Spanish occupation of the Dominican Republic
The Reintegration of Santo Domingo was a brief period of Spanish reintegration of the Dominican Republic. In 1861, Dominican general Pedro Santana suggested retaking control of the Dominican Republic to Queen Isabella II of Spain, after a period of 17 years of Dominican sovereignty. The newly independent Dominican Republic was recovering economically from the recently ended Dominican War of Independence (1844–1856), when the Dominican Republic had won its independence against Haiti. The Spanish Crown and authorities, which scorned and rejected the peace treaties signed after the dismantling of some of its colonies in the Spanish West Indies some 50 years prior, welcomed his proposal and set to reestablish the Capitancy.
Santana becomes Governor-General
Spanish military officer in Santo Domingo
Pedro Santana y Familias, 1st Marquess of Las Carreras was a List of people from the Dominican Republic military commander and royalist politician who served as the president of the junta that had established the First Dominican Republic, a precursor to the position of the President of the Dominican Republic, and as the first President of the republic in the modern line of succession. A traditional royalist who was fond of the Monarchy of Spain and the Spanish Empire, he ruled as a governor-general, but effectively as an authoritarian dictator. During his life he enjoyed the title of "Libertador de la Patria." Aside from Juan Sánchez Ramírez, he was the only other Dominican head of state to serve as a governor to Santo Domingo.
Colour portrait of Pedro Santana
General Jean-Pierre Boyer occupied eastern Hispaniola between 1822 and 1843.
Having secured his forces, Santana marched to El Seibo to proclaim Dominican independence in what is known today as the Basilica of the Holy Cross
Santana, with presidential sash, photograph in 1853.