. land
holdings in Mexico expose the rural working class’ lack of control over their own survival. A failure of
food crops in the Northern states leads to famine and food riots, and there is an economic downturn in the
timber, agricultural and mining industries. Throughout 1910 regional revolts against the Díaz regime spread
across the country. Nevertheless, the centenary celebrations are held and the flag of Guadalupe is carried
through the streets as the symbol of independence. As it flutters in the wind self-determination seems once
again to elude the Mexican people.
The desire to oust Díaz from office, in combination with the catalyst of popular discontent in the North,
unites different leaders in temporary support of Madero, who has escaped to San Antonio, Texas after
being bailed out of prison by his family. Madero issues the Plan de San Luis Potosí in mid-October. In it he
denounces the election as fraudulent, the Díaz presidency as illegal, and declares himself the legitimate
president. His promise of agrarian reform attracts the support of peasants throughout Mexico and mobilizes
workers and the middle-class. Madero declares November 20th the day for the Republic to rise up in arms
against Diaz’s regime, and in that month rebel armies begin to form.
The abuses of Díaz’ regime and control over the land by the hacendados (hacienda owners) and the
presence of American interests are acutely felt in the North, especially Chihuahua, and the region becomes
one of the key centers for the emergent revolutionary movement. Pascual Orozco, a muleteer and the son of
a village storekeeper in Chihuahua, gains the support of Abraham González, governor of the state, and
becomes the leader of the rebel movement. Governor González also forges an alliance with the young
Francisco (Pancho) Villa from the state of Durango, who has gained a reputation as a powerful bandit chief,
horseman and leader of a strong guerilla army. González introduces him to Madero, and Villa and
González decide to join forces, recognizing that they come from opposite ends of the social spectrum and
can reinforce one another's support.
On Feb. 14th, 1911 Madero crosses into Mexico near Ciudad Juárez in the state of Chihuahua to head the
anti-Díaz forces. At around the same time, José Garibaldi arrives in Chihuahua to become one of Madero’s
commanding officers. A photographer from El Paso, Jim A. Alexander, captures a portrait of him. General
Victoriano Huerta, who has already served in military campaigns for Díaz against the Maya in Yucatán, is
now dispatched to Chihuahua to meet the rebel forces.
From this time on, photography in Mexico will be transformed. Local and foreign photographers begin to
set up agencies in Mexico City, producing images that will become part of the daily news coverage locally
and throughout the world. The idea of the “photo opportunity” will become critical to raising consciousness
and support for the events and protagonists involved.
The End of the Porfiriato: Ciudad Juárez (1911)
By April the Revolution against the Porfiriato has spread across Mexico into eighteen states, and the area
around Ciudad Juárez in the state of Chihuahua becomes a flash point. Because it is the official port of
entry from the United States the control of the city is of strategic importance, and U.S. president William
Howard Taft sends 20,000 troops to watch the border. Residents of El Paso, Texas watch the battle raging
between Mexican Federal troops and rebels in Juárez from their rooftops and the U.S. side of the Río Bravo
(Rio Grande). News of impending border battles often precedes the actual fighting, and railroads run
special excursions to accommodate the spectators. W. H. Horne, who had come from the East coast to
recover from tuberculosis, buys a camera and begins to photograph the conflict. He and other local
photographers seize the opportunity of selling postcards as a business. Horne will later write a letter to his
family in which he expresses his hope that U.S. troops from the northern states will once again come down
to the border for the sake of his business.
Agustín Víctor Casasola, who has worked as a journalist for the Mexican daily press and as official
photographer for Porfirio Díaz, photographs Federal soldiers with their loved ones prior to their departure
to Ciudad Juárez to reinforce the army against the insurgent forces. Although principally a studio
photographer Casasola also travels to Juárez, following the Maderista movement. Upon arrival he takes a
famous photograph of Pancho Villa with his staff. The clear differences between Villa’s group and that of
Francisco Madero or that of the governor of Chihuahua Abraham González are indicative of how broad the
alliances being drawn against Díaz are.
On April 7th, 1911 Madero advances on Ciudad Juárez, with Villa and Pascual Orozco commanding the
rebel troops. The possibility of a siege of the city leads Díaz to strike a truce for two weeks. Fearful that a
border skirmish will bring the U.S. into the war, Madero orders Orozco and Villa to withdraw their advance
on the Federal garrison. Defying him, they attack. The insurgents fight from the ditches, using 1860s rifles
against the modern machineguns of the Federal troops. Nevertheless the Federal forces under General Juan
Navarro surrender, and Ciudad Juárez is handed over to Madero on May 10th. The revolutionary leadership
forms a coalition in which Governor González strongly supports Madero. The coalition includes Madero’s
brother Raúl, Orozco, Venustiano Carranza (governor of Coahuila), and José Garibaldi. On May 17th in
Ciudad Juárez, Madero and Díaz’s representatives jointly sign a peace treaty that demands Díaz’s
resignation in exchange for armistice.
In the years to follow the photographic coverage of the Mexican Revolution as it unfolds is extraordinary.
Thousands of images capture a country at war. With smaller cameras and improved methods of printing
and circulation, photo-reportage becomes the most dramatic and immediate way to chronicle events and
individual lives. Never before, and possibly never since, has a country been the subject of such scrutiny or
fascination.
