Fernando Figueredo y Socarrás

Fernando Figueredo y Socarrás was born on February 9, 1846, in Puerto Príncipe, Cuba, the son of  Bernardo Figueredo y Tellez and Tomasa Socarras y Varona.  He grew up in Bayamo, but was sent to school in Havana in 1862, then to the Troy Academy of Civil Engineering in Hudson, New York, in 1864.  In Cuba, Céspedes and others were plotting revolution and Fernando, through letters from his father and discussions with other students followed the events in Cuba with great interest.  In 1868, he left Troy and joined the rebels in Bayamo, eight days after the start of the Ten Years’ War.

In 1871, while he was with Céspedes in the midst of the Sierra Maestra mountains, he met Juana Antunez y Antunez, the daughter of Joaquin Antunez  and María Caridad Antunez, and in November 1874, they were married by a notary public attached to del Ejército Libertador de Cuba [the Cuban Liberation Army].  Shortly afterwards they had their first son, who spent the first three years of his life in the jungles and mountains of Oriente, while his father fought the Spanish.

Fernando Figueredo y Socarrás held several positions of importance in the revolutionary cause, including secretary to the President of the Republic in Arms, Carlos Manuel de Céspedes.  When Céspedes was deposed in 1873, Figueredo became jefe del estado mayor de la Primera División del Primer Cuerpo del Ejército de Oriente [chief of staff of the 1st division of the 1st corps of the Army of Oriente], under Mayor General [Major General] Manuel de Jesús Calvar.  He was, next, secretary to the cabinet of the third Presidente de la República de Cuba en Armas, Juán Bautista Spotorno until 1876, when he, Figueredo, was elected a member of the Cámara de Representatives [house of representatives] por Oriente.  By the end of the war he had risen to the rank of colonel.

He was secretario del Gobierno Revolucionario [secretary of the Revolutionary Government] and miembro del Provisional [???] después de la protesta de Baraguá [after the Protest of Baragua] el 14 de mayo de 1878, and following La Guerra Chiquita [the tiny war] in 1878, went with his family into exile, first to the Dominican Republic, and in 1881, to Key West.

In the Dominican Republic, in the town of Puerto Plata, the son, who had survived three years of war in Cuba, died.  Soon after, on July 1, 1878, Juana gave birth to their second son, Bernardo Figueredo y Antunez, and Fernando asked his friend, the Monsignor Merino, Archbishop of Santo Domingo, to baptize the new baby.  Merino agreed, but then it was discovered that the church wouldn’t recognize the marriage of Fernando and Juana that had taken place four years earlier in the Cuban manigua.  The solution, said Merino, was that he should remarry them and that, for good measure, they should also be married by a Dominican civil judge.  This was done and Fernando wrote about it in his biography many years later as mis tres bodas [my three weddings].

In 1881, Fernando, Juana, and Bernardo sailed for Key West, and in 1884, Fernando became a US citizen and was soon working as a clerk for the US Customs Service.  Amazingly, that same year he was elected to the Florida House of Representatives from Monroe County.  He became active in Key West community affairs and was elected superintendent of public instruction for Monroe County, but “consistently worked on behalf of Cuba Libre.”  In January, 1892, José Martí and others visited Fernando’s home in Key West and there founded the Cuban Revolutionary Party.

In 1893, Fernando took a position with the O’Halloran Cigar Company in Key West and the next year moved with the firm to West Tampa.  Soon, his home at 404 Main Street “became the meeting place and office of the Cuban Revolutionary Party.”  In Tampa, Fernando was subdelegado del Partido Revolucionario Cubano y agente de la República de Cuba [subdelegate of the Cuban Revolutionary Party and agent of the Republic of Cuba].

On January 6, 1895, when the Cuban Junta in New York decided to start active hostilities against the Spanish authorities on the island, the instructions were delivered to Fernando in West Tampa for transmission to Cuba.  Fernando arranged for the message to be concealed inside a special panatela cigar which was delivered by courier to the leaders in Cuba.  On February 24, 1895, the Cuban Revolution began.

In June 1895, Fernando was elected mayor of West Tampa and later that same month, when Tampa became headquarters for the Cuban expeditionary forces, under General Emilio Nunez, he was named second in command with the rank of colonel.  Fernando tirelessly recruited men and money, and volunteers started pouring into Tampa from all over the US and when, in April 1898, the US declared war on Spain, Tampa served as the launching point for the invasion fleet.

Four months later, with the US victorious over Spain, many of Tampa’s Cubans returned to their homeland but Fernando remained in West Tampa as chairman of the West Tampa City Council.

Fernando went back to Cuba, finally, on December 27, 1898, as deputy collector of customs at Cienfuegos.  In March 1899, his family, who had remained in Tampa, joined him in Cienfuegos, and in early 1900, he was appointed sub-secretary of the interior, and moved to Havana.  His La revolución de Yara, a history of the Ten Years’ War, was published in Havana in 1902, and in May of that year, he was appointed director-general of communications by new Cuban president, Estrada Palma.

In 1904, Estrada Palma appointed him comptroller-general of the Republic of Cuba, and in 1906, during the second intervention of the U.S. Government in Cuba, the American governor- general, Charles A. Magoon, named Fernando treasurer-general of Cuba following the death of Carlos Roloff.  He remained treasurer-general until the 24th of June, 1924, when he retired.

After his retirement, he wrote historical articles for newspapers and for the Academy of History in Havana, until he died in Havana on April 13, 1929.  Fernando and Juana had nine children, María de la Concepción, Tomasa, María de la Luz, Evangelina, Carmen, Leonor, Pedro, Fernando, and Bernardo.  On March 17, 1951, the Cuban government issued three postage stamps bearing his portrait.

Fernando Figueredo y Socarrás was the first cousin, once removed, of Perucho Figueredo, that is, his grandfather and Perucho's father were brothers.