Joaquín Ibáñez Cuevas y de Valonga, Baron de Eroles

Joaquín Ibáñez Cuevas y de Valonga, 3rd Baron de Eroles and Marquis of Cañada Ibáñez (Kingdom of the Two Sicilies) (6 January 1785 – 25 August 1825

Peninsular War (1807–1814)

Eroles was present at the defeat at Molíns de Rey (21 December 1808), and by the end of that year he had raised, armed and financed his own unit of 1,600 volunteers, ) Two days later, and despite his still-open wound, he led the action at Lladó (21 October), where he defeated an enemy force four times greater than his own. At La Plana (5 & 8 December), he defeated Clément’s division and pursued it from Olot to Bañolas.

The following month, Eroles fought at Altafulla (20 February) and in March, at the defence of Roda de Isábena, Aragón (5 March), where he repelled three attacks by Marshal Suchet’s troops, which outnumbered his own troops by three; Suchet's army lost a general, more than forty officers and hundreds of soldiers.

Eroles was then sent to the Balearic Islands to co-ordinate with the British squadron its expedition to Sicily. However, the defeat at Castalla made him return to the mainland at Alicante, where he was able to join the Army of Catalonia at the end of August 1812.

Cultural references

Nickname

After having wiped out an entire battalion in the mountains of Puigventós (16 April 1811) Eroles came to be known by the enemy as the "Nero of Catalonia" (Diario de Barcelona, 9 August 1811). mentions in his essay Autobiography of Madrid, a popular copla in Madrid in 1814 and 1815 about Eroles and two other generals, Francisco Javier de Elío (executed for treason during the Triennium) and Francisco de Eguía, the three of whom were considered "uncouth, fanatical and cruel":

Eguía, Eroles, Elío...Dios te libre de los tres;porque si Dios no te libra,¡Santíguate y muérete!¡Santíguate y muérete!(Eguía, Eroles, Elío...God save you from the threebecause if God doesn't save youMake the sign of the cross and prepare to die!Make the sign of the cross and prepare to die!)