Enrique Collazo Tejada (May 28, 1848 - March 13, 1925) was a

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

n writer, army general, and distinguished veteran of the

Ten Years' War The Ten Years' War (; 1868–1878), also known as the Great War () and the War of '68, was part of Cuba's fight for independence from Spain. The uprising was led by Cuban-born planters and other wealthy natives. On 10 October 1868, sugar mil ...

and

War of Independence Wars of national liberation, also called wars of independence or wars of liberation, are conflicts fought by nations to gain independence. The term is used in conjunction with wars against foreign powers (or at least those perceived as foreign) ...

Early history

Enrique Collazo y Tejada was born in

Santiago de Cuba Santiago de Cuba is the second-largest city in Cuba and the capital city of Santiago de Cuba Province. It lies in the southeastern area of the island, some southeast of the Cuban capital of Havana. The municipality extends over , and contains t ...

on May 28, 1848. He was the elder brother of Guillermo Collazo Tejada and Tomás Collazo Tejada. During his early years, Collazo lived in

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

and attended the Academia de Artilleria of

Segovia Segovia ( , , ) is a city in the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castile and León, Spain. It is the capital and most populated municipality of the Province of Segovia. Segovia is located in the Meseta central, Inner Pl ...

, a Spanish military academy from which he graduated in 1866.

Ten Years' War

He left Spain in 1869 to join the Cuban uprising which became the first war of independence, the

. Collazo was a troop commander in the

Cuban Liberation Army The Cuban Liberation Army (), colloquially known as the Mambises, Mambí Army () was an insurgency, insurgent army which was formed in the last third of the 19th century and fought for independence from Spain and the abolitionism, abolition of ...

. He became Gen.

Máximo Gómez Máximo Gómez y Báez (November 18, 1836 – June 17, 1905) was a general of Dominican origin in the Cuban Wars of Independence (1868-78 and 1895–98). He was known for his controversial Scorched earth tactics, which entailed dynamiting pa ...

's adjutant and reached the rank of colonel. In 1893, Collazo wrote and published ''Desde Yara basta el Zanjón. Aputanciones históricas'' () in Havana.

The Necessary War

Col. Enrique Collazo was a member of the third Revolutionary

Cuban Junta The Cuban Junta was a group of Cuban nationalists that advocated for Cuban independence before and during the Spanish-American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898). The Junta was primarily made up of naturalized Cubans located in the United States. ...

. Collazo, along with

José Martí José Julián Martí Pérez (; 28 January 1853 – 19 May 1895) was a Cuban nationalism, nationalist, poet, philosopher, essayist, journalist, translator, professor, and publisher, who is considered a Cuban national hero because of his role in ...

and Gen.

, signed the orders to commence the

revolution In political science, a revolution (, 'a turn around') is a rapid, fundamental transformation of a society's class, state, ethnic or religious structures. According to sociologist Jack Goldstone, all revolutions contain "a common set of elements ...

. General Collazo led

insurgent An insurgency is a violent, armed rebellion by small, lightly armed bands who practice guerrilla warfare against a larger authority. The key descriptive feature of insurgency is its asymmetric nature: small irregular forces face a large, well ...

forces in the 1895

. In 1898, he was appointed a brigadier general of the

Mayarí Mayarí is a municipality and town in the Holguín Province of Cuba. History The origins of the city date back to 1757 in Spanish Cuba, when the first farms were established here by immigrant colonists. On 19 January 1879 the city became the se ...

brigade in the

Spanish–American War

Collazo was a member of the staff of the late Gen.

Calixto García Calixto García y Íñiguez (August 4, 1839 – December 11, 1898) was a Cuban general in three Cuban uprisings, part of the Cuban War for Independence: the Ten Years' War, the Little War, and the War of 1895, itself sometimes called the C ...

and his trusted aide. Preceding the outbreak of the

Spanish–American War The Spanish–American War (April 21 – August 13, 1898) was fought between Restoration (Spain), Spain and the United States in 1898. It began with the sinking of the USS Maine (1889), USS ''Maine'' in Havana Harbor in Cuba, and resulted in the ...

, he escorted U.S. Army lieutenant Andrew S. Rowan on his mission to Cuba to deliver a message to General García. Collazo also accompanied him on his return to the U.S. In 1905, he published ''Los Americanos en Cuba'' (), analyzing U.S. intervention in Cuba during the

Spanish-American War Spanish Americans (, ''hispanoestadounidenses'', or ''hispanonorteamericanos'') are Americans whose ancestry originates wholly or partly from Spain. They are the longest-established European American group in the modern United States, with a ...

Politics

Collazo was elected in 1909 to represent the Havana district in the

Cuban House of Representatives The Congress of Cuba () was the legislature of Cuba from 20 May 1902 until the Cuban Revolution of 1959. The Congress consisted of the 130-member Chamber of Representatives (''Cámara de Representantes'') and the 54-member Senate (''Senado'') in ...

, where he served until 1911. He published ''Cuba Heroica'' () in 1912.

Death

Enrique Collazo y Tejada died in

Havana, Cuba Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.1848 births 1925 deaths Cuban revolutionaries 19th-century Cuban military personnel People of the Ten Years' War People from Santiago de Cuba