Walking fast in Revolution
From Camagüey, Salvador Cisneros Betancourt attended his revolutionary preaching in a secret meeting held in his apartment, in New York, on November 12th, 1882. This appointment would be followed by others with Cuban emigrants, including a handful of former members of the Camagüey mambisado in the last war.
“Work in silence” and in the most absolute secrecy, guided Martí. Everything had to be done with the utmost intelligence so that the Revolution project would bear fruit and it would not fail due to improvisations, imprudence and unnecessary haste. “Hold” the impatient and inexperienced.
Martí devoted himself body and soul to this gigantic work. Preparation of secret codes with the alternate use of numbers and letters, sending double messages to Cuba transported by agents in strict compartmentalization, transfer of parcels carrying encrypted messages inside, among other resources to be known; They were part of the commendable secret work that he carried out to circumvent the stealthy actions of the North American and Spanish detective agencies, who were looking for clues to discover his plans.
Nothing in the North could discover Martí; No agent of the dozens who left in compliance with his instructions to Cuba discredited his secret task. And when a sheet fell into the hands of the enemy, its incomplete encrypted preparation prevented all its details from being known.
Cisneros and youth: Camagüey in arms
In the legendary city of Puerto Príncipe, where the league of surnames derived from endogamic interbreeding had dragged families and relatives into the insurrection, which began at the Saramaguacán or Las Clavellinas Pass, in 1868, he once again enlisted men and colts to mount the emancipatory fight in 1895.
With initial reluctance, the “old patrician” (Creole bourgeoisie) used justifications to evade commitments before the new stage of struggle; others launched accusations against the mass of black slaves and the threat of a supposed “race war”; One part claimed fear of seeing their rural properties lost again due to the war; There were those who had gone over to the side of fundamentalism, to enjoy themselves under the Spanish flag.
On the other hand, the shame of Major Ignacio Agramonte moved consciences and hearts to respond affirmatively to the exhortations of Major General Máximo Gómez, who called for riding to “conquer the unfading laurel of victory”, as the Supreme Commander had stressed of Camagüey, upon reassuming the military command of the region, in January 1871. Gómez offered ranks and soldiers, but few attended Chino Viejo.
On the other hand, there was no house where there were “willing patriots” whom the young son of the ’68 commander Enrique Loynaz del Castillo called to convey to them the Martian message of resuming the liberating combat and to deliver to them the Bases and Secret Statutes of the Cuban Revolutionary Party. Cisneros, Enrique and other revolutionary propagandists had to fight hard, first, to make known in Camagüey who José Martí was; second, to wage a tremendous ideological battle against the Autonomist Liberal Party, the Autonomist Liberal Circle and the Liberal Youth, groups of character and anti-independence projections, classists and opponents of the figure of Martí, and whom the autonomists challenged the most.
From house to house of well-known patriots, Salvador Cisneros and Enrique Loynaz were testing the wills. One of the visits was in the house located in San Diego almost on the corner of San Pablo that brought together gatherings and among them young people eager to fight, such as the mestizo poet Alberto Morales Casalís.
On Contaduría Street, they opened the house for Francisco Sánchez, whose wife Concha Agramonte was one of the liaisons of an agent that Martí directed towards her. Other buildings visited were scattered along Mayor Street, Candelaria, San Juan, San Fernando, Soledad, Plaza San Juan de Dios… Cisneros Betancourt’s house was a center of conspiracy. Another building used to receive agents was El Liceo, in the Plaza de Armas, at the foot of the Town Hall. And in front of this for “message exchange” the famous Emilio Xiques Pharmacy.
And in the building that was to fulfill the purpose of “facade” or “cover” -using a more current term- of the Puerto Príncipe Urban Tram Company, whose project was assumed by Enrique Loynaz himself, from April 1891. There they would have held secret meetings with young and non-young followers of El Mayor Ignacio Agramonte, who would soon enter into combat following Salvador Cisneros, on June 5th, 1895.
Translated by: Aileen Álvarez García
