314 Olmsted, Frederick Law when the Chilean forces were defeated at the hands of the royalists, O’Higgins was replaced as commander In October 1814 the Chileans were badly mauled at the Battle of Rancagua and the royalists occupied most of Chile Several thousand Chilean nationalists, or patriots, as they became known, including O’Higgins, were forced to flee across the Andes into western Argentina, where they drew up plans for a subsequent invasion of Chile Over the next three years, the Chileans and Argentines were drilled and trained at Mendoza, and José de San Martín prepared them to cross the Andes With Argentina independent from July 9, 1816, the soldiers of San Martín and O’Higgins were reinvigorated, and on January 24, 1817, the two took the 3,000 infantry, 700 cavalry, and 21 cannons through the passes at Gran Cordillera They were met on February 12–13 at the Battle of Chacabuco On the first day of the battle, O’Higgins led his men in an early morning move where they prevented the Spanish from withdrawing San Martín then attacked and routed them On February 15 O’Higgins took the Chilean patriots back into Santiago, and O’Higgins was elected as interim supreme dictator Chile’s independence was proclaimed on February 12, 1818 During his six years as supreme dictator, O’Higgins overhauled the administration With Chile at peace, he set about establishing a navy with the flagship called O’Higgins and founding the Chilean Military Academy, as well as instituting the new Chilean flag He also mounted a major military expedition into Peru, where royalists were still threatening Chilean independence However, although he was a good military commander, O’Higgins was not a good politician An admirer of democracy, he wanted to abolish the titles of the nobles and introduce liberal reforms O’Higgins alienated the Roman Catholic Church and the aristocracy, followed by the business community A constitutionalist, he had no political base, and once there was no threat of attack from the Royalists, it was not long before O’Higgins was eased from office His government was implicated in the assassination of four political figures, José Miguel Carrera, his two brothers in Argentina, and a friend Manuel Rodriguez O’Higgins resigned under pressure on January 28, 1823, unable to fulfill his ambitions for independence for all of Latin America O’Higgins went into exile in Peru in 1823, spending half of his time at a farm he bought and the other half of his time in Lima He never married but did have a son, Pedro Demetrio O’Higgins, who remained with him for all of his life He died on October 23, 1842, in Peru In his will he left money for the establishment of an agricultural college in Concepción, a lighthouse in Valparaíso, and the Santiago Observatory In 1869 his remains were brought back to Chile and put in a mausoleum facing the Palacio de la Moneda, the government palace The main street in Chile’s capital, Santiago, is Avenida Bernardo O’Higgins, in which there is a large statue of him See also Bolívar, Simón; Freemasonry in North and Spanish America; Sucre, Antonio José de Further reading: Clissold, Stephen Bernardo O’Higgins and the Independence of Chile London: Rupert Hart-Davis, 1968; El Libertador Bernardo O’Higgins Santiago: Editorial Lord Cochrane, 1978 Justin Corfield Olmsted, Frederick Law (1822–1903) U.S architect and urban planner Gentleman farmer, antislavery journalist, gold mine supervisor, and U.S Civil War official, Frederick Law Olmsted is today best known for his design and implementation of New York City’s Central Park He and the partners and sons who carried on his work were ultimately responsible for thousands of important urban and suburban projects that reshaped and beautified North America, from the U.S Capitol grounds to Niagara Falls to Montreal’s Mount Royal His multifaceted career epitomizes what a man of means, intellect, and enthusiasm could achieve in 19th-century America Olmsted was, as one biographer put it, the “eager and undisciplined” son of a successful Hartford, Connecticut, merchant He entered Yale University, but never graduated Fond of the outdoors, he apprenticed as a surveyor and endured a year aboard a square-rigger involved in the China tea trade, before taking up scientific farming in then-rural Staten Island, New York As the slavery issue began to boil over in the late 1840s, Olmsted, although no abolitionist, raised money for Free-Soil causes and became an early supporter of the new Republican Party Hired by the New-York Daily Times (now the New York Times), the young correspondent undertook a series of trips through the slave-owning South to write influential articles revealing slavery’s economic and social impact Olmsted’s involvement with Central Park was almost accidental On the recommendation of a well-