"Heriberto Pérez Vázquez (Martin Rosel), Fallen Martyr, but Never Forgotten"

On January 9, 1959 in front the Columbia Military Camp (Liberty City), with a white dove perched on his shoulder: Fidel Castro said .......
___ "I want to tell the people and mothers of Cuba, that I will solve all problems without spilling a drop of blood. I tell mothers, that you will never have to mourn." However, the reality has been very different and there have been and are many mothers who weep for their children, because of the Castro brothers and their accomplices."

Thousands of men and women who have fought and are fighting for a Cuba where all citizens can live a life of dignity and freedom. We should always remember the martyrs who gave it all for for the freedom of our country. To one of those forgotten martyrs, is today's tribute.

Heriberto  Pérez Vázquez, known in the underground as Martin Rosel, was born into a poor family of more than ten children, on August 24, 1918. He abandoned his studies after the eighth grade to work and help his family, yet his lack of formal education did not stop him from acquiring knowledge and a clear vision for the future of his homeland. Heriberto fought first against the Batista dictatorship and later took up the fight against the dictatorship of Fidel Castro.

The labor leader, who gave everything for the cause of the working class and later gave his life for Cuba, always maintained a humble demeanor, but firm in his convictions. He dedicated the best years of his life to the improvement of the poor class and was by nature the leader of the Jarahueca miners.

His contempt for communism was so great that he starts to make enemies, but nothing stops his fight to improve the conditions of the working class that they may live to see the fruits of their hard work.

In late 1958 during a meeting with his friend Dr. Felix Egues Castilla near Yaguajay, Heriberto said to him ... ___ "I think, as the Liberator (Simon Bolivar), we have plowed the sea. Over in my camp, the color is red ". Like all great men, Heriberto had the clarity of mind to see the truth that many did not dare see.

When the Revolution triumphed, Heriberto came down from the mountains with the rank of First Lieutenant, but had made an enmity of Commander Felix Torres. Heriberto wanted to stop the peasants from drinking polluted water from nearby rivers that was brought to the shacks. With hard work and he was able to help provide wells of clean water to hundreds of houses, but his enthusiasm for the revolution, no longer existed and thus began his clandestine work against the dictatorship.

His loyalty as a friend, urges him to join the November 30 Revolutionary Movement and continues his tireless work for the future of his homeland. He later took up arms with a group of brave men, but the date does not coincide with an invasion that would come from Central America.

The Bay of Pigs surprises him, because the information doesn't arrive on time and after the failure was that invasion, he goes off on his own with a very small group to the Escambray Mountain and makes contact with Bravo Ramirez, but there is no union and he brakes rank and makes camp separately. He finds no unity there and travels to Havana.
His friend Felix Egues like his family remember that Heriberto was very trusting and careless  with his personal safety. He attends a suspicious meeting where he is betrayed, and never returns.

Heriberto was arrested in Havana. His sibblings tried by every means to find out where he was taken to and finally found him in the G-2 in Santa Clara. They managed to arrange a visit and get a date set for one of his sisters and his wife to visit. Meanwhile, the family hears from him, because his wife was given his clothes to wash and Heriberto manages to write notes in the fabric of his pants pockets, his wife did the same. One of the things that he asked his wife was ..... "Take care of my little girl.", he was refering to his youngest daughter, only 2 years old, as if sensing that would not be there to take care of her with his wife.

As often happens during revolutions, the fury of killing the opposition took over Cuba and the long-awaited visit unfortunately did not materialize. Two days before the date of the visit, one of his relatives shows up at the site where he was kept prisoner and was told he he was dead. Like many others, Heriberto was denied the privilege of a fair trial and on the morning of July 19, 1962 at the age of 45 years in the small town of Iguará in the province of Las Villas, the idealistic man who swore to give his life for his country, laid down his life by firing squad. His death certificate lies and says she died of internal bleeding.

As if trying to kill him twice, the communists did not give his body to his family to receive a Christian burial. The remains of Heriberto Perez Vazquez lie in an unknown tomb, apparently with three other men, also executed. His mother never knew the tragic fate of her-the family hid the truth to spare her the pain. His 4 children, 15, 12, 11 and 2 years were left virtually destitute. His widow suffered a lot-she could not accept what had been done to her husband. A sister of her late husband helped her financially. The older children helped their mother as best they could. The oldest helped a neighbor plant vegetables, the second shined shoes. In the end one by his children left Cuba.

Sonia, his eldest daughter remembers that .....

