Year of the Lash

“Punishing Slaves in Cuba”, an illustration of a slave being tortured using a ladder

Year of the Lash (in Spanish, Año del Cuero) is a term used in Cuba in reference to June 29, 1844, when a firing squad in Havana executed accused leaders of the Conspiración de La Escalera, an alleged slave revolt and movement to abolish slavery in Cuba. The term "Year of the Lash" refers generally to the harsh response toward the would-be revolt by the Cuban colonial authorities, whereby thousands of Afro-Cubans (both slave and free) were executed, imprisoned, or banished from the island. La Escalera ('the ladder') alludes to the fact that slave suspects were bound to ladders and whipped with the lash when they were interrogated.

Historians have debated over the years whether the Conspiracy of La Escalera was real or whether it was largely an invention of the Spanish authorities to justify a crackdown on abolitionists and the Afro-Cuban population, though at this point there seems to be a consensus that some kind of revolt was planned. The British consul to Cuba, David Turnbull, was convicted in absentia of being the "prime mover" of the conspiracy. Turnbull had already been expelled by Cuban authorities two years earlier.

Historical background

Nineteenth-century Cuba was built upon systematized violence, similar to American slave societies. Due to this, Cuba became one of the world’s largest sugar producers as well as one of Spain’s remaining colonies. The plantations of the west-central region became known for their hard labor as well as their sugar production. Slaveholders began to purchase more African women in an attempt to ensure their economic status.

In March, May, and November 1843, a series of slave revolts occurred on the island of Cuba. In December of 1843, an enslaved woman named Polonia Gangá informed her owner that his property was about to be overtaken. Polina's comment is seen as the beginning for hunting down the said conspiracy. There are two more well-known African-born rebel women of the Lucumí nation, Fermina and Carlota. These two women are seen as leaders in the November uprising.

It is likely that as a Lucumí, Fermina, like Carlota, came from the region of Yorubaland, and was taken on board a slave ship. If so, she was one of the millions of people forced into slavery from that region.

Records indicate that Fermina worked in the fields on the Ácana sugar plantation and was verbal about her dislike for her working conditions on several occasions. During summer of 1843, Fermina escaped from Ácana with a group, and there is a possibility that she and another slave organized a smaller rebellion in June. By November Fermina has a reputation as a troublemaker. For running away, Fermina Lucumí was whipped and placed in iron shackles for five months. A massive uprising occurred on November 5, 1843, several days after they were removed.

The November Uprising

Several enslaved women gave harmful testimony about Fermina regarding the events of the night of November 5. A woman named Filomena Gangá stated that “she only remembers having seen the black woman Fermina among the rebels.” Filomena reported that “Fermina joined the rebels to show them where the estate foreman and other families of the estate lived . . . [Filomena] saw her leading some of them showing them the doors of the rooms where the whites usually slept. . . .” Another Gangá woman reported seeing Fermina and another male rebel “clearly and distinctly,” with Fermina showing fellow slaves where the white plantation residents slept. The woman, named Catalina, said she heard Fermina and another male rebel yelling to other slaves, “telling them ‘The whites are escaping . . .’ and began to run in pursuit of the fugitives.”

Camila Criolla, a field worker on the same estate, testified that Fermina “was shouting to the Triunvirato slaves[,] telling them that the whites were escaping that way; that right away [the witness] observed that Fermina was approaching the plantain grove directing several slaves and telling them ‘grab that fat white man and hit him with your machete [dale de machetazos] for he is the one who puts [us in] shackles. . . .’” Camila believed “the fat white man” to be the foreman or overseer on the estate. Another fieldworker named Martína said that “with great shouts, [Fermina] requested a large hammer to take off the shackles of the prisoners who were locked up on this estate.”

Fermina denied the allegations against her. When questioned about what she had been doing that night, she stated that “she was sleeping in her cabin,” and that when she heard the noise she ran from her cabin and "hid in a cane patch." She insisted that those who testified against her must have done so “to place themselves in a good position [buen lugar] and leave her [in a bad one],” and that they must have received some kind of reward.

Carlota Lucumí was enslaved on the Triunvirato estate where the rebellion began. Carlota is remembered for attacking the overseer’s daughter at Ácana and for bragging about it to several other slaves. A field worker named Matea Gangá stated, “It is very true that a black woman from Triunvirato whom she . . . heard is named Carlota, was boasting that she had attacked with a machete [habia dado con el machete] a white daughter of the overseer who is named Doña Maria de Regla.” Magdalena Lucumí testified that Carlota “was talking about having attacked the child Maria de Regla, daughter of the mayoral[,] with a machete. . . .”

