National Anthem of Chile

Music piece by:
Eusebio Lillo and Ramón Carnicer
Testimony by:
Eduardo Ojeda
Experience in:
Campamento de Prisioneros Isla Dawson, September 1973

We arrived at Dawson Island on the afternoon of 11 September(1973) Day when the Chilean armed forces led by Augusto Pinochet overthrew President Salvador Allende.. All we knew was that we had been arrested in the morning - nothing else.

We arrived at the first detention camp, called Compingin. Music was with us all of the time on the island.

First of all, were the military songs we were forced to sing. If prisoners arrived from Pudeto, we had to sing that regiment’s anthem.

We also had to learn the anthems of the Cochrane and Telecommunications regiments. The infantrymen would say, 'here's the anthem, you have until the afternoon to learn it by heart'.

When we were in Compingin, one morning at dawn a group of ministers and senators were brought in from Santiago.

We were completely separated from each other. We wondered who the new arrivals might be. Some said: 'They’re bringing the women'.

At six o'clock in the afternoon, they lined us up to sing the National Anthem. We became aware of singing from the prisoners on the other side, the ones who had just