Battleground Women: Soldaderas and Female Soldiers in the Mexican Revolution1 | The Americas | Cambridge Core (original) (raw)

References

2 I use the terms soldadera and camp follower synonymously. Although some authors object to this usage on the grounds that it conveys negative overtones, the term is nevertheless apt to describe the unofficial status accorded to these women. Soldadera will not be italicized hereafter. By female soldier I mean a woman who volunteered as a soldier and who was officially recognized as such. She often commanded her own unit.

3 Von de Ellen, Fritz Arno, “Mexican Camp-Followers,” Harper’s Weekly 58:19 (May 2, 1914), 19.Google Scholar

4 Most notably, Salas, Elizabeth, Soldaderas in the Mexican Military: Myth and History (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990).Google Scholar Salas gathered a wealth of otherwise dispersed information. She builds upon the work of Alatone, Angeles Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana (Mexico City: Talleres Gráficos de la Nación, 1961).Google Scholar Other studies also deal with the battleground women: Macías, Anna, Against All Odds: The Feminist Movement in Mexico to 1940 (Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1982);Google Scholar Soto, Shirlene Ann, Emergence of the Modern Mexican Woman: Her Participation in Revolution and Struggle for Equality, 1910–1940 (Denver: Arden Press, 1990);Google Scholar Deutsch, Sandra McGee, “Gender and Sociopolitical Change in Twentieth-Century Latin America,” Hispanic American Historical Review 71:2 (1991), 259–306;CrossRefGoogle Scholar Pablos, Julia Tuñón, Mujeres en Mexico: una historia olvidada (Mexico City: Editorial Planeta, 1987);Google Scholar Turner, Frederick C., The Dynamic of Mexican Nationalism (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1968);Google Scholar and “Los efectos de la participación femenina en la revolución de 1910,” Historia Mexicana 44:4 (1967), 603–20. See also Fisher, Lillian Estelle, “The Influence of the Present Mexican Revolution Upon the Status of Mexican Women,” Hispanic American Historical Review 22:1 (1942), 221–28.Google Scholar For recent historiographical reviews of this subject see Asunción Lavrin, “La mujer en México: veinte años de estudio, 1968–1988,” and Escandón, Carmen Ramos, “(Qué veinte años no es nada? La mujer en México según la historiografía reciente,” in Memorias del simposio de historiografía mexicanista (Mexico City: Instituto de Investigaciones, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, 1990), pp. 545–79 and 580 93, respectively.Google Scholar

6 Corrido, “La chinita maderista,” translated by Turner, Frederick C., The Dynamic of Mexican Nationalism, pp. 284–85.Google Scholar

7 El Imparcial, June 8, 1911.

8 Katz, Friedrich, The Secret War in Mexico: Europe, the United States, and the Mexican Revolution (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), pp. 36–37.Google Scholar The exact composition of these bands is not well known. See Karush, Matthew B., “Assessing a Revolutionary Contribution: The PLM in Chihuahua, 1906–1912,” unpublished paper, University of Chicago, 1993, passim.Google Scholar

9 The most famous women of the Maderista revolution were wives and relatives of the leaders: Sara Pérez de Madero, Francisco’s wife; María Ochoa de Robles Domínguez, wife of Alfredo; Carmen Serdán, sister of Aquiles, and others. See Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, 66–77.Google Scholar

10 Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 94–95.Google Scholar For a more general description of this insurrectionary movement see Rojas, Beatriz, La Pequeña Guerra: Los Carrera Torres y los Cedillo (Zamora: El Colegio de Michoacán, 1983), chapter 2.Google Scholar

11 El álbum de la mujer: antología ilustrada de las mexicanas, 4 vols. (Mexico City, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, 1991), 4, pp.83–85, 236 includes a letter from a female soldier to Madero offering her services. See also Casasola, Gustavo, Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 5 vols. (Mexico City: Editorial Trillas, 1967), 1, p. 241;Google Scholar Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 77–78, 86, 89. For female soldiers with Orozco see The Sun (New York), September 21, 1913, William Buckley Collection of Papers (hereafter BP).Google Scholar

12 La Opinión (Los Angeles), October 19, 1930; Excélsior (Mexico City), November 23, 1930; Uroz, Antonio, Hombres y mujeres de Mexico (Mexico City: Editorial Lic. Antonio Uroz, 1974), p. 261;Google Scholar Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, p. 89.Google Scholar

