Sign-In
Cart
The Saltpeter War - 1879-1884
Paperback
Currently unavailable to order
Please enter your email and a message will be sent to you when this product becomes available on our website.
Publisher: Ruben Ygua
Published: Oct 22 2025
Pages: 44
Weight: 0.28
Height: 0.09 Width: 8.50 Depth: 11.00
Language: English
Since Chile became an independent Republic, it has claimed titles to the Atacama Desert area, which today corresponds to the Antofagasta region. Since 1822 the constitutional texts included, as the northern limit of the country, the Atacama Desert.
However, Chile did not show interest in these lands, which were considered of little value, and at the time its greatest wealth was in the agricultural area of the center of the country.
The desert seemed to be an abandoned territory when Bolivian President Andrés de Santa Cruz decided to found the port of Cobija (1829) within the territory theoretically claimed by Chile, but whose government did not present any protest to the Bolivian Foreign Ministry.
Chilean indifference would end when the economic value of the desert was discovered in the late 1839s. Important deposits of guano were found, a rich fertilizer in great demand by European countries and the United States. That's when the border conflicts between the two countries began. The Government of President Bulnes decided to send an exploratory commission to recognize the potential of the deposits in the area. A law, dated 1842, declared the guaneras south of Mejillones Bay (23, south latitude) national property, which meant establishing the country's northern border on that line.
The Government also began to grant permits to private entrepreneurs to load guano in the vicinity of Mejillones.
In 1847, the Bolivian authorities decided to interrupt this activity and expelled Chilean businessmen and workers from the area.
The Chilean Government responded by sending troops to occupy Mejillones.
Groups of Chilean workers, and soon after, big businessmen of the same nationality, were increasing their presence in the whole area, during the government of President Montt, which motivated repeated diplomatic claims by Bolivia, which claimed that the limit between both countries was on the 25th parallel and not on the 23rd, as Chile claimed.
Also from
Ygua, Ruben
Also in
South American History
The Jakarta Method: Washington's Anticommunist Crusade and the Mass Murder Program That Shaped Our World
Bevins, Vincent
Paperback
A Flower Traveled in My Blood: The Incredible True Story of the Grandmothers Who Fought to Find a Stolen Generation of Children
Gilliland, Haley Cohen
Hardcover
A Flower Traveled in My Blood: The Incredible True Story of the Grandmothers Who Fought to Find a Stolen Generation of Children
Gilliland, Haley Cohen
Paperback
Aprender inglés para adultos principiantes: 5 libros en 1: ¡Habla inglés en 30 días!
Towin, Explore
Paperback
Things Are Never So Bad That They Can't Get Worse: Inside the Collapse of Venezuela
Neuman, William
Paperback
The Quest for El Dorado: Sir Walter Ralegh and the Search for the City of Gold
Gibbins, David
Hardcover
The Radical Spanish Empire: How Paperwork Politics Remade the New World
Masters, Adrian
Cañizares-Esguerra, Jorge
Hardcover
Angels with Dirty Faces: How Argentinian Soccer Defined a Nation and Changed the Game Forever
Wilson, Jonathan
Paperback
The Flying Death: Poison, Plunder, and the Quest for a Miracle Medicine in the Amazon
O'Hara, Matt
Hardcover
English Liberator: William Miller and the Independence of Spanish South America
Hemming, John
Hardcover
The Battle for Brazil: Resistance, Renewal, and the War Against the Dutch, 1580-1654
Litrel, Suzanne M.
Paperback
Child of the Dark: Child of the Dark: The Diary Of Carolina Maria De Jesus
de Jesus, Carolina Maria
Paperback
No Apparent Danger: The True Story of Volcanic Disaster at Galeras and Nevado del Ruiz
Bruce, Victoria
Paperback
The Collapse of Venezuela: Scorched Earth Politics and Economic Decline, 2012-2020
Rodríguez, Francisco
Hardcover
Life and Death in the Andes: On the Trail of Bandits, Heroes, and Revolutionaries
MacQuarrie, Kim
Paperback
The Battle for Brazil: Resistance, Renewal, and the War Against the Dutch, 1580-1654
Litrel, Suzanne M.
