The Story of Pedro Pablo Atusparia and Pedro Cochachin (aka Uchku Pedro)

Pedro Pablo Atusparia was one of the leaders in one of the small communities that lived in the hills east of Huaraz back in the 1880’s. The leaders differentiated themselves by having long hair. Back then the city of Huaraz was a small town. The people that lived there were a combination of Spanish and local people. They thought they were superior to the surrounding people because they were Spanish. There were many smaller communities up in the hills, and when they used to come down, the people from Huaraz used to exploit them to make them work on their homes until Sunday and then let them go without pay. They also imposed cruel taxes on them. There was a man named Pedro Pablo Atusparia and he consulted a lawyer and the lawyer said you have to gang up with your smaller communities and confront the people of Huaraz. So they came confronting with slingshots and ancient weapons. But the people of Huaraz called the government of Peru in Lima and they came with modern weapons. It was not a fair fight. They captured Pedro Pablo Atusparia and tortured him and they cut off his long hair. This made the his constituents very upset. So there was another leader in Carhuaz and he was Pedro Cochachin (aka Uchku Pedro and he was a mine worker And he had access to dynamite from the mine. He was a more violent man. He showed Pedro Pablo Atusparia how dynamite worked, and he was impressed. So he came again to attack Huaraz with dynamite. But he was unsuccessful. Pedro Pablo Atusparia was injured and Pedro Cochachin went to hide Up the hills with a friend. Pedro Pablo Atusparia went to the federal government and brought his young boy and even asked the president if he would be his godfather. So he did so, and the constituents of Pedro Pablo Atusparia were upset about that. They said he was a traitor. The story is that somebody poisoned him. But one of his ancestors says that he had stomach problems and died from that. The other Pedro Cochachin was told on and captured. Somebody said they were going to town, but they went to go get the army. So they brought the other Pedro to the federal government where they executed him in a firing squad. He turned his back to the firing squad and bent over. Then they shot and killed him.