Statue Generalisimo Máximo Gómez y Báez in Havana

At the beginning of the Malecon you will find this large statue of Máximo Gómez y Báez (November 18, 1836 in Bani, Dominican Republic - June 17, 1905 in Havana. Cuba)

He was a Dominican Major General in the Ten Years War (1868–1878)

He was also Cuba`s's military commander in that country’s

War of Independence (1895–1898)

Gomez retired from the Spanish Army and soon took up the rebel cause in 1868, helping transform the Cuban Army's military tactics and strategy from the conventional approach favored by Thomas Jordan and others

He gave the Cuban Mambises their most feared tactic: The "Machete Charge"

On October 26, 1868 at Pinos de Baire, Gomez led a Machete Charge on foot, ambushing a Spanish column and obliterating it

The Spanish Army was terrified of these charges because the majority (there were at least 200 Spanish casualties in the attack) were infantry troops, mainly conscripts, who were fearful of being cut down by the machetes

Because the Cuban Army always lacked sufficient munitions, the usual combat technique was to shoot once and then charge the Spanish

In 1871 Gómez led a campaign to clear Guantanamo from forces loyal to Spain, in particular the rich coffee growers - mostly of French descent whose their ancestors had fled from Haiti after the Haitians slaughtered the French

Gómez carried out a bloody but successful campaign, and most of his officers went on to become high-ranking officers, including Antonio and José Maceo, Adolfo Flor Crombet, Policarpo Pineda "Rustán", and many others

Following the death in combat of Major General Ignacio Agramonte y Loynaz in May 1873, Gómez assumed the command of the military district of the province of Camaguey and its famed Cavalry Corps

Upon first inspecting the corps he concluded they were the best trained and disciplined in the nascent indigenous Cuban Army and would significantly contribute to the war for independence

Source: Wikipedia