# Vidal Morales Morales

**Date of birth:** April 21, 1848

**Date of death:** August 27, 1904

**Categories:** Society, journalist, historian, lawyer

Lawyer, journalist, biographer, and Cuban historian.

He was born in La Habana. Nephew of Antonio Bachiller y Morales, the father of Cuban biography. He completed his early studies in La Habana.

In 1870 he graduated with a degree in Civil Law from the University of La Habana, under the influence of Anselmo Suárez Romero and Antonio Bachiller Morales, who motivated him to approach the History of Cuba. He made his first journalistic works known in La Tertulia, with an article that appeared in 1873, titled "Forgotten Pages of Espronceda." He published works on legal topics in El Foro (1874). He collaborated in the Revista de Cuba (1877), in whose first issue an article of his authorship appeared titled "Three Cuban Historians." In El Triunfo he published, between 1878 and 1879, the series of 22 articles titled "The Island of Cuba in its Different Constitutional Periods."

His main contributions were aimed at the dissemination of historical-legal articles in the most important journalistic publications of his time. He collaborated in almost all the newspapers and magazines of greatest significance of his era: El Siglo, El Triunfo, La Enciclopedia, Cuba y América, and El Fígaro.

From September 19, 1881 to May 21, 1883 he served as substitute fiscal lawyer of the Court of La Habana. He was also a founder of the Bar Association of La Habana, where he served as secretary accountant and belonged to the classification board of the lawyers' guild.

Subsequently, he held various legal positions in La Habana and in Matanzas. On February 11, 1884 he took office as fiscal promoter of Guanabacoa. On October 25, 1888 he was appointed judge of the Court of First Instance of San Antonio de los Baños. By promotion he held the position of second judge of the Court of First Instance of the Southern District of Matanzas on December 16, 1894. On April 21, 1897 he was transferred to the Secretariat of the Court of La Habana.

In 1897, during the first military occupation of the United States in Cuba, the interventionist government appointed him chief of the Archives of the Island of Cuba. In 1902 he founded the Bulletin of the Archives of the Island of Cuba which changed its name to the Bulletin of the Archives of the Republic of Cuba, which he directed until his death.

The work carried out during the period of North American military occupation transcended beyond that time and influenced directly and indirectly other historians of the generations that succeeded him.

He dedicated a good part of his existence to the task of gathering information and accumulated a large arsenal of data with the aim of correcting some of the repeated historical errors in works of this nature that circulated in Cuba until the end of the nineteenth century. He worked with first-hand materials that he knew how to review and patiently organize. He preserved books, pamphlets, letters, and documents, many of which became volumes of his invaluable library or more especially of his "factitious collection," today in the José Martí National Library, or formed the files that constitute the fund of his archive, on deposit in the library of the Sociedad Económica de Amigos del País.

His studies were characterized by unprecedented features, since in addition to first-hand documentary material, he used direct information, moving in the intellectual circles of his time. He accumulated enormous correspondence for his work as a biographer.

He was a promoter of important editions, such as volume VI of the General History of Slavery, by José Antonio Saco. The historical archive of Vidal Morales turned out to be the most complete of its time and formed the most comprehensive libraries on national matters at those moments. He published important historical works, such as Men of '68 and Notions of the History of Cuba (1901). The latter was approved by the Board of Superintendence of Schools on April 9, 1901, and had eight editions through the year 1944. It was adopted as an official text for primary education; throughout its pages, Morales exposes the historical bases of the emerging national State, assuming the tasks that the romantic historiography had carried out decades earlier in other countries of the continent.

The text Initiators and First Martyrs of the Cuban Revolution (1901) constitutes a work of careful methodical and documentary craftsmanship, studying in detail, as well as with solid and explicit support in sources, the separatist conspiracies and some other political movements developed by Cubans until the outbreak of the Ten Years' War.

In the field of historiography he was a faithful representative of the line of erudite and apologetic work. He carried out works linked to the historical and literary past of Cuba.

Vidal Morales was one of the Cuban historians who most contributed to making the national history loved, to knowing its heroes better and honoring them; he likewise awakened in many researchers the interest in gathering information in archives and libraries, with the aim of filling existing historiographical gaps. At his death he left several unpublished works. He signed his works with his initials and used the pseudonyms Ladislao Vermy XX.

He died in La Habana on August 27, 1904.

Source: EnCaribe.org