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n 1960, Antonio Cosme Imbert Barrera resided at 45 Calle Caonabo in Santo Domingo. A native of Puerto
Plata, he had been the neighbor of Francisco (Queco) Rainieri Franceschini, who was born in Bologna,
Italy, in 1904, the son of an Italian family that also settled in Puerto Plata. This friendship would endure
indefinitely—between the two men and their descendants as well. It should be noted that the close re-
lationship between the Imbert and Rainieri families was also the result of the marriage of Francisco’s sister,
Yolanda Celia Rainieri Franceschini, to Enrique Manuel Imbert Peralta, Antonio Imbert’s first cousin.
Francisco married Venecia Margarita Marranzini Lepore, a native of San Juan de la Maguana and the
daughter of Italians from the Avellino region, in Campania, Italy. This family knew a portion of the details of
the events narrated below. Antonio Imbert, prior to these events, asked them to take care of his family, should
he ever need to be absent.
A momentous event that serves as benchmark in the twentieth-century history of the Dominican Republic
was the execution of the dictator Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina on the night of May 30, 1961. Among the
conspirators was the future General Antonio Cosme Imbert Barrera, who was wounded on that memorable
night, along with other conspirators. That same night, Dr. Manuel Antonio Durán Barrera,
1
Antonio’s first
cousin, treated Antonio’s wounds at his house located at 18 Calle Cayetano Rodríguez, two blocks from Aveni-
da Máximo Gómez, where the headquarters of the Ministry of Education was located at the time.
After being treated, Dr. Durán took him to his sister-in-law, Dr. Gladys de los Santos Noboa,
2
who lived a
short distance away at 15 Calle Santiago, where he would remain through the night of the 31
st
. Very early in
the morning on June 1, he asked her to take him to Calle Santiago, near the Ministry of Education; from there,
he walked to the house of Julián Suero, and his wife, Dolores Marranzini Di Piano, who was a cousin of Venice
Marranzini, the wife of Don Francisco Rainieri. The Suero Marranzini house was located at 17 Calle Elvira de
Mendoza in Santo Domingo, just two blocks from the home of Máximo Gómez.
And it is here that we provide a parenthetical anecdote, in order to insert the memories and experiences
of Frank Rainieri Marranzini—Francisco Rainieri’s son, a prominent businessman, and a good man—who has
preserved the following story about his father:
We lived in La Caonabo four houses away. My father was aware of the plans to execute Trujillo, which
were under way. On Sunday, May 28, 1961, Mother’s Day, Uncle Julián Suero Moquete and Uncle Anto-
nio Imbert, among other families, were at home. That day, Uncle Julián spoke of the shipment of rice
he had transported from San Juan de la Maguana to his warehouse in the vicinity of Mercado Modelo.
CHAPTER 18
Antonio Imbert Barrera Rescued:
Italian Families Serving the Nation
By Antonio J. Guerra Sánchez
Director of the Engineering Laboratory and member of the UNPHU Academic Committee
•