Pascual Orozco Click on the photos to see larger view Then use you browser back button to return to this page. Pascual Orozco was born January 28, 1882 near Guerrero, Chihuahua. He joined the revolutionary movement in October 1910, recruited by Abraham Gonzales, a maderista organizer. Gonzales also recruited Pancho Villa, and Villa originally operated under Orozco's command. When his forces were finally successful in installing Madero in power, he soon found himself ignored and forgotten while Madero was far away in Mexico City with the same satraps the revolutionaries thought were to be deposed. Orozco next led a rebellion against Madero, and Emiliano Zapata was among those who voiced their support for it. However, Orozco was soon in league with the old order of the state of Chihuahua, including the Creel and Terrazas families, and he was branded as a reactionary and an opportunist. Madero flung the federal army forces against him, under the command of Victoriano Huerta, and Pancho Villa was one the commanders of the former revolutionary irregulars who fought beside the federal army. Huerta defeated Orozco in one battle after another, and he hastily fled to the US. When Madero was assassinated, Orozco joined forces with general Victoriano Huerta, and his troops - known as the "colorados", for their red flag - went after Pancho Villa and the other Constitutionalist generals. Villa's forces and the other constitutionalist armies under Alvaro Obregon in the West and Pablo Gonzales in the east, defeated Huerta, and he and Orozco fled together to the United States. They were both arrested, and Orozco escaped, but was killed just north of Ojinaga by Texas ranchers in an attempt at stealing horses. Pascual Orozco poses for a newspaper photographer near the beginning of his military career in 1910. Orozco in the company of Francisco I. Madero, whom he later betrayed. Former enemies: Pascual Orozco embraces Victoriano Huerta in an infamous photo taken at the meeting where they publicly announced their alliance against the constitutionalists. Orozco poses next to the unquestioned symbols of power and prestige at the time - a row of 30-30 rifles. Pascual Orozco, in civilian clothes, stands for a portrait together with a group of federal officers preparing for a campaign against Villa, Carranza, Zapata, and others. Orozco's body is held up for photographers after his untimely and disgraceful end when he was shot as an unsuccessful horse thief by Texas ranchers in a failed bid to reenter Mexico for yet another armed adventure.

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