The popular conga known as La Chambelona, also called the Liberal Anthem, was introduced by the followers of the Liberal Party in the 1916 political campaign led by José Miguel Gómez against the sympathizers of the conservative president Mario García Menocal, in his re-election.

¡Ae, ae, ae La Chambelona,

Aspiazo me dio botella

Y yo voté por Varona…

¡Ae, ae, ae La Chambelona

Yo no tengo la culpita ni tampoco la culpona

¡Ae, ae, ae La Chambelona!

The situation turned violent. Orders arrived at the polling stations to prevent voting from one side and the other. Camagüey was considered lost by the conservatives, meaning, the liberals were ahead, also in Las Villas, Havana and Oriente. “The Liberals beat us with their votes. We have lost the election” said Aurelio Hevia to García Menocal. “You may have lost it, I did not!” Menocal countered.

Investigator Rolando Rodríguez pointed out that García Menocal, before the court ruling, favorable to Zayas, believed he had lost and thought that he only had one weapon left to win: violence. The Liberals, faced with the tense situation aggravated by the new elections, asked for guarantees. The government moved troops into the provinces.

On February 11th, three days before the complementary elections were held, former president José Miguel Gómez took up arms at the head of the liberal forces.

In Camagüey

In the military district of Camagüey, he points out, Rolando Rodríguez joined the uprising. The mutineers locked up Governor Sánchez Batista and the city’s mayor, Enrique Sariol. Governor-elect Enrique Recio and Senator Gustavo Caballero Arango, commander in the war of ’95 and “general” since August 1906, joined the rebellion. Mambí of the Necessary War that led La Chambelona in Camagüey.

Gustavo Caballero, as a general, leaves the town with his troops in the morning hours; he heads east and camps at La Matilde farm. Nicolás Guillén Urra, appointed colonel, also left the town and headed south, according to José Manuel Villabella.

Colonel Pujol with his artillery regiment penetrates the town, pursues Caballero, although the latter has him in check, also fights in Oriente and is taken prisoner in Camagüey on April 21st at La Caridad farm, near San Miguel, by the first motorized force in America and the second in the world.

Guillén Urra settled on the San Ramón farm with his troops, now Najasa. This place is well known to him, because during the War of Independence, he and his father, Francisco Guillén Rivero, joined the Liberation Army. Narrates Villabella. On March 15th, El Camagüeyano newspaper published the death of Guillén Urra, father of what would later become the national poet: Nicolás Guillén Batista, at this time he and his brothers were orphaned.

Outcome

The music band from the Camagüey district had entered the neighborhood of the Stewart power plant, where José Miguel Gómez camped, to the sound of the popular conga. Real threat to the government leadership due to the number of thousands of followers.

The uprising took on extraterritorial overtones. On February 16th, García Menocal launched a proclamation to the people of Cuba, of any political affiliation but lovers of order and law, asking them to join them. That day, four US warships arrived sent by Daniels, the Secretary of the Navy, Rolando Rodríguez pointed out. These ships docked in Havana, Santiago de Cuba, Nuevitas and Cienfuegos.

In Camagüey, 500 cavalrymen were appointed. On the 26th, Colonel Pujol occupied Camagüey and restored the civil government. However, the insurgents set fire to a sugar cane field in Camagüey resulting in the loss of two million arrobas of cane, clarified Rolando Rodríguez.

With the capture of April 21st and the murky death of Gustavo Caballero y Arango, on the 22nd, when he boarded the train alive in Nuevitas and arrived dead in Camagüey, one of the many painful pages of the First Republic comes to an end.

Bibliography

Rodríguez, Rolando (2012) República rigurosamente vigilada de Menocal a Zayas. Tomo 1. Ciencias Sociales. La Habana, Cuba.

Villavella, José Manuel (2013) Guillén: romance en Pueblo Viejo. Ácana, Camagüey, Cuba.

El Camagüeyano Newspaper. 1917.

Translated by: Aileen Álvarez García