Ángela Jiménez

Ángela Jiménez, alias Lieutenant Ángel (January 6, 1886–1990) was a soldadera (woman fighter) during the Mexican Revolution. She performed different duties such as a flag bearer, spy and sometimes cook. She was also an expert in explosives.

Jiménez left the state of Oaxaca and fought in the center and north of the country with the Villaistas and Zapatistas.

Biography

Early life Jiménez was the daughter of a Zapotec mother and a Spaniard. Her father was the Political Chief of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec under the Porfirian regime. Growing up, she lived in a Spanish style hacienda surrounded by a barrier of trees and running brooks. She would often skip school to play in the countryside while her father's workers searched for her

In 1910, when the Mexican revolution first began, her father tried to pacify the Zapotec by reading Madero's Manifiesto a la Nación and reassuring them that Diaz would resign. When that didn't happen, small groups began to form and they named her father as their leader.

In 1916, General Jacinto Trevino captured Jiménez, her father, and other soldiers and took them to Chihuahua to have them executed. Her father, upset that they were going to die, gave Jiménez his belt filled with gold coins and centeranios. Jiménez bought food from a peddler that was allowed to enter the prison, and after slipping her a gold coin, she brought Jiménez women's clothing that she used to escape from prison. While free, she stayed with the peddler, Maria, and her children and eventually met a railroad worker for the Carranzistas.

Ángela Jiménez died in 1990.