Vilma Espín: A Painting of a Woman with a Homeland

By Enrique Milanés León on April 7, 2025

She was born on April 7, 1930 and her rebellious spirit, cultivated at home and influenced by the progressive ideas of exiled teachers who had arrived in Cuba after the Spanish Civil War, was further awakened by Fulgencio Batista’s coup on March 10, 1952, when she was not yet 22. Vilma Espín thought it was the last straw that the cheaters did not even respect the recipe of the so-called representative democracy.

When they found out about the coup in her classroom, one teacher said, just as a joke, that if that “early up rise” was true, they had to rise up, but Vilma didn’t see it as a joke: she thought, yes, seriously… they have to rise up!

So when the soldiers began to climb up to her University of the East, in Santiago de Cuba, Vilma and her friend Asela de los Santos not only took to the bull horns with those verses of Guillén — “I don’t know why you think, soldier that I hate you, if we are the same thing …” — but they also confronted the intruders, who were carrying rifles to the place where there should only be books and pencils.

“What do you want …?” she challenged, very slim and energetic, to a big soldier who, most likely, felt small … in his cap.

***

Those were the days of the well-fitted skirts. At the University of Oriente itself, with the help of the janitors, they began to write pamphlets and distribute them throughout Santiago. They even got a map and divided the city among several colleagues, but at first the messengers were only girls, who hid the papers in… their skirts!

It was then that Vilma added a certain “postscript” to some verses by José María Heredia, a fellow countryman and great poet of all Cubans. It turns out that, under a stanza of the bard who had written that “… if a people do not dare to break their chains with their hands, it is easy for them to change tyrants, but they will never be free”, Vilma added a six-syllable verse as clear and powerful as the waters of Niagara: “Down with Batista!”.

The pamphlet was discovered and in the end it all resembled the Spanish story by Lope de Vega, about the sad end of a commander of Fuenteovejuna: when, in Santiago de Cuba, a soldier asked the professor who was there who had written it, he could only shrug his shoulders and reply: “Heredia, sir!”.

***

Many still wonder how Vilma outwitted so many soldiers who were looking for her all over Santiago. How did she escape them?! The answer almost seems “simple”: She was either Vilma, Alicia, Monica, Deborah or Mariela. If one alone was a problem for the Batistianos, what would it be like with so many together at the same time in the same city. She would disguise herself, change houses… as she would say much later, in Caracas, a graffiti about how Hugo Chávez —the great friend of Fidel and Raúl— put it to the imperialists: He had them going crazy!

***

Vilma was very Vilma. The captain of the volleyball team —they were named the Mambisas (after the Cuban guerrilla fighters during the independence wars against Spain)— she also danced, anything from Swan Lake to a Hungarian dance, or she would just whirl around at carnival time. Yes, she really liked boleros and instrumental music, but she said there was nothing as tasty as a conga in Santiago de Cuba. She was a driver for her colleagues, she could shoot, she could sing… she was a woman through and through!

***

On that morning in July 1953, the morning of Santa Ana, the shots fired at the Moncada Barracks woke up Vilma, who lived nearby, on San Jerónimo Street. Her father was worried because, when he saw how restless she was, he thought she knew something about what had happened, but what really intrigued her was who the attackers were. The next day she went with Asela de los Santos to the barracks and told a soldier — very “kind” he was, after so many prisoners had been killed — that they wanted to see the wounded. The soldier wanted to be clever: “What wounded?”, but she already had a better name to define them: “We’ve come to see what the brave men look like!”

***

Vilma also lived for a few months in ‘the monster’ and got to know its ins and outs. To keep her out of danger, her father sent her to Boston for a nine-month postgraduate course. She had already seen Yankee marines in Santiago, so close to the land they stole from us, nearby, in Caimanera, but in the United States she gained experience for what was to come, so on her return she went through Mexico to meet the troops preparing the expedition on the Granma yacht.

At the airport in Mexico, surprises rained down on her because Fidel was waiting for her, with an orchid in his hand. There were a lot of Cubans, and they left in a car, huddled together, some on top of the others.

Later, Fidel gave her instructions and letters to take back, especially for Frank País. That was where she met the love of her life. Much later she would write: “The first meeting with Raúl was in Mexico. How far tht was one from thinking anything personal!” She hesitated, but when Vilma thought something, it turned out well.

***

She was a beautiful and an elegant woman, who knew languages and rules of protocol, but was not at all fragile! If necessary, she adapted to the situation and became stronger than anyone else. When she and the people of the Sierra Maestra began to get to know each other and to meet from mountain to mountain, some peasants would  bring the guerrillas a lot of food and she, who had recently arrived from the city, was not very hungry. She left a good part of her rice with chicken and taro, which some hungry rebels immediately took advantage of. Vilma hesitated: “How can I give them leftovers …?” Over time, her doubts were dispelled, because she wrote: “In the war, nobody left even a little bit of food. Everyone shared it.”

