Set up:
Guadalupe, Chihuahua was a small border town south of the Rio Grande, 20 miles or so southeast of Juárez. The river runs northwest to southeast about three quarters of a mile north of the town. The area along the river and surrounding the town is covered in farmland. To the southwest is all desert. In the center of town, place a plaça with a large home for the local landlord and a police station for the rurales. Place a supply cache in one of the garrisoned buildings.
Conditions:
Torrential Rain - low visibility
Objectives:
Rebels:
Phase 1 - approach town from three sides, capture plaça and town. Find supplies.
Phase 2 - rescue Madero
Government:
Phase 1 - Control Guadalupe, defend plaça and supplies
Phase 2 - Capture Madero. Control Guadalupe.
Forces: Phase 1 (turns 1 - 10, or until the rebels capture the town and both sides want to take a break).
*PLM Forces:
Detachment 1 - Prisciliano Silva, 24 insurgents
Detachment 2 - Gabino Cano, 24 insurgents
Detachment 3 - Lázaro Gutiérrez de Lara, 24 insurgents with a Spanish Anarchist among them.
*Government forces:
-20-30 Rurales
Forces: Phase 2 (turn 10 - 20, or until one side reaches victory).
Rebels:
Madero and 24 fighters. They enter at the US border, and march southwest into the desert at the rate of 2 die per turn. Player can only control them once player’s forces catch up to Madero in the desert.
Government:
50 Federal soldiers
2 trucks
1 machine gun and crew.
They enter in the mountains in the south-west corner.
Victory Conditions: PLM must capture the town within the first 10 rounds, and then rescue Madero from the desert while maintaining control of the town through round 20. Government must either capture Madero or control the town at turn 20.
Aftermath:
The PLM forces here captured clothing, food and other provisions, weapons and ammunition. Silva’s force plants, for the first time on Mexican soil, the red flag with the slogan “Tierra y Libertad.” The victory, however, is short lived. After rescuing Madero, the wealthy presidential candidate arrested Silva and many other comrades, forced more across the border into US custody, and co-opted what of the PLM forces remained. The revolution of the PLM is betrayed and crushed in Chihuahua.
Historic Note:
Commanded by Prisciliano Silva, Gabino Cano, and Lázaro Gutiérrez de Lara, 150 soldiers captured Guadalupe. Gutiérrez de Lara led 30 “American Mercenaries” with a Spanish Anarchist among them. This author found few details on the battle, except that in the aftermath the rebels captured many supplies. The PLM victory at Guadalupe proved extremely important to the outcome of the Revolution, as it was there, three days after the battle, that Madero first arrived in Mexico. He arrived with only 100 supporters. His forces had risen in some towns and cities in Chihuahua, but by this point almost all of them had been defeated. After the PLM victory at Guadalupe, Prisciliano Silva, as the PLM leader in the region, now commanded 300 fighters. Nevertheless, Madero immediately declared himself commander of all of the revolutionary bands then operating in Chihuahua. Madero immediately marched his forces out of Guadalupe, and as they “wandered in the desert...a large group of federal soldiers was on their trail. Lázaro Gutiérrez de Lara persuaded Prisciliano Silva...to help Madero’s small group repel the attack” (Ringside Seat to Revolution: An Underground Cultural History of El Paso by David Dorado Romo). After Silva rescued Madero’s small force from obliteration, Madero demanded he and the PLM army subordinate themselves to him. He ordered the PLM groups to join him in an attack on Zaragosa, Coahuila. The orders from the PLM Junta stated, however, the PLM units in the field were to cooperate with Madero’s forces and even combine if necessary, but by no means recognize his leadership of the revolution. Only one PLM leader put himself and his detachment under Madero. Pascual Orozco, in fact, himself a PLM supporter at the time, refused to put his forces, the largest insurrecto army in Chihuahua and the masters of the northern mountains, under command of Madero. While he had earlier “accept a commission in the Maderista army,” when later “his communications were cut between him and the Maderistas, Orozco sent a letter offering his services to Ricardo Flores Magón and asking for PLM veterans to reinforce his troops….Orozquista rebels would later adopt the red flag of the PLM and would become known as los colorado, or the “Red Flaggers.” (Romo).
Madero would not accept PLM commanders cooperating with him as equals or allies. When Silva told Madero the PLM army must wait for the detachment led by the Cano to arrive, Madera seized his opportunity and had Silva and his men arrested. The Liberals were imprisoned in Guadalupe, the town they had just freed. When Cano arrived, coming to Madero for aid for his wounded men, Madero arranged their arrest at the U.S. border instead. And thus, Madero accomplished his first coup - coming to control of the revolutionary army of northern Chihuahua through deceit and betrayal. Thereafter, the PLM Junta changed their orders regarding the Maderistas to refuse to cooperate with the traitor. Unfortunately, the move came too late. The destruction of the PLM army of Chihuahua left only the newer Baja force at the immediate disposal of the Junta, who still hoped to cross the border and establish headquarters on Mexican soil.
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