Tulane University

Last Friday, January 17th the Stone Center for Latin American Studies sponsored the New Orleans Theatrical premiere of Rebel. The film explores the secret life of Loreta Velázquez, New Orleans Cuban immigrant and Confederate Soldier turned Union Spy. Shrouded in mystery and long the subject of debate, the story of Loreta Velázquez is one of the Civil War’s most gripping forgotten narratives. Loreta Janeta Velázquez, a Cuban immigrant raised in New Orleans’ French Quarter, was one of the estimated 1000 women who secretly served as soldiers during the American Civil War. Who was she? Why did she fight? And what made her so dangerous that she has been virtually erased from history?

The event brought more than 150 people out to the Ogden Museum to learn more about Velázquez and to meet the filmmaker María Agui Carter who was a Rockefeller Fellow at the Stone Center in 2002-2003. The event was sponsored by Tulane University’s Stone Center for Latin American Studies, the Newcomb College Institute, and funded in part through the Silverstein Film Fund administered by the Communication Department.

This film is an excellent resource for teachers interested in adding another “voice” to the American Civil War, Louisiana History, and it serves as an excellent resource for Latin American Studies students. If you are teaching in the classroom, you may want to check out the 30 minute version of the film through LARC’s lending library. and view the grades 6 – 12 curricular resources created by PBS Learning Media.

Watch a preview of the film here.