Minerva mirabal sisters

What happened to the mirabal sisters husbands
Minerva mirabal in the time of the butterflies
Minerva mirabal children

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For as long as there has been human history, women have been making it. This March, HAI wishes to share with you a few stories of exemplary women who changed their worlds.

Sometimes, freedom is a family affair. So it was with the Mirabal sisters, three national heroines of the Dominican Republic. Patria, Minerva, and María Teresa’s defiance, resistance, and martyrdom remain one of the defining stories of the Trujilo regime – and one of the reasons it finally fell.

Las Mariposas grew up in a nation ruled by a dictator. Rafael Trujillo seized power by military coup in 1930, when the eldest, Patria, was only six years old. Under his brutal regime, civil liberties were strictly curtailed, and his secret police force used “intimidation, imprisonment, torture… and murder” to ensure compliance. Tens of thousands died.

Despite the despotism of the Trujillo regime, the Mirabal sisters grew up in a comfortable life. Their parents were farmers and shop owners in Ojo de Agua, Salceo Province, and were prominent enough that in 1949 the family was invited to a party hosted by Tru

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María Argentina Minerva Mirabal Reyes

When the Dominican Republic was run by dictator Rafael Trujillo, the fearless efforts of three ordinary sisters, Patria, Minerva, and Maria Teresa Mirabal, helped expose the corruption and brutality of Trujillo’s regime. The sisters were assassinated on November 25, 1960; however, their deaths led to Trujillo’s own assassination six months later. The United Nations General Assembly designated November 25 as the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women in honor of the Mirabals. María Argentina Minerva Mirabal Reyes (12 March 1926 – 25 November 1960), commonly known as Minerva, was the third daughter. At the age of 12, she followed Patria to the Colegio Inmaculada Concepción.[6] In 1949, the Mirabal family was invited to a party for the local elite where Minerva first caught the eye of Rafael Trujillo, so much so that the Mirabals were invited to a different party by Trujillo himself. At this party, Trujillo made more sexual advances toward Minerva.[12] A

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On November 25, 1960, three sisters—Patria, Minerva and María Teresa Mirabal—were reported killed in an “automobile accident.” Reports said a car they were riding in plunged over a cliff in the Dominican Republic.

At least, that was the story in El Caribe, a newspaper sanctioned by the government of Rafael Trujillo, the brutal dictator who had seized control of the island nation in a military coup 30 years earlier. In reality, the Mirabal sisters were active members of the growing underground resistance against Trujillo’s regime, and everyone knew their deaths were no accident.

Growing Up in Trujillo's Dictatorship

Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo, c. 1960.

As middle-class women, wives and mothers, the Mirabal sisters didn’t seem like obvious revolutionaries. Patria, Minerva and María Teresa, along with their sister Dedé, grew up in the town of Ojo de Agua, Salcedo Province, where their parents owned and operated a successful farm, along with a coffee mill and general store.

After attending the Colegio Inmaculada Concepción, a Catholic boarding school in the city of