This Is Meant For My 'Blog'

Billy Morgan was a harebrained 'free booter' who attained the rank of Comandante in Cuba's Rebel Army and fought along with Che Guevara in the "Frente Escambray". He was the only 'gringo' to have attained that rank in the Rebel Army. But the CIA got to him, it seems, and he was tried and sentenced to be shot. I interviewed him the day before the execution and he gave me a letter for his mother which I transcribed textually and sent over the UP wire as a news story.

Time warp: Just talked to Olga, William Morgan's ex-wife. Or should it be ex-widow? She is remarried to a man in Toledo, Ohio. I met her fleetingly (literally) as she was leaving her 'asylum' status at the Braziian Embassy residence in Havana the very day I arrived there. She had donned a blonde wig and hoped she would not be recognized in Santa Clara, where she had friends in the regime she had hoped would intervene on behalf of Billy who was about to be sentenced to be shot. But it would not be. The moment she arrived in Santa Clara somebody recognized her in the street, called her name and she, taken aback, responded. That was when the G-2 agents led her away. She was sentenced to 30 years in jail but would have to serve only 12 before being released for goodcondct'. She gave me the name of the other 'Comandante' who was shot with Morgan: Jose Carreras. She will be in Miami later this month for a meeting of Alpha 66.