Cubans pay tribute to Perucho Figueredo, creator of the National Anthem

Havana, Feb 18 (RHC) Cubans pay tribute to Perucho Figueredo, creator of the National Anthem, who was born on a day like today in 1818.

Despite his family ties with the Spanish colonial power, he was linked to the independence movement and composed La Bayamesa, a song whose lyrics he would write on October 20, 1869, when the Cuban Liberation Army took his hometown, Bayamo, which later became the National Anthem.

A very dear anecdote among the Cubans reports that he came to interpret the anthem in front of the Spanish authorities in the cathedral of Bayamo in a brave act of rebellion that won him the admiration of his companions and the suspicion of the colonialists.

Figueredo was born in the city of Bayamo, in southeastern Cuba, into a wealthy family, which allowed him to train as a lawyer and develop his artistic and literary skills on the island and abroad.

His house in Bayamo was the main center of the independence conspiracy in the eastern region and when the Ten Years' War broke out on October 10, 1868, he quickly joined the nascent Cuban army and organized the attack on Bayamo.

During the conflict, he occupied several political and military positions.

He fell prisoner of the Spaniards on August 12, 1870, when he was convalescing from typhoid fever, in the Santa Rosa de Cabaniguao farm, in Las Tunas, then he was taken to Santiago de Cuba where the Spanish authorities shot him five days later. (Source: PL)