Tomás Pérez Guerra

Tomás Pérez Guerra y Sánchez (c. 1775, Santiago de los Caballeros – ca. 1846) was Mayor of Ponce, Puerto Rico, from 1 January 1826 to 31 December 1826. He was given the rank of Cadete del Batallón on June 7, 1791. He was noted as being a part of the militia in Puerto Rico at this time. While stationed in San Juan, Pérez Guerra was promoted to the rank of Teniente. He also owned a slave named Rafaela who had a daughter named María Ricarda in 1814. At some point, he returned to Santo Domingo serving in the militia and where he had a child in 1821 before relocating back to Puerto Rico likely as a result of the occupation of the colony of Santo Domingo by Haiti in 1822. By 1826, Pérez Guerra was in Ponce serving as mayor and a part of the militia. His son Hilarión Pérez Guerra y Miura also served as Mayor of Ponce.

Mayoral term On 31 August 1826, during the midst of mayor Pérez Guerra's mayoral term, a slave revolt in Ponce against the slave owners in Ponce was discovered and the slaves were condemned to death. The Provincial Military Governor of Puerto Rico, Miguel de la Torre, traveled to Ponce to witness the mass shooting. The 11 slaves shot dead were named as follows: Francisco José, Federico, Benito, Pablo Viejo, Oguis, José Félix (from Barrio El Quemado), Faustino (also from Barrio El Quemado), Francisco Antonio, Don Esteban Miguel Roque's Francisco Antonio and Manuel, and Don Wedestein's Inés. There are no Acts in the Municipality for the period from 1824 to 1834, affecting the period while Pérez Guerra was mayor.