In the 1880’s, the Island would traverse a period of great economic and social changes. Spain finally abolished slavery in 1886, much weakened as a result of the Ten Years’ War. This brought notable transformations in the organization of sugar production that reached, at last, the rank of industry. Cuba’s economic dependence from the United States was bound to be practically complete and absolute while US capitals investment was more and more present in several sectors of the economy.

The bourgeoisie in the Island, estranged from their independence aspirations, had formed two major political groups or parties: the Liberal Party, which would later become the Autonomist Party, and the Constitutional Union. The former was resuming the old trend of trying to obtain some reforms within the Spanish colonial system, aiming at an eventual home-rule. The latter was the most reactionary expression of the sectors interested in the full integration of Cuba into Spain. Meanwhile, mostly the Cubans that had been forced to emigrate to the United States and other countries were supporting the efforts for independence, more popularly rooted. A first outbreak, the "Guerra Chiquita" (Short War) in 1879, once again sent the Cubans to the battle fields in the Eastern and Central regions, but was easily controlled after a few months due to its lack of organization and political coherence. Several landings, conspiracies and uprisings followed, usually organized by military chiefs of the Ten Years War, but were aborted or suffocated by the Spanish authorities because of the rebels’ incapacity to articulate their actions with a more comprehensive and united movement within the masses. That would be José Martí's task.

Gifted with exquisite poetic sensibility and being a terrific and bright speaker, Martí also possessed a tremendous foresight and a profound political thought, enriched by the experience of the years he lived in Spain, the United States and other Latin American countries.

All his work for the union of the Cuban revolutionaries, mainly among the Cuban emigrates in the United Sates, had an important repercussion in Cuba, and became a reality in 1892, when the Cuban Revolutionary Party was founded. Conceived as the only and unique organization of all the Cubans in favor of independence, the Party had to find the means, both material and human, for the new liberation endeavor. At the same time, it should grant the military chiefs the indispensable political authority to carry out the "necessary war."

The war started on February 24, 1895. Martí landed in Cuba with Máximo Gómez, General in Chief of the Liberation Army, and shortly after was killed in combat at Dos Ríos. Though Martí’s death was a terrible loss for the Revolution, the revolutionary movement became stronger and stronger in the province of Oriente, where Maceo -who had come in an expedition from Costa Rica- had taken command of the mambí troops, and extended the actions to the provinces of Camagüey and Las Villas. Delegates of the Liberation Army met in Jimaguayú to draft the constitution that would rule the destiny of the Republic in Arms. The Assembly elected Salvador Cisneros Betancourt, a patrician from Camagüey, for the Presidential post, and appointed Máximo Gómez General in Chief of the Liberation Army. And Maceo was appointed as Lieutenant General. Shortly after, Maceo would set out from Baraguá commanding a column that would carry out the invasion to the Western regions together with the forces under the command of Máximo Gómez, who was waiting for Maceo in Las Villas.

After the victories at Mal Tiempo, Coliseo and Calimete, the invading troops entered in the province of La Habana panicking the colonial authorities in the capital. Maceo’s troops arrived in Mantua, the most Western town in Cuba. The invasion had met its objectives: the war was making devastating effects in the whole territory, whose main productions dropped dramatically. This time, Spain was prevented from taking out from the Island the necessary resources to fight her own independence.

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