The Jayuya Uprising, also known as Jayuya Revolt or Cry of Jayuya (Spanish: Grito de Jayuya), was a Nationalist insurrection that took place on October 30, 1950, in the town of Jayuya, Puerto Rico. The insurrection, led by Blanca Canales, was one of the multiple insurrections that occurred throughout Puerto Rico on that day against the Puerto Rican government supported by the United States. The insurrectionists were opposed to US sovereignty over Puerto Rico.
Don Pedro Albizu Campos, leader of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party
In the 1930s, the United States-appointed governor of Puerto Rico, Blanton Winship, and the police colonel, a former U.S. ArmyColonel named Elisha Francis Riggs, applied harsh repressive measures against the Nationalist Party.[2] In 1936, Albizu Campos and the leaders of the party were arrested and jailed at the La Princesa prison in San Juan, and later sent to the Federal prison in Atlanta. On March 21, 1937, the police opened fire on the crowd at a Nationalist parade, killing 19 people in what came to be known as the Ponce massacre. Albizu Campos returned to Puerto Rico on December 15, 1947, after spending ten years in prison.[3]}
On May 21, 1948, a bill was introduced before the Puerto Rican Senate which would restrain the rights of the independence and Nationalist movements on the archipelago. The Senate, controlled by the Partido Popular Democrático (PPD) and presided by Luis Muñoz Marín, approved the bill that day.[4] This bill, which resembled the anti-communist Smith Act passed in the United States in 1940, became known as the Ley de la Mordaza (Gag Law) when the U.S.-appointed governor of Puerto Rico, Jesús T. Piñero, signed it into law on June 10, 1948.[5]
Under this new law it would be a crime to print, publish, sell, or exhibit any material intended to paralyze or destroy the insular government; or to organize any society, group or assembly of people with a similar destructive intent. It made it illegal to sing a patriotic song, and reinforced the 1898 law that had made it illegal to display the Flag of Puerto Rico, with anyone found guilty of disobeying the law in any way being subject to a sentence of up to ten years imprisonment, a fine of up to US$10,000 (equivalent to $127,000in 2023), or both.[3]
According to Dr. Leopoldo Figueroa, a member of the Partido Estadista Puertorriqueño (Puerto Rican Statehood Party) and the only member of the Puerto Rico House of Representatives who was not a member of the PPD,[6] the law was repressive and in violation of the First Amendment of the US Constitution guaranteeing Freedom of Speech. As such, the Law was seen as an assault on the civil rights of every Puerto Rican.[7]
On June 21, 1948, Albizu Campos gave a speech in the town of Manatí that explained how this Gag Law violated the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. Nationalists from all over the island had gathered to hear Albizu Campos's speech and to prevent the police from arresting him.[3]
Uprising
From 1949 to 1950, the Nationalists in the island planned and prepared an armed revolution. The revolution was to take place in 1952, on the date the United States Congress was to officially approve the Estado Libre Associado ("Free Associated State") political status for Puerto Rico.[8][9][10]
Albizu Campos called for an armed revolution because he considered the "new political status" to be a colonial farce. Albizu Campos picked the town of Jayuya as the headquarters of the revolution because of its location and because weapons were stored in the home of Blanca Canales.[8][9][10]
On October 26, 1950, Albizu Campos was holding a meeting in Fajardo, when he received word that his house in San Juan was surrounded by police waiting to arrest him. He was told that the police had already arrested other Nationalist leaders. He escaped from Fajardo and ordered the revolution to start. On October 27, the police in the town of Peñuelas intercepted and fired upon a caravan of Nationalists, killing four.[8][9][10]
In the pre-dawn hours of October 29, the Insular Police surrounded the house of the mother of Melitón Muñiz Santos, president of the Peñuelas Nationalist Party, in Barrio Macaná, where they were storing weapons for the Nationalist revolt. Without warning, the police fired on the house and a gunfight ensued. Two Nationalists were killed and six police officers were wounded.[11] Nationalists Melitón Muñoz Santos, Roberto Jaume Rodríguez, Estanislao Lugo Santiago, Marcelino Turell, William Gutierrez and Marcelino Berríos were arrested and accused of participating in an ambush against the local Insular Police.[11]
Members of the Nationalist Party had stored weapons in Canales's house in Jayuya. Canales and the other leaders, including her cousin Elio Torresola and Carlos Irizarry, led the armed Nationalists into the town and invaded the police station. Shots were fired, one officer was killed, three were wounded, and the other officers surrendered. The Nationalists cut the telephone lines and burned the U.S. post office. Canales led the group into the town square where, in defiance of the Ley de la Mordaza (Gag Law), they raised the Flag of Puerto Rico.[12] In the town square, Canales declared Puerto Rico a free Republic. Torresola had a brother, Griselio Torresola, living in New York City, who was outraged by the attacks.