13 Excélsior, November 23, 1930.

14 La Opinión, October 19, 1930; Excélsior, November 23, 1930. Photographic evidence can be found in Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 1. p. 241.Google Scholar

15 Jiménez, Angela, in Kallas, James, Rallas, Nina, and Pérez, Esther eds., Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920: Authentic Bilingual Life Experiences as Told by Veterans of the War, (San José, CA: Aztlán Today, 1974), pp. 35–64.Google Scholar

16 The Sun (New York), September 21, 1913, BP.

17 “Corrido del Desertor,” in Flores, Jesús Romero ed., Corridos de la revolución mexicana (Mexico City: Costa-Amic, 1979), 30.Google Scholar

19 For women in European armies see Hacker, Barton C. “Women and Military Institutions in Early Modern Europe: A Reconnaissance,” Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society 6:4 (1981), 643–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For women in the U.S. Federal army see Coffman, Edward M., The Old Army: A Portrait of the American Army in Peacetime, 1784–1898 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), pp. 25–26, 104–36, 287–327.Google Scholar

21 American vice consul John R. Silliman to State Department, Saltillo, May 17, 1913, National Archives, Washington D.C., Records of the Department of State Relating to the Internal Affairs of Mexico, 1910–1929 (hereafter cited as SD), 812.00/7726, 422.

23 Rutherford, John, Mexican Society During the Revolution: A Literary Approach (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1971), p. 296.Google Scholar See also Lieuwen, Edwin, Mexican Militarism: The Rise and Fall of the Revolutionary Army, 1910–1940 (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1968), pp. 4–5, 11.Google Scholar

24 Kelley, Jane Holden, Yaqui Women: Contemporary Life Stories (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1978), pp. 127–98.Google Scholar

25 The enganche was an advancement given to a laborer who then had to work off the debt thus acquired. In Yucatán this system was so corrupted that it resembled bondage.

26 Ibid., pp. 130–38, 157–63.

27 Ibid., pp. 138–39, 163.

28 Baerleìn, Henry, Mexico: The Land of Unrest (Philadelphia: Herbert and Daniel, 1913), pp. 30–31.Google Scholar

31 Knight, Alan, The Mexican Revolution, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 2: 78–79.Google Scholar

32 Womack, John, “The Mexican Revolution, 1910–1920,” in Cambridge History of Latin America, ed. Bethell, Leslie, 7 vols. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986), 5, p. 98 Google Scholar; Lieuwen, , Mexican Militarism, pp. 19–20.Google Scholar

33 O’Shaughnessy, Edith, A Diplomat’s Wife in Mexico (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1916), 58, 66–67.Google Scholar

35 The World (New York), December 1, 1913, BP.

37 Some of the most scornful descriptions of the Federal army include; The Evening Sun (New York), November 18, 1913, BP; and Report of the USS Minnesota Flagship to the Secretary of the Navy, June 26, 1913, SD 812.00/8017, 61.

38 Corrido “La entrada a México de las fuerzas obregonistas,” Flores, Romero ed., Corridos de la revolución mexicana, p. 212.Google Scholar

39 King, Rosa, Tempest Over Mexico: A Personal Chronicle (Boston: Little, Brown, 1935), p. 94.Google Scholar Quoted in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 39 Google Scholar; and Macías, , Against All Odds, p. 41 Google Scholar.

40 Womack points out that far from an autonomous military corporation, the revolutionary army that took shape in Morelos in 1913–14 was simply “an armed league of the state’s municipalities.” Womack, John, Zapata and the Mexican Revolution (New York: Knopf, Alfred A., 1968), p. 225.Google Scholar See also Womack, , “The Mexican Revolution,” pp. 109–10.Google Scholar

41 Irene Copado Viuda de Reyes, Archivo de la Palabra, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City, Programa de Historia Oral (hereafter cited as PHO), Z/l/10. Quoted in El álbum de la mujer, 4, p.82–83.

42 Lewis, Oscar, Life in a Mexican Village: Tepoztlán Restudied (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1963), p. 233.Google Scholar

43 Lewis, Oscar, Pedro Martínez: A Mexican Peasant and His Family (New York: Random House, 1964), p. 93.Google Scholar

45 Lewis, , Pedro Martínez, 85.Google Scholar The Carrancista anti-insurgency strategy was condemned in the American press. See The World, December 1, 1913, BP.

