Jorge Agostini Villasana

Outstanding athlete and Cuban revolutionary combatant. A career military officer who conspired against the dictatorship of Gerardo Machado, for which he had to go into exile. He fought in the Spanish Civil War in which he commanded a submarine of the Republic. Upon returning to Cuba, he rejoined active service in the Navy.

He opposed the coup d'état of March 10 and left the service. He was assassinated by the repressive forces of dictator Fulgencio Batista in the heart of Havana.

He was born in Mayarí, province of Holguín. He entered the Naval School of Mariel at sixteen years of age. There he graduated as frigate ensign in 1931, successively joining the crews of the school ships Patria and Enrique Villuendas of the Navy.

In 1933 he participated in conspiracies against the regime of Gerardo Machado and had to go into exile. In September of that same year, when the movement of soldiers and enlisted men occurred, he left the Navy to collaborate in revolutionary activities.

He linked up with the followers of Antonio Guiteras and had to go into exile again. He returns in 1936 to continue the struggle, but the atmosphere after Guiteras's death was not the best and he was persecuted again. For this reason he was forced to return to the United States.

In the United States he met other exiles who showed their desire to fight for the cause of the Spanish Republic and, demonstrating his internationalism, he went to Spain in 1937, where he put his experience at the service of the Republic and obtained the rank of Commander.

He participated in various naval combats and was wounded in one. Upon recovery he was stationed at a naval base with senior command of the submarine C-4. With his skill and audacity he managed to evade the Nazi-fascist blockade of Catalonia. He also transported numerous combatants to Málaga and in the final stages of the war he was appointed Colonel Chief of the retreat from Catalonia.

After the defeat of the Spanish Republic and his stay in a concentration camp, he managed to return to Cuba in 1940. In 1941 he rejoined the Cuban Navy. For his knowledge and experience he was a professor of artillery at the Naval School of Mariel. With the increase in Nazi operations in the Caribbean Sea, as a consequence of the Second World War, Agustín served on the cruiser Cuba until he was assigned the mission of receiving a course in antisubmarine tactics in the United States.

After the end of the war, he devoted himself entirely to sports. He was Champion of foil and épée (individual and team) at the Central American and Caribbean Games in Barranquilla, 1946; four years later, at the Guatemala event, he obtained a silver medal in foil and gold in team events.

He participated in the London 1948 Olympic Games without reaching the podium. In 1951, during the first Pan American Games, the Cuban delegation achieved second place in team foil and third place in épée. In these victories the accumulation of individual points was decisive.

He was in front of the Naval Station of Camarioca when he was surprised by the coup d'état of March 10, 1952.

He joined the struggle against Batista. As he was persecuted for his revolutionary activity, he had to go into exile again. He entered the island clandestinely with the objective of fighting against the regime, while conspiring with some elements of the armed forces discontented with the political-military leadership headed by Batista.

He was surprised by Batista's repressive forces on June 9, 1955 on 2nd Street, between 15 and 17 in Vedado. After beating him savagely, his body was shot and thrown in front of the First Aid Station in that Havana area, where all attempts to save his life were in vain. As testimony to the brutality of his assassins, the autopsy revealed that he had received 21 bullet perforations scattered throughout his body.

The criminal brutality was denounced by Fidel Castro in the newspaper La Calle on June 11, 1955, in the article titled Facing terror and facing crime, in one of whose paragraphs he stated:

"Would the savagery go unpunished? Does a group of men have the right to take the lives of their fellow men with more impunity than the worst gangsters ever had? Today it is Jorge Agostini, new martyr in the struggle for national liberation, who will be the next combatant to fall riddled with bullets?"