Thomas Picton, the first British Governor of Trinidad after the capitulation of the Spanish, who held office from 1797 to 1803, was a great support to the revolutionaries or "Patriots" in Venezuela.

Soon after becoming governor, he issued a proclamation on 6 June 1797, based on suggestions from Britain, which stated: Ironically, the 1807 devastating defeat of the British invasions of the River Plate in South America, largely by local militias, encouraged a more independent attitude in Spain's American colonies.

A "Supreme Central Junta" was formed to govern in the name of Ferdinand, marking the beginning of Spain's War of Independence from French domination.

The young Bolívar went to London and Mariño to Port of Spain (Trinidad) to seek support if Venezuela was attacked and to pressure the Spanish grants special privileged.

Spain viewed these developments with alarm and, in 1810, declared the popular party rebels, the province was treated as enemy territory and its ports were blockaded.

[6][7] Mariño was informed of the ill-treatment that befell Miranda and the other patriotic men, by the Royalist leader General Monteverde, who violated the terms of the armistice by imprisoning many Venezuelans.

Bolívar entered Caracas on 6 August 1813, proclaiming the restoration of the Venezuelan republic, which was not fully recognized by Mariño based in Cumaná, although the two leaders did cooperate militarily.

They regrouped at Valencia and Bolívar handed over command to Mariño, "as a sure sign of his high opinion of his person and services, and also in this way to ensure the adhesion of the eastern officers to the common cause of Venezuela."

Bolívar and Mariño were arrested and removed from power by José Félix Ribas and Manuel Piar, each representing the two republican commands then in place in Venezuela.

On 8 September, after the fall of the second republic, Bolívar and Mariño set sail for Cartagena de Indias, leaving Piar and Ribas to lead the increasingly encircled republicans.

That same year, it triumphed over the colonel Eugenio Arana in the combat of Cantaura and while Bolivar operated in the liberation of Viceroyalty of New Granada took part in the movement that displaced Francisco Antonio Zea of the vice-presidency of the Republic.

Gradually more and more of the caudillos (warlords or political bosses) began to join Bolívar, but then Piar rebelled against him and was finally put to death in October 1817.

Finally Bolívar managed to win Mariño over by appointing him General-in-Chief of the Army of the East with control over the plains of Barcelona, while Bermúdez and Cedeño were given the rest of the eastern districts and Páez was yet to be pacified.

[12] In May 1831, a council of 150 residents of the city of Barcelona, General Santiago Mariño and José Tadeo Monagas were invested as the principal authorities of the "State of the East", until the installation of the first Congress to be convened later.

After that, President José Antonio Páez stopped this separatist attempt, negotiating with the Monagas brothers, convincing them to submit to central authority.

On 9 July 1835 President Vargas and Vice-president Andrés Narvarte were expelled to the Island of Saint Thomas, and Mariño briefly took the power of the country.

However, José Antonio Páez and his forces entered Caracas on 28 July to find it abandoned by the Reformists, and reinstated Vargas, putting an early end to Mariño's military rule.