The Wild Life of William Morgan, Yanqui Comandante Turned Cuban Counterrevolutionary
One of the Cuban Revolution’s most colorful characters was William Morgan, a former circus performer from Toledo, Ohio, who became a commander in the rebel forces. But Morgan's final act was his most brazen: he became a counterrevolutionary for the CIA.
William Morgan, a US-born commander in Cuba’s rebel army, later stockpiled weapons for a CIA-backed coup against Fidel Castro’s government. (Lester Cole / CORBIS via Getty Images)
“Cuba shipped a million dollars’ worth of frogs’ legs to the US last year,” William Morgan, an American expat, declared shortly after the 1959 Cuban Revolution. “I’m going to double that.”
Morgan was an adventurous man with glowing blue eyes, blond hair, and a personality that engulfed him in a constant stream of trouble. He was “nomadic, egocentric, impulsive, and utterly irresponsible,” according to the file the CIA later made on him. In a word, he was bored — constantly and profoundly.
Two years earlier, Morgan had joined the rebels as a twenty-nine-year-old, only to fall out with them after the revolution succeeded. But with Fidel Castro’s new government pushing agrarian reform and eager to fund new enterprises, it got behind Morgan’s plans for a bullfrog hatchery. And then, in yet another twist, Morgan secretly began using the hatchery as a weapons depot for a CIA-backed coup.
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