Antonia María Teresa Mirabal Reyes de Guzmán (October 15, 1935 – November 25, 1960) was a surveyor and political activist from the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. It shares a Maritime boundary, maritime border with Puerto Rico to the east and ...

. She was one of three sisters assassinated together at the direction of the country's dictator

Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina ( ; ; 24 October 1891 – 30 May 1961), nicknamed ''El Jefe'' (; "the boss"), was a Dominican military officer and dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from August 1930 until his assassination in May 1961 ...

Early years

María Teresa was the youngest of four sisters born into a wealthy family in the Dominican province of

Salcedo Salcedo or Salzedo may refer to: Places ;Dominican Republic * Hermanas Mirabal Province (formerly called Salcedo) * Salcedo, Dominican Republic, the capital of the Hermanas Mirabal Province ;Ecuador * Salcedo Canton, Cotopaxi Province *: Salcedo, ...

(now, after a name change, it is called Hermanas Mirabal, or in English,

Mirabal Sisters The Mirabal sisters ( ) were four sisters from the Dominican Republic, three of whom (Patria, Minerva and María Teresa) opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo () and were involved in activities against his regime. The three sisters were a ...

). Her parents were Enrique Mirabal Fernández and Mercedes Reyes Camilo. Like her sisters before her, she attended Colegio Inmaculada Concepción de La Vega. She graduated from the Colegio Sagrado Corazón de Jesús in

Santiago de los Caballeros Santiago de los Caballeros ("James, son of Zebedee, Saint James of the Knights"), often shortened to Santiago, is the second-largest city in the Dominican Republic and the fourth-largest city in the Caribbean by population. It is the capital of ...

and in 1954, from the Liceo de San Francisco de Macorís in mathematics. She then continued her studies to become a surveyor at the

Autonomous University of Santo Domingo In developmental psychology and moral, political, and bioethical philosophy, autonomy is the capacity to make an informed, uncoerced decision. Autonomous organizations or institutions are independent or self-governing. Autonomy can also be defi ...

. On February 14, 1958, she married fellow engineer Leandro Guzmán and on February 17, 1959, their daughter Jacqueline was born. Maria Teresa admired her sister Minerva and like her became involved in political activities. In time, the siblings became known collectively as the

. Her outrage at the "trujillista tyranny" was so profound that she joined a January 1959 conspiracy that was hatched in the residence of Guido D'Alessandro (political nephew of her sister Minerva) to lay the foundations for what later would be called the June 14 Revolutionary Movement, hoping to overthrow dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo.

Detentions

On January 20, 1960, María Teresa was detained at a military base in Salcedo, but released on the same day. Two days later, on January 22, she and sister Minerva were detained and taken to La Cuarenta, the infamous torture prison, and then transferred to another prison, La Victoria. They were released on February 7, 1960, but shortly thereafter, on March 18, María Teresa and Minerva were arrested again and returned to La Cuarenta. They were given a five-year sentence but that was reduced to three years on appeal, and they were released again on August 18, 1960. María Teresa was not intimidated by political confrontation saying, “''Life is risked without thinking about possible personal benefits, since the main reason for which we fight is the complete cancellation of privileges ..perhaps what is closest to us is death, but that idea does not intimidate me: we will continue fighting for what is just''."

Murders

On November 25, 1960, when three of the sisters, Minerva, Patria and María Teresa, were returning from visiting the prison holding their husbands, who were leaders of the June 14 Revolutionary Movement, the women were ambushed by agents of the Military Intelligence Service (SIM) outside of Puerto Plata. Each was fiercely beaten to death, as was their driver Rufino de la Cruz. At that time, Patria was 36 years old,

Minerva Minerva (; ; ) is the Roman goddess of wisdom, justice, law, victory, and the sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. She is also a goddess of warfare, though with a focus on strategic warfare, rather than the violence of gods such as Mars. Be ...

was 34, and María Teresa was 25. Their bodies were found with the vehicle, destroyed at the bottom of a ravine. While the crime scene was meant to indicate that the sisters and driver died in the "accidental fall," it became widely assumed that their deaths were an "arranged car accident" ordered by the dictator and became a source of national outrage and called "the last straw for the Dominican people."

Aftermath

According to historian

Bernard Diederich Bernard Diederich (18 July 1926 – 14 January 2020) was a New Zealand-born author, journalist, and historian. Diederich was born into an Irish-German family in Christchurch, where his father was a barman at the Empire Hotel. The family moved to ...

, the assassinations of the

Mirabal sisters The Mirabal sisters ( ) were four sisters from the Dominican Republic, three of whom (Patria, Minerva and María Teresa) opposed the dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo () and were involved in activities against his regime. The three sisters were a ...

"had greater effect on Dominicans than most of Trujillo's other crimes." The killings, he wrote, "did something to their machismo" and paved the way for Trujillo's own assassination six months later on May 30, 1961.

(1999). ''Trujillo: The Death of the Dictator''. Markus Wiener Publishing. p. 71. . In the Caribbean country today, the sisters are remembered as "symbols of both popular and feminist resistance."

Tributes

Every year on November 25, the three sisters, Minerva, Patria and María Teresa, are honored on the

International Day to Eliminate Violence against Women The United Nations General Assembly has designated November 25 as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women ( Resolution 54/134). The premise of the day is to raise awareness around the world that women are subjected t ...

, which was declared by the UN in their honor. Commemorations of all three sisters (called martyrs by some) have so far included many poems, songs and books, including Julia Alvarez's second novel ''

In the Time of the Butterflies ''In the Time of the Butterflies'' is a historical fiction novel by Julia Alvarez, relating a fictionalized account of the Mirabal sisters during the time of the Trujillo dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. The book is written in the ...

'' (1994), which was adapted into a

film A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally, sinc ...

in 2001.

References