Calixto García

Calixto García Iñiguez (August 4, 1839 – December 11, 1898) was a general in three Cuban uprisings, part of the Cuban War for Independence: Ten Years' War, the Little War and the War of 1895, itself sometimes called the Cuban War for Independence, which bled into the Spanish–American War, ultimately resulting in national independence for Cuba.

García was born in Holguín to parents of Cuban Criollo descent. He was a large, strong, educated man with a short fuse. García was the grandson of Calixto García de Luna e Izquierdo, who had fought in the Battle of Carabobo in 1821 during Venezuelan War of Independence. His grandmother was Maria de los Angeles Gonzalez, said to be the daughter of a Cacique Chief from Valencia, Venezuela. His grandfather (who had dropped the aristocratic "de Luna" upon taking refuge in Cuba) had been jailed on March 18, 1837 for demanding emancipation of slaves, constitutional freedom for all, and allegedly trying to hang a priest who opposed him. As befitted a man of importance of that time, Calixto had a wife, Isabel Velez Cabrera, and a good number of mistresses; these women gave birth to many children both legitimate (about 7) and illegitimate (at least six, each to a different woman). A number of his sons, most notable Carlos García Velez and Calixto Enamorado, fought in his armies.

Around the age of 18, taking after his grandfather, García joined with a Cuban uprising which became the first war of independence Ten Years' War. García fought against Spanish colonial rule for five years until his capture. Far from his troops, protected only by a small detail who soon lay dead or dying around him, Garcia in an attempt to avoid giving the Spanish the satisfaction of his seizure shot himself under the chin with a .45 caliber pistol. Although the bullet went out of his forehead and knocked him unconscious, he survived; the wound, which left a great scar, and gave him headaches for the rest of his life. When the Spanish authorities came to Holguín to inform Calixto's mother, Lucía Iñíguez, she said that he wasn't her son. When the officials explained to her Calixto tried to commit suicide, she replied that he was her son, "first dead than captured!" He was imprisoned until the Pact of Zanjón and the end of the Ten Years' War, was signed in 1878. García travelled to Paris and New York between imprisonments. In keeping to his quest, García joined with Maceo in the Little War from 1879 to 1880 as well as the 1895 War for Independence. He, and at least three sons, separately escaped Spain and arrived with a well-supplied expedition in 1896. In that last conflict he succeeded Maceo, once his subordinate in the Ten Years' War, as the second in command in the Cuban Army.

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