Bayamo
The Second Spanish Settlement In Cuba, Where The National Anthem Was Written And First Sung In 1868, And Which Its Own Inhabitants Burned To The Ground In 1869 Rather Than Surrender It · Bayamo, Granma
Bayamo was the second town the Spanish founded in Cuba and for three centuries it was one of the richest. In October 1868 Carlos Manuel de Cespedes, a landowner from just outside it, freed the people he had enslaved and declared war on Spain; within days the rebels held Bayamo, and in the square beside the church Perucho Figueredo wrote and the town sang what is now the Cuban national anthem. Fourteen months later, with a Spanish column approaching and no way to hold the city, the inhabitants set fire to their own houses and left. That is why Bayamo does not look like Trinidad or Camaguey: most of what a colonial town would have is simply gone, and what remains - the church, the Cespedes house, the Plaza del Himno - carries all the weight. It is also a city where horse-drawn carriages are still ordinary public transport, where mechanical street organs are a local tradition, and where the whole of Calle General Garcia is given over to roast pork and music on a Saturday night.
Plaza del Himno, Bayamo, Granma, Bayamo, Granma, Cuba
The squares are open at all times. The Casa Natal de Carlos Manuel de Cespedes, the Museo Provincial and the Iglesia Parroquial Mayor de San Salvador keep daytime hours with a weekly closing day. THE FIESTA DE LA CUBANIA fills Calle General Garcia on SATURDAY EVENINGS with food, street organs and chess tables. Horse-drawn carriages run as ordinary public transport through the day.