On September 13, 1810, the conspiracy of Querétaro was betrayed. Josefa Ortiz de Domínguez, the wife of the corregidor Miguel Domínguez, was locked in her room. She sent her warning with “el alcaide Ignacio Pérez” (the jailer Ignacio Pérez). He went to San Miguel and, when he did not find Ignacio Allende, “puso el aviso en manos de Hidalgo” (put the warning in Hidalgo’s hands), according to Excélsior. Hidalgo began the uprising early on September 16.
Accounts differ on how she reached Pérez. One says that she struck the floor with her shoe. Another says that she knocked on the wall.