Haydée Santamaría

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Haydée Santamaría (1968)

Haydée Santamaría Cuadrado (called Yeyé; born December 30, 1923 in the province of Villa Clara , † July 28, 1980 in Havana ) was a Cuban revolutionary. Together with Melba Hernández , Vilma Espín and Celia Sánchez , she was one of the most important revolutionaries.

Life

Haydée Santamaría comes from a family of Spanish descent. She grew up as the second of five children on a sugar plantation in central Cuba. In 1948 she moved to Havana with her younger brother Abel Santamaría . Abel Santamaría was a friend of Fidel Castro . In their shared apartment, which now houses a museum, they forged plans to overthrow Fulgencio Batista, who came to power in 1952 .

On July 26, 1953, Haydée took part in the attack on the Moncada barracks in Santiago de Cuba led by Fidel Castro . The action failed and resulted in dozens of deaths among the attacked soldiers and the attackers. In the subsequent trial, Santamaría and Melba Hernández were sentenced to seven months' imprisonment. After her release, she continued to support the revolutionary movement that Castro had led from prison until his amnesty in May 1955, including during the armed struggle that began in November 1956. From May 1958, she was in Miami for the July 26th Movement in charge of collecting donations from the Cubans in exile there .

After Batista was expelled on January 1, 1959, Haydée founded the Casa de las Américas , a cultural center of national importance. From its opening until her death in 1980, she was the executive director of the Casa de las Américas. She was also a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Cuba.

Haydée was married to Armando Hart Dávalos , the former Cuban Minister of Education and Culture. She had two children, Celia Hart Santamaría and Abel Hart Santamaría, who both died in a traffic accident during a hurricane on September 7, 2008.

On July 28, 1980, Haydée Santamaría committed suicide. It was her second attempt at suicide. There is uncertainty about their motive. Castro biographer Carlos Widmann blames , among other things, the castration of the Casa de las Américas, which was originally characterized by free spirit, by the Castro regime in the so-called gray decade in Cuba in the 1970s. Writers critical of the regime were persecuted, leading European left-wing intellectuals to turn away from the Cuban revolution. Haydée lost her access to the innermost circle of power.

Reminiscences

  • In Luigi Nono's opera "Al gran sole carico d'amore" you can find them in the choir.
  • Olu Oguibe honored Haydée Santamaría in his "Woman of Progress" project.
  • The Cuban state awards the Haydeé Santamaría Medal to outstanding artists

literature

  • Maclean, Betsy (Ed.), Haydée Santamaría: Woman guerrilla leader in Cuba whose passion for art and revolution inspired Latin America's cultural renaissance, Melbourne: Ocean Press, 2003. - 125 pp. - (Rebel Lives) ISBN 1-876175-59 -1

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Carlos Widmann : The last book about Fidel Castro , Carl Hanser Verlag, 2012, ISBN 978-3446240049

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Santamaría, Haydée
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Santamaría Cuadrado, Haydée; Yeyé
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Cuban revolutionary, Fidel Castro's campaigner
DATE OF BIRTH December 30, 1923
PLACE OF BIRTH Villa Clara Province , Cuba
DATE OF DEATH July 28, 1980
Place of death Havana , Cuba