Supposedly, she refused to be satisfied by the wounds she inflicted, wanting the two male rebels that were with her to hit the white girl again and harder [“que le dieran mas duro”], even though the male rebels told Carlota they believed the girl to be dead.

Several men who were called to testify said Fermina “went with some of [the] blacks toward the patio of the house, showing them the doors of the whites’ dormitories so they might attack them.”

Other Women Involved

On Eusebia Criolla’s estate of Recurso, a small group of men had been having conversations of a rebellion. Pedro and Bienvenido Gangá had been discussing news of slaves on the nearby Echeverría mill that were planning to rebel.

Almost a year later, Eusebia would testify how she overheard this conversation. When questioned, she reported: “ . . . approximately one year ago in her master’s home, she heard her companion Pedro[;] that he was letting those of his class Antonio and Bienbenido know in their language that on the sugar mill Purisima Concepcion de Echeverria, they were attempting to rise up against the whites, assuring that she knows absolutely nothing more than what she has declared. . . .”

After providing authorities with the names of men who had been involved in rebel activities, Ramon Criollo, a rebel organizer in Ceja de Pablo, added: “The black women of the plantation force [dotación] had also known of the plot through hearing the conversations of the men.”

In May of 1844, a woman named Cecilia Criolla stated that “about four months ago she began to notice conversations amongst the slaves of this work gang that indicated they were plotting . . . a conspiracy to destroy and do away with the whites.” Cecilia continued “From what she has perceived, all the slaves of the work gang with the exception of very few, were accomplices in and ready for the plot,” but the organizers “did not discuss [their plans]” with the women. Cecilia’s statement concluded that “she was very careful to listen stealthily [ocultamente] to their secret conversations”; and she heard “from the very mouth of the organizers Alejandrino, Crisostomo and José Belen all that she has expressed. . . .”

A woman named Teresa Mina reported “that she heard [them say] that the blacks were going to kill the whites. . . .” She specified “them” as two leaders, but quickly concluded, “that she has nothing else to record on the subject.”

La Escalera and Aftermath

Carlota was found dead the morning after the uprising. Twenty-four-year-old Fermina was interrogated and imprisoned for months. She was one of eight accused leaders to be executed by a firing squad. Her body was then burned. All the other slaves of the mill were ordered to be witnesses, along with a slave representative from each of the nearby properties.

Following the rebellions near Matanzas, government agents under the orders of the Cuban captain general, Leopoldo O’Donnell, began an investigation. During which, the government tortured suspects and arrested the “confessed” organizers. Persecution and torture spread throughout much of western Cuba in 1844. Before the investigation ended, “thousands of people of color, free and slave, had been executed, banished, or imprisoned, or had simply disappeared.”

More than four thousand individuals were arrested. The most famous of those sentenced to death was the accused Gabriel de la Concepción Valdés, alias Plácido, a free Mulato, and one of Cuba’s most famous poets. Free people of color made up almost half of those sentenced to death.

During interrogation, questions were designed to find the most dramatic or violent moments of the rebellion. Officials framed their questions "in terms of who killed, who set fire to buildings, who had weapons (such as machetes), who released people from shackles, who assaulted white employees/employers, who led rebels, and how the witnesses positioned themselves within such events."

Carlota is so interwoven in memory that Cuba launched its 1975 attack in support of the Angolan liberation movement under the title “Operation Carlota.”

Other mentions

Robert L. Paquette’s Sugar Is Made with Blood, Pedro Deschamps Chapeaux’s El negro en la Economía habanera del siglo XIX, and Aisha Finch’s Rethinking Slave Rebellion in Cuba.

The Cuban novelist Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda wrote of her dad's desire to return to Spain and settle in Seville, sharing that “this plan was most definite and uppermost in his mind during the last months of his life [1823]. He complained of not being laid to rest in his native soil [Spain] and, predicting that Cuba would suffer the same fate as that of a neighboring island, seized by the blacks, begged my mother to come to Spain with their children." Cirilo Villaverde, in his famous novel of the Cuban, Cecilia Valdés, wrote a of slave conspiracy in the making. He included the use of the term “Worse than Aponte!” and hinted at La Escalera.

The novel Sab is best known for its antislavery character. The Royal Censor banned Sab in Cuba because it contained “doctrines subversive to the system of slavery in this island and contrary to morals and good habits.”

See also

• Timeline of Cuban history
• History of Cuba
• Spanish colonization of the Americas
• David Turnbull (British abolitionist)
• Carlota (rebel leader)

Further reading

• Paquette's Sugar is Made With Blood is a standard account. See his introduction, "La Escalera and the Historians," for an overview of the historiographical debate.