Ana Monterroso de Lavalleja

On 3 September 1791, a few meters from the San Pedro Pedro of Montevideo on what is now Sarandí street, Ana Monterroso de Lavalleja was born. Her father, Marcos José da Porta, was an immigrant from the Galicia region of Spain who became a merchant and alderman who championed the rights of the poor and her mother was Juana Paula Bermúdez Artigas, a cousin of José Gervasio Artigas and secretary of Miguel Barreiro.[3] She was born in a time of change for Uruguay and Montevido, seeing in her youth the construction of the Montevideo Cabildo and the Montevideo Metropolitan Cathedral and the demolition of the old city walls.[1] Monterroso's family, supportive of the Independence movement, included six brothers, one of whom was José Benito Monterroso, who would closely collaborate with Artigas.[4]

On 21 October 1817, Monterroso married Juan Antonio Lavalleja, then still a divisional commander under Colonel Fructuoso Rivera, in the Uruguayan village of Florida. They were wed by proxy, as Lavalleja was at the time leading troops against the Portuguese in the Portuguese conquest of the Banda Oriental. the Lavallejas were captured by the Portuguese under Carlos Frederico Lecor in Salto and imprisoned in Rio de Janeiro until the end of the war.[4] In this time, Monterroso involved herself in the politics of the time, delivering and managing Uruguayan correspondence in resistance to the Portuguese.[1]

In July 2017, Rosana Carrete, Director of Cabildo Historical Museum in Montevideo, debuted an exhibit dedicated to the women of the Uruguayan revolution, including Monterroso.[2]