A Black Soldier’s Story: The Narrative of Ricardo Batrell and the Cuban War of Independence by Ricardo Batrell (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: A Black Soldier’s Story: The Narrative of Ricardo Batrell and the Cuban War of Independence by Ricardo Batrell Michael A. Antonucci A Black Soldier’s Story: The Narrative of Ricardo Batrell and the Cuban War of Independence. By Ricardo Batrell. Edited & Translated by Mark A. Sanders. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 2011. Midway through Ricardo Batrell’s narrative of the Cuban War of Independence, Para la historia: apuntes autobiographicos de la vida de Ricardo Batrell, the Cuban Liberation Army veteran writes, “as I said earlier in this historical narrative, some of our white compatriots in the war did not participate in racial discrimination. That’s [End Page 77] why at the hour of sacrifice, the black [sic] was inspired to lift his heart like a brother to the height of the sacrosanct ideal of liberty. Black and white embraced each other, and so together they celebrated victory; and together they fell under the enemy’s steel.” Unfortunately, this spirit of interracial cooperation did not endure. Batrell continues, suggesting that at “the end of the war, or as soon as victory was certain, it became necessary to ignore or to obscure the heroism and valor of those with dark skin. For white soldiers, it wasn’t possible to present blacks as commanding officers to the privileged white families who visited us” (141). Para la historia is the only known account of the Cuban War of Independence written by an Afro-Cuban. It delivers an intimate examination of race and national identity. As a chronicle of this young Afro-Cuban’s transformation through the struggle for “Cuba Libre,” Batrell’s narrative reveals the dynamic possibilities that Afro-Cubans associated with the independence movement. At the same time, it also conveys a sense of the profound betrayal that the author and his comrades experienced as ideals that they had fought for were undermined. Available for the first time in English as A Black Soldier’s Story: The Narrative of Ricardo Batrell and the Cuban War of Independence, Batrell’s memoir articulates aspirations and experiences of Afro-Cubans at the turn of the last century. Edited and translated by Mark A. Sanders, A Black Soldier’s Story promotes a cross-cultural conversation about racial democracy in the Americas. In recovering this text, Sanders introduces new audiences to an Afro-Cuban writer whose work corresponds with several African American literary contemporaries, including W. E. B. DuBois, Sutton Griggs, and Ida B. Wells. For readers familiar with African American experience and U.S. history, Batrell’s narrative constructs a transnational template to analyze events and phenomena such as African American participation in the United States military and white supremacist backlash following Reconstruction. A Black Soldier’s Story also speaks to the impact that American constructions of race have had on U.S. policy in the Caribbean, including its involvement in Cuba, especially during the Spanish American War. Sanders’ scholarship thereby contributes to the project of internationalizing American studies and African American studies. Initially published in 1912, as a U.S. supported Cuban regime was overseeing the massacre of Afro-Cubans during Cuba’s “Little Race War,” Batrell’s autobiography collects events from the life of an unlettered agricultural worker, propelled forward by his decision to resist colonialism and racism while embracing democratic ideals. Writing with the benefit of hindsight, throughout A Black Soldier’s Story, Batrell is aware that sacrifices he and other Afro-Cubans made for the cause of independence have been overlooked and even violently rejected by Cuban elites. The memoir thereby becomes an expression of Batrell’s desire to participate, freely and fully, in the Cuban nation-building project, which he shared with countless other Afro-Cubans. Sanders’ introduction to A Black Soldier’s Story connects the work to the tradition of the American jeremiad. He explains that Batrell “uses his experiences in the war as a means of commentary on postwar conditions. Very similar to the North American jeremiad tradition, [he] cites the ideal, decries the current political conditions that fall short of the ideal and calls on the nation to return to the promise of Cuba Libre” (xlviii). [End Page 78] A Black Soldier’s Story presents readers...