___ "It was too sad for all of us, yet it's strange, I miss having my father with me, my mother I miss a lot, but I had much more time with her, and I remember how my father was with me. When I was only 9 years old, and I got sick it was he who looked after me all night." Her younger sister who does not remember him, and whom he affectionately called cCuqui, recalls, "I was left with the desire to know what it feels like to have a father."If tragic and inhumane was his murder, also tragic and inhumane was to deny his family the last goodbye. Failing to close that chapter of his life, creates doubts and conflicts that are not easy to resolve. His daughter Sonia stayed with that doubt, if maybe he was alive in a concentration camp, as in some isolated cases. 


She recalls a strange anecdote .......

___ "At 14 or 15 years of age, a cousin requested a photo of my father, because another cousin of hers who had visited a concentration camp in Camagüey, told her that during a visit, when all prisoners lined up,that though he could not talk to them, there was a man that looked like my father, and he stepped forward and whispered to him, tell Juan I'm here (Juan was my father's brother) he wanted the picture to make sure it was him the next time he visited the camp, but unfortunately, it was not to be and he was not sent back to the concentration camp. You could never imagine how many years I spent suffering in silence unable to tell anyone what my cousin told me, because that was dangerous, while hoping that my dad was there and would come out someday. After many years I mentioned it to my mom, but I don't know if she believed me or not, but the fact is, I have lived with that question all my life."

The lies and manipulations of communist systems, leave always doubts. It's as if they get pleasure out of punishing the families of prisoners and dissidents.

It's very Important to note that, the insurrections of the Escambray Mountains have been the strongest that the the Castro dictatorship has had to deal with, and the guerrilla fighters there were known for their boldness and courage. They faced the communists' army without hesitation. In its quest to disappear them, the dictatorship of Fidel Castro, after annihilating all freedom fighters, moved all the farmers in the area to other parts of the island and most recently, led by Raul Castro, they are trying to change the name to the Escambray, in the futile attempt to erase parts of the history of Cuba they do not want anyone to know-something that can not be achieved, for the dead seek justice and will receive it someday.

Partial list of those excecuted by the Castro dictatorship which includes the name of Heriberto.

The name of Heriberto Perez Vazquez is reflected in the historical memory, along with all the forgotten martyrs of Cuba. Your country watches you proud!

Sources:
Dr. Felix Castilla Egues
20 De Mayo Newspaper
Sonia, eldest daughter of Heriberto Perez Vazquez 

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50 Years After the Communist Takeover, Cuba Crumbles

Five decades after the rise to power of the Castro brothers, Cuban crumbles, while the world keeps looking at the Castros as if only they were citizens of Cuba. The people must be heard!

"Che, The Butcher of the Cabana"

The Ghosts of Communism

In 1959, with the rise to power of the Castro brothers, life as we new it had changed forever. My family came from Quivican-a little town south of Havana. My father ran a small welding business, from our house, but under Communist rule, free enterprise is not allowed and the welding shop was closed. My father was so angry and frustrated, that he buried most of his equipment in our back yard. He figured, that at least that way, the government couldn't get the satisfaction of stealing what he worked so hard for.

He raised pigs and sold them for profit, but that too had to end. Raising and killing your own pigs for food was prohibited. We weren't allowed to raise and kill our own farm animals and the authorities branded each one. Everything belonged to the State.

If you didn't participate in the Revolution, the police would call you in for questioning. My father was called to march on the streets, because everybody had to get prepared to defend their country. He hated that with a passion and eventually got sent to a work camp. Work Camps, by the way, were started by Argentinian Revolutionary and murderer, Che Guevara.

With the Communist Revolution came the firing squads, the disappearances, the massive exodus, the food rationing and the long lines. I can't tell you, how many times we stood in line for bread or any other item, only to get to the front of the line and be told, they were out of it.

While the regime wasted our resources, and sacrificed the lives of thousands of Cubans, spreading the seeds of communism, we had to survive on the few crumbs allowed by the rationing card issued to each family. Toilet paper was no where to be found, so we used old newspapers, when we could get them.

From the time a person entered kindergarten, the state kept a cumulative file that would follow you for the rest of your life. This file documented every thing or anything you had ever done. I lost count of how many times I heard my teachers in school say how much the revolution had done for us. The math didn't add up. If it was so great, why did so many people leave, and why was everyone so afraid?

Suicide was very high. I can't still remember conversations about people as young as fifteen, locking themselves in the bathroom and setting themselves on fire. Just behind our house, an old man who lived with his sisters hang himself from a tree. A man taking his cow out to pasture, found him when the cow wondered near the tree. My brother being the nosy person he was, ran over to see, when he heard. He said the man still clinched his tobacco in one of his hands; needless to say, that image gave him nightmares for years.