Hardcover
Ethanol: A Hemispheric History for the Future of Biofuels
Manuel, Jeffrey T.
Rogers, Thomas D.
Hardcover
After Escobar: Taking Down the Notorious Cali Godfathers and the Biggest Drug Cartel in History
Balboni, Jessica
Mitchell, Dave
Feistl, Chris
Paperback
The Mapmaker's Wife: A True Tale of Love, Murder, and Survival in the Amazon
Whitaker, Robert
Paperback
Rupay: A Graphic History of Political Violence in Peru, 1980-1990
Rossell, Luis
Guevara, Jesús Cossío
Villar, Alfredo
Paperback
People of the Ucayali: The Shipibo and Conibo of Peru
Lauriault, Erwin
Boonstra, Harry
Eakin, Lucille
Hardcover
Inca Garcilaso de la Vega: Literary Genealogies of an Indigenous Intellectual in Nineteenth-Century Peru
Ward, Thomas
Hardcover
Mi Vida Y Mi Carcel Con Pablo Escobar / My Life and My Prison with Pablo Escobar
Henao, Victoria Eugenia
Paperback
Emerging El Dorado: Steam Age Expansionism and the Social Worlds of Growth in Argentina
Elena, Eduardo
Paperback
Into the Amazon: The Life of Cândido Rondon, Trailblazing Explorer, Scientist, Statesman, and Conservationist
Rohter, Larry
Paperback
Mi País Inventado / My Invented Country: A Memoir: Spanish-Language Edition of My Invented Country: A Memoir
Allende, Isabel
Paperback
The Souls of Purgatory: The Spiritual Diary of a Seventeenth-Century Afro-Peruvian Mystic, Ursula de Jesus
Jesus, Ursula De
Paperback
Under the Flags of Freedom: Slave Soldiers and the Wars of Independence in Spanish South America
Blanchard, Peter
Paperback
In the Darkness of the Cinema: Gender and Moviegoing in Early Twentieth-Century Urban Brazil
Suk, Lena Oak
Paperback
Afro-Peruvian Mestizos: The Invisibility of Blackness in Post-Abolition Peru
Cozart, Daniel S.
Paperback
Portuguese Jews and New Christians in Colonial Brazil, 1500-1822: A New Geography of the Atlantic World
Marcus, Alan P.
Paperback
Wallace in the Field: Ethnographic Expeditions and the Rise of Anthropology
Limeira-Dasilva, Victor Rafael
Paperback
The Inca Empire: An Enthralling Overview of the Incas, Their Civilization in Ancient Peru, and the Spanish Conquest
Wellman, Billy
Hardcover
Reinvention and History Making in Huarochirí: A Local Narrative of Colonialism in the Peruvian Andes
Hernández Garavito, Carla
Hardcover
Extraordinary Threat: The U.S. Empire, the Media, and Twenty Years of Coup Attempts in Venezuela
Emersberger, Joe
Podur, Justin
Paperback
Mourning Remains: State Atrocity, Exhumations, and Governing the Disappeared in Peru's Postwar Andes
Rojas-Perez, Isaias
Paperback
Principles in Power: Latin America and the Politics of U.S. Human Rights Diplomacy
Walker, Vanessa
Hardcover
The Slum and the City: Culture and Dissidence in the Villas Miseria of Buenos Aires
Codebò, Agnese
Hardcover
Forty Days in the Jungle: Behind the Extraordinary Survival and Rescue of Four Children Lost in the Amazon
Youkee, Mat
Paperback
El Derrumbe de Pablo Escobar: Las Actas Secretas de la Persecución Al Capo Hace 30 Años / The Collapse of Pablo Escobar
Naranjo, Óscar
Paperback
Barrio Rising: Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela
Velasco, Alejandro
Paperback
In the Hands of Devotees: Indigenous and Black Confraternities and the Creation of Visual Culture in Colonial Lima
Gómez, Ximena A.
