ST. AUGUSTINE AND CUBA
The Monument to the 1812 Spanish Constitution

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The "Plaza de Armas", (1839, by Frédéric Mialhe) in Havana.
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St. Augustine is very rich in history, but of all places in the city, few are as evocative as the monument built to commemorate the liberal Constitution, signed in Cadiz, in southern Spain on March 19, 1812. It was built because that Constitution did something quite remarkable: it promised that, in Spain and all its colonies, fundamental human rights would be protected by law —human rights that, unfortunately, are absent today in many nations of the world.
For 300 years the Spaniards had been living under an absolute monarchy, in many respects as others today live under totalitarian regimes. Then, a group of progressive minded Spaniards decided it was time to follow the example set in the United States and in France, by limiting the power of government to protect the rights of the people.
Many of the principles set out in the Constitution of Cadiz were inspired by the U.S. Bill of Rights and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen. Freedom of speech and thought and freedom of peaceful assembly were among the most inspirational of the declarations of basic rights in these models. The Constitution of Cadiz echoed its models in stating that "All Spaniards have the right to write, publish and print their political ideas without need for permission, revision or approval of any kind."

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The Constitution of 1812 is promulgated in Cadiz.
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The Constitution arrived by schooner in Havana on July l3th. There, two days later, with all due solemnity, the highest colonial officials swore allegiance to it, upsetting the island's most reactionary elements. On December 4th a royal order was received which decreed that henceforth the most important plaza in each and every town and city under Spanish rule should be called “Plaza de la Constitución.” In Havana, the "Plaza Nueva" ("Vieja "after 1836) was accordingly renamed.
In St. Augustine the Constitution was proclaimed on October 17, 1812, and its adoption was celebrated as a great triumph for the people. With its proclamation came a new form of government for the city. It was a Council consisting of the governor, a mayor and five aldermen. The alderman in charge of the Church Ward was Antonio Huertas, who played an important part in the construction of the monument.
This Antonio Huertas was born in Andalucía, and he came to St. Augustine in 1778, where he married Catalina de Aguilar, a native of the Canary Islands. Antonio and Catalina had several children. Among them were three daughters: María de las Nieves, María Antonia and Águeda. María de las Nieves, who is buried in Tolomato Cemetery, next to Father Félix Varela's funerary chapel, married the Cuban Juan José Robles, and their daughter, María Monserrate, in turn wed, in Havana, Captain Pablo Antonio Toñarely. The Galician captain and María Monserrate had a son, Juan Pablo Toñarely y Robles, who was my granduncle. When María Monserrate died, Captain Toñarely married her cousin Leonarda, who was the daughter of Águeda and Francisco Reyes, from St. Augustine. Captain Toñarely and his second wife Leonarda had a daughter, Angela Toñarely y Reyes, who was my grandmother.

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The "Plaza Nueva" (1824, by Hippolyte Garnerey), in Havana, the public square bordered by Muralla, Mercaderes, Teniente Rey and San Ignacio Streets, was renamed "Plaza de la Constitución" and then "Plaza de Fernando VII" until 1830.
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As had happened in Havana, St. Augustine received the order that the most important plaza in the city was to be called "Plaza de la Constitución." The order arrived at the beginning of 1813, and it went on to say that the Plaza should have a monument to commemorate the Constitution. The monument was inaugurated on February 14, 1814 with a plaque stating that the Constitutional Council had erected the monument as a memorial to the Constitution. It read:
PLAZA DE LA CONSTITUCION
Promulgada en esta Ciudad de San Agustin de la Florida Oriental en 17 de Octubre de 1812 siendo Gobernador el Brigadier Don Sebastian Kindelan, Caballero de la Orden de Santiago. Para eterna memoria, el Ayuntamiento Constitucional erigio este obelisco dirigido por Don Fernando de la Maza Arredondo, el Joven, Regidor Decano y Francisco Robira Procurador Sindico. Año de 1813.
An English translation at the base of the monument was placed by the St. Augustine Historical Society on 1953, and it reads:
PLAZA OF THE CONSTITUTION
Proclaimed in this City of St. Augustine, East Florida on the seventeenth of October, 1812 During the Governorship of Brigadier Sebastian Kindelan Knight of the order of Santiago. The Constitutional Council has raised this monument as an everlasting memorial under the supervision of Don Fernando de la Maza Arredondo, the Younger, Dean of the Council and Don Francisco Robira Attorney General. 1813.
The plaque spoke of "eterna memoria" ("an everlasting" memory"), however, it wasn't long before absolutism returned to Spain, and with its restoration, the official desire in fact was to blot out the memory of the Constitution.
King Fernando VII annulled the Constitution by decree in 1814, less than three months after the inauguration of St. Agustine's monument. Soon after, newspapers received from Havana reported that in Spain and all Spanish territories every "Plaza de la Constitución" had to be called "Plaza de Fernando VII", and all the monuments to the Constitution had to be demolished or disposed of. Of course, along with these changes came the end to government by Council in St. Augustine.

