Oriente Province - History

History

Diego Velazquez founded the capital of Oriente province in 1514 and named it Santiago de Cuba. The province is made up by 22 municipalities and is Cuba’s largest province containing about one third of the country’s population. Oriente Province is in the most eastern region of Cuba with a population of 1,797,606. It stretches across 14,641 square miles (37,920 km2) and consists of various mountain ranges with the Sierra Maestra region having Cuba’s highest mountain peak and elevation in Pico Turquino. Oriente Province holds much of Cuba’s history being the place of Fidel and Raul Castro’s birth, Jose Marti was killed in battle in Dos Rios and many guerilla wars have also taken place in Oriente like the Bay of Pigs. Cuba’s first Guerilla-style war was in 1523. against the conquering Spaniards in the Sierra Maestra Mountains. Some of Cuba’s oldest cities are in Oriente Province like Baracoa and carry a rich history of Cuba’s struggle for independence and racial relations.

Throughout the 1800s a large amount of slaves were brought to Cuba to help work at the sugar mills. Many slaves were brought from Haiti and other neighboring islands because they were cheap and efficient labor. Open warfare broke out after an independence movement and lasted from 1867 to 1878. Slavery was finally ended on 1886, but life for many Afro-Cubans was still a struggle especially in Oriente Province.

After the occupation of the Spaniards ended in 1899, Oriente Province became a refuge to Afro-Cubans. Oriente had the highest number of individual land owners and renters with 96% of the population being native born. Afro-Cubans made up 26% of the land workers and of the total land owned by Afro-Cubans 75% were in Oriente Province. Even though Afro-Cubans fared better in Oriente, poverty was still rapid in the Province and they were still an oppressed by wealthy Cubans and foreign land owners.

Sugar and coffee were the main agricultural products produced and at the highest there were forty one sugar mills spread throughout the reign. Foreign investors saw prime opportunity within the province and began to buy as much land as possible increasing sugar production. As investors bought land, local farmers were pushed out and frustration built. Poverty grew and by May 1912 Cubans in Oriente Province had reached a boiling point. Massive demonstrations broke out and Afro-Cubans began to loot and burn businesses and property owned by foreign investors. As a result, the Cuban government answered by sending the Army in to burn the property of the Afro-Cubans and to slaughter them. Within two years, half of the sugar mills in Oriente were owned by U.S. investors and for the Cubans working within the Province life became almost unbearable.