It is a turning point, too, for Mexican photography. Prior to the Revolution, Europeans and Americans had
taken much of the photography of the country. Now local photographers begin to emerge, opening studios
and agencies and traveling across the country to document events. At the same time, because U.S.
economic and political interests are seen to be at risk, American photographers are sent to cover the front
line and course of the Revolution, just as photographers had come from France in the 1860s when French
interests were at stake. Traveling across the border by train, many photographers come and go without
setting up studios, leaving behind little evidence of their work, and many photographs of the era do not
offer any specific information as to the occasion on which they were taken and remain anonymous,
unsigned, and undated. Here we attempt to reconstruct the specificity of those images from internal and
external evidence, and to create a narrative from what is only a small portion of a vast and dispersed
archive of images.
Madero’s Return (1911)
On May 25th, 1911 Porfirio Díaz officially steps down from the presidency before a massive public
audience in Mexico City, ending a 35-year regime, and flees into exile in Paris. Francisco Madero names
Mexican Ambassador to the United States Francisco León de la Barra interim president until new elections
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
2
can be held. De la Barra, who had been secretary of foreign relations under Díaz, appoints a cabinet of Díaz
supporters instead of revolutionaries. On June 7th Madero returns in triumph to Mexico City. He is accompanied by José María Pino Suárez. The two met in the Yucatán during the Madero’s 1911 political
campaign and joined forces in Ciudad Juárez. Suárez is soon to become Madero’s vice-President.
D.W. Hoffman, a photographer about whom little is known, captures Madero’s arrival while the French
photographer Felix Miret, who produced some of the most extensive coverage of the Centenary of 1910,
captures images of the welcoming crowds, standing on the trolley cars and the statue of Charles IV. There
are celebrations in the streets for days. Both Pascual Orozco and Emiliano Zapata, a former stable master
and rebel leader from Morelos, come to express their support. On June 12th, the young Mexican
photographer Antonio Garduño captures Madero’s triumphant entry into the city of Cuernavaca in the state
of Morelos, just south of the capital, to rally support for his election. The image is to become iconic. Such
images show us the ecstatic response to the end of the Porfiriato, as people move along the dusty streets on
foot and horse with their hats, guns and flags raised in the air. The presidential election in October 1911 is a
resounding triumph for Madero, who assumes office on November 6th.
By this time the photographer Agustín Víctor Casasola has established the Association of Press
Photographers, and he organizes a series of exhibitions showing the best of photo-reportage. Symbolically,
Madero inaugurates the first exhibition in December. Within a year Casasola will have formed the Agencia
de Información Fotográfica (Photographic Information Agency) in Mexico City and create an
indispensable photographic archive of the period. The Agencia is co-founded by Gonzalo Herrerias,
director of the newspaper El Independiente.
Disillusionment (1912)
Upon assuming power Francisco Madero almost immediately aligns himself with the elite, the class against
which the Revolution had begun, causing his support to wane. Both Emiliano Zapata and Pascual Orozco
become disillusioned with what they perceive as a lack of enthusiasm for continuing the revolution and
instigating real social reform. (Madero had asked Zapata to disband his army at the time of his entry into
Mexico City. Zapata began to do so, but stopped when interim President de la Barra sent Federal troops
under General Victoriano Huerta in an unsuccessful attempt to force the demobilization.)
After an abortive visit to President Madero in November to advocate reforms to benefit indigenous workers
Zapata issues his Ayala Plan, which demands agrarian reform and armed conflict against the government.
The rural working class people take up arms supporting Zapata, and throughout the country rural
insurgency gathers strength. It is a grassroots peasant war and the fighters call themselves Zapatistas. Rare
photographs remain of Madero’s forces using aircraft to fight the Zapatistas, and of a single Zapatista
soldier standing at attention.
At the same time Orozco organizes a band of rebels in the north and on March 25, 1912 issues his
Orozquista Plan—a blueprint for proposing measures to improve working conditions for the poor. In April
Huerta becomes commander of the Federal Division of the North, and requests that Pancho Villa be under
his command against Orozco. Villa is promoted to honorary brigadier general in early May. On May 22,
Villa inflicts a defeat on Orozco at Rellano on the Chihuahua-Durango border. However, a rivalry develops
between Huerta and Villa, and when Villa’s men seize an Arabian horse and Villa keeps it for himself
Huerta orders Villa ’s execution for insubordination. Villa is sent before the firing squad, but Madero sends
Colonel Rubio Navarette to deliver a stay of execution. (By some accounts he is only saved by the
intervention of the president’s brother, Raúl Madero.) Huerta is indignant at President Madero’s order
countermanding his own, while Villa awards Navarette with his horse and sword before he is imprisoned
by Madero’s order.
Orozco works across the northern states, recruiting widely. W.H. Horne photographs different groups of
men and women, townsfolk, campesinos and Indians taking up arms in his cause. One photograph is of
Yaqui Indians from the state of Sonora, possibly with Orozco standing behind them. (After an uprising in
1901, Díaz had expelled thousands of Yaquis into the Yucatán and Tehuantepec. They were later forced to
work as serfs for the henequen plantations.) With strong economic interests at stake, including a quarter of
Mexico’s private landholdings, the United States becomes concerned with developments south of the Río
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
3
Bravo (Rio Grande). President Taft orders an arms embargo in October, which hinders Orozco and allows
Huerta to gain the upper hand. Villa escapes from prison on December 27th and makes his way to the
border. Abandoned by the Madero government, he recruits forces, including indigenous peoples who had
suffered repression under Porfirio Díaz and rapacious landowners. Control over the railway lines becomes a
key objective of the various combatants in the Revolution.
