The Confederacy’s Female Cuban-American Spy

Born in 1844 to Cuban parents, Dolores “Lola” Sánchez was one of five children alongside her siblings Emiliano, John Henry, Francesca (who was referred to as “Panchita”) and Eugenia who grew up in the vicinity of the town of Palatka, which was a major shipping port and tourist spot in the 1840s. The family tended to their father and to their mother who suffered from an infirmity. When the Civil War broke out in the early 1860s, Palatka was initially occupied by Confederate troops. One of Lola’s brothers served alongside them. On October 7, 1862, however, the USS Cimarron gunboat fired some shells, and soon thereafter, Palatka was occupied by Union troops.

Initially, Lola avoided getting herself involved in the Civil War. That would all ultimately change, however, when her father Mauricio was falsely accused of being a spy for the Confederacy, despite information leaks continuing after his arrest. It is said that this was due to one of Lola’s siblings serving in the Confederate army. Mauricio was imprisoned at the Castillo San Marcos in St. Augustine and a few Union troops were stationed to keep watch at and occasionally search the Sánchez home. Despite their attempts to negotiate their fathers’ release, the Union troops repeatedly refused to release the elder Sánchez from his imprisonment.

The Sánchez sisters spent their evenings entertaining Union officers which included preparing Cuban coffee, home-made cuisine, light conversation, singing and even Spanish guitar music. At one point however, Lola overheard the troops speaking about a morning gunboat raid at Camp Davis near St. Augustine followed by an ambush on Confederate soldiers to steal their supplies while they slept, all of which was to be carried out the following day. After telling her sisters, Lola got on her horse and rode to the St. John’s River where she took a small boat. She then met a Confederate guard who gave her his horse so she can ride off to Camp Davis. At Camp Davis, she met with Captain J. J. Dickison and told him of what she had overheard. She then rushed back home so that the Union troops wouldn’t begin to suspect her of doing anything suspicious. During her absence, her sisters distracted the troops by cooking for them.

The following day on May 22, 1864, the planned Union raid at Camp Davis ended in failure, with the Confederate troops not only ambushing and sinking their vessel, the USS Columbine, they captured most of the Union troops, killed one of their generals and even captured one of their colonels, William Noble. This encounter became known as the Battle of Horse Landing which gave the Confederates a victory over the Union troops. During the years after the Civil War, she married a former Confederate soldier named Emmanuel Lopez (of the 3rd Florida Infantry, Company B) and had a daughter named Leonicia who was born in St. Augustine. Lola passed away in 1895 and was buried in Palatka and is remembered for being a Confederate spy. Her sisters also married former Confederate soldiers.