A P-47 Thunderbolt, the aircraft type employed to bomb Jayuya and Utuado
The governor, Luis Muñoz Marín, declared martial law. The United States sent ten P-47 Thunderbolt fighter planes out of Ramey Air Force Base to bomb the town of Jayuya.[13] American infantry troops and the Puerto Rico National Guard, under the command of the Puerto Rico Adjutant General, Major General Luis R. Esteves,[14] used P-47 Thunderbolt attack aircraft, land-based artillery, mortar fire, and grenades to counterattack the Nationalists. The planes dropped 500-pound bombs and machine-gunned nearly every rooftop in the town, leaving the town in ruins.[15]
Although an extensive part of Jayuya was destroyed, news of the military action was prevented from spreading outside of Puerto Rico. Instead, the American media reported President Truman saying it was "an incident between Puerto Ricans."[12][3]
Nationalists in New York City as well as Puerto Rico were outraged by the counterattack. Griselio Torresola and Oscar Collazo, among other Nationalists in the city, made a quick plan to assassinate the U.S. president, Harry S. Truman. He was reported as staying at Blair House while the living quarters of the White House were under renovation. After traveling south by train, on November 1, 1950, they attacked guards at the Blair House, seeking to gain entry. Torresola and White House police officer Leslie Coffelt were killed in the attempt; Collazo and two American officers were wounded.[3]
After the Nationalists were forced to surrender, the Puerto Rican government arrested thousands of people supporting independence. According to police estimates, 28 people were killed and 50 were wounded in the uprising, including in Jayuya and elsewhere in Puerto Rico. 16 Nationalists, 8 police officers and soldiers, and 4 civilians were killed.[16]
Some attempt to frame the events as if the Puerto Ricans bombed themselves (Luis Ferrao). Nelson Denis refutes this: "The P-47 fighter planes that bombed Utuado and Jayuya were built in the US, hangared in US airfields, maintained with US equipment, flown by US-trained pilots who dropped US-made bombs, and all of it – the planes, the airfield, the pilots, the bombs – were financed by the US. Yet Ferrao would have us believe that a decal saying “Air National Guard” means that Puerto Rico bombed itself."[17]
Aftermath
External audio
Newsreel scenes in Spanish of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party Revolts of the 1950s here
The top leaders of the Nationalist party were arrested, including Albizu Campos and Blanca Canales, and sent to jail to serve long prison terms. Oscar Collazo was convicted of murder in the US and sentenced to death. U.S. President Truman commuted his sentence to life. In 1979 President Carter commuted Collazo's sentence to time served and he returned to Puerto Rico. The city of Jayuya converted the Blanca Canales home into a historical museum.[citation needed]
The last major attempt by the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party to draw world attention to Puerto Rico's colonial situation occurred on March 1, 1954, when nationalist leader Lolita Lebrón, together with fellow nationalists Rafael Cancel Miranda, Irvin Flores and Andres Figueroa Cordero, attacked members of the United States House of Representatives, shooting from the gallery and wounding several members. Lebrón and her comrades were charged with attempted murder and other crimes.[18]
Gallery
Jayuya Uprising Monuments
The House of Nemesio and Blanca Canales
Monument to the Jayuya Uprising participants in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico
Plaque honoring the combatants of the 1950 Jayuya Uprising
Plaque honoring the female participants of the 1950 Jayuya Uprising
Pedro Albizu Campos was a Puerto Rican attorney and politician, and a leading figure in the Puerto Rican independence movement. He was the president and spokesperson of the Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico from 1930 until his death. He led the nationalist revolts of October 1950 against the United States government in Puerto Rico. Albizu Campos spent a total of twenty-six years in prison at various times for his Puerto Rican independence activities.
