Mirabal Sisters

The Mirabal Sisters (Spanish pronunciation: [erˈmanas miɾaˈβal], Hermanas Mirabal) were four Dominican sisters who opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo and were involved in clandestine activities against his regime. Three of the sisters were assassinated on 25 November 1960. The assassinations turned the Mirabal sisters into "symbols of both popular and feminist resistance".

In 1999, in the sisters' honor, the United Nations General Assembly designated 25 November the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

The Mirabal family were farmers from the central Cibao region of the Dominican Republic. The sisters grew up in a middle-class environment, raised by their parents, Enrique Mirabal Fernández and Mercedes Reyes Camilo. Unlike her sisters, Dedé never attended college. She worked as a homemaker and helped run the family business in agriculture and cattle.

Patria Mercedes Mirabal Reyes, commonly known as Patria, was the eldest of the four Mirabal sisters, born on 27 February 1924. When she was 14, she was sent by her parents to a Catholic boarding school, Colegio Inmaculada Concepción in La Vega. She left school when she was 17 and married Pedro González, a farmer, who would later aid her in challenging the Trujillo regime. Patria is quoted as saying, "We cannot allow our children to grow up in this corrupt and tyrannical regime. We have to fight against it, and I am willing to give up everything, even my life if necessary."

María Argentina Minerva Mirabal Reyes, commonly known as Minerva, was the third daughter, born on 12 March 1926. At the age of 12, she followed Patria to the Colegio Inmaculada Concepción. After graduating, she enrolled at the University of Santo Domingo. She studied law, but because she had declined Trujillo's romantic advances in 1949, she was denied a license to practice. At the university, she met her husband, Manuel Tavárez Justo, who would help her fight the Trujillo regime. Minerva was the most vocal and radical of the Mirabal daughters, and she was arrested and harassed on multiple occasions on orders given by Trujillo himself. She was quoted as saying, "It is a source of happiness to do whatever can be done for our country that suffers so many anguishes. It is sad to stay with one's arms crossed."

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