Rebel loyalties: Afro-Cuban women and colonial war in the first Spanish republic, 1873-1874

  • Carla Andrés Bauzá Universitat Pompeu Fabra
Keywords: First Spanish Republic, Ten Years’ War, women, colonialism, slavery

Abstract

The First Spanish Republic (1873-1874) took place during the Ten Years’ War in Cuba (1868-1878). This paper examines through military and colonial sources how Afro-Cuban women participated in the insurgency and contributed to their strengthening during the First Spanish Republic. Gender, and a common experience of enslavement and resistance practices, played a key role in insurgent tactics such as mass desertions from Spanish military camps. Republicanism in the Spanish metropole advocated for the abolition of slavery and political and civil rights for free Afro-descendants but did not implement their reformist policies in Cuba. Afro-Cuban women participating in the insurgent communities, which were based on kinship relations, experienced republican colonialism as an extension of the slave system and racism. By focusing on gender and race in the context of the colonial war and republican policies, it is possible to observe a more complex dimension of the colonial relationship and the revolutionary (anti)colonial processes during the First Spanish Republic.

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Published
2025-06-24
How to Cite
Andrés Bauzá C. (2025). Rebel loyalties: Afro-Cuban women and colonial war in the first Spanish republic, 1873-1874. Historia y Política, 53, 131-162. https://doi.org/10.18042/hp.53.05