“MONSTROUS AND ILLEGAL PROCEEDINGS”: LAW ...

Montevideo’s walled citadel. Rondeau’s combined armies then surrounded the city and
began a prolonged siege. 20
At this moment, the old imperial conflicts over the Río de la Plata’s eastern
borderlands reemerged and decisively shaped events in the Banda. Elío again reached out to
the Portuguese Crown. The Portuguese in turn sensed an opportunity to realize their long-
standing dream of extending their dominions to the mouth of the Río de la Plata. For their
part, the revolutionary leadership in Buenos Aires desperately needed to avoid conflicts with
the Brazilians following the reversals in Upper Peru and Paraguay. As Portuguese forces
streamed across the borderlands towards Montevideo, porteño officers opened up
negotiations with Elío in order to avoid a direct conflict with the imperial armies. In
October, the two sides agreed to an armistice recognizing the viceroy’s authority over the
Banda. In turn, Buenos Aires committed to withdraw its forces across the river. The
Portuguese promised to evacuate the Banda after securing the interior for the Spanish
viceroy and restoring order. In practice, however, imperial forces behaved much more like a
permanent occupation force. They carved a swath of destruction across the borderlands as
they advanced. The Spaniards in the interior were largely left to fend for themselves.
Frustrated, Artigas withdrew his forces from the Banda Oriental in the wake of the
Portuguese invasion. As he retreated, the bulk of the Spanish population in the eastern
borderlands migrated with him to avoid the destruction reaped by the Brazilians marching
from the north. 21 Artigas established an encampment just across the Uruguay River in Entre
20 Ibid., 76-80.
21 Some scholars estimate that as much as fifty percent of the Banda’s rural inhabitants
joined the migration that later became known as the Uruguayan “Exodus.” In a careful
study, Ana Frega places the number closer to twenty-five percent. Frega, Pueblos y Soberanía,
142-43. The Padrón de la Familias submitted by Artigas to the Revolutionary Government in
Buenos Aires in 1811 lists 4,031 individuals as settling on the west bank of the Uruguay out
44