Haydée Santamaría Cuadrado, Heroine of the Republic of Cuba, was born on December 30, 1923, 102 years ago, in Encrucijada, in the former province of Las Villas. From a very young age, she led an intense revolutionary life until her death.
She was the eldest daughter of Spaniards Benigno Santamaría Pérez and Joaquina Cuadrado Alonso. She attended primary school in a small school where one teacher taught all grades and aspired to enter nursing school, which she was unable to do due to the country's political climate.
Her younger brother, Abel Santamaría, moved to Havana, and she soon joined him. From a young age, she was sensitive to the social problems around her and became active in the ranks of the Orthodox Youth. Yeyé, as she was known to her family and closest friends, after the coup d'état of March 10, 1952, along with her brother Abel and other revolutionaries, edited the clandestine newspapers *Son Los Mismos* and *El Acusador*, where they carried out intense agitation work.
After meeting Fidel Castro, her small apartment at 25th and O Streets in El Vedado became the center of the nascent revolutionary movement, known as the Centennial Generation, and there they planned the attacks on the Moncada Barracks in Santiago de Cuba and the Carlos Manuel de Céspedes Barracks in Bayamo.
On July 26, 1953, Haydée participated in the attack on the Moncada Barracks and, along with her brother Abel Santamaría, occupied the Saturnino Lora Civil Hospital to support the attackers. Together with her friend Melba Hernández, she assisted Dr. Mario Muñoz as a nurse and, in the midst of the battle, tended to all the wounded, even those from Batista's army.
When the assault failed, she was taken prisoner by the army. To make her talk, they told her that her brother and boyfriend had been tortured and killed after the battle, and showed her Abel's eye and the remains of her boyfriend Boris Luis Santa Coloma's genitals. Despite the brutal method, they couldn't extract any information from her, and she firmly replied: "To die for one's country is to live."
In his defense speech, History Will Absolve Me, Fidel Castro, recalling Haydée's gesture, would say: "Never before has the name of the Cuban woman been placed in such a high position of heroism and dignity."
Along with Melva, they were taken from Columbia Airport to the National Women's Prison (in Guanajay), where they were imprisoned for six months. They were kept incommunicado the entire time and were only allowed to get some sun in the courtyard on the days their families visited them.
She was released on February 20, 1954, and almost immediately participated in the printing and distribution of the manifesto "To Suffering Cuba," in which Fidel and his fellow prisoners declared their irrevocable decision to continue the fight against the Fulgencio Batista regime. It was also Haydée, along with Lidia Castro and Melba Hernández, who compiled and organized the notes that Fidel managed to smuggle out of prison, written with lemon juice, in which he reconstructed his defense speech at the Moncada trial, which would later be known as "History Will Absolve Me."
In a letter dated June 18, 1954, Fidel entrusted Haydée and Melba with making every effort and concentrating their meager resources on printing "History Will Absolve Me," and little by little they managed to edit and publish the manuscript. On July 26, 1954, along with Melba, she led a demonstration that was attacked by the dictatorship's police forces at the Colón Cemetery.
She was a member of the first National Directorate of the 26th of July Movement. From the underground, she played a decisive role in regrouping the revolutionary forces for armed struggle and participated in organizing the uprising of November 30, 1956, in Santiago de Cuba.
During the most difficult moments for the guerrilla movement led by Fidel Castro, in February 1957, she marched to meet him, accompanied by Frank País, Faustino Pérez, and other members of the National Directorate of the Movement, to coordinate support from the plains and guide New York Times journalist Herbert Matthews to interview Fidel. The publication of that interview with the guerrilla leader would disprove the widely circulated news of his supposed death. At the end of April, she returned to the Sierra Maestra mountains with American journalist Bob Taber, with the same objective.
From there, she went into exile, appointed by Fidel as the 26th of July Movement's delegate to unite forces abroad and obtain funds and weapons. She returned to Cuba after the triumph of the Revolution and worked in the Ministry of Education. In 1959, Fidel entrusted her with the mission of founding a cultural institution that would become an emblem for intellectuals and artists worldwide: Casa de las Américas. She accomplished this, imbuing it with her enormous charisma.
Haydée was also a creator and patron of the Nueva Trova movement and succeeded in promoting the unknown artistic work of young musical talents such as Silvio Rodríguez, Pablo Milanés, and Noel Nicola, among others.