Manuel Fernández Silvestre

Manuel Fernández Silvestre y Patinga and Pantiga (El Caney, Cuba, December 16, 1871 – Annual, Morocco, July 22, 1921) was a Spanish military general.

He was the son of the lieutenant colonel of artillery Victor Fernandez and of Doña Eleuteria Silvestre. In 1889 he enrolled in the Military school of Toledo, where he met with the future high commissioner of Spanish Morocco, Dámaso Berenguer.

Silvestre first saw action in 1890 at the age of 19 in a skirmish as a cadet against the Mambises seeking independence in Cuba, and displaying traits that were to reoccur throughout his career had charged ahead recklessly on his horse and was badly wounded. In February 1895, a full blown rebellion broke out in Cuba known as the Cuban War of Independence. After the Academy, Silvestre returned to Cuba in 1895 against to fight there against the Mambises until the Spanish withdrawal in 1898. There he received 16 wounds altogether, and had a severe incapacity of the left arm which he disguised very well. During his time in Cuba, the aggressive Silvestre had a marked preference for cavalry charges and fighting mano a mano against the Mambises, being widely liked and respected by the men under his command. A charismatic, charming man whose nickname was Manolo, Silvestre was a great womanizer who had fathered scores of illegitimate children by various women he seduced. In words of the American historian David Woolman: "Silvestre was a real-life character as flamboyant as any to be found in the pages of a romantic novel." Silvestre was a very brave, albeit reckless junior officer in Cuba, but as a general he was hopelessly inept, and owned his rapid rise up the ranks to the patronage of his best friend, King Alfonso XIII, who used his position of Supreme Commander to promote favored officers. After the Spanish–American War, Silvestre had served as a military aide to the king, whom become his patron. When Alfonso ascended to the Spanish throne in 1886, Spain could at least maintain the pretense of being a world power as Spain had colonies in the Americas, Africa, Asia and the Pacific. The great shattering event of Alfonso's childhood had been the Spanish–American War of 1898, which saw Spain defeated by the Americans and the loss of Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Philippines, and Guam, and shortly afterwards Spain sold the Carolines and Mariana islands to Germany. As a result, Spain's empire now consisted only of Spanish Guinea in central Africa and some footholds on the Moroccan coast. Alfonso had taken the losses of the Spanish–American War very badly and supported the africanistas who longed to conquer for Spain a new empire in Africa to compensate for the lost empire in the Americas and Asia. As an militarist educated by army officers and an africanista, Alfonso liked swashbuckling, macho generals who might conquer for him an African empire, which explains why the flamboyant Silvestre become a royal favorite. Alfonso was fascinated by Silvestre who entertained him with colorful tales of his martial and sexual exploits on the battlefields and in the bedrooms of Cuba.

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