Andrés de Santa Cruz Andrés de Santa Cruz y Calahumana ( December 5 , 1792 , Huarina , Bolivia – September 25 , 1865 , Beauvoir , France ) was President of Peru ( 1827 ) and Bolivia ( 1829 - 1839 ) . He also served as Supreme Protector of the short - lived Peru - Bolivian Confederation ( 1836 - 1839 ) , a political entity created mainly by his personal endeavors . Early life and education . Santa Cruz was born on December 5 , 1792 in the village of Huarina , close to La Paz , which at that time had been recently transferred from the Viceroyalty of Peru to the Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata . His father was José Santa Cruz y Villavicencio , a Spaniard , and his mother Juana Basilia Calahumana , an Indian and " cacique " of the town of Huarina . In later years , Andrés de Santa Cruz would claim that through his mother , he descended directly from Inca rulers . He began his studies in his hometown at the San Francisco Convent , and continued them at the San Antonio Abad Seminary in the city of Cuzco . In 1809 he left the seminary and returned to La Paz . Military career . After Santa Cruz ' s return home , his father enrolled him as an alférez in the " Dragones de Apolobamba " Regiment of the Spanish Army . As such , he participated in the battles of Guaqui ( July 20 , 1811 ) , Vilcapugio ( October 1 , 1813 ) and Ayohuma ( November 14 , 1813 ) . The latter resulted in the defeat of the Argentine Independentist forces attempting to liberate the Upper Peru ( modern day Bolivia ) from Spanish rule . Santa Cruz also took part in the Spanish colonial campaigns to suppress the insurrection of Mateo Pumacahua ( 1814 - 1815 ) , further demonstrating his loyalty to the Spanish Crown . His luck ran out at the Battle of La Tablada ( April 15 , 1817 ) , where he was captured and taken as prisoner of war to Buenos Aires . He managed to escape , first to Rio de Janeiro and then to Lima . As a reward , he was named Commander of Chorrillos . War of Independence . At the time of the landing of the rebel army of José de San Martín on the Peruvian coast , Santa Cruz was commander of militia forces in the region of Huarochirí . In that position , he fought against the independetist in the Battle of Pasco ( December 6 , 1820 ) , but the royalist s were defeated and Santa Cruz captured . Taken to San Martin ' s headquarters at Huaura , he decided to switch sides and joined the Patriot Army ( January 8 , 1821 ) . Santa Cruz ascended rapidly , reaching the rank of Colonel later that year and that of Brigade General in 1822 for leading Peruvian troops at the Battle of Pichincha ( 24 May 1822 ) . He revolted against the Peruvian Congress on February 26 , 1823 , and forced it to elect José de la Riva Agüero as President . As commander of a Peruvian Army expedition , Santa Cruz occupied the port of Arica and defeated a royalist army at the Battle of Zepita ( August 27 , 1823 ) . Failing to exploit his victory , he retreated hastily . When Simón Bolívar assumed the presidency of Peru ( February 17 , 1824 ) , Santa Cruz joined his army and was named Chief of Staff of the Peruvian Division . In that condition , he participated of the Battle of Junín ( August 6 , 1824 ) . Afterwards , he was named Prefect of Ayacucho , and then Chief of Staff of the Patriot Army during the campaign for the liberation of Bolivia . As a reward for his actions , Santa Cruz received the title s of Marshal and Prefect of Chuquisaca on April 1825 . Named President of the Government Council in Lima , he was in charge of the Peruvian Executive after Bolívar returned to Gran Colombia on September 4 , 1826 , until the collapse of the Bolivarian regime in Peru on January 27 , 1827 . Santa Cruz temporarily assumed the post of President until June 9 , 1827 , when José La Mar was elected by Congress . President of Bolivia . Removed from power , Santa Cruz was named Peruvian ambassador to Chile , but he was recalled to Bolivia where he had been proclaimed as President . Sworn in on May 24 , 1829 , he found a country afflicted by endemic internal disorders and very near to bankruptcy . Measures undertaken to resolve these problems included purging conspirators , reforming and strengthening the Army , reforming the bureaucracy , reforming public finance s , issuing new currency , issuing a new Constitution , issuing a new Civil Code based on the Napoleonic Code and establishing Cobija as a free port . The authoritarian regime imposed by Santa Cruz brought stability to Bolivia at a time when most countries in Latin America faced widespread unrest . Furthermore , it formed a solid base from which to pursue his main project , the Peru - Bolivian Confederation . Peru - Bolivian Confederation . As President of Bolivia , Santa Cruz instigated several failed plots to achieve a political union with Peru , taking advantage of that country ' s chronic political unrest . His best opportunity came in 1835 when the Peruvian President Luis José de Orbegoso requested his assistance to fight the rebel army of Felipe Santiago Salaverry . Santa Cruz defeated Peruvian caudillo Agustín Gamarra at the Battle of Yanacocha ( August 13 , 1835 ) and Salaverry at the Battle of Uchumayo ( February 4 , 1836 ) after which he had Salaverry summarily executed . At the instigation of Santa Cruz , a Congress of the Peruvian southern departments ( Arequipa , Ayacucho , Cuzco and Puno ) gathered at Sicuani and declared the establishment of the Republic of South Peru ( March 17 , 1836 ) . A similar assembly at Huaura of the northern departments ( Amazonas , Junín , La Libertad and Lima ) founded the Republic of North Peru ( August 11 , 1836 ) . Both recognized Santa Cruz as Supreme Protector with extensive powers , which enabled him to create the Peru - Bolivian Confederation on October 28 , 1836 . He summoned to the city of Tacna representatives of both legislatures together with those of the Bolivian Congress assembled at Tapacarí to establish a Constitution for the new State . Under his direction , they signed a pact on May 1 , 1837 which named him Supreme Protector for a ten - year period . Invested with considerable powers , Santa Cruz endeavoured to establish in Peru the same type of authoritarian order he had imposed in Bolivia . He issued a Civil Code , a Penal Code , a Trade Regulation , a Customs Regulation and reorganized tax collection procedures allowing an increase in state revenue s while restraining expenditures . The Confederation generated resistances among several groups in both countries , who resented the dilution of national identities . An important number of Peruvian politicians opposed to the idea of the Confederation fled to Chile , where they received support from the powerful Minister Diego Portales . Together they amassed a military expedition against Santa Cruz , led by Admiral Manuel Blanco Encalada , but they were encircled by Santa Cruz and had to surrender by the Treaty of Paucarpata , signed on November 17 , 1837 . The Chilean Government organized a second expedition , which defeated the Supreme Protector at the Battle of Yungay ( January 20 , 1839 ) and forced the dissolution of the Confederation . Later years . After resigning from his post as Supreme Protector ( February 20 , 1839 ) , Santa Cruz fled to Ecuador from where he plotted unsuccessfully to regain power . On October 13 , 1843 he disembarked at Camarones in the Peruvian province of Tarapacá but was captured while trying to reach Bolivia . Delivered to the Chilean Government , he was imprisoned at Chillán from 1844 until 1846 when he was freed . He was named ambassador to several European countries by Manuel Belzú ( 1848 - 1855 ) and then ran for president of Bolivia but was defeated by General Jorge Córdova . After staying for a while in Argentina , he returned to France where he lived the rest of his life at Versailles . He died at Beauvoir , near Nantes on September 25 , 1865 . One hundred years later , in 1965 , the remains of the old Marshal were repatriated from France by the military government of the day and reinterred ceremoniously beside the Presidential Palace in Bolivia .