46 Lewis, , Life in a Mexican Village, p. 237;Google Scholar Lewis, , Pedro Martínez, 85–86;Google Scholar Womack, , Zapata and the Mexican Revolution, pp. 138–140,Google Scholar 158, 173–76. See also interview with Ignacia Peña viuda de Fuentes, Huitzilac, PHO/Z/1/18. Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer, 4, pp. 81–82.

47 The Mexican Herald, April 13, 1913. Quoted in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 40.Google Scholar

50 The Mexican Herald, November 26, 1914. See also Silliman to State Department, December 2, 1914, SD 812.00/13957, 1275.

52 King, , Tempest Over Mexico, p. 69.Google Scholar The Mexican Herald reported that a band of 400 Zapatista rebels, including about 20 women, were seen in Michoacán, The Mexican Herald, June 20, 1913.

53 See interview with doctor Juan Olivera, PHO/Z/1/11. Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer, 4, pp. 83–85. There is also a photograph of Rosa Bobadilla with the military staff of General Pacheco.

54 García, General Rubén provides the description in El Nacional (Mexico City), November 29, 1959.Google Scholar Reproduced in Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 92–93.Google Scholar If we are to believe the General’s account, Margarita Neri was a cold-blooded fighter ready to torture and kill. She stoned a man to death and cut a young woman’s breasts off.

55 Corrido “La toma de Torreón,” Flores, Romero ed., Corridos de la revolución mexicana, p. 82.Google Scholar

56 Azcárate, Juan F., Esencia de la revolución mexicana (Mexico City: Costa-Amic, 1966), p. 80;Google Scholar José Felipe Hernández Ortiz, PHO/1/51, 14. Quoted in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 45.Google Scholar

57 Reed, John, Insurgent Mexico (New York: International Publishers, 1969), pp. 188–89.Google Scholar

58 See the case of López, María Villasaña, in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, p. 208;Google Scholar Martínez, Oscar J., Fragments of the Mexican Revolution: Personal Accounts From the Border (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1983), p. 232;Google Scholar Davis, William B., Experiences and Observations of an American Consular Officer During the Mexican Revolution (Chula Vista, CA.: Wayside Press, 1920), pp. 51, 171–72.Google Scholar

59 Whitaker, Herman, “Villa and his People,” Sunset: The Monthly of the Pacific 33:2 (1914), 255.Google Scholar Quoted in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 40.Google Scholar

63 de Rivera, Emilia Enríquez, “Misión Sublime de la Mujer,” El Hogar 12 (August 1914).Google Scholar Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer mexicana, 4, p. 228; Plenn, J.H., “Forgotten Heroines of Mexico: Tales of the Soldaderas, Amazons of War and Revolution,” Travel 68 (April 1936), p. 60;Google Scholar De Ellen, Arno Von, “Mexican Camp-Followers,” p. 19.Google Scholar

64 Chepa Moreno said that most of the women accompanying the soldiers of the Mayo battalion were from northern Mexico. Kelley, , Yaqui Women, p. 143.Google Scholar

65 Gray, I. Thord, Gringo Rebel (Coral Gables, Fla.: University of Miami Press, 1960), pp. 209–10, 234.Google Scholar

67 Villistas boasted Coras and Huicholes some of whom were won over by the Carrancistas. See Grimes, Joseph E. and Hinton, Thomas B., “The Huichol and the Cora,” in Handbook of Middle American Indians, 12 vols. (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1964), 8, p. 795.Google Scholar Ralph Beals studying the Mexican Yaqui communities in 1932 found out that the ration of women to men was 3 to 1. This suggests the extent to which Yaqui Indians participated in the Revolution. Beals, Ralph L., The Contemporary Culture of the Cáhita Indians (Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology, 1945), p. 1.Google Scholar

68 New York Times, November 9, 1913.

69 The Sun, November 16, 1913, BP.

71 The Sun, November 16, 1913, BP.

72 The New York Tribune, December 1, 1913, BP.

73 Corrido “La adelita,” in Flores, Romero ed., Corridos de la revolución mexicana, 94.Google Scholar This corrido became a battle hymn of Villistas. Soldaderas were known as “adelitas” among Villa’s troops while the soldaderas of the Federal army were pejoratively called “guachas.” See Kallas, and Pérez, eds., Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, pp. 32–33;Google Scholar and Soto, , Emergence of the Modern Mexican Woman, p. 44.Google Scholar

75 Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, p. 212;Google Scholar Salas, Soldaderas, p. 43. An entire army could be housed in trains. Before entering Mexico City, Villista General Felipe Angeles stopped at the Hacienda de los Morales. Many people went in automobiles, taxi-cabs, and coaches to greet the army. They found long lines of boxcars strung out over the tracks on both sides of the hacienda station for a distance of several miles. The Mexican Herald, December 3, 1914.