The 1954 United States Capitol shooting was a domestic terrorist attack on March 1, 1954, by four Puerto Rican nationalists seeking to promote Puerto Rican independence from the United States. They fired 30 rounds from semi-automatic pistols onto the legislative floor from the Ladies' Gallery of the House of Representatives chamber within the United States Capitol.
Nemesio Canales was a Puerto Rican essayist, journalist, novelist, playwright, politician and activist who defended women's civil rights. As a politician, he presented a bill to the Puerto Rico House of Representatives, which was defeated 23 votes to 7, giving women their full civil rights, including the right to vote.
The Nationalist Party of Puerto Rico is a Puerto Rican political party founded on September 17, 1922, in San Juan, Puerto Rico. Its primary goal is to work for Puerto Rico's independence. The Party's selection in 1930 of Pedro Albizu Campos as its president brought a radical change to the organization and its tactics.
Griselio Torresola Roura born in Jayuya, Puerto Rico, was one of two Puerto Rican nationalists from New York City who attempted to assassinate United States President Harry Truman on November 1, 1950. Torresola mortally wounded White House policeman Private Leslie Coffelt and wounded two other law enforcement officers. Torresola was killed by a return shot from Coffelt.
Blanca Canales was an educator and a Puerto Rican Nationalist. Canales joined the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party in 1931 and helped organize the Daughters of Freedom, the women's branch of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party.
Oscar Collazo was one of two Puerto Rican militants of the Nationalist Party who on November 1, 1950, attempted to assassinate U.S. President Harry S. Truman in Washington, D.C. He had been living in New York City after growing up in Puerto Rico.
On November 1, 1950, Puerto Rican pro-independence activists Oscar Collazo and Griselio Torresola attempted to assassinate President Harry S. Truman at the Blair House during the renovation of the White House. Both men were stopped before gaining entry to the house. Torresola mortally wounded White House Police officer Leslie Coffelt, who killed him in return fire. Secret Service agents wounded Collazo. Truman was upstairs in the house and not harmed.
Rosa Collazo a.k.a. Rosa Cortez-Collazo was a political activist and treasurer of the New York City branch of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. She was the wife of Oscar Collazo one of two Nationalists who attacked Blair House in 1950 in an attempt to kill President Harry Truman. She was accused by the FBI of assisting Nationalists Lolita Lebrón, Rafael Cancel Miranda, Irvin Flores and Andres Figueroa Cordero in their assault on the United States House of Representatives in 1954. She was charged on both occasions with seditious conspiracy for her complicity in a conspiracy to overthrow the United States Government and imprisoned because of her political beliefs.
The Utuado uprising, also known as the Utuado revolt or El Grito de Utuado, refers to the revolt against the United States government in Puerto Rico which occurred on October 30, 1950, in the town of Utuado. There were simultaneous revolts in various other towns in Puerto Rico, including the capital of San Juan and the cities of Mayaguez and Arecibo, plus major confrontations in the city of Ponce and the towns of Peñuelas and Jayuya.
The San Juan Nationalist revolt was one of many uprisings against United States Government rule which occurred in Puerto Rico on October 30, 1950 during the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party revolts. Amongst the uprising's main objectives were an attack on La Fortaleza, and the U.S. Federal Court House Building in Old San Juan.