It is not only those advocating liberal reforms that turn against Madero. The conservative opposition also
sees itself as unfairly treated, and forms a coalition around Bernardo Reyes, former governor of Nuevo
Leon, who served as secretary of war under Díaz, and Félix Díaz, the former dictator’s nephew. In October
Díaz, with the support of disaffected officers from the former Porfirian army stationed in Veracruz, leads a
revolt against Madero. It is quashed and both Díaz and Reyes are imprisoned.
Decena Trágica: Opening, February 9th, 1913
Following President Francisco Madero’s decision not to execute the conservative insurgents Félix Díaz and
Bernardo Reyes, his general, Manuel Mondragón, releases them from prison, and then joins them in open
rebellion. On February 9th Madero enters the Palacio Nacional (National Palace), and General Victoriano
Huerta decides to join the fight to put down Díaz and his Felicista forces. As under Porfirio Díaz, Agustín
Víctor Casasola turns his camera on the faces of power, photographing Madero’s entry into the Palace and
capturing an ominous portrait of Huerta. Reyes and (Félix) Díaz lead a coup against Madero and the
National Palace, opening La Decena Trágica. Reyes is killed on his horse in front of the Palace, while Díaz
is repulsed by government troops loyal to Madero and leads his forces across the city to the Ciudadela, an
old army arsenal that they are able to commandeer.
Felix Miret and Manuel Rámos, working for Casasola’s photo agency, become the principle photographers
to document the tragic events that follow, when heavy fighting leaves thousands of people, soldiers and
civilians, dead. Rámos goes to the northwest corner of the Palace, near the Cathedral, to witness and
capture on film the massacre of the Felicistas in front of the National Palace. He makes a virtually
cinematic portrayal of the events, photographing the guards lined up in front of the Palace, and then from
almost the same spot, photographs after the attack. Díaz’s forces lie dead with their horses on the broad
expanse of the Zócalo (central square). Crowds gather in the distance around the dead, and the Palace casts
a shadow across their bodies. Rámos moves his camera, turning it towards the Northwest corner. We see
the statue of Enrico Martínez that Abel Briquet photographed some thirty years earlier. The trolley-tracks
are still there, the trees have grown, but the apparent peacefulness of an old colonial city has disappeared.
Rámos documents these scenes of destruction perhaps more thoroughly than any other known
photographer, but Miret is there too. His photographs are different, closer to their subject, less expansive in
their construction. He photographs the Federal soldiers as they defend the Palace with canons. We never
see the subject at whom they direct their fire. Later, Rámos enters the Arsenal to photograph the
conspirators. Hugo Brehme, who arrived in Mexico from Germany only three years earlier, begins to
document La Decena Trágica for Casasola’s agency. Not since Cortés laid siege to the city of Tenochtitlán
has the central area of Mexico City seen such fighting. Evidence of the violence and destruction of human
life is everywhere apparent.
Decena Trágica: Street Fighting, February 1913
Sporadic fighting continues throughout La Decena Trágica. The military confrontation gradually
intermingles with the daily life of Mexico City, and photographers begin to photograph the effects upon life
on the street as well as the street fighting. There is an image taken by Osuna of Federal soldiers being
poured beverages at the window of a house. Osuna’s action startles the woman inside the house and she
raises a hand to her mouth. A photograph by Hoyas captures people passing by the destroyed clock tower
on the corner of Bucareli and Atenas streets, and photographs by anonymous photographers show the dead
bodies lying in the street.
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
4
Hoping to crush the rebellion, President Madero sends General Huerta to lay siege to the Ciudadela, which
Díaz is using as a base. Huerta pretends to fight the rebel troops commanded by Díaz and General
Mondragón while actually acting in collusion with them. He orders the military units loyal to Madero into
suicidal attacks while holding his own forces in reserve. Huerta’s indiscriminate shelling of colonial
buildings near the fortress reduces many of them to rubble.
Decena Trágica: Huerta and U.S. Complicity, February 18th, 1913
La Decena Trágica ends when the United States intervenes in order to safeguard its own interests. The
violence, loss of human life and damage to property in Mexico City is of great concern to U.S. ambassador
Henry Lane Wilson, who believes President Madero is to blame for the crisis and unable to bring internal
stability to the country. Wilson offers General Huerta counsel, complicity and aid, thus defying President
William H. Taft's instructions to remain aloof from domestic Mexican politics. On February 18th Huerta
publicly switches his allegiance from Madero to the opposition, and Huerta and Díaz sign the so-called
“Pact of the Embassy” in the U.S. Ambassador’s office, in which they agree to conspire against Madero
and to install Huerta as president. The pact leads to what becomes known as “Huerta’s Insurrection”
(Usurpacion Huertista): the general assumes the presidency the following day, after arresting Madero.
Huerta is seen publicly with U.S. officers and his insurrection is covered by the photographic agency
Mexican View Company.