***

One day, in the Sierra, she was introduced to Che, who didn’t show much “etiquette” in his dress. His pants were already undone and part of his underwear was showing! Vilma joked with him about his age: she had heard so much about his history that she thought he was an old man. Between her, Haydée Santamaría and Celia Sánchez they mended not only his trousers, but also the clothes of all the guerrillas.

Vilma said to him: “You don’t talk like an Argentinean…” and Che replied: “That’s because I’m international!” In the end, the Cuban Revolution had in them two of its best ambassadors to the peoples of the world. And to History!

***

She knew that the Apostle Jose Marti always saves Cubans. When she drove combatants who were going to become guerrillas from Santiago de Cuba to Manzanillo, the soldiers would stop them to find out who they were and where they were going… and she, very calmly, would usually reply that they were going to Calle Martí in this or that town. The formula almost always worked, not only because in Cuba in the streets  are filled with infinite busts of the Apostle, and  Marti has never abandoned us neither then or now.

***

If she hadn’t filled the entire height of a woman, she would not have been able to take over the leadership of the 26th of July Movement in Oriente from Frank País, that angel of a combatant for whom the whole of Santiago continues to mourn, every day. And back in mid-1958, already “well-known” in the city for her intense work, Vilma Espín stayed in the Sierra Maestra.

She would have liked to continue braving the dangers in the city of steep streets, but Raúl (who was then known as Juan Carlos) interceded and explained in a letter to another combatant that he wanted Vilma in the capital of Oriente: “… because Frank did the same and for that we no longer have him fighting by our side. I insist that the “rabi-larga” come here. If they catch her they will cut her to pieces, you will die of remorse and guilt and the movement will have lost two great comrades”. And so the ‘rabi-larga’ stayed in the mountains. That singular nickname was due to her long, blond hair.

Beneath the hair shone a precious head. Vilma became a national delegate of the 26th of July in the Second Eastern Front, which was named after Frank and commanded by Raúl. It was, as she said, a Republic: they organized communications, transport, education… The guajiros were amazed that a few guerrillas could bring up there what entire governments could not even provide in the cities! Between battles, they carried out the first literacy campaign. While his friend Asela took care of the schools, Dr. José Ramón Machado Ventura organized the first public health system… a truly public one!

***

At the end of the war, Fidel was preparing a joint attack on Guantánamo and Santiago to finally defeat Batista. He would carry it out with his forces, those of Raúl and Juan Almeida, but it was not necessary; because the dictator fled, literally, loaded with suitcases full of other people’s money. So, instead of going to fight in Guantánamo, which was her idea, Vilma went with everyone — in kind of huge conga with touches of Revolution — to her beloved Santiago, where she was moved to see the women in the street, the men celebrating even in their pajamas, the people happy… And she walked with all of them to the Town Hall, to listen to Fidel, something she never stopped doing. They were great interlocutors. Even after Vilma died, Fidel continued the dialogue in a Reflection.

***

The Federation of Cuban Women (FMC) is another story. Cuba was a country of housewives. Too much “love” for the home, but little for its women. When the Revolution triumphed, 90 percent of Cuban women worked — or struggled — only in the home, without a profession or trade. And in the countryside it was even worse, so many women proposed to Vilma that she create an organization to end this discrimination. When she consulted Raúl, he responded with three words: “Work on it.” And boy, did she work on it!

 

The official constitution was drawn up on August 23, 1960, but everything had been ready beforehand. Vilma wanted Fidel to preside over the ceremony, but Fidel, who also wanted to be present because it was part of his great battle, had thousands of urgent matters to attend to. “Well, when …?” she asked him, and he replied: ‘As soon as we get a chance, we’ll set it up.’ And yes, the chance did come along and, with the leader at the helm, on that other 23rd in history the girls of Cuba also ‘broke a sweat’ … in the palm of equality.

Fidel said then: “And today the women meet and form this Federation of Cuban Women, united in that word: Cuban, and united in that flag they carry in their hands.” They, with Vilma as their star, were also stripes on the flag.

***

From the beginning of the Revolution, Fidel said that if unemployment was eliminated, women could work, but there was a problem: who would look after their children? So Vilma, at the head of the Federation, set to work. Not only were new buildings constructed, but even in mansions abandoned by the bourgeoisie, where previously only one or two “blonde children with blonde eyes and blonde teeth” were raised, now the children of working women of all origins, of all conditions and of multiple “colors” would be cared for.