The Puerto Rican Nationalist Party insurgency was a series of coordinated insurrections for the secession of Puerto Rico led by the president of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party, Don Pedro Albizu Campos, against the United States government's rule over the islands of Puerto Rico. The party repudiated the "Free Associated State" status that had been enacted in 1950 and which the Nationalists considered a continuation of colonialism.
Isolina Rondón was a political activist. She was one of the few witnesses of the killing of four Nationalists committed by local police officers in Puerto Rico during a confrontation with the supporters of the Nationalist Party that occurred on October 24, 1935, and which is known as the Río Piedras massacre. Rondón joined the political movement and became the Treasurer of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party which staged various uprisings in Puerto Rico against the colonial Government of the United States in 1950.
Isabel Rosado, also known as Doña Isabelita, was an educator, social worker, activist and member of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. Influenced by the events of the Ponce massacre, Rosado became a believer of the Puerto Rican independence movement and was imprisoned because of her commitment to the cause.
Vidal Santiago Díaz was a member of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party and served as president of the Santurce Municipal Board of officers of the party. He was also the personal barber of Nationalist leader Pedro Albizu Campos. Though not involved in the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party Revolts of the 1950s, Santiago Díaz's barbershop was attacked by forty armed police officers and U.S. National Guardsmen. The attack was historic in Puerto Rico—the first time an event of that magnitude had ever been transmitted live via radio and heard all over the island.
Ruth Mary Reynolds was an American educator, political and civil rights activist who embraced the ideals of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. She was incarcerated in La Princesa Prison for sedition during the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party Revolts of the 1950s. As one of the founders of the organization known as the "American League for Puerto Rico's Independence," she devoted many years of her life to the cause of Puerto Rico's independence from the United States after her release from prison.
Raimundo Díaz Pacheco was a political activist and the Treasurer General of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. He was also commander-in-chief of the Cadets of the Republic, the official youth organization within the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. This quasi-military organization was also known as the Ejército Libertador de Puerto Rico.
Cadets of the Republic, known in Spanish as Cadetes de la República, was the paramilitary wing of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party in the twentieth century. The organization was also referred to as the Liberation Army of Puerto Rico(Ejército Libertador de Puerto Rico).
Tomás López de Victoria (1911–????) was a political activist and the Sub-Commander of the Cadets of the Republic. These cadets were the official youth organization within the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party. They were also known as the Ejército Libertador de Puerto Rico.
Law 53 of 1948 better known as the Gag Law, was an act enacted by the Puerto Rico legislature of 1948, with the purpose of suppressing the independence movement in Puerto Rico. The act made it a crime to own or display a Puerto Rican flag, to sing a patriotic tune, to speak or write of independence, or to meet with anyone or hold any assembly in favor of Puerto Rican independence. It was passed by a legislature that was overwhelmingly dominated by members of the Popular Democratic Party (PPD), which supported developing an alternative political status for the island. The bill was signed into law on June 10, 1948 by Jesús T. Piñero, the United States-appointed governor. Opponents tried but failed to have the law declared unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court.
1 2 3 4 5 "War Against All Puerto Ricans, Revolution and Terror in America's Colony"; Author Nelson Antonio Denis; Page 263; Publisher Nation Books; ISBN1568585012; ISBN978-1568585017
1 2 3 4 "Encyclopedia of Minorities in American Politics: Volume 2; Hispanic Americans and Native Americans (American Political Landscape Series)"; by Andrew L. Aoki (Author) and Kerry L. Haynie (Author); Page: 417; Publisher: Greenwood; ISBN978-1573561495.
Nelson Antonio Denis, War Against All Puerto Ricans: Revolution and Terror in America’s Colony, Author: Nation Books (April 7, 2015); ISBN978-1568585017.
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The House of Nemesio and Blanca Canales
Monument to the Jayuya Uprising participants in Mayagüez, Puerto Rico
Plaque honoring the combatants of the 1950 Jayuya Uprising
Plaque honoring the female participants of the 1950 Jayuya Uprising
Puerto Rican Nationalist Party 
United States 
