Lindsey Graham (9:34)
Nests. It's January 1960 in Los Conucos in the Dominican Republic. Seven years after the death of Enrique Mirabal. 45 year old Patria Mirabal leans over her kitchen table with a knife in hand. She cuts into the plastic coating of a firework, gently easing the blade around the cylinder until the top comes off. Then she tips it upside down and lets the gunpowder cascade into a ball. She shakes the firework to get out every crumb of explosive before picking up another from a box by her feet and beginning the process all over again. After half an hour, Patria has amassed a pile of 50 empty fireworks and has a bowl brimming with black gunpowder. She then glances at the clock on the wall and realizes she's finished just in time. In the seven years since their father died, the Mirabal sisters hatred for the Dominican President Rafael Trujillo has only deepened. He has continued to wage war on his own people, crushing dissent with an iron fist. But his brutality hasn't stamped out rebellion. Instead, it's only fueled a growing underground resistance. On June 14th of last year, a group of these dissidents attempted to overthrow the government. Exiled rebels gathered at three different locations outside the country, including intending to invade and overthrow the Trujillo regime. Unfortunately for the rebels, sabotage and bad weather doomed their bold plan. Only one team successfully crossed the border, and they were easily overpowered, detained, and then executed by regime forces. Still, even though the plot to topple Trujillo failed, the incident gave rebels in the country belief that momentum was with them. They adopted a new name in honor of the plot and and began calling themselves the June 14th Movement. No one has been more committed to the cause than the Mirabal sisters, Patria, Minerva and Maria Theresa. Now six months on from the failed coup, Patria allows her home to be used as a safe house. She stores weapons, hides revolutionaries on the run. And tonight, she's even hosting a class on guerrilla warfare. Having collected the gunpowder from the fireworks, everything is ready. The doorbell rings and the first of tonight's guests arrive. Patria welcomes them and leads them into the parlor. After a few minutes, the doorbell rings again and then again. Soon the parlor has 10 people waiting. Last to arrive is the guest speaker, a skilled bomb maker who's here to pass on the tricks of the trade to his fellow revolutionaries. But one person who doesn't attend the bomb making class is Patria's sister, Minerva. She can't be there because she's spending another night in jail. Ever since Minerva rejected President Trujillo's advances at that party in San Cristobal, Trujillo has held a vendetta against Minerva. He tried everything to have her banned from university. But Minerva worked around his restrictions and eventually became the first woman to graduate law school in the Dominican Republic. Even then, Trujillo ensured that Minerva wasn't allowed to practice law. But the public dispute transformed her into a figurehead of the campaign against the regime. She's now been thrown behind bars, along with hundreds of other suspected rebel sympathizers. But her incarceration only adds to the Mirabal sister's status within the June 14th movement. And when Minerva is eventually released and reunited with her family, she's treated like a hero. So President Trujillo realizes that if he is to silence the sisters, he will have to change course and decides to go after their husbands. The three men are arrested and detained, but even when their loved ones are in danger, the Mirabal sisters don't let up. They continue their campaign against Trujillo's despotic regime, and their support grows and grows. Outside the country, foreign governments that once supported President Trujillo begin to step Away inside the country, the influential Catholic Church turns on him as well. Several church leaders denounce his human rights record and call on him to release all political prisoners. But President Trujillo refuses. He blames the increasing domestic and international opposition to his rule on propaganda circulated by the Mirabal sisters. And he decides he must put a stop to it. Jailing the sisters hasn't silenced them, nor has imprisoning their husbands. A more permanent solution must be found. So Trujillo will give orders for the three women to be killed. But murdering the Mirabal sisters won't shore up President Trujillo's regime. Instead, it will precipitate his downfall. It's late evening on November 25, 1960, on a remote mountain road in the northern Dominican Republic, a few weeks after President Rafael Trujillo concocted a plan to kill the Mirabal sisters. Ignoring the torrential rain, military intelligence officer Ciriaco de la Rosa waits by his car, his eyes fixed on the road ahead. Four soldiers stand with him, rifles at the ready. Then, through the storm, the headlights of a jeep come into view. Ciriaco gives a curt nod and his men step forward, blocking the road. The jeep slows to a halt. Ciriako then approaches the vehicle and raises a flashlight. Inside the car, he can see the three people he's looking for. Minerva Patria and Maria Therese, a Mirabal. He gives another order and the soldiers pull the Mirabal sisters and their driver from the vehicle. Each soldier then takes a prisoner and marches them away from the others. In the darkness beside the road, the three sisters and their driver are beaten and then strangled to death, one by one by one. After a few minutes, the soldiers return, dragging the lifeless bodies behind them. Syriako instructs his men to put the corpses back into the jeep. Then they push the vehicle over the edge of the mountain road. It tumbles to the bottom of the ravine. Satisfied with his evening's work, Ciriako returns to base and reports that his mission was a complete success. When the deaths are announced, the regime tries to claim that the Mirabal sisters died in a tragic car accident. But few Dominicans believe that story. Most suspect that President Trujillo ordered their deaths. And it becomes another blow to his fast fading popularity. Because in the aftermath of the murders, the June 14th movement is only boosted by a new influx of Dominicans who see the assassination of the Mirabal sisters as the last draw. And eventually, President Trujillo will lose the support of those he needs most, the army. Six months after the murder of the Mirabal sisters, Trujillo will be killed in a plot led by his own generals. He will be ambushed on the road and gunned down by soldiers, in an ironic echo of the way he killed his most prominent political opponents, the brave and brilliant Mirabal sisters, who were murdered on his orders on November 25, 1960. Next on History Daily, November 26, 1789. President George Washington attempts to unify his bickering nation with a new national holiday, Thanksgiving. From Noiser and Airship, this is History Daily Hosted, edited and executive produced by me, Lindsey Graham Audio editing by Mohammad Shazi Sound design by Molly Bak Music by Thrum. This episode is written and researched by Owen Paul Nichols, edited by Scott Reeves Managing producer, Emily Burke Executive producers are William Simpson for Airship and Pascal Hughes for Noiser.
