José Guillermo Moncada Veranes

This Giant of Ebony who took to the mountains with a group of companions when Carlos Manuel de Céspedes issued the cry for independence in October 1868, participated in all the important actions of the Ten Years' War and stood alongside Antonio Maceo at the Protest of Baraguá, a decade later. He returned to the struggle in the Little War and in 1895 was selected by José Martí to lead the uprising in the Oriente region, but Guillermón, weakened by tuberculosis, decided to relinquish command and shortly thereafter died at a place known as Joturito.

He was one of the most outstanding heroes of the Cuban independence struggles against Spanish colonialism. He constitutes a legendary hero of the fight for independence and one of the most popular leaders. Skilled in the use of the machete, he challenged and defeated several Spanish officers on the battlefield who were recognized as excellent swordsmen.

He was born in Santiago de Cuba, Department of Oriente, Cuba. His father, Narciso Veranes, a freed slave, refused to recognize his children, so Guillermón had only his mother's surname, Dominga Moncada. As a child he learned to read and write. As a young man, he became a carpenter, a trade with which he knew how to earn his daily bread.

His fellow soldiers called him Guillermón, for his stature and courage in battles. Son of a very poor Black family, he was among the first to join the insurgent ranks in 1868, and thanks to his bravery he rose to General of the Liberating Army.

In the Ten Years' War he rose up in mid-November 1868 and placed himself under the orders of Major General Donato Mármol.

He participated in the first attack on El Cobre on December 5, 1868.

In July 1869, Mármol appointed him second chief of one of the battalions of the Cuba Division. That year he fought at Loma de Sevilla, El Salado, Mayarí, Michoacán, Jiguaní, Santo Domingo, Zarzal, Guanal de la Cana, Mayarí Arriba, El Ramón, La Sidónea and Jarahueca, among other places.

From February to June 1870 he was with Rustán, under the orders of Brigadier General José María Aurrecoechea, chief of the Staff of the Cuba Division.

In July 1870, after the Cuba Division was reorganized by its new chief, Major General Máximo Gómez, Moncada became chief of the Fifth Battalion.

In 1870 he participated in the battles of La Curia, Cueva de Bruñí and Ti Arriba on October 23, 1870, where he received a bullet wound to the chest.

In February 1871 he temporarily assumed command of the regiment, replacing Rustán, who was gravely wounded.

On May 16, 1871, at a place known as Los Peladeros or El Palenque, he defeated and killed the guerrilla chief of the squadrons of Santa Catalina del Guaso, or Guantánamo, the hated colonel of Cuban origin, Miguel Pérez. On July 6 and 12 of that year, he participated in the actions of La Galleta and La Estacada, respectively.

He was chief of the vanguard of the forces that invaded Guantánamo in August of that same year, participating in various battles, among which La Indiana, Dos Amigos and Oasis stand out.

In June 1872 he subordinated himself to Major General Calixto García, new chief of the Cuba Division. That same year he fought at Tiguabos, Tres Piedras, Rejondón de Báguanos, Samá, Cupeyal, Guisa and Holguín, and in 1873 at Auras, El Zarzal, El Curial, Santa María de Ocujal, Bijagual and Manzanillo. After fighting at Melones, jurisdiction of Holguín on January 9, 1874, he joined the detachment that General Gómez organized to invade Las Villas. He was wounded in the battle of Naranjo-Mojacasabe, in Camagüey on February 10, 1874.

On September 30, 1874 he returned to Oriente, together with Antonio Maceo. He distinguished himself in the assault on a Spanish military train between Guantánamo and Caimanera, on September 6, 1875 and was wounded in the attack on Sabanilla, on December 23, 1876.

In 1877 he was appointed chief of the Mayarí Brigade. He fought at Duaba, again at El Purial, Las Cañas and Mayarí Arriba.

In February 1878 he distinguished himself in the battle of the Llanada de Juan Mulato and on the road of San Ulpiano, for which Maceo entrusted him with command of the rearguard with all the impedimenta.

He rejected the Pact of Zanjón to become one of the men of the Protest of Baraguá on March 15, 1878 alongside General Antonio Maceo. The provisional government of Major General Manuel de Jesús Calvar appointed him chief of the Guantánamo Division, with the rank of brigadier general, to continue the war. He laid down arms on June 10, 1878.

Promotions
Corporal, in November 1868
Sergeant, December 5, 1868
Second Lieutenant, in April 1869
Lieutenant, October 27, 1869
Captain, January 29, 1870
Commander, November 1870
Lieutenant Colonel, May 5, 1871
Colonel, June 7, 1873
Brigadier General, March 17, 1878
Intervention in the Little War

Despite being one of the protagonists of the events in Santiago de Cuba on August 26, 1879, where the Little War began, he did not join until four days later when he attacked the sugar mill La Borgita.

Calixto García, as president of the Cuban Revolutionary Committee, appointed him chief of the forces of the center and south of the Oriente province, with the rank of major general.

He engaged in some actions in the Guantánamo region, realizing that the cause was lost, and together with the then brigadier general José Maceo, he carried out the Agreement of Confluentes, by which he capitulated on June 2, 1880.

After boarding for Jamaica, the Spanish treacherously arrested him on the high seas and took him to Puerto Rico, from where they sent him to Spain and the Balearic Islands. In 1886 he was granted amnesty. He returned to Santiago de Cuba on September 22 of that year.

He participated in the preparations for the Gómez-Maceo plan (1884-1886), in its final stages, and in the Conspiracy of the Manganese Peace (1890). Because of his subversive activities, from December 1, 1893 to June 1, 1894, the Spanish regime kept him imprisoned in the Reina Mercedes barracks, in Santiago de Cuba.

Participation in the War of '95
Upon leaving prison he returned to Cuba, to his Oriente. There he learned of the creation of the Cuban Revolutionary Party, Martí's work, and he began to conspire waiting for the moment when he would once again take the path to the wilderness.

Two days before February 24, 1895, Guillermón, with knowledge of the order to rise up, took to the mountains in the company of the distinguished Rafael Portuondo Tamayo, a young man of the most prominent citizens of Santiago de Cuba, later general of the Revolution.

José Martí appointed him chief of the eastern province during the preparation for the War of 1895. After giving the order to rise up to the eastern region of the province, Guillermón headed to Alto Songo, where he rose up at dawn on February 24.

Already tuberculosis, an illness he had contracted in Spanish prisons, was in its terminal phase. Feeling the approach of death, he entrusted the leadership of his region to Major General Bartolomé Masó, gathered his General Staff and handed over command of the forces directly subordinated to him to Colonel Victoriano Garzón. He died on April 5 of that same year. General Enrique Collazo would later write about the role played by Guillermón in the beginning of the War of '95:

"Guillermo Moncada, in Cuba, could do little, he was a dying man who came in fulfillment of his word, and guided by his patriotism to die in the shadow of his flag."[1] Enrique Collazo

He died at the Joturito camp, in Mucaral, municipal term of Alto Songo, Songo - La Maya, Santiago de Cuba on April 5, 1895. His remains rest in the Santa Ifigenia Cemetery, in the city of Santiago de Cuba.

Tribute
In his honor, during the Republic his name was given to the barracks where the No. 1 Regiment of Santiago de Cuba was located, where the colonial regime had the Reina Mercedes barracks installed.

The Moncada Barracks re-entered history on July 26, 1953, when the Moncada Barracks was attacked by a group of revolutionaries led by Fidel Castro Ruz.

Source: Ecured