76 H. O. Harris, United States Senate Hearings, Subcommittee on Foreign Relations, 62nd Congress, 1913, 663. Casasola confirms the story: soldaderas had plants hanging from the boxcars, dogs with military names such as Napoleón, El Sargento, and Trompeta. Boxcars were like moving homes. Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 2, p. 664.Google Scholar

77 Soldaderas riding on top could even cook while the train was in motion so that it seemed as if each boxcar had a chimney. Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 2, p. 664.Google Scholar See also Whitaker, , “Villa and his People,” p. 362;Google Scholar The New York Times, November 9, 1913; Plenn, , “Forgotten Heroines of Mexico,” p. 60.Google Scholar

78 Harris, H. O., United States Senate Hearings, pp. 663–64.Google Scholar

79 Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 2, p. 664;Google Scholar Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, p. 212;Google Scholar Silliman to Department of State, May 17, 1913, SD 812.00/7726, 423.

83 American consul in Durango to the State Department, Durango, dated June 4, 1913, SD 812.00/ 8075, 328.

84 Plenn, , “Forgotten Heroines,” pp. 25–26.Google Scholar See account of Villista soldier Jesús Hurtado Ramírez, PHO/1/108.

85 Duncan, Louis C., “The Wounded at Ojinaga,” Military Surgeon 34 (May 1914), 412;Google Scholar Whitaker, , “Villa and his People,” p. 363.Google Scholar There were middle-class women serving as nurses. See Macías, , Against All Odds, p. 39;Google Scholar and Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, p. 83.Google Scholar

86 Duncan, , “The Wounded at Ojinaga,” pp. 412, 436;Google Scholar Salas, Soldaderas, p. 56; and Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, p. 82.Google Scholar

87 López, María Villasaña, in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, p. 80.Google Scholar

90 Manuel L. Luján, representative of Pascual Orozco in the United States, declared that during the Orozco uprising men, women, and children smuggled arms and ammunition. Manuel L. Luján, United States Senate Hearings, p. 295.

91 El Paso Morning Times, January 24 and May 6, 1914. Quoted in Salas, Soldaderas, p. 56.

92 Estes, Captain George H., “The Internment of Mexican Troops in 1914,” Infantry Journal 11 (May-June, July-August, September-October 1915), pp. 54–55.Google Scholar Cited in Salas, Soldaderas, p. 64. Rivalries among soldaderas could have serious consequences since they had easy access to weapons. Whitaker describes how one soldadera blew off the head of a rival with a bomb that she had picked up on the battlefield. Whitaker, , “Villa and his People,” p. 254.Google Scholar

93 First Captain Jesús Herrera Calderón, PHO/1/66, 13. Cited in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 44;Google Scholar Lewis, Oscar, A Death in the Sánchez Family (New York: Vintage Books, 1969), p. 17.Google Scholar

94 Dr. Francisco Ruiz Moreno, PHO/1/155, p. 22. Quoted in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 44.Google Scholar See also the account of Jacobo Estrada, PHO/1/121, p. 31.

95 Duncan, , “The Wounded at Ojinaga,” p. 435.Google Scholar For prostitution among soldaderas see also Pozas, Ricardo, Juan Pérez Jolote: biografía de un Tzotzil (Mexico City: Editorial Jus, 1948), p. 302.Google Scholar We can get some glimpses of this world in the reports of United States officials concerned with the internment of the Federal army commanded by General Salvador Mercado at Fort Bliss, Texas and Fort Wingate, New Mexico in 1914. There is evidence that some soldaderas were prostitutes. American officers at Fort Wingate decided to set up a detention area for camp followers who “engaged in repeated acts of infidelity or who appeared incorrigible,” and were at the brink of expelling Guadalupe Ramirez from the camp. Salas, Soldaderas, p. 64.