J. E. Long, while working for the U.S. government in Mexico during the crisis, puts together a
photographic album that provides visual evidence of the damage done to the embassy, the American club,
and his own residence. The album includes photographs by different photographers, including an image by
Agustín Víctor Casasola of people on the street. They are close to the building, as if seeking to avoid the
street fighting. The image captures a trail of dust that conveys a sense of their rapid movement. The caption
states: “Natives getting themselves and effects out of line of fire.” The album also includes a map showing
where Madero’s federal troops are stationed, and a letter from Ambassador Wilson asking both sides to
give Long “free pass to carry out a human duty.”
Decena Trágica: Assassination, February 22nd 1913
On February 19th, 1913 new head of state Huerta secures the resignation of Madero and his vice president
Pino Suárez, who are transferred to the Mexico City penitentiary. On February 22nd, three days after
assuming the presidency and with the full complicity of United States ambassador Wilson, Huerta orders
Madero and Pino Suárez assassinated on the way to the Federal District prison. Images taken after the
murders, by Manuel Rámos and Felix Miret among others, show crowds waiting outside the Penitentiary,
and others gathering around the site where the men are supposed to have fallen. In a scene reminiscent of
that played out on the site where the emperor Maximilian and his generals were killed outside Querétaro, a
stone pyre is built and a small cross is placed to mark the spot. The official explanation given by Huerta’s
government is that the two men were shot while trying to escape custody. Shortly afterwards, anonymous
photomontage postcards circulate, depicting Huerta as a “Traitor, Assassin and Hypocrite” and Madero and
Pino Suárez as martyrs.
Unity Against Huerta (1913)
While Victoriano Huerta is recognized by European powers as the rightful leader of Mexico, incoming
United States president Woodrow Wilson is shocked by the events leading to the assassination of Francisco
Madero and his vice-President, and removes the complicit American ambassador Henry Lane Wilson from
office. Huerta’s brutal and repressive regime silences any talk of social change and forces many into open
rebellion: in the northern states of Coahuila, Sonora and Chihuahua a coalition of military officers forms
the Constitutionalist Army to defeat the new dictator and appoints Venustiano Carranza, Governor of
Coahuila, as its leader. (The name of the army is derived from their demand that the office of the
presidency be elective, as specified in the constitution.) When Governor Abraham González of Chihuahua
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
5
is arrested soon after Madero’s assassination, and murdered on March 7th while on a train with Federal
soldiers en route to Mexico City, Chihuahua joins the open revolt against Huerta.
On March 26 Carranza issues the Plan de Guadalupe, a refusal to recognize the authority of Huerta or
judicial and legislative bodies. The plan contains nothing concerning land reform; it is rather an open
declaration of war. The declaration is displayed publicly throughout the country, including at the
International Bridge between El Paso and Ciudad Juárez, and gains the adherence of Pancho Villa, Álvaro
Obregón, Pablo González, and Emiliano Zapata.
One of the first military leaders to follow Carranza and sign the Plan de Guadalupe is General Lucio
Blanco from Coahuila. Blanco leads the rebel forces during the battle of Matamoros (at the border between
Texas and the northeastern Mexican state of Tamaulipas), which takes place in early June and spreads to
the nearby Texan town of San Benito. With the aid of Carranza’s troops, Blanco captures the Federal
garrison on June 3rd. The defense of the city includes the local militia, volunteers and the Rurales.
Blanco’s views of social reform are far more radical than those of Carranza. In August Blanco plays a
major role in the destruction of the haciendas near Matamoros owned by Félix Díaz and known as Los
Borregos, and the redistribution of the land to eleven campesinos.
An amateur photographer, Grant Bobier, takes photographs of Matamoros. He also collects other images
taken at the time by P.C. Shockey, who had a studio in the neighboring town of Harlingen, and P.A. Todd.
Other photographers whose work is not represented here (such as Robert Runyon) also witness the battle in
Matamoros as well as those in the cities of Monterrey and Ciudad Juárez. The images by Bobier, Shockey
and Todd are typical of the period, focusing as they do on the leaders, the soldiers, and the casualties. There
is little by way of civilian life or the townsfolk, except images of events such as a reception for Blanco.
What is striking about many of these postcards is what is written on the back. One photograph by Shockey
has the inscription on the front: “Loaded to kill.” And another shows the American consulate in Matamoros
with a furled flag and barricades and trenches alongside. In a note that was typical of American concern for
material assets, Bobier writes on the back: “Though some of the hardest fighting took place here both sides
were very careful not to fire upon American property. All American property in the town had our flag on it
therefore it was not to be molested.”
What is not remarked upon is the youth or utter destitution of the rebels, though it is evident in the
photograph of women soldiers by Bobier or “Typical Mexican soldiers” by Shockey. Some images serve as
a grim reminder of what occurred in these towns, the several hundred wounded and the more than one
hundred who died in combat. However, there is little with which to better understand how the Mexican
Revolution becomes a symbol of liberation that mobilizes the landless working class and those
impoverished by the Mexican state and its North American ally.
Catalyst for Revolt
After La Decena Trágica most of the fighting moves away from Mexico City to the north or elsewhere, and
a number of photographers cease to report on events; there are few photographs documenting the later
Revolution to be found by Felix Miret, Manuel Rámos, Osuna, Antonio Garduño or H.J. Gutierrez. Rámos
begins to photograph architecture and landscape sometime during the revolution years, while Garduño
turns more toward the arts. Of the careers of the others little is known. The fighting in the North ranges
across a vast territory, with many fronts involving broad sectors of the community. Other photographers
working in the states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Sonora and elsewhere take over the task of documenting the
Revolution, as evidenced by the powerful, sharply focused images of General Toribio Ortega and his men
belonging to a series taken by an unknown photographer in one city in the North. They convey a rich sense
of the time and of the people involved, capturing not only their appearence but even their mood as they
hold the Mexican flag and prepare to leave for the front line.
