La guerra en Santa Clara

As I understand it now, Santa Clara was the plum, the ultimate goal in the center of the island as el Ejercito Rebelde swept towards La Habana. Che Guevara was in charge of the offensive which started in earnest on December 15, 1958. El Che first took Caibarien and Remedios and then aimed for Santa Clara.

In Santa Clara, the Batistianos counted with 2000 men, medium and light tanks and bombers. They set up defensive centers within the town while outside town they had various cuarteles and an armored train. Rebel squads were assigned to go into town and attack the defensive centers, eliminate the nests of snipers en el Teatro Martí y Gran Hotel and create obstacles in the streets to impede the tanks. The attack started on December 28.

The Mariban may be the tall building in this photo.
I remember we lived en el edificio "Mariban". It was a building of many floors con una azotea where I went sometimes. What I remember of the battle is that all the big white metal windows were shuttered and mamita told me to stay on the ground and to move only crawling on my belly. Then there was a lot of climbing stairs up and down depending on whether the tanks or the planes were attacking. After climbing up one time, I remember I sat on a mattress laid on the floor next to a young woman with a very large belly - I think that was the time I became aware of pregnancies. Other women were also there and a man (abuelo?) laid another mattress over us in case the bombs struck our building. I sat there, weighted down by the heavy mattress, hearing the terrifying whistle of bombs falling followed by the explosions and then by relief that it had not blown us up. So much noise: the tanks rolling by and the explosions of their rounds, the loud machine gun fire (later I learned it was a rebel antiaircraft gun) and the regular gunfire. Modeling my new bathing suit en la azotea del Mariban.

One time, there was a lull in the battle. We had been on the floor at home and it must have been for a while because mamita went into the kitchen to make us (papito, Neni, me - I don't remember abuelo there) hot chocolate. As you walked into the kitchen, you faced a counter and the stove was to the right. At both ends of the counter was a window: one window faced the street, the other a shaft. Mamita walked to the counter and soon bullets started coming in through the window. To me it was like machine gun fire but, on hindsight, it must have been a snipper because, otherwise, why sustain that line of fire for so long?

Mamita was trapped against the counter pero no perdió la cabeza. (Tenia agallas mi madre!) She flattened herself against the counter pushing her upper body against the cabinets doing a limbo. I stood transfixed staring at her blanched face as the rounds flew by her belly and then started running towards her screaming terrified: she was in danger. Papito quickly intercepted me and held me back and we stood there staring at mamita: me screaming and him pale and mute. Then I saw mamita slowly, very slowly and carefully sink to the floor still flattening herself as much as possible against the counter, holding her belly in to keep it out of the bullets' path. After a time, thankfully, she made it alive below the path of the bullets and quickly crawled out to us.

After the battle ended, I remember going outside and seeing the holes from the tank rounds in the supporting columns of our building. (I heard later that because of the antiaircraft gun, we had been a target of the tanks and planes.) We walked a bit further than normal and, amazed, I saw sofas, stuff and trash cluttering the street. Walking in the opposite direction, I saw that all the buildings there had been flattened. I learned later that it was were the cuarteles had stood. In Santa Clara's country club. Neni unhappy because he had to pose.

Even after the Batistianos surrendered on January 1, our beautiful black-haired neighbor Olga almost got shot by a persistent sniper while sitting at her vanity table with her back to the window. The bullet came through the window whizzing by her face. It made a hole in the mirror, ricochet, traveled between wall and mirror, hit something so that it came back out through the mirror and embedded itself in the round powder box that rested inches from her waist.

The boys were told to be careful picking cartridges ,etc because there could be live munitions. But, as I saw them animatedly showing off their finds one day, I don't think they listened. Mi hermano Neni has blogged recently about his memories of this war.