Cabeza de Perro

Santa Cruz de Tenerife · Category: Memory · Subcategory: Testimonies · Year: S. XIX

The figure of the pirate “Cabeza de Perro” is presented to us amid legendary mists that are historically unclear. His fanciful life, possibly based on reality, is mainly narrated in a novel written in 1897 by the Tenerife-born Aurelio Pérez Zamora titled Sor Milagros o Secretos de Cuba . Years later, to further enlarge the myth, the Cuban writer Dulce María Loynaz included the adventures of this pirate in her work Un verano en Tenerife . Likewise, many local writers and journalists (Luis Álvarez Cruz, Miguel Borges Salas, Carlos García…) have focused on the legendary figure of Cabeza de Perro, whose story, in broad strokes, is as follows:   

Ángel García, better known as Cabeza de Perro, according to tradition, was born at the end of the 18th century or the beginning of the next in the small hamlet of Igueste de San Andrés. From childhood he was mistreated and abandoned to his fate, growing up sullen and surly. His nickname “Cabeza de Perro” came from his unpleasant physical features: thick and stocky body, flat nose, small eyes, large mouth, spaced teeth, and a deformed and swollen head which he always kept covered to disguise his deformity. 

He soon learned the trade of the sea and after crossing the Atlantic gained a reputation for brutality and bloodthirstiness in his raids through the Caribbean on his ship Invencible as a slave smuggler, plunderer and pirate. The worst crime he is known for was the assault he carried out on the brigantine El Audaz on its route from Havana to New York. In the skirmish he stabbed the crew and passengers, except for a woman and her small child, who had hidden; however, when both were discovered he threw them into the sea, while sinking the ship and making his escape. It seems that from that moment the pirate changed his attitude, as the child's crying while drowning was imprinted on his mind, causing him deep resentment. It was then that in Havana, where he had his home port and residence, he began to think about returning to his homeland.

He returned, and upon arriving at the port of Santa Cruz de Tenerife, his ugly appearance as an eccentric indiano dressed in wide trousers above the ankles, a jacket with large skirts, wide-brimmed hat and umbrella, as well as carrying a cage with a parrot inside, was the cause of jocular comments as well as mockery by a crowd of children who usually wandered idly around the dock. The jeers and insults provoked the anger of the newcomer who began swinging his umbrella wildly. After the intervention of the authorities, the former pirate was found with a knife whose handle shaped like a dog's head gave him away. He was immediately arrested. 

Imprisoned in the castle of Paso Alto, it is said he entertained himself by making small wooden boats. Later he was sentenced to death, a sentence carried out by public execution south of the San Carlos barracks, in what was then known as Los Llanos de los Anacletos. The accounts tell us that many people attended his execution and that the pirate travelled through the whole town, from Paso Alto to Los Llanos, with a proud and solemn attitude, guarded by bayonets. Upon reaching the place of execution he requested, as a last wish, to smoke a cigar, after which he was shot.  

The story of Cabeza de Perro, wrapped in legend, immediately took hold in popular mentality. His romantic yet repugnant figure, along with the novelistic presumption that he might have hidden a treasure somewhere in the city (Igueste or Los Llanos), gave the whole tale the character of a folk story that has endured.

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