The death of his allies Francisco Madero and Abraham González is the catalyst that galvanizes Pancho
Villa into action. His ascent is aided when Ortega from Chihuahua, who had previously allied himself with
the murdered González, joins him. Ortega is a highly respected revolutionary and soldier who brings with
him a force of five hundred guerillas. He becomes Villa’s deputy in what will come to be known as the
División del Norte (Northern Division).
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
6
Villa’s forces cross the Rio Grande to do battle with Pascual Orozco, who has joined with Victoriano
Huerta. Clashes between the two forces follow at Saltillo and Torreón. Orozco occupies Zacatecas at the
end of the May. On November 5th Villa launches an attack against Chihuahua City, the state capital and a
government stronghold. Five days later he withdraws, but he has gained possession of two coal trains from
the Terrazas family station - the largest landowning family in Chihuahua - and enters Ciudad Juárez via the
railway on the night of the 15th. The battle against the Federales and Orozco’s forces moves south thirty
miles to Tierra Blanca, a railway junction, and although outclassed by advanced weaponry of Germanmade machineguns, Villa’s forces win by dynamiting the railway line.
Villa becomes governor of Chihuahua on December 8th, 1913 and immediately institutes beneficial social
changes. He reforms land ownership laws, makes credit available to small farmers, cuts taxes, and begins a
program of public works to lower unemployment and assist with hospital bills. Villa understands very well
the importance of publicity and not only encourages and pays photographers to escort him, but from this
period on - and for more than a year - the Mexican filmmaker Luis Guzmán accompanies him.
Villa’s Forces (1914)
The photograph of Pancho Villa and his wife, Luz Corral de Villa, was taken in front of their residence in
Ciudad Juárez on New Year’s Day. On January 10th Villa and his men gain decisive victory over Ojinaga,
a border town in Chihuahua, leading to annihilation of Pascual Orozco’s troops. After his defeat, Orozco
escapes to Veracruz, rejoining Victoriano Huerta’s much-weakened Federal army. A postcard of the time
shows a group of soldiers waiting for Antonio Rabago, a general who had been a chief in the division
fighting Orozco, but joined forces with Huerta after being implicated in the death of Abraham González. In
February 1914 Villa rescues the body of González, allowing the people of Chihuahua to pay their final
respects to the former governor. On February 26th, Villa is photographed carrying the coffin of his friend.
Another image shows Rudolfo Fierro, a former railway worker and important officer in Villa’s army,
presiding over a brutal execution of Orozco’s soldiers and sympathizers. American landowners become
concerned for their safety and the American authorities cut off fuel supplies to Villa, but he is still able to
buy arms across the border.
By early 1914 Villa’s core forces became known as the División del Norte, a powerful and feared military
force that travels by train and controls much of the North. They take control of the Mexican Central
Railway Line (the same line William Henry Jackson photographed in 1883) between Chihuahua and
Mexico City, while El Paso, Texas remains Villa’s stronghold. Villa works with members of the wealthy
elite in the states of Coahuila and Nuevo Leon, including the family of Francisco Madero (especially Raúl
Madero, who has become a Villista). Their plan is to overthrow Venustiano Carranza and form a new party.
The son of Luis Terrazas, who has supported first the Orozquistas and then Huerta, is held for ransom,
allowing Villa to exploit the enormous Terrazas family fortune to fund his struggle. Villa’s men push
Huerta south and attack and overrun Torreón, but access to coal for fueling the trains will continue to
plague Villa’s attempt to proceed further southward. Villa finds another source of income in movie
contracts signed for the battles of Ojinaga and Torreón. His fee is high. The battle in Torreón is later to be
released in the U.S. under the title The Life of General Villa. Other leaders, including Huerta and Carranza,
will also have films made.
Villa’s defeat of the Federal army unleashes a flood of refugees into Texas. They include soldiers and their
families, sympathizers and both rich and poor from Chihuahua City. It takes them eight days to cross the
desert and mountains to reach the Texas border. About 7,000 Mexican refugees escaping Ojinaga are
interned in Fort Bliss. Photographs reveal the conditions they endure as they wait for the end of the
Revolution in the barren desert landscape of New Mexico and Texas. Many such images are unsigned,
untitled and undated. Each is a distillation of a personal story that might be found in memoir and fiction,
but collectively they belong to a larger history, and document how many lives were directly and deeply
affected by the Revolution.
