Vicente Bertrán de Lis

Vicente Bertrán de Lis Thomas (1772–1857) was a Spanish banker and politician.

Biography

Peninsular War

By April 1808, following the Tumult of Aranjuez in March and before the Dos de Mayo Uprising in Madrid, Bertrán de Lis and his brother Manuel, had recruited and armed over 500 men, at eight reales a day, for the service of the new king, Ferdinand VII, whom he went to see personally to congratulate him on gaining the throne.

Following the Madrid uprising, the governor of Valencia, Miguel de Saavedra, Baron Albalat

Early the following month, when Canon Baltasar Calvo instigated the massacre of 300–400 French citizens, half of whom were inside the city's citadel, where the local authorities were protecting them against popular reprisals following the killings in Madrid, Bertrán de Lis and his brothers recruited and paid for a local force to maintain order in the city.

Bertrán de Lis was arrested in 1809, along with Canga Argüelles, and deported to Ibiza for five months. The latter, on being appointed minister of finance in 1811, rewarded Bertrán de Lis with a contract for supplying the Spanish army. acting as his agent, Bertrán de Lis financed and coordinated Rafael del Riego's military uprising in 1820. Despite General Elío having had Bertrán de Lis's son, Félix, executed in 1819 for his involvement in Colonel Valdés's pronunciamiento in Cádiz, when Elío was captured in Valencia, Bertrán de Lis prevented the mob from lynching him and insisted on a court martial, which finally condemned the former captain general of Valencia to the garrote.