The event surprised at its time and the story spread so much that almost immediately the legend took shape to the point that today it is difficult for many to distinguish where one began and the other ended. Perhaps, however, during these days at the beginning of the month of May, the fluttering of the "Aura Blanca" (white vulture) will raise the serene flight of the Creole vulture that for almost two centuries has remained among us as a heritage of all generations in the memory of Puerto Principe.
The appearance of the white vulture in our city, although it was not a miracle, did become a symbol of faith and since then to date it has remained on this mysterious border of the certain-uncertain when at ten in the morning on May 2nd, 1838 all the bronze voices of the city's church bells tolled dead. They said goodbye to the Franciscan religious Vicente de la Cruz Valencia, born in Valencia, Spain, on January 13th, 1763 and who died 75 years later in Camagüey, after staying in our city for 25 years of fruitful and pious work.
It is difficult to categorize the most valuable contributions of Father Valencia to the poorest population of Camagüey, then devoured by social backwardness, illnesses and misery as a result of the medieval policy of the Spanish crown. To its credit is the San Lázaro leprosy hospital, the Carmen church, the San Roque inn, the bridge over the La Jata stream, the women's hospital and the most important pottery of its time. All these works contributed to local development and made it possible to cover hospital expenses and provide resources to the sick and helpless families whom he helped. Therefore, his death caused shock among all social classes, leaving a void that only the tenacity and work of the father Valencia had achieved. Little by little, with the economic resources exhausted, the situation of the sick in the asylum and the beggars who copulated in the town began to be desperate. This is the origin of the story.
After this story, in the middle of the chronicle-legend, it is related that an unusual character arrived at the asylum patio who easily, they say, allowed itself to be captured. It was a white vulture whose presence attracted the curiosity of numerous people, who from then on paid to observe the bird locked in a cage. They also say that with these monies the situation of those in need improved for some time. From there the fable spread wings like the vulture itself, as it was believed that the bird, more than albino, was the evangelical spirit of Father Valencia who had returned to continue helping his poor helpless, a belief that the parishioners reaffirmed by maintaining such a belief for a long time to which they dedicated prayers, poems, and the well-known work of Gertrudis Gómez de Avellaneda. El Lugareño, in its Everyday Scenes, dedicated a good amount of space to the White Vulture in the pages of the newspaper El Fanal of Port-au-Prince.
The vulture was exhibited for some time in different cities on the island until the Matanzas naturalist Francisco Ximeno, who had acquired the already embalmed bird, sold it to the Secondary Education Institute of Matanzas in 1884, and it has been preserved since then in the Museum of Natural History of the said city.
It is interesting to note that albinism is a rare but not impossible peculiarity, present in all living beings, including reptiles, insects, birds, fish and, of course, human beings. This genetic condition can change from one species to another and usually occurs through inheritance in the alteration of the gene responsible for regulating the production of pigments.
We must point out that the white vulture of Camagüey's history-legend has not been the only one captured in our territory, since until now the only region of the country that has reported the presence of albino auras is our province. In 1943 one was captured on the Tagarro farm, west of the city, and was donated to the Ignacio Agramonte provincial museum where it is still exhibited. In 1964 another white vulture arrived at the Museum of Natural Sciences of the Pre-University Institute of Camagüey but without an identification card. This specimen once disappeared. For 2021, another one was sighted over the Maraguán mountain range northeast of our city.
Translated by Linet Acuña Quilez