Alejandro O'Reilly

Lieutenant-General Alejandro O'Reilly, 1st Count of O'Reilly, KOA (October 1723 – 23 March 1794) was a Spanish Army officer and colonial administrator who served as the governor of Louisiana from April to December 1769. Born in Ireland, O'Reilly moved to Spain at a young age and enlisted in the Spanish army in 1734, serving in the War of the Austrian Succession and Seven Years' War. In 1763, he led the expedition which accepted Britain's handover of British-occupied Havana, overseeing efforts to reform Cuba's governance and defences. Rewarded for his service and appointed inspector general of the Spanish Army, in 1769 O'Reilly was sent to Louisiana at the head of an expeditionary force to restore Spanish control in the wake of the Louisiana Rebellion of 1768. He accepted the rebels' submission and implemented reforms in Louisiana similar to those in Cuba, though his efforts to punish certain rebels led him to be nicknamed "Bloody O'Reilly". In 1770 O'Reilly returned to Spain and was made a count in the Spanish peerage by Charles III of Spain, resuming his service as inspector general. In 1775, O'Reilly led an invasion of Algiers, which resulted in a major Spanish defeat which badly damaged his career and public reputation. As punishment, he was briefly banished by Charles III before returning to his good graces in 1776 and being appointed the captain general of Andalusia and governor of Cádiz. O'Reilly resigned from both offices in 1786 and retired, but he was recalled from retirement in 1794 to command the Spanish army as part of the War of the Pyrenees against Revolutionary France. En route to Alicante, O'Reilly died of a heart attack in the village of Bonete.