The U.S. Invasion of Veracruz (April 1913)
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
7
On March 4th, 1914 United States President Woodrow Wilson, who refuses to recognize Victoriano
Huerta’s authority, recalls the American ambassador, and begins to supply Venustiano Carranza with a
flow of arms. On April 9th Huerta’s troops arrest and briefly detain the crew of the U.S.S. Dolphin,
anchored in the port of Tampico off the coast of Veracruz. Wilson demands a 21-gun salute to the U.S. flag
in apology, and when Huerta refuses embarks upon what becomes known as the Veracruz Incident, or an
invasion of Mexico in which the city of Veracruz is captured and held for six months, cutting off Huerta’s
main supply route. It is a report that Germany is sending arms to Huerta aboard the merchant vessel
Ypringa that nominally prompts Wilson to have Veracruz seized, and on April 21st American marines
arrive with 15 ships (and 38 more in reserve) and rather than attacking the Ypringa, whose cargo does reach
Huerta, bombard the city. The U.S. troops set up a garrison in the old fort San Juan de Ulloa and impose
martial law. They meet with resistance from local citizens and Mexican Navy Maritime School cadets. The
Mexicans, military and civilian, suffer heavy casualties, and the invasion causes outrage throughout the
country.
With the advent of direct American intervention across the border, journalists and photographers from all
over the U.S. and Mexico come to Veracruz. The influx includes Hugo Brehme, working for the Casasola
agency, who photographs the U.S. warships and sailors, the Mexican resistance, and most vividly the
desecration of public monuments, seen disfigured with anti-American sentiments. One roughly made poster
reads “Death to the Bandit Wilson …” and goes on to insult the U.S. president at some length, ending with
a defiant “Long Live Mexico, Long Live Hidalgo.” Another reads “Long Live President Huerta, Long Live
the Armed Forces of Mexico.” In a comment that reveals the racist sentiments of the time the caption
“Future Generals and Presidents of Mexico” accompanies an image of a row of mostly naked young boys
lined up along the beachfront. The American photographer Walter P. Hadsell, a photographer from Tucson,
Arizona, arrives to document the American side of the intervention. Jack London, the famous American
author and journalist, also arrives as a war correspondent for Collier's Weekly.
The invasion prompts many who otherwise stand in opposition to the Mexican government forces to offer
support: Pancho Villa, Emiliano Zapata, and Carranza all send troops to converge on the city. In the face of
this opposition, and of the fall of the Huerta government in July, President Wilson orders the U.S. troops to
leave the city on November 14th.
Battle of Zacatecas (June 1914)
Between June 11th and 24th Pancho Villa attacks and crushes the Federal forces in the city of Zacatecas,
situated on the main railway line between the North and Mexico City and of great strategic importance.
Federal forces in the city numbered some 12,000 and included Yaqui Indians of northern Sonora
conscripted into the Federal army in exchange for land as part of a new strategy from Victoriano Huerta
intended to create popular alliances.
Agustín Víctor Casasola photographs the Federal forces and the American Press Association wires images
of the battle and its aftermath back to the U.S. for the American public. The image of Villa leading the
charge is almost cinematic, while others are raw, sober images showing little else but the wounded and
dead. They will serve to convince powerful American interests that Huerta can no longer be supported. He
is forced to resign on July 15 and retreats into exile. Thousands have died during his brief reign. The fall of
Zacatecas to Villa proves to be a decisive moment in the Revolution. It also leads to an irreparable break
between Villa and Venustiano Carranza, when Villa refuses to follow Carranza’s directives, and Carranza
refuses to supply coal to División del Norte trains.
The Revolutionaries Realign and Split (1914)
After his defeat at Zacatecas Victoriano Huerta abandons Mexico for the United States, but ends up with
other civilian refugees and army prisoners interned in Fort Bliss along with Pascual Orozco. Orozco tries to
mount another campaign, but fails, taking final refuge in the mountains of Texas. He is later killed by
Texas Rangers pursuing a gang of cattle rustlers.
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
8
With both Huerta and Orozco now out of Mexico, the opposition splits into factions, with each leader
offering different programs of reform. Venustiano Carranza, who has declared himself to be the new
president despite Pancho Villa’s objections, triumphantly enters Mexico City in August 1914. The Rurales,
who have become the Federal police corps, ride with the Constitutionalist forces. The commanding officer
is Álvaro Obregón from Sonora, who has gained a fine reputation as a Constitutionalist officer under
Carranza as commander of the Northeastern Division. The defeat of Huerta leaves the formerly tenuous
allies Villa and Obregón facing off against each other, as the ensuing power vacuum opens up and they
clash over political and territorial differences.
The Pacto de Torreón is drawn up between Villa’s División del Norte and Obregón’s Cuerpo de Ejercito,
and in August 1914 they hold talks in a customs house in Ciudad Juárez. United States Brigadier General
John J. “Black Jack” Pershing, famous for his role in the Spanish-American War and future commander of
the American Expeditionary Force in Europe during World War I, moderates the meeting. A photograph of
the three men standing together is made into a postcard and sold widely across Mexico and the U.S. Villa
comes to believe that the U.S. will acknowledge him as Mexico’s leader, but instead it throws its support
behind Carranza and offers the Constitutionalist troops arms held by American forces in Veracruz.
Hostilities break out and Villa aligns himself, sporadically, with Emiliano Zapata.
Zapata’s Resistance (1914)
The short-lived pact between the revolutionary leaders splits along class lines. Venustiano Carranza and
Álvaro Obregón are of the elite petit bourgeois businessmen and professionals, and their support reflects
this. Pancho Villa and Emiliano Zapata gain the support of the rural working class and masses, though there
are differences between Zapata and Villa both in the composition of their troops and their revolutionary
beliefs. Villa’s troops consist of former hacienda workers, day laborers, miners, and railway workers.
