This is the last installment of my series of blog posts in honor of my late father, Francisco Guerra, a veteran of Brigade 2506, Sixth Battalion.

“The last battle had an epic quality all the more tragic because it was so hopeless. It did not affect the outcome or even add a footnote to history. It was merely another moment when the men [of Brigade 2506] tried against great odds and failed.”

Haynes Johnson, The Bay of Pigs: The Leaders’ Story of Brigade 2506 (1964), p. 163.

***

Wednesday, 19 April (D-Day +2)

On the road from Playa Larga (Red Beach) to Playa Girón (Blue Beach) — what I have called “the road with no name” — the men of the Sixth Battalion prepared for what would be their final engagement with the enemy — a Quixotic battle that would become known as “The Last Stand of Girón“. The previous night (18 April), their new battalion leader, Erneido Oliva (pictured below), had selected a strategic spot where the road curved. (See Johnson 1964, p. 163; see also Triay 2001, p. 80. Recall that Oliva had assumed direct command of the men of the Sixth Battalion on 18 April after their former chief, Francisco Montiel, was wounded.)

According to one account, at around 7:00 AM Oliva positioned his remaining big guns — seven bazookas — by the bend in the road and stationed the Sixth Battalion, armed only with rifles, in front of the bazookas. (See Johnson 1964, p. 163; see also Triay 2001, p. 80.) He then spoke with brigade commander Pepe San Román by radio, telling him that that a major attack was imminent and that he needed reinforcements. (Johnson 1964, pp. 163-164.) “Fifteen minutes later the Second Battalion arrived, and then ten minutes after that three Brigade tanks.” (Ibid., p. 164.)

The fighting began at 9:45 AM, and in the course of battle brigade forces knocked out three enemy tanks and an armored truck. By 12:30 AM the enemy fell back. (Johnson 1964, pp. 164-165.) But the enemy had more men and more ammunition, and they resumed their attack at two o’clock. (Ibid., p. 165.) With precious little ammunition, Oliva’s men now found themselves engaged in hand-to-hand combat. (Ibid.; see also Triay 2001, p. 81.)

Somehow, against all odds, they were able to stop the advance.

Although the brave men of the Second and Sixth Battalions were able to hold the line, they were now out of ammunition. Some men were sent back to Playa Girón (Blue Beach) for more ammo. (Johnson 1964, p. 166.) In the meantime, Oliva had lost radio contact with brigade commander Pepe San Román, so during a lull in the fighting, around 4:15 PM, Oliva went back to brigade headquarters at Blue Beach to confer with San Román. (Ibid., p. 169.) When he arrived at the command post, however, he saw the radio equipment destroyed and the maps burned. The eerie headquarters were all but abandoned. (Ibid., p. 171.) What happened next is heartbreaking:

"Thinking that he and his men had been betrayed by the Americans and abandoned by his own Brigade commander, Oliva, surrounded by three hundred of the Second and Sixth Battalions, tore off his shirt, shook his fist toward the sea and shouted that he would not abandon them; that they would die like men facing the enemy. 'I can still see Oliva standing there, shaking his fist,' one said long after." (Ibid.)

Until the end, Oliva and his men did not know they had been beaten. All they knew is that they had been betrayed.