The thousand lives of Celia the combatant

Celia Sanchez Manduley, the first female member of the Rebel Army, died on January 11, 1980, a few months shy of her 60th birthday, an age way below Cuba’s present life expectancy but cut short by cancer. However, the extraordinary heroine of the underground and guerrilla warfare did as much as she would if she had lived a thousand lives and her legacy became Cuba’s pride and history ever since she left us 43 years ago.

Celia Esther de los Desamparados was born on May 9, 1920 in a town in the foothills of the Sierra Maestra mountains, where she saw from up close and soon became sensitive to the extreme poverty suffered by the Cuban peasants, whom her father, a doctor, gave medical supplies and treated for free.

What the thin and diligent young girl learned from such efforts to help others and from her generous and patriotic father shaped her personality and instilled in her the humanist nature that would characterize her and led her to work tirelessly for the needy through festivals and fairs that she organized both in her hometown and in the most far-off settlements. From that seed the fighter and revolutionary was born who maintained until the very end the clarity of her wild soul and the purity of her courageous heart.

Like many of her compatriots, she was marked by Fulgencio Batista’s coup d’état in 1952. The following year, Celia and her father climbed Turquino Peak, the highest point of the Sierra Maestra mountains, to place a bust of José Martí in honor of his centenary.

After joining the 26th of July Movement in 1955 in the town of Manzanillo, she worked closely—and effectively—with Frank País, who led the movement in the city of Santiago de Cuba. Both were devoted to recruiting new combatants and became major pillars of the actions in support of the landing of the yacht Granma in eastern Cuba despite the constant harassment of Batista’s government, one of the most sadistic and bloodthirsty tyrannies that Cuba had ever suffered.

Because of the constant danger, the time came for Celia to leave for the mountains and join the Rebel Army on April 23, 1957. No woman had done so until then. However, it became imperative to reinforce the clandestine struggle in the city and she went back to Manzanillo, but following the bloody and savage killing of Frank País in July that year at the hands of Batista’s henchmen, Celia was ordered to return to the general staff in the mountains.

In the glorious days of the triumph of the Revolution, she already enjoyed Fidel Castro’s full confidence, as she had proved her obvious qualities as a first-rate combatant and a patriot.

Celia was never seen to settle quietly anywhere. She kept working as hard as she always did. She was appointed Secretary of the Council of State and deputy to the National Assembly for Manzanillo, established the Office of Historical Affairs of the Council of State and became a member of the Central Committee of the Party.

Her duties showed to those who did not know her the beauty of her fine and creative soul, her human virtues and her sensitivity to other people’s problems and pains. She was oblivious to no claim, complaint or grievance that ever reached her desk from all over Cuba and she strived to solve every one of them. As one would say now, doing things right in every detail had become an obsession with her.

In the early days before the institutions and mechanisms of justice existed, many people would say with great faith and confidence: "I am going to write to Celia bout this", knowing that she would not let them down. And she never did.

Someone so intense and generous still illuminates the path of the Homeland with a soft and serene light that never dies out. That is why you are always in Cuba’s memories, dear Celia.