Pedro Santana - As A Dictator

As A Dictator

He is considered a brilliant military strategist, and was a key figure in the successful separation of the Dominican Republic from Haiti. But many historians think that some of his later actions barred him from becoming a genuine national hero.

• After he drove the Haitian army out of the country in the Dominican War of Independence, he almost immediately moved to eliminate the very Independentists that fought alongside him. Santana felt that the new nation could not survive without being annexed to Spain, which the Trinitarian Independentists did not accept.

• He relentlessly arrested or exiled members of La Trinitaria. The very first person that was forced out of the country was Juan Pablo Duarte, founding father of the new Dominican Republic.

• Santana attacked María Trinidad Sánchez, the first heroine of the Republic and aunt of Francisco del Rosario Sánchez of the Founding Fathers of the nation. She and Concepción Bona made the first national flag. Santana imprisoned her, tortured her, and sentenced her to death when she refused to name "conspirators" against him in the newly independent republic. Exactly one year after the proclamation of Independence (February 27, 1845) María Trinidad Sánchez was executed by a firing squad. This made her the first (but not last) female martyr of the republic .

• After being defeated in the elections of 1848, he reluctantly handed over the presidency to Manuel Jiménes, only to overthrow him by force less than a year later.