Joaquín de Agüero was the main figure of the armed uprising of July 4th, 1851, first in Cuba against the Spanish forces that was accompanied by an act of Independence. Little is said about his deed or about the fact that in 1843 he freed his slaves. Even less is known about the fact that his wife, Ana Josefa Agüero Perdomo, along with other women from Camagüey, played a decisive role in organizing the uprising.

“Ana Josefa, along with other women, was the one who presumably embroidered the first known flag of the red triangle and the silver star. She was going to send it to her husband, who had left it behind a religious altar with a cousin of his -who by the way had the same name, Joaquín de Agüero.

“But he was very daring, and on July 3rd he was captured and the flag and, of course, his weapons were seized. There are two letters in which Ana Josefa writes to Joaquín de Agüero that the women of Puerto Príncipe are going to celebrate masses in the churches to ask God to protect them during the uprising and to achieve freedom. In addition, she asks him to notify her when she can join the troop, in the battlefield”, comments the researcher from Camagüey Fernando Crespo.

Any armed uprising had to have funds to support the fight; and in this context, the principeñas did not hesitate to financially support Agüero’s cause.

“The women of Puerto Príncipe, mainly in jewelry and other objects, had managed to raise some 3,500 pesos to support the cause. Usually they only talk about the fact that the women from Camagüey cut off a lock of their hair after Agüero’s execution, but they had already been doing actions to support the fight long before,” adds Crespo.

That cause that the people of Camagüey embraced in the year 1851 currently appears as a fact of great pride for the children of this land and is an event of special connotation for the national historiography.

So much so that in the park that bears the name of the patriot -once the place where he was shot along with three fellow fighters- a plaque at the foot of the monument in his honor reads: Remember Cuban that here Joaquín de Agüero was shot for your freedom.

Translated by: Aileen Álvarez García