BIO: Fred Duany, Tillard Pen Pictures, 1911, Blair County, PA

Contributed April 2003 for use in the USGenWeb Archives 
by Judy Banja <jbanja@comcast.net>

Copyright 2003.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/blair/
_________________________________________ 

                Pen Pictures of Friends and Reminiscent Sketches
                                by J. N. Tillard

             Altoona, PA: William F. Gable & Co., Mirror Press, 1911 

                           FRED DUANY, Cuban Patriot
                   Singular and Exciting History of a Quiet,
                    Esteemed Resident of The Mountain City

THE local Pennsylvania Railroad Shops have given employment to many men with 
singular and exciting histories. Quiet men, most of them without any 
inclination to call attention to whatever heroic deeds or unusual 
achievements may have figured in their past, they have not been noticed in 
the great mass and have passed out without special mention.
  The writer during nearly twenty-five years spent in the big plant, formed 
the acquaintance of many such. Men from all lands, who by strange freaks of 
the wheel of fortune, had found themselves in the ranks of the workers in the 
Mountain City. Some of them had been men of wealth and position in their 
youth, and not a few had at one time in their lives successfully practiced 
one of the learned professions. Nearly every country on the globe had been 
traversed by these wanderers; there were those who had gazed at the Southern 
Cross from the Royal Observatory in South Africa; sought the North Pole with 
some one of the explorers of the frozen seas, or had exciting adventures in 
Australia, India and China.
  Among those who are still on the rolls of the Juniata Shops is a Cuban 
patriot in the person of Mr. Fred Duany of 227 East Fifth Avenue. His father, 
Diego Duany, when Fred was born sixty-nine years ago, was possessed of sugar 
plantations near Santiago de Cuba, that employed five thousand slaves, while 
his family were among the most prominent on the island. Their possessions 
were many and their prosperity was great, but they had the instincts of 
freemen in their blood and the Spanish rule became more irksome day by day. 
The tyranical practices of the mother country were not abated in spite of 
their protests, and when the brave but ill advised Lopez and equally brave, 
if misguided, American, Crittenden, hatched up what has been known as the 
"Lopez Conspiracy," the Duany family risked their lives, their fortunes and 
their sacred all in the venture. 
  The uprising failed for the reason that the fear of negro domination and 
outrage was so great among the leading Cuban families, and then the support 
of the United States, promised by Crittenden, totally failed to materialize 
and they were regarded as filibusters pure and simple. After the memorable 
proclamation of President Fillmore, Crittenden and sixty of his American 
adherents were shot at Atares by the Spanish soldiery, and the Cuban patriots 
were obliged to flee for their lives, abandoning all their earthly 
possessions except what money and jewelry they were in possession of.
  The Duanys became fugitives in Europe, going for the most part to France 
and Italy. Diego sent the other members of his family to France, but hoping 
that he might at some time regain his sugar plantations, he took his son, 
Fred, who was then ten years old, to New York in order to be educated and 
later to learn the machinist trade as practiced by the Yankees, in order that 
he might be able to superintend the machinery in the sugar industry.
  Fred was placed in the famous private school maintained in New York by the 
father of Frederick Coudert, the celebrated lawyer, and his father followed 
the other members of the family to Europe until the conditions in Cuba might 
grow more favorable. He remained in Professor Coudert's School for three 
years, where, among his other accomplishments, he learned to speak and write 
French and English, and then went to Philadelphia where he entered the big 
machine shops of I. P. Morris & Co.
  After completing his apprenticeship, he went to Cuba and managed the 
estates of his relatives, grinding out sugar crops during the season and 
returning to Philadelphia for the balance of the year. His father had in the 
meantime returned to Cuba, but finding himself under proscription, went to 
Jamaica which he made his headquarters.
  Mr. Duany handled the sugar business until the "ten years' war" broke out 
when he accepted a commission as colonel under General Louis Marcano and 
fought through nearly all of that bloody and terrible conflict. He was 
several times severely wounded and bears across his broad chest a terrible 
scar where a heavy ball tore its way, crushing the breast bone. He was not in 
any sense a soldier of fortune, but quite the reverse; he served for nothing 
and paid his own expenses except such sustenance as he could command.
  It was a terrible experience for a young man and required the greatest 
fortitude and courage to endure it all for pure love of country. He once was 
taken prisoner and only escaped an ignominious death by the garrote by the 
interference and influence of his uncle who did not make known their 
relationship to the Spanish authorities. Mr. Duany had been commissioned by 
Maximo Gomez to open negotiations with his uncle and several other planters, 
but when he arrived at his uncle's estate, that gentleman was absent and Fred 
was betrayed to the Spanish by a negro. He managed to get in communication 
with his relative and escaped execution, but was compelled to leave the 
island.
  Shortly afterward he came to Philadelphia where he was married. Accepting a 
commission for a syndicate of sugar planters in Venezuela, South America, to 
set up sugar producing machinery, he took his young wife to that country 
where his eldest son was born. Here he remained for several years, his skill 
and experience in the mechanical arts serving him in good stead and he not 
only set up and operated the improved machinery sent from the United States, 
but made many improvements generally in the sugar manufacturing business in 
that section. He then returned to Cuba with the hope that he might be able to 
remain in the land of his birth for which he always retained a warm and 
enduring affection, but it was not to be. He was there for six months in 
constant danger, as he was still on the proscriptive list and he might be 
taken and executed at any time by the authorities.
  He returned to Philadelphia and then to the home of Mrs. Duany's people at 
Middletown. Here he heard of the great railroad shops at Altoona and likewise 
heard of an old friend in authority here. On one of his several voyages 
between Cuba and the United States, he had met on the steamer a young 
Frenchman named F. D. Cassanave who was on his way to New York to learn the 
machinist trade. Mr. Duany persuaded him that he would find better 
opportunities in this direction in Philadelphia; and he accordingly went 
there and following the advice of his new-found friend, went to work in a 
Philadelphia shop. In the meantime he had succeeded so well that he was now 
assistant master mechanic at the Altoona Machine Shops, and to him Mr. Duany 
applied for a place, which was given him.
  Leaving behind him his adventurous youth, this man of many vicissitudes has 
been here ever since. Good citizen, good workman and worthy man. He has 
almost reached his three score and ten, and the fiery trials that he went 
through in the long ago have left their marks upon him and he is not so 
strong as he once was. His eyes still turn longingly to the land of his 
nativity whose freedom came too late to give him an abiding place, and he is 
contemplating another visit before he goes hence on the long road.

                                      #