Zapata is an ardent champion of the peasants who adopts “Tierra y Libertad” (Land and Liberty) as his
slogan. His Ayala Plan of 1912 called for the repossession of all land previously usurped by the large
hacienda owners, and his army is formed mostly of poor, landless peasants. Many women and men from a
broad cross section of the populace also volunteer to join in the conflict on both sides. The soldaderas are
women who obtain and prepare food, attend to the wounded, and on occasion fight on the frontlines. A
number of young boys also work at the frontline as runners, sentries, and even soldiers.
By August Zapata’s forces have control over most of the southern states of Morelos and Guerrero. Having
renounced negotiations with Carranza, he conquers the city of Cuernavaca in August 1914. It has been
barely four months since the Veracruz Incident, but photographer Hugo Brehme is again in the right place.
He photographs Zapata entering the city, with his family, and speaking to the crowds. We can imagine him
telling them that the Plan de Ayala will redistribute the land, establish a rural loan bank (the country’s first
agricultural credit organization), and begin to reorganize the sugar industry into cooperatives. Brehme’s
photographs are to become iconic images of the great revolutionary leader. However, they will be among
his last of the Revolution. After this time he turns to photographing the landscape for newspapers and
journals such as National Geographic, as he did while traveling to Africa on German expeditions. He will
later be virtually forgotten as a photographer of the revolution, and remembered instead as a great
photographer in the picturesque tradition.
In an attempt to resolve the ongoing political controversy and agree on a provisional president, the
revolutionary factions decide to convene in October in the neutral city of Aguascalientes. When Villa and
Zapata take control of the assembly and name Eulalio Gutiérrez as their choice, Carranza and Obregón
withdraw to Veracruz to set up a separate Constitutionalist government.
Making Deals (1914/1915)
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
9
With Venustiano Carranza and Álvaro Obregón regrouping in the face of the split between the
revolutionary factions Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa race against each other to be the first to reach
Mexico City. Zapata arrives first, and on November 26th, 1914 his troops take control of the capital. One
week later Villa arrives with his own army, and the two finally meet in Xochimilco on December 4th. Here
Villa adopts Zapata’s Ayala Plan and the two agree to work together to oust Carranza. A famous
photograph by Agustín Víctor Casasola captures a historic moment: Zapata sits next to Villa, who is sitting
in the presidential seat and smiling at the camera. This is to become one of the most famous images of the
Revolution and symbolically a decisive point in the three-year-old revolutionary struggle for both men.
However, after the meeting the two leaders go their separate ways.
In December Zapata takes control of Puebla and begins a war with Obregón. In January 1915 Carranza
moves his administration to Veracruz and reorganizes his forces, and Obregón drives Zapata out of Mexico
City. In April Obregón hands a devastating defeat to Villa at Celaya in Central Mexico. The rout marks the
beginning of Villa’s decline and his forces are defeated repeatedly throughout the year. He sends family
members out of the country to Cuba.
In August 1915, President Woodrow Wilson’s military advisor, General Hugo Scott, meets with Villa and
his deputy Rodolfo Fierro at the racetrack in Ciudad Juárez to discuss the possible financing of Villa’s
revolutionary movement. Villa is desperately seeking funds to keep his movement alive. Scott, in terms that
reveal racist views, recommends helping Villa: “Firmness is essential in dealing with all inferior races and
they must have perfect confidence of your word.”
Border Battles: Agua Prieta (1915)
Although the border continues to be the battleground between leaders of the Mexican Revolution, there is
less photography of the struggle. Most of the photographers are now from the United States, and while
some follow the fortunes of Pancho Villa and Venustiano Carranza, but most focus on the American troops
stationed along the border.
Carranza is much less radical than either Villa or Emiliano Zapata in terms of social programs. He focuses
on nationalist rhetoric and increased governmental authority over foreign investments. With the railroads
and much of the country now in the hands of Carranza, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson officially
recognizes him as the rightful leader of Mexico, and the U.S. helps move the Constitutionalist troops and
artillery that have been building up along the northern edge of Carranza’s home state of Morelos to the
border town of Agua Prieta. Now desperate for a victory, Villa sends an army of over 6,000 men to attack
the town on November 1, 1915. General Plutarco Elias Calles, a Carranzista from Sonora --with the aid of
U.S. troops stationed across the border in Arizona--inflicts severe losses on Villa’s troops, who are forced
to retreat. The defeat marks the end of the domination of the División del Norte.
Villa’s Stand Against the Americans (1916)
Throughout 1916 tensions and brutality rise as Pancho Villa and his men, incensed by the interference of
the United States in the Mexican Revolution, continue to threaten the border. On January 9th, 1916 Villa
and his men stop a train by laying a barrier across the tracks, drag out a group of American mining
engineers, and murder them. In the aftermath of this and similar events postcards of the Mexican
Revolution, particularly those by Walter H. Horne, become enormously popular. Knowing that brutal
scenes sell well, Horne makes an arrangement with the officer in charge of firing squads, whereby he is
able to position his camera prior to executions of captured revolutionaries in return for a small fee. His
best-selling group of postcards is a triple execution series taken on January 15th, 1916 at the railway station
in Ciudad Juárez. Those who die are Francisco Rojas, Juan Aguilar and José Moreno, although the postcard
reproduction reduces them to anonymity. Horne also photographs scenes of lynching and five men
executing a blindfolded man. The pictures are entitled: “Executing bandits in Mexico,” assuring Americans
that justice is being done. Villista soldiers and anti-Carranza forces are no longer viewed as fighting a just
cause or a revolution, but as bandits rounded up by American troops or, worse, still at large. The word
‘Bandit’ becomes a pejorative term used indiscriminately to describe all Mexicans, whether they are part of
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
10
Villa’s units or not. By viewing Mexicans in this way such postcards undermine the Revolution and those
still struggling for a more equitable system.
