Máximo Gómez y Báez (November 18, 1836 – June 17, 1905) was a Dominican Generalissimo in Cuba's War of Independence (1895–1898). He was known for his controversial scorched-earth policy, which entailed dynamiting passenger trains and torching the Spanish loyalists' property and sugar plantations—including many owned by Americans. He greatly increased the efficacy of the attacks by torturing and killing not only Spanish soldiers, but also Spanish sympathizers. By the time the Spanish–American War broke out in April 1898, Gómez had the Spanish forces on the ropes. He refused to join forces with the Spanish in fighting off the United States, and he retired to a villa outside of Havana after the war's end. Early life Gómez was born on November 18, 1836 in the town of Baní, in the province of Peravia, in what is now the Dominican Republic. During his teenage years, he joined in the battles against the frequent Haitian incursions of Faustin Soulouque in the 1850s. He was later trained as an officer of the Spanish Army at the Zaragoza Military Academy in Spain. He had arrived originally in Cuba as a cavalry officer, a captain, in the Spanish Army and fought alongside the Spanish forces in the Dominican Annexation War (1861–1865), earning promotion from captain to commander in a famous victory over the Dominican general, Pedro Florentino. In Cuba, he married Bernarda Toro, who accompanied him during the war. Changes allegiance After the Spanish forces were defeated and fled the Dominican Republic in 1865 by the order of Queen Isabel II, many supporters of the Annexionist cause left with them, and Gómez moved his family to Cuba. Gómez retired from the Spanish Army and soon took up the rebel cause in 1868, helping transform the Cuban Army's military tactics and strategy from the conventional approach, favored by Thomas Jordan and others. He gave the Cuban mambises their most feared tactic, the "machete charge." Cuban War of Independence On October 25, 1868, during the Battle of Pino de Baire, Gómez led a machete charge on foot, ambushing a Spanish column and obliterating it; the Spanish suffered 233 casualties. The Spanish Army was terrified of the charges because most were infantry troops, mainly conscripts, who were fearful of being cut down by the machetes. Because the Cuban Army always lacked sufficient munitions, the usual combat technique was to shoot once and then charge the Spanish. In 1871, Gómez