In all his great actions and in all his important missions, the figure of Don Jaime Miguel de Guzmán emerges as one of the most outstanding personalities of the 18th century. However, we believe that it has not had the resonance proportionate to its exceptional nature, due to the lack of a biography at the level of its real representativeness.

The young Jaime de Guzmán-Dávalos, had his first acts of arms during the War of the Spanish Succession, fighting on the Bourbon side. In 1709 he asked King Felipe V for permission to create a regiment of dragons at his expense. It would be known as the Pezuela Regiment and, later, as the Lusitania Regiment, whose name still survives in the Spanish army. Guzmán-Dávalos was at his head as a colonel for twenty years. In 1732, the already II Marquis de la Mina participated in the conquest of Oran as field marshal, under the duke of Montemar. Two years later, in 1734, as lieutenant general, he commanded the right wing of the Spanish army in the battle of Bitonto (Italy) in the framework of the confrontations with the Austrians due to the War of the Polish Succession. In 1742, during the Austrian Succession War, he was appointed supreme commander of the Spanish armies in Savoy to replace the Count of Gages. The Marquis de la Mina remained in Italy until 1749. In that year he moved to Barcelona, where he took office as Captain General of Catalonia.

During his tenure, the most important urban development in its history was carried out in Barcelona before the nineteenth-century extensions took place. This action consisted basically of carrying out the illustrated project of tracing a city outside the walls with squared blocks and wide squares and walks. The new neighborhood, designed by the military engineer Juan Martín Cermeño, would be known as La Barceloneta, and served to house the population that had to abandon their homes due to the construction of the military citadel in the Ribera neighborhood. Jaime de Guzmán-Dávalos maintained a typically enlightened policy regarding the execution of large public works, such as the improvement of city accesses, paving and street lighting, and port dredging. Also with measures such as implementing the opera at the Santa Cruz theatre, where Catalan musicians will compete with the works of the great European composers. Although he also used an iron military hand at certain times, such as the popular revolt over the famine of wheat in 1766.

The Marquis de la Mina died occupying his post in Barcelona in 1767 and was buried in the church of San Miguel del Puerto, built ex novo in La Barceloneta during his tenure. Its tomb, made in 1767 by the sculptor Joan Enrich, and which was inside the church, was destroyed in 1936.

He married twice: the first with Francisca Funes de Villalpando, daughter of the counts of Atarés, the second with María Agustina Zapata de Calatayud and Fernández de Híjar, duchess of Palata, princess of Massalubrense, marquise de Cábrega and Baroness de Mozota, with the one who shared as consort these titles granted in the Kingdom of Naples by the Spanish Bourbons. With neither of them had offspring.

The figure wears the uniform established in the regulations of 1706, where the new currencies that were to distinguish generals, chiefs and officers were assigned. The generals will be distinguished by the embroidered windings on the cuffs and seams of the jacket and by the sash. He is also seen carrying the baton, as reflected in paintings by Pedro Capmany or Manuel Tramulles or an engraving from that time that is kept in the National Library.