Hardcover
Exploration Fawcett: Explorer Percy Fawcett's obsessive Amazon expeditions searching for a fabled lost city
Fawcett, Percy
Paperback
Indigenous Struggle at the Heart of Brazil: State Policy, Frontier Expansion, and the Xavante Indians, 1937-1988
Garfield, Seth
Paperback
Revolutions in Cuba and Venezuela: One Hope, Two Realities
Romero, Carlos A.
Pedraza, Silvia
Paperback
Flashes in the Dark Volume 2: USAF Nuclear Espionage in Argentina, 1960-1966
Marón, Gustavo
Paperback
History of the Inca Realm
Canseco, Maria R.
Rostworowski de Diez Cans, Maria
de Diez Canseco, Maria Rostworowski
Paperback
Demons in the Golden Empire: Gonzalo Pizarro during the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire
Hernandez, Marcos Antonio
Paperback
Either Catholicism or Liberalism: The Pastoral and Circular Letters of St. Ezequiel Moreno y Diaz
Moreno Y. Diaz, St Ezequiel
Paperback
Cooperation and Hierarchy in Ancient Bolivia: Building Community with the Body
Juengst, Sara L.
Paperback
A New History of Modern Latin America
Clayton, Lawrence A.
Conniff, Michael L.
Gauss, Susan M.
Paperback
Bruchko and the Motilone Miracle: How Bruce Olson Brought a Stone Age South American Tribe Into the 21st Century
Olson, Bruce
Paperback
The Monumental Andes: Geology, Geography, and Ancient Cultures in the Peruvian Andes
Chambers, Roseanne
Paperback
The Five Hundred Year Rebellion: Indigenous Movements and the Decolonization of History in Bolivia
Dangl, Benjamin
Paperback
Changing Venezuela by Taking Power: The History and Policies of the Chavez Government
Wilpert, Gregory
Paperback
Urbanism as Warfare: Planning, Insecurity, and the Remaking of Downtown Bogotá
Pérez Fernández, Federico
Paperback
We Are All Chile: Representations of Difference in Contemporary Chilean Historical Fiction
Karr-Cornejo, Katherine
Hardcover
Argentine Skyhawks in the Falklands War: Targeting the Task Force in the South Atlantic in 1982
Huertas, Salvador Mafé
Hardcover
I'll Samba Someplace Else: A Spatial History of Race, Ethnicity, and Displacement in São Paulo
Britt, Andrew G.
Paperback
When We Sold God's Eye: Diamonds, Murder, and a Clash of Worlds in the Amazon
Cuadros, Alex
Hardcover
From Virile to Sterile: Science, Masculinity, and Modernity in Argentina, 1776-1852
Novoa, Adriana
Paperback
Aspectos varios de la inmigración: Carlos Beck Bernard, Karl Oenike, Paul Zech, Maria Bamberg
Crolla, Adriana Cristina
Rohland De Langbehn, Regula
Beck-Bernard, Karl
Paperback
Cradle of Gold: The Story of Hiram Bingham, a Real-Life Indiana Jones, and the Search for Machu Picchu
Heaney, Christopher
Paperback
Conquistador Voices (vol II): The Spanish Conquest of the Americas as Recounted Largely by the Participants
Siepel, Kevin H.
Paperback
Historia política de Chile, 1810-2010. Tomo III: Problemas económicos
Estefane, Andrés
Robles, Claudio
Jaksic, Iván
Paperback
Brazil - Culture Smart!: The Essential Guide to Customs & Culture
Culture Smart!
Branco, Sandra
Paperback
Traveling with Che Guevara: The Making of a Revolutionary
Granado, Alberto
Alvarez De Toledo, Lucia
Paperback