On March 9th, 1916, taking revenge for a failed arms deal with an American and apparently hoping to
incite an invasion of Mexico, Villa’s soldiers lead a deadly strike against the town of Columbus in New
Mexico, just west of El Paso and Ciudad Juárez. Eighteen Americans and ninety of Villa’s men are killed.
Shortly afterwards Villa has his photograph taken with his officers, including one of the most faithful,
General Nicholas Fernandez, who has fought with Villa since his youth and took part in the raid on
Columbus. Desperate for provisions and ammunitions the Villistas raid Boquillas and Glenn Springs, Texas
in May.
Horne becomes the first photographer to enter Columbus and his images become the exclusive accounts of
Villa’s attack. They cause the revolutionary leader’s reputation to plummet in the United States, though
many in Mexico see him as an avenger of American oppression. By September, 200,000 U.S. troops are
active along the border, with 40,000 in the El Paso region alone, and U.S. authorities round up Mexicans in
the region. Although Venustiano Carranza apologizes for Villa’s attacks in an effort to prevent U.S.
punitive action and an invasion of Mexico, President Woodrow Wilson orders American troops under the
command of General John J. Pershing to cross the border in pursuit of Villa. Wilson also federalizes state
militias and orders all troops to the border. The evidence that Villa had actually participated in the raids is
never conclusive, but for the next eleven months Pershing pursues Villa, unsuccessfully, across Northern
Mexico. Carranza responds in turn, sending forces north to halt Pershing’s incursion. By January U.S.
troops have withdrawn. (Over the next four years, sporadic fighting continues throughout the northern
states between Carranza’s Federal army, Villa’s rebels, and the U.S. troops sent to capture Villa and bring
him to justice.) On February 5th, 1917 a new constitution is ratified and one month later Carranza is elected
president. The constitution takes effect on May 1st.
End of the Revolution
Venustiano Carranza is elected president in May 1917, and names a cabinet that includes Plutarco Elías
Calles. Emiliano Zapata continues to fight a losing battle against Carranza, despite many of his troops
deserting him, until he is murdered on April 10, 1919. Tricked into believing he is to meet a disaffected
colonel of Carranza’s army Zapata rides to southern Morelos, where he is shot dead. When Carranza insists
on naming Ignacio Bonillas his successor, Calles resigns in order to support the candidacy of General
Álvaro Obregón, and the two collude with others in deposing the president in April 1920. In early May
Carranza is assassinated by his own bodyguard, whom Obregón has won over with the help of the
remaining Zapatistas. Obregón enters Mexico City triumphantly on May 9th, Adolfo de la Huerta is elected
provisional president on May 24th, to be succeeded as president by Obregón on September 5th. (Calles
serves as secretary of foreign relations in the provisional government of Adolfo de la Huerta, and then as
secretary of the interior under Obregón, and eventually as president from 1924-1928.)
After two United States army “punitive expeditions” into Mexico in 1916 and 1919 fail to capture Pancho
Villa, who continues to occupy key cities in the north, the Mexican government opts for a peaceful
settlement with the legendary rebel. With Carranza gone from power Villa surrenders in July, 1920 and is
granted amnesty. He retires to a ranch in Durango. Three years later (on July 20th, 1923) he is shot down
by unknown attackers while returning from bank business in Parral, Chihuahua. The assassination of Villa
is a violent footnote to the Mexican Revolution. The multiple-image postcard seen here, made from
pictures taken by local Mexican photographers, was one of several produced by American companies
seeking to profit from public interest in his death.
While the Revolution has led Mexico out of a dictatorship and foreign ownership and control, the country
has been left in ruins, hundreds of thousands of Mexicans have been killed or have fled across the border,
the economy is at a standstill, and the countryside destroyed. However, governmental stability has been
restored and a new era is beginning. While anonymous images depicting looting, fire and death in the north
continue to appear, photographers like Hugo Brehme have turned to photographing Mexico City and the
country’s rich heritage of colonial and modern architecture. Photography is once again documenting
monuments, as the very first photographers in Mexico did, rather than change.
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
11
The images presented here are inevitably inadequate to their task, leaving many individuals and groups
unrepresented, many stories and events untold. Archives depend upon what was recorded and what
remains, what is acquired and donated from families who wish to share the legacy across borders, and they
will always remain incomplete. Even so, they can provide compelling and unique glimpses into history: in
1917 Agustín Víctor Casasola rescued the photographic archive of the newspaper El Imparcial, for which
he worked for over ten years. In 1921 he published an extraordinary compilation on the Revolution, Álbum
historico gráfico. It has become the seminal visual source for those seeking to understand the ten violent
years of rebellion and revolution.
Mexico: Empire to Revolution, http://www.getty.edu/research/tools/digital/mexico/, © 2002, J. Paul Getty Trust
12