Who was the great love of Porfirio Díaz

General Porfirio Díaz is a controversial figure in Mexican history because he is hated and loved by many. And despite the fact that today he is known and credited with various advances in the country, his love life is a topic that interests many; there are those who consider that it was sometimes secret and controversial, as with Delfina Ortega and in others public, as was his second marriage with Carmen Romero Rubio.

The first woman in his life was Delfina Ortega, who took 15 years. With her, the president had eight children, of whom only two became adults. Unfortunately, Delfina died when her last daughter was born, who also lived for a few hours. A year later, Porfirio Díaz met Carmen Romero, daughter of wealthy Manuel Romero Rubio, and they decided to get married.

The love that Diaz had for his niece is manifested in the letters he wrote to her, in addition to the fact that he abandoned his Masonic beliefs in order to marry Delfina for the Catholic Church; the marriage lasted 13 years.

Although it is believed that the relationship between Diaz and Romero may have been a tactic for the general to build a bridge between him and the economic elite of the time, there is a letter he wrote to his second wife while he was still in the process of conquering her:

“I must express to you that I love you. I understand that without an unforgivable presumption I cannot expect that much will happen in your spirit and that is why I am not asking you; but I think that in a good, virgin and presided heart with a clear intelligence such as yours can germinate that powerful feeling, as long as it is a gentleman who cultivates it and knows how to love so loyal, sincere and absolutely as you deserve it and I do it almost unconsciously,” he wrote.

Between the time of the death of his first wife and the second marriage, it is recorded that Diaz met a mysterious woman from Tlalpan named Francisca Ramírez , an employee of the National Palace, with whom she had a brief and passionate affair from which a son was born in May 1880.

It is also known about a woman named Juana Catarina Romero, who was a mestiza and sold cigars, is said to have been the general's lover during War of Reformation because she saved his life by hiding it under her skirt in the middle of a battle. However, the president did not mention it in any of his memoirs, so we can only observe the affection with which Romero wrote to Diaz when he became president.

Although there is a record of some of the loves that Porfirio Díaz had, it is considered that what the president wanted most was the homeland and power. This can be seen in the letter of resignation he submitted in 1911.

“The Mexican People, that people who have so generously showered me with honors, who proclaimed me their leader during the Intervention War, who patriotically supported me in all the works undertaken to promote industry and commerce in the Republic, that people, gentlemen deputies, have insurrected themselves in bands millennial armed forces, stating that my presence in the exercise of the Supreme Executive Power is the cause of their insurrection,” he wrote.

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