There was a house on each street, whose job it was, to keep tabs on each neighbor's comings and goings. They knew what time you left your house, what time you got home and who your friends were. They knew what you read, what you ate and what time you ate it. These were the CDR or Comite de Defensa de la Revolucion (Comity of Defense of the Revolution). One year sometime in the seventies, during election time, my mom, who was a rebel, decided to go visit her sister in a neighboring town. She said she wasn't about to participate in a election with just one candidate. It was a nice try, but not successful. Our CDR watch found out from the neighbors we were and went all the way to her sister's house to pick us up so she could vote. We had no choice, but to get in the car and my mom reluctantly voted for the one and only candidate-Fidel Castro.

The police kept a close eye on every person. One day, as my father sat in the movie theater, one of our towns policeman, asked him, "why do you always sit in the same seat?". There was no particular reason; my dad was just a bit obsessive. He had obviously been following him for sometime. It was this same policeman, who personally confiscated my father's hunting rifle, the year he filed papers to leave the country.

I was six years old, my brother was one, when my father left Cuba and I will never forget that day, for as long I live. His flight had been canceled two times before, so when he carried me on his shoulders that day I thought he would be back, just like the other times, but he didn't. The following weeks are very blurry, but I recall my mother telling to stop waiting, because he was not ever coming back.

We were denied an exit visa. It was standard procedure to let the husband leave without his family. It was their way of punishing us for not conforming and when young kids where involved, they had the opportunity to indoctrinate them. It would be another eight years before we could see my father again. Every family had someone that had left Cuba, via somewhere in the world.

My mother was a seamstress and a tailor, a trade also practiced by her maternal grandfather-a Spanish immigrant, who left Spain during the Civil War. I recall getting up in the middle of the night and seeing her sitting in front of the sewing machine. She had an old Singer with an electric pedal adapted to it. When I was 12, she gave free enterprise a try, when she started giving sewing lessons from our house. I recall that time as a very special era in our saga. It was refreshing to see all these women standing around a big table learning to make patterns and designing clothes. I meet my best friend during that time, when her mother joined the class. It was really nice, while it lasted; some lady in town, turned my mom in and she was called in to the police station and asked too join the Federation of Women and give classes for the state. She refused and that was the end of our little adventure in Capitalism.

We bought some things in the black market, as did most people. My mom had to cook the pork meat in the middle of the night, to avoid being discovered. Pork had a really strong odor back in Cuba. I don't know if it was the way pigs were raised, but It doesn't smell the same here in the US. Buying contraband of any kind, was punishable with jail time and food was no exception. The government didn't give a crap if we had enough food or not.

When we were finally given permission to leave, our house had an inventory done and everything in it was documented by the authorities. A few days before departure, they had us vacate the premises and they sealed it.

To this day, the house that my father built and baptized with the name Villa Zurama, is owned by the Cuban government.

I will forever be hunted by the ghosts of communism.

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Since When is Che a Hero?

Every time I see a teenager with Che Guevara's picture plastered on a T-shirt I feel sad. I wonder if they even know who this man really was. The truth is; they don't know, but they think they do and they proudly ware his picture.

Cubans on the other hand, know too well who this man was. An Argentinian mercenary and mass murderer who by his own admission executed and send thousands of Cubans to the firing squads, without luxury of a trial. During the first years of the Castro regime, Che was the head executioner. He is also responsible for founding the work camps, where the opposition were sent, including my father, who did nothing against the communist regime.

My Spanish teacher in High School, once told me, that as a University Student in Havana, she attended a rally, where the Comandante Che Guevara was speaking and she said, that he was a handsome man, that he had blue eyes, and a bigger than light persona, but that she had never seen so much hate, in one man's eyes as she did in his.

I remember as a student in Cuba how his image was used by the Communist Regimen to indoctrinate us. Our teachers used to tell us, that he was still alive and one day, my little brother came home and told my mom, that Che and all the others were still alive and that he should think Che for the shoes he was wearing. My mom, who was a rebel said......___Really, well let me have those shoes your wearing and go tell Che, to buy some knew ones-good grief. I know they meant that he was alive in all of us, but let me tell you, that sack of crap was not alive in me. I hated Communism from the moment I took my first breath.

In part their brainwashing was successful, but for the most part, the majority of us new better; we just couldn't say anything. The reality was that Fidel Castro send Che to Bolivia in the sixties and abandoned him. He left him there to die, because he couldn't take the competition. Che was outshining him and that was just not acceptable. In the end he was shown the same mercy, he had given his victims.