 

It was not just a question of building or adapting premises: the educators and assistants had to be trained, a program had to be established, budgets had to be taken care of, a network of services had to be created. Only a guerrilla fighter who, after the triumph, was anything but clandestine could guarantee that! Vilma never stopped, she was everywhere!

All the Cuban women contributed ideas to cover the costs of the first circles: small parties, meetings, propaganda… They bought materials and brought tools. They even created the five-cent cup of coffee campaign: three for the coffee and two for the circles. Coffee with the aroma of… federated women, ideal for discussing the good news in Marianas (Grajales) gatherings!

Where did so many of them come from? The same women who were previously locked up in their houses became builders, master builders, carpenters, electricians, plumbers… and there are the circles they made, still very beautiful! Ah, but who was the great master builder? Vilma Espín!

***

The heroine liked flowers, but not everything around her was rosy! Who could fool the discerning revolutionary? Once she went to a children’s club and sat down to talk to the children. They were all shining in their new clothes, from the snow-white soled trainers to the pullovers.

The atmosphere was impeccable, like that of a biotechnology laboratory. “Oh, what beautiful clothes!” “What a beautiful little shirt!” “What a beautiful little blouse!” the dear godmother cooed, and the preschoolers, who immediately felt at ease, replied, “Yes, we dressed up for the visit!” She had already realized it; she was just checking the word of those who don’t know how to lie.

***

There are many ways to be beautiful. Vilma was beautiful, sweet, but when it came to fighting for the cigar cutters she was anything but meek. She clearly said that those who abuse their power to prevent a qualified woman from accessing a job should be punished.

On one occasion she wrote that there were cases “… of women who are not accepted for a job for which they are qualified, despite the fact that they submitted their job application before the one who was selected. Or of managers who prefer young, single and, why not say it, prettier women”. She, who was already beautiful on the outside, became even more so because she defended them all equally.

She faced a lot more. Another day she criticized a case in the call for a course for shop assistants of industrial products in which only female applicants were required to present a “moral certificate”.

“What organization has the power to issue such a document?” she asked at the time. Nobody could answer her.

She herself wrote about a worse case: in a cafeteria they removed a woman from her post for having been unfaithful to her husband, but the man who had relations with her, also married, had no problem at all. She was clear in her judgments: what was considered immoral for women would have to be immoral for men as well, and revolutionary vigilance had to be applied against that justice as well.

***

Vilma Espín shed new light not only on the lives of former prostitutes. Thousands of young peasant women came to Havana, not only to learn dressmaking and sewing and to heal, but also to live their lives for the first time. Doctors, dentists, teachers, tradesmen, lecturers… devoted themselves entirely to banishing the darkness from their bodies and their minds.

So much was done for them that, very soon, fearful of the threat that more than 14,000 Cuban women bringing such truth to their families in the countryside would pose, the counter-revolution created the usual ghosts: that they would be prostituted or sent to the Soviet Union to be turned into canned meat.

Some peasants, most of them illiterate, believed the lie, but when they arrived in Havana to “rescue” their girls and saw the women Vilma and Fidel had turned them into, instead of taking them away, they burst into tears of emotion.

***

It was the most powerful hand of the Revolution to save thousands of women and girls from prostitution. They were registered and their health, which was very poor, was attended to. They were given a job or a place to learn a trade. Schools and craft centers were set up for them to guide them towards decent jobs.

Aida Ballester, a former prostitute, recalled how, leading a group, Vilma one day arrived at the house where she “worked” and, as Fidel did with Cuba, she ordered a halt!

The girl had been deprived of the dream of celebrating her 15th birthday, but Vilma and Fidel arrived in time to rescue a smile that her face no longer remembered. Aida was impressed that, afterwards, thanks to the Federation, a Cuban mother would take her 13-year-old daughter to her, no less, to teach her to read and write. “That mother trusted me…!” she would write with new letters, still amazed.

But the young woman received more: she married in white, had a daughter and two grandchildren, and learned several trades. Aida was elected delegate to the Seventh Congress of the FMC! and suddenly found herself sitting in a theater with the most prominent people in the country. As soon as she could, she approached Vilma and said: “Thank you. I owe you my life!” and Vilma replied that she should not thank her alone, but many people.

Later, Aida Ballester, the prostitute in Batista’s time, even went to a Party school and, when asked who her teachers had been, she didn’t have to think long before saying: “Vilma and Fidel!”

***

She left stories everywhere. On one occasion, in a women’s prison, a girl tearfully acknowledged that the behavior that had led her to that place had been “betraying Vilma,” whom she had met in the days when the heroine visited the home for children without filial support where she had grown up.

“She would check our clothes, our beds, our notebooks. She would go to the kitchen to see how clean it was and what we were cooking,” said the young woman before promising that she would go out and honor the president of the FMC by being a good member.