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Fernando VII. Emilio Castelar , President of the Spanish Republic and the greatest Spanish orator of the nineteenth century referred to Fernando VII as "an incompetent, infamous, indecent low life for whom piety was a myth and indulgence in cruelty a feline sport."
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Contrary to what happened in Havana where the annulment of the liberal Constitution was received with joy by the authorities, the people in St. Augustine refused to destroy their monument to the Constitution. They just removed the original plaque. The monument continued to stand as a reminder of the progressive spirit that prevailed in the city. And in fact the Plaza continued to be called "Plaza de la Constitución," as it still is today. In Havana, however, the king’s orders were obeyed, and the “Plaza of the Constitution,” the former "Plaza Nueva", was accordingly re-named “Plaza de Fernando VII.” In 1833, following the king’s death, a statue of the Bourbon autocrat was erected in the "Plaza de Armas" in front of the Governors Palace, with a marker that read: “Presented in the name of King Fernando VII to the city of Havana, in token of its exemplary love and loyalty, that he may always be in the heart of this city as he was always in the hearts of its people.” The statue remained on its pedestal for many years after Cuba achieved its independence, when it was finally replaced, in 1954, with one of Carlos Manuel de Céspedes, whom Cubans rightly consider the “Father of the Country."
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Facsimile of a newspaper published in Havana after the Cadiz Constitution proclaimed Freedom of the Press. Its front page slogan read: "Festive criticism is more constructive than harsh and serious invectives." (José María de la Torre, Lo que fuimos y lo que somos; La Habana Antigua y Moderna, 1857).
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In St. Augustine the order to rename the Plaza was not the end of the monument's story, however. Change came again in 1820. A revolutionary uprising in Spain forced Fernando VII to reinstate the Constitution of 1812, and with it was revived government by Council in St. Augustine. The new appointed mayor was Maza Arredondo, and the appointed officer of the Church Ward was Juan Huertas, son of Antonio, whom I mentioned earlier. He was also brother to Águeda my grandmother's grandmother. So another of my family members was involved at this new stage in the monument's history because the new Council replaced the plaque honoring the reinstated Constitution.
The official records report that this was done with "all due ceremony and majesty." The festivities lasted for three days, with great rejoicing in St. Augustine. There were salvos of artillery, decorations, lights and joyful ringing of bells. In Cuba, however, news of the reinstatement of the Constitution was received in a completely different way: When word arrived that the Constitution was once again in effect, the Governor of Cuba refused to recognize it until an official communication was received. The island's liberals, accompanied by an army battalion that had encamped in the "Plaza de Armas," stormed the Governor’s Palace and compelled him to swear allegiance to it himself and to order all colonial officials to do likewise.
As it turned out, Spain's rule over St. Augustine was nearing its end. By treaty with the United States, Spain sold its remaining lands in Florida the following year, and the Spanish flag was lowered and the Stars and Stripes were raised over San Marcos castle on July 1821.
St. Augustine had fallen from Spanish control once before, in the 18th century. At that time, when Florida became English territory, almost all of St. Augustine's inhabitants moved to Cuba and Mexico. This time, in 1821, when Florida became U.S. territory, very few left. María de las Nieves Huertas stayed here but her daughter, María Monserrate, and her niece, Leonarda, left for Havana. They were the beginnings of the Cuban branch of my family.
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