José Ramón Fernández Álvarez
José R. 'Pepe' Fernández was born in San Nicolás de Bari, Cuba, and lives in exile since 1962. His love of reading and historical research resulted in the publication of Las damas de La Habana y sus joyas. Un mito persistente en la historia de Cuba (The Ladies of Havana and their jewels. A persistent myth in the history of Cuba) in 2015. Presently, he continues to search for protagonists and forgotten or unknown facts of Cuba's wars towards independence. The years between 1808 and 1812, which conceived the great emancipations in the Spanish colonies of Tierra Firme, also witnessed the growing tensions and incipient independence aspirations in the island of Cuba. Neglected for a long time in Cuban historiography, this formative stage in the country’s history has recently received more attention and recognition as the bicentennials of the most notable events approached: the frustrated Junta de La Habana, the expulsion of the French, the riots of blacks, conspiracies of whites, interracial and blacks, and the first constitution project. This work limits itself to trying to clarify aspects of the conspiracies of 1809 and 1810, which suffered frequent distortions due to the varied readings of the scarce documentation, and to present the information available in the light of an interpretation that allows reordering the chronology of the facts and reevaluate the performance of the protagonists.
