“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

alliances with the blancos to open up further trading connections into the Estado Oriental.
Perhaps more importantly, when the European powers blockaded Buenos Aires in 1845,
Urquiza rapidly worked to open up Entre Ríos’ ports along the Uruguay to overseas trade in
defiance of Rosas. The move expanded upon the already growing rivertine trade, producing
a commercial explosion connecting Entre Ríos to Corrientes and Rio Grande do Sul’s
interior ports. Regarding the river trade, Urquiza wrote to Antonio Crespo, Urquiza’s
handpicked successor to the entrerriano governorship, expressing his “complete satisfaction
[with the commerce of our ports along the Uruguay] and for that reason disposed that things
continue in the same manner.” 60
By the mid-1840s, Urquiza had established himself as the dominant political, military
and commercial figure along the Uruguay River’s expanding trading networks. He had made
a massive fortune. Urquiza’s commercial network reached its zenith with the establishment
of Santa Cándida, a vast saladero operation along the banks of the Uruguay near Concepción.
By 1849, Urquiza’s salting operations were processing around 1,000 animals per month. The
plant continued to grow throughout the early 1850s. Urquiza progressively increased its
efficiency by installing steam driven motors to pump water into the factory, as well as
rationalizing the slaughtering process. 61 His palatial residence, the San José Palace near his
saladero in eastern Entre Ríos, doubled as the de facto capital not only for Urquiza’s home
province, but also for many of his trading partners throughout the borderlands. This center
of authority served as one of the principal sites in the intractable sovereign conflicts between
the borderlands and putative national centers like Buenos Aires for the next thirty years.
60 Schmit, Ruina y Resurrección, 141.
61 Manuel Macchi, Urquiza: el Saladerista (Buenos Aires: Ediciones Macchi, 1971).
95