José de La Serna and Martínez de Hinojosa , he was the fortieth and last viceroy of Peru. He was born in Jerez de la Frontera in 1770. Son of Álvaro de La Serna y Figueroa and Nicolasa Martínez de Hinojosa. He studied at the Royal College of Artillery in Segovia, from where he graduated in 1789 with the rank of Second Lieutenant. He immediately participated in the defense of Ceuta, a place coveted by the Moroccans (1790-1791), then in the campaign in Catalonia against the revolutionary infiltration of the first French Republic (1794-1795). Under the orders of General José Mazarredo, he joined the maritime forces in the war with England (1802). After the Napoleonic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, he had a prominent part in the second siege of Zaragoza ; but he was taken prisoner and taken to France. He eventually managed to flee to Switzerland in 1812, and marching from there to the port of Thessaloniki, he rejoined the fight against the occupying French hosts. In such war interventions he managed to be promoted to brigadier of the third artillery regiment. In 1815 he already had the rank of field marshal, had been declared worthy of the country to a heroic degree and had received the cross of the military order of San Hermenegildo.
It was then that General Joaquín de la Pezuela, head of the royalist army in Upper Peru, was promoted to the position of viceroy and president of the audience of Lima, and to replace him in command of the Upper Peruvian troops, he was appointed to La Serna . Accompanied by several veteran officers, this character embarked in Cádiz and arrived in September 1816 at the port of Arica. From here he continued by land to the headquarters of Cotagata (today Bolivia), where he assumed leadership of the royalist army on November 2 of that year. .
Peru's road to independence
In fact, he underestimated the effectiveness of the American patriot soldiers and entered into disagreements with Pezuela about the direction of the so-called war of independence or pacification, according to the terminology of one or the other side, due to which he promptly requested his resignation from the command that practiced in the high provinces. In September 1819 he handed over the command of the army stationed in Cochabamba to Brigadier José Canterac and immediately set off for Lima, planning to board a ship to travel back to his homeland. However, he was met with his promotion to lieutenant general and his appointment to the presidency of a brand-new advisory war board, a fact that forced him to remain in the country. At that time, the threat of the liberating expedition of General San Martín was already evident, which eventually touched the coast of Pisco and installed the bulk of his troops in Huaura. In view of the failure of the operations of the royalist army in order to counteract the San Martinian incursion, the main chiefs summoned Viceroy Pezuela, in the Aznapuquio field, on January 29, 1821, to withdraw from the government and the supreme command of the hosts. The position of viceroy, governor and captain general thus passed to the favorite of public opinion and the military class, which was La Serna .
In March 1821, the new vice-sovereign sent Colonel Marquis de Valleumbroso and Commander Seoane to explain to the court the anomalous incidents that had taken place in Peru. La Serna was forced, however, to evacuate the city of Lima under pressure from San Martín (July 6, 1821). He went to the mountains and established his viceregal government in Cuzco, the ancient capital of the Incas and the seat of a royal audience. From here he continued to dispatch and dictate orders over the jurisdictions that remained loyal to the king's banner; the documentation generated by the viceregal government of Cuzco has been studied and published by Horacio Villanueva Urteaga (Documentary Collection of the independence of Peru, volume XXII, 1973). Finally, in the battle of Ayacucho (December 9, 1824), La Serna fell wounded and was taken prisoner by the Bolivarian chiefs. He had to sign the capitulation right there that definitively recognized the political independence of Peru. He discreetly embarked for Spain on January 2, 1825, and spent some years in obscure retirement in the metropolis. But in the end he was entrusted with the captaincy general of Granada, in 1831. The last Peruvian viceroy died in the city of Seville on July 6, 1832, when he was 62 years old.