***

She was a great companion, a symbol of the people embroidered with the threads of sensitivity. Back in 2003, in another children’s home in Sancti Spíritus, after greeting people and so on, she sat Felipe, the youngest of the group, on her lap. He immediately realized that the boy did not see well. He asked and was told that, in addition, his intellectual development was affected.

She left, but the following day she called Sancti Spíritus from Havana, where she had arranged an examination for Felipe at the prestigious hospital of the Center for Medical and Surgical Research (CIMEQ). On top of that, she found him accommodation with a garden, so that the little boy could play during his stay in a strange place.

Vilma brought him toys and throughout the week of medical investigations she called the hospital director to find out about this little spirit who apparently, only apparently!, had no one in this world.

***

Once again, on a stopover in Holguín of the plane in which she was traveling, a doctor and a nurse boarded with a girl in an incubator. Vilma took it upon herself to sit next to her and ask the young mother all about the little girl, she gave her her phone numbers and a while later, when the doctor saw that there was little oxygen left, Vilma sent her assistant to the cabin to get them to call the hospital and arrange for an ambulance, with oxygen, at the airport.

Her sleepless nights did not end there: every day, her assistant had to give her an update on the situation of that unknown Tunisian family. The girl, who had a congenital malformation, died, but Vilma then followed up with the young mother, who, together with her partner, was accommodated and examined by the doctors. In the end, they were able to have a second baby. The little girl’s father would call at any time, certain that his family’s anguish was shared in Havana by none other than Vilma Espín.

***

Green was her favorite color. Even if she wore other shades, she always wore her olive green suit on the inside. Like Fidel’s “moral vest,” she never took off that spiritual uniform, neither at home nor abroad. Once in Sweden, during the first session of the World Congress against the Sexual Exploitation of Children, they suddenly announced that they were going to approve the final document. The final document!?

Apparently, the other foreign delegations became more “Swedish” than the hosts themselves and let the announcement pass, but not the Cuban. They say that Vilma came out like a bullet, stormed the podium and said: how could they approve something that had not been discussed? With the expensive tickets, how could they disrespect Cuba and other countries like that! The applause from the audience put justice and honor in their place.

***

With such attributes, it was no surprise that she was the second Cuban woman to become a chemical engineer. It must be because of that ability with atoms, molecules and people — because we are made of atoms — that she found ways to unite all women and earn the respect of men, starting with Fidel, the guide who, when he thought of Cuban women, would call out: Vilma! But where she really excelled as an engineer in the field was in her personal chemistry with Raúl.

A lot of combat, yes, but she and Raúl were, no more and no less, two young people at war. They became engaged one day in November, in the Sierra Maestra. They were talking and suddenly he rested his head on her shoulder.

Vilma asked him what was going on and Raúl replied: “We’re in love!”

Pure tactics and strategy, à la Mario Benedetti, but with bullets flying around: ‘And you, how do you know?’ she retorted. And he attacked with the edge of astonishment: ”Ah, but you don’t know?!”

And so began their courtship. They made plans to get married “in style” in the Sierra Maestra at the end of December, but then came the end of the war, the “rebambaramba”, as she put it, and it turned out even better, because they finally celebrated the wedding on January 26, not only in Santiago de Cuba, but in Revolución! You have to look at those photos to understand the shared hope of an entire people who were recovering the color white for the light of their days and even for the shoes of the coalmen’s daughters!

Vilma was a special bride who, just as she did in the underground and in the hills, knew that she would fight for her happiness until the end. A month and a half before, she had made a small self-portrait and dedicated it to her boyfriend, with this note: “I hope we are always together and it is not necessary for you to appeal to this photo when you want to see me, right? Love, your Vilma”.

Time passed and so did the love over the sea. She left on June 18, 2007 and her remains rest in the Mausoleum of the Second Eastern Front Frank País, in the foothills of the Mícara mountain.

Raúl not only fulfilled her wish that they see each other constantly, but also, after the departure of his beloved, reserved a space at her side, under the guerrilla sky of Segundo Frente, to one day lie down again on her shoulder. Forever.

Note: This text is a version of the one written by the author himself last year for the script of the gala of the Children’s Theatre Company “La Colmenita”, dedicated to the 92nd anniversary of Vilma Espín’s birth. The data was taken, fundamentally, from the book Vilma, an extraordinary life, by Juan Carlos Rodríguez, and from various journalistic works about the heroine.

Enrique Milanés León is a member of the editorial staff of Cubaperiodistas. He received the Patria Prize  awarded by the José Martí Cultural Society. He has also won the Juan Gualberto Gómez Prize, from the UPEC, for the work of the year.

Source: Cubaperiodista, translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English