Rush Tarquin
Gone Fishin'
Calling South America experts. The challenge is for the Riograndense Republic to take the region's larger cities and have the desire and wherewithal to completely, successfully, and permanently secede from Brazil.
It depends in what history you're relying. There is the real history of the Ragamuffin War and the history created after the downfall of the monarchy in 1889.
The latter one presents the Reiograndense republic as anti-slavery, powerful and able to create a peace accord with the Empire like an equal.
That's untrue.
The rebellion began in 1835. Most inhabitants of the province remained loyal to Brazil. They were Brazilians and regarded themselves as such. Anything else, such as "a feeling of being Riograndense" is nonsense created after 1889.
In 1836 the Ragamuffins had a few villages to the southwest and southcentral. All of the eastern area was in the hands of the Empire. That means that the Ragamuffins were unnable to reach the sea. "What about the central area of the province? Or the northwest?" The province was small and scarcely populated. It was not worth the trouble for both sides to have a militayr presence in deserted areas.
By 1840 the Ragamuffins had a few villages in the southwest. Two years later they were on the run, leaving Brazil and entering nearby Uruguay then returning after the Imperial troops left. By 1843 most of the Ragamuffins were desperate to stop their futile rebellion.
Enters Caxias.
My brother would be sorely disappointed to hear that the Riograndense Revolution couldn't have been successful. After two years there he considers himself a Gaucho at heart. This is the first time I've heard that the sequence of events as told in Brazil and especially in Rio Grande do Sul is fictionalized. Where can I find out more about this? The typical websites (Wikipedia) don't give that much information.