Radio Cadena Agramonte emisiora de Camagüey
Camagüey, September 23. - Belita was the youngest of the four sisters of Lina Ruz, Fidel's mother. Her baptismal certificate, by chance, appears in the parish church of San Antonio, in Sibanicú.
Unlike María Isabel Ruz González, the name she later assumed throughout her life, in the statistical register of the ecclesiastical institution of that Camagüey municipality, she appears as Agustina Isabel, with her date of birth on May 4, 1914.
“It should be noted that the Baptismal Certificate of Agustina Isabel, Belita is, without a doubt, one of the most complete documents related to the family. It includes all the details in very clear handwriting and provides very valuable information. [...]”
This statement, recorded by Katiuska Blanco on page 509 of Todo el tiempo de los cedros ("All the Time of the Cedars"), first Cuban edition, includes general data that, of course, come from the location of the documents in Sibanicú, but also from the family memories of Angelita and Agustina, and from testimonies that Angelita kept from Aunt Panchita, Lina’s older sister.
In a lively and recent telephone conversation with the journalist, writer and biographer of Fidel, she would confirm the neatness of that document and the usefulness of not losing stories related to the Leader of the Revolution, like this one of Belita, who apart from the family connection contributed her son Roberto Estévez Ruz (1) to the Cuban martyrology as a combatant of the Rebel Army in the II Eastern Front Frank Pais.
The disparity of names and dates are issues that occurred at the time. Children were born on one date and registered on another. In volume 128, folio 225 of the Cueto Civil Registry, however, the date cited is July 3, 1915, under the name Isabel Ruz González.
HOW DID THE RUZ-GONZÁLEZ FAMILY REACH CAMAGÜEY’S TERRITORY?
Heavy rains and the passage of a cyclone through the Pinar del Río region, where Don Francisco Ruz Vázquez and Doña Dominga del Rosario González Ramos, Fidel's grandparents, lived, forced the family to pilgrimage in search of a prosperous place.
The overflowing of the Cuyaguateje River, which had become navigable, not only destroyed the belongings of those who lived in that area, but also plunged entire families into poverty.
The journey to the eastern part of the country was made by train. In "All the Time of the Cedars," converted into a familiar landscape of Fidel Castro Ruz, the author narrates that Panchita etched that moment in her mind, a prelude, without any stops, to reach Tana, in Camagüey, where they pinned their hopes on a more comfortable and affluent life, based on the promises of employment and housing.
Tana was a point in Camagüey's geography, located not far from a settlement known as Elia, which today belongs to the province of Las Tunas.
They got off the train because there was work in the sugar harvest. "The contractor who awaited them showed them the path to the small house where they were going to live. The labor suppliers saw Camagüey and Oriente as the land of promise, diminishing possibilities in the west, especially after the almost widespread ruin of tobacco growers due to the 1910 cyclone in Pinar del Río," Katiuska cites in that work.
Pancho's efforts during 1912 and 1913 were in vain; the family was in scarcity, away from the boom period and complicated by the arrival of Haitian and Jamaican laborers who accepted low wages, displacing Cubans.
They redirected their path. The malaria epidemic in Tana prompted them to change course to Ignacio, closer to Camagüey and not far from the Siboney sugar mill. That stay also failed, so they decided to try their luck in Hatuey with the whole family, a town with houses lined under the symmetry of the roofs and contractors' proposals.
At another point in the book, Katiuska mentions that Lina didn't know why, but one day they loaded up all their belongings and headed to the new sugarcane plantations, where her father and uncle, Perfecto Ruz Vázquez, began working with Don Ángel Castro Argiz, a Spaniard who owned an inn and several farms in the Birán area, currently in the province of Holguín.
AN ANECDOTE THAT BELITA NEVER FORGOT
For those who have not read the book, it is recommended to do so. Belita never forgot the great fright she experienced. At barely twelve years old, she was carrying Fidel, who was eight months old, and from her strength, the infant rolled off. Fortunately, nothing happened to him, and her aunt's distress passed.
She could not bear Doña Dominga reproaching her for her relationship with Prudencio Estévez, a "very humble Cuban, a machete worker in the sugarcane fields, with whom Belita was always happy," and then she moved to live in Vertientes, in the mid-south of Camagüey province, more than 31 kilometers from the provincial capital.
There, her beloved son Roberto Estévez Ruz was born on April 4, 1938, and he carried out his revolutionary actions until he took the path to the insurrectionary mountains. He was mortally wounded on July 14, 1958, in a frontal battle against the enemy.
In the last years of her life, Belita lived on Bayardo Agramonte street, between Lugareño and Bembeta, in the América Latina neighborhood, formerly known as Boves. Ramón, her eldest nephew, visited her every time he came to Camagüey for work and shared time with her.
Very few people in Camagüey knew that for several years Fidel sent Belita a monthly money order of 50 pesos from his salary. Juana Elisa Suárez de La O, who mostly received it at the central post office, sent by Celia Sánchez, bears witness to this.
René Casas Bautista, a member of the group caring for families of internationalists and martyrs and currently working at the Carlos J. Finlay Birthplace, remembers María Isabel as a kind, cheerful person, very willing to help others, a point also shared by Enrique Monteagudo Estévez, her grandson.
He also says that she often spoke of Fidel and how, despite her apparent physical frailty, she refused to allow anyone to speak ill of her nephew or the Revolution wherever she was.
Regarding this article, in an exchange with Katiuska, she confirmed:
"I met her, had the opportunity to visit her with Angelita and Agustina, Fidel's sisters, and with Tania Fraga - Angelita's daughter. Belita was a very sweet, suffering, and also lovingly familial person with Fidel and Raúl."
On March 3, 2006, at Clinic 43 in Havana, where she had been admitted some time before, the heart of María Isabel Ruz González stopped beating at the age of 90.
Family reports here reported that before the funeral procession left the capital for Camagüey and her body was laid to rest at the La Caridad funeral home, Fidel and Raúl paid tribute to Belita, a clear sign of the mutual affection they felt for each other and for the rest of the family. (Enrique Atiénzar Rivero/Radio Cadena Agramonte Contributor) (Photos: Archive)
