Accompanied by a band of 81 men on board the yacht Granma, Castro landed in eastern Cuba on December 2, 1956, but most of the force was quickly killed or captured. Among the dozen men who escaped were the Castro brothers and Ernesto (“Che”) Guevara. This small band then began a guerrilla campaign against Batista in the Sierra Maestra mountains and took the name 26th of July Movement to commemorate the 1953 attack.