96 Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, p. 211 Google Scholar; Reed, , Insurgent Mexico, pp. 141, 189 Google Scholar; and Plenn, , “Forgotten Heroines,” p. 60.Google Scholar

98 Major Constantino Caldero Vázquez, PHO/1/110, 29. See also Knight, The Mexican Revolution, 2, p. 143, 162; Salas, Soldaderas, pp. 43, 45–46; and Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, pp. 36, 208–209, 216.Google Scholar

99 The Sun, September 21, 1913, BP.

100 Interview with doctor Juan Olivera, PHO/Z/1/11. Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer, 4, p. 83–85. See story of Jiménez, Angela, in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, p. 35–64;Google Scholar La Opinión, August 15, 1937; Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 89–90.Google Scholar

101 Macías, , Against All Odds, pp. 42–43.Google Scholar There are contradictory reports about Margarita Neri. See El Nacional (Mexico City), November 29, 1959; and Soto, Emergence of the Modern Mexican Woman, p. 45. Womack, , Zapata and the Mexican Revolution, p. 170;Google Scholar Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, p. 212.Google Scholar For criminal acts of women soldiers see El Imparcial, August 19, 1914.

102 Macias draws the distinction very clearly: Macías, , Against All Odds, p. 41.Google Scholar Salas, on the contrary, contends that the difference is less than clear-cut and argues that because of the changing configurations of battle lines, many times camp followers by necessity had to perform as soldiers. Salas, , Soldaderas, pp. 73, 77.Google Scholar

103 For “La Güera” Carrasco see Soto, Emergence of the Modern Mexican Woman, p. 52–53. Other persons who met her confirm the impression that she was a sophisticated lady. See Wilhelmy, Adolfo M., La Opinión, August 15, 1937;Google Scholar and Plenn, , “Forgotten Heroines,” p. 60.Google Scholar For Carmen Vélez see El Nacional, January 3, 1947. For the story of “Chiquita” see The Sun, September 21, 1913, BP.

104 See declarations of General Ramón F. Iturbe in Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 108–09;Google Scholar Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 2, p. 720;Google Scholar El Nacional, November 8, 1959; Gray, Thord, Gringo Rebel, p. 212;Google Scholar King, , Tempest Over Mexico, p. 69.Google Scholar

105 Interview with doctor Juan Olivera López, PHO/Z/111. Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer, p. 85.

106 Recollections of Esperanza, in Lockert, Lucía Fox ed., Chicanas: Their Voices, Their Lives (Lansing, Mich.: State Board of Education, 1988), p. 1.Google Scholar

108 Jiménez, Angela, in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, p. 41.Google Scholar

109 Interview with Irene Copado viuda de Reyes. Reproduced in El Álbum de la mujer, 4, p. 83.

110 El Nacional, March 5, 1954.

111 The Sun, September 21, 1913, BP. From an independent source, Soto tells almost the same story so the character, probably called Josefina Ranzeta, may have been real. Soto, Emergence of the Modern Mexican Woman, 38.

112 Urquizo, Francisco L., Memorias de campaña: de subteniente a general (Mexico City: CostaAmie, 1971), p. 135.Google Scholar

113 El Paso Morning Times, February 19, 1914. Cited in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 61.Google Scholar

114 Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 2, p. 664.Google Scholar Part of this quote can be found in Macias, , Against All Odds, p. 42.Google Scholar

115 See the story of Jiménez, Angela, in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, pp. 35–64.Google Scholar

116 There are several photographs of female soldiers in Casasola, , Historia gráfica de la revolución mexicana, 1, p. 241–42.Google Scholar For details about their attire see The Sun, September 21, 1913; and Urquizo, , Memorias de campaña, pp. 133–34.Google Scholar Cross-dressing has been a common feature of female soldiers in all wars and revolutions. See Elshtain, Jean Bethke, Women and War (New York: Basic Books, 1987), pp. 173–74.Google Scholar

117 La Opinión, October 19, 1930 and January 31, 1932. See also Excélsior, November 23, 1930. Enriqueta Martínez was not the only female leader encouraging women to join; Petra Ruiz also commanded a brigade of female soldiers. El Nacional, November 8, 1959. Cited in Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 47.Google Scholar

118 La Opinión, January 31, 1932.

119 Brenner, Anita, The Wind that Swept Mexico (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1971), p. 46;Google Scholar and Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, p. 77–78.Google Scholar

121 Corrido “La cucaracha,“ in Flores, Romero ed., Corridos de la revolución mexicana, p. 146.Google Scholar

122 La Opinión, October 19, 1930.

123 See declarations of Charles Smith, United States Senate Hearings, 674–75.

125 King, , Tempest Over Mexico, p. 184;Google Scholar Pedro recounts that the Carrancistas were so hungry that they ate raw mangos and fell sick. Zapatista General Marino fell upon the Carrancistas at this point and “zas, zas he finished them up. That’s why they named Marino General Mango.” Lewis, , Pedro Marténez, pp. 93–93, 101–02.Google Scholar For accounts of starvation in Hueyapán see Riedlander, Judith, Being Indian in Hueyapán: A Study of Forced Identity in Contemporary Mexico (New York: Saint Martin’s Press, 1975), p. 58.Google Scholar

127 Martinez, Oscar J., Border Boom Town: Ciudad Juárez Since 1848 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1975), p. 41.Google Scholar

129 Katz, , The Secret War in Mexico, pp. 260–73;Google Scholar Knight, , The Mexican Revolution, 2, pp. 263–328;Google Scholar Lieuwen, , Mexican Militarism, p. 34.Google Scholar

130 Knight, , The Mexican Revolution, 2, pp. 333, 338;Google Scholar Lieuwen, , Mexican Militarism, pp. 34–35.Google Scholar See description of the American consul at Piedras Negras, January 24, 1916, SD 812.00/7893. Villa and Villismo decayed to the point where reckless acts of violence were directed against soldaderas. In one instance in 1916 Villa had eighty or ninety soldaderas shot. See Salas, , Soldaderas, pp. 46–47.Google Scholar

131 Lieuwen, , Mexican Militarism, p. 45;Google Scholar Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, p. 90;Google Scholar Kelley, , Yaqui Women, pp. 143, 172.Google Scholar

132 See Estadísticas Históricas de México, 2 vols. (Mexico City: Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía, e Informática, 1985), 1, pp. 254–57.

134 Kelley, , Yaqui Women, pp. 75, 144–45, 171–72.Google Scholar In Morelos the situation after the revolution was equally grim. See Lewis, , Pedro Martinez, p. 116 Google Scholar; Knight, , The Mexican Revolution, 2, p. 524.Google Scholar

135 Macías, , Against All Odds, p. 43.Google Scholar The entire roster of women recognized as veterans of the revolution by the Mexican War Ministry is reproduced in Alatorre, Mendieta, La mujer en la revolución mexicana, pp. 112–122.Google Scholar For biographies of female fighters see El Popular (Mexico City), April 29, May 1, 4, and 7, 1939.

136 Lewis, , Pedro Martínez, pp. 162–77;Google Scholar and A Death in the Sánchez Family, pp. ix-x. See also Knight, , The Mexican Revolution, 2, p. 523;Google Scholar and Salas, , Soldaderas, p. 80.Google Scholar

138 The story of Maria Villasaña López sheds light on the bad reputation of soldaderas after the revolution: “Ya no podíamos regresar a nuestro hogar pues habíamos quedado descreditadas [sic], yo entonces decidí venirme a este país.” López, María Villasaña in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, p. 80.Google Scholar See also Salas, , Soldaderas, pp. 80–81.Google Scholar

139 Kelley, , Yaqui Women, p. 208;Google Scholar García, Mario T., Desert Immigrants: The Mexicans of El Paso, 1880–1920 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), pp. 60, 74–79.Google Scholar

140 See testimonies of López, María Villasaña and Angela, “Angel” Jiménez in Those Years of the Revolution, 1910–1920, passim.Google Scholar

141 This is question that has been frequently raised and seldom been answered. See Carmen Ramos Escandón provides a brief historiographical review on the subject: Escandón, Ramos, “¿Qué veinte años no es nada?,” pp. 592–93.Google Scholar

142 The impact of the Mexican Revolution on women has many parallels in other wars and revolutions. See Berkin, Carol R. and Lovett, Clara M. eds., Women, War and Revolution (New York: Holmes and Meier Press, 1980);Google Scholar and Higonnet, Margaret R., Jenson, Jane, Michel, Sonya and Wetz, Margaret C. eds., Behind the Lines: Gender and the Two World Wars (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987).Google Scholar