Miguel Jerónimo Gutiérrez Hurtado

Cuban poet and revolutionary. He presided over the armed uprising of Las Villas against Spanish colonialism, elected vice president of the Republic of Cuba in Arms in 1869.

He was born in Santa Clara, son of Miguel Gutiérrez and Maria Nicolasa Hurtado De Mendoza. He was baptized in the demolished Parroquial Mayor, on the 20th, of the same month and year, with Volume 18 on Folio 4, which reinforced his prominent condition of "pilongo" caste. He completed his early studies at the San Francisco de Asís school in his native city, standing out as a student, and likewise showed a fondness for literature.

At 18 years of age he collaborated in the local newspaper El Eco de Villaclara; also in La Alborada, La Guirnalda Literaria, El Progreso, El Guateque, El Central, El Alba and La Época, the latter founded by Eduardo Machado and Salvador Domínguez.

On June 3, 1848, he entered into holy matrimony with Ángela Quirós Hurtado De Mendoza, eight children were the fruit of said marriage. His revolutionary work for the independence of Cuba motivated him to create, in 1860, united with a group of patriotic intellectuals, the Cultural Society "Liceo de Villa Clara".

He achieved fame as a good poet, to the point that his work was part of the Cuba Poética collection, published in 1855. His house became a gathering place for poets and intellectuals from Villa Clara, interested in debating literary and political topics.

In early 1866, he delivered a speech at the reception ceremony for Eduardo Asquerino, director of La América, a newspaper published in Madrid that advocated for reforms in Spain's overseas colonies.

Together with Eduardo Machado he promoted the candidacy of Manuel Fernández Bramosio, councilman of the Havana city council, as commissioner for the jurisdiction of Santa Clara to the Board of Information, to be held in Madrid between 1866 and 1867.

The decision that Bramosio participate for Cárdenas led to Francisco Frías Jacott, Count of Pozos Dulces, defeated in the elections for Havana, being chosen to represent Las Villas. Following the farewell held for Pozos Dulces before his departure to Spain, he composed the poem "To the Count of Pozos Dulces at the Moment of Embarking for the Peninsula as Representative of Villaclara, in the Information of 1866", recited aboard the steamship Morro Castle, in the port of Havana.

After the failure of the island's reformist efforts in the Board of Information and the armed uprising of October 10, 1868, by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes y del Castillo, he waited for the decisions of the Revolutionary Board of Havana, hopeful with the political and administrative reforms promised by the arrival of Spanish Captain General Domingo Dulce to the government of the Island.

Meanwhile, at his residence met Eduardo Machado Gómez, Antonio Lorda, Juan N. Cristo, Arcadio Severino García, Tranquilino Valdés and other influential figures from Remedios, Sancti Spíritus, Sagua, Cienfuegos and Trinidad, forming the Revolutionary Board of Villaclara, in close connection with the one existing in Havana, presided over by José Morales Lemus.

Despite his independence aspirations, he joined his civic forces to those of the Reform Movement, formed among others by Félix Varela, José De la Luz y Caballero, José Antonio Saco and José Morales Lemus. Therefore, when the clarion call given by Carlos Manuel de Céspedes rang out in October 1868, he joined the liberation cause and on February 6, 1869, he seconded that action in Las Villas.

He headed, along with his wife, children and friends, to San Gil, near Santa Clara, where the members of the board proclaimed the independence of Cuba. Later, all the insurgent forces concentrated in El Cafetal González, an area of Manicaragua, where Miguel Jerónimo himself, before some 6000 fellow citizens, drafted the act of pronouncement against Spain.

In the first days of January 1869, he was designated, together with Machado, to go to Havana and meet with Morales Lemus, who shortly thereafter left hidden for the United States. On February 2 they abandoned Santa Clara and issued orders to begin the uprising, concentrating in Manicaragua, near the Villa Clara capital.

On February 6 the uprising of the region took place with a very limited number of firearms and ammunition. Despite this limitation, he rejected the reform proposals made by Colonel Francisco Montaos, Spanish chief of the Military Command of Santa Clara, aimed at persuading the insurgents to return to their homes.

He did not consider feasible the idea, maintained by Machado and the Polish Carlos Roloff, of advancing toward Matanzas and from there to Havana. He called the plan a desperate resort, which could lead to revolts of enslaved blacks in the sugar regions of the West. He proposed instead to move to Camagüey, in arms since November 1868, and, if necessary, to the Eastern Department, in search of weapons and war supplies.

His view prevailed, and in March, General Roloff escorted and led the members of the Revolutionary Board to Camagüey. That same month he held an interview with Manuel Sanguily Garrite, commissioned by the Assembly of Representatives of the Center, in order to persuade the people of Villa Clara to strengthen their conceptions of republican organization, contrary to those held in the East by Céspedes, by centralizing political and military command in his person.

His position, like that of the rest of those involved in the Las Villas uprising, was to declare themselves followers of Céspedes, but implementing the forms of organization of Camagüey: division of civil command from military.

On April 10, 1869 he was part of the Assembly of Guáimaro, convened for the purpose of constituting a single, democratic government, representative of the Republic of Cuba in Arms.

In that meeting he proposed and obtained an amendment to Article 7 of the Constitution. With the intention of not further restricting the powers of the president of the republic, it established that the commander in chief of the Cuban Liberation Army should be subordinate to the executive power, to which he would report on his operations.

On April 11 he was elected vice president of the Chamber of Representatives, which he would preside over frequently, due to the absence of its president Salvador Cisneros Betancourt.

On July 5, Spanish authorities ordered the embargo of his assets.

On December 2, 1869 he launched a proclamation addressed to the Sons of Villaclara, in which he called them "fellow citizens" and summoned them to join the revolutionary movement. Days later, in Palo Quemado he signed the deposition of Manuel de Quesada y Loynaz from his position as commander in chief of the army.

In early 1871 he was appointed to a government commission in Las Villas, in order to promote revolutionary activities in the region. On April 4 he witnessed the murder of Arcadio García, in Monte Oscuro, Sancti Spíritus, and a few days later he was betrayed and surprised in the El Purgatorio woods by forces of the guerrilla commanded by Captain José Velasco.

On April 19, 1871 he was wounded, taken prisoner and dragged through the mountains of the region until he lost his life. He was given burial, by order of the Spanish military chief of the department, somewhere along the road to Sancti Spíritus, whose location has not been able to be determined.

Doña Ángela, a widow, at Candelaria Street #22, suffered the horrors of the peninsular rulers. Her assets and possessions were embargoed, which left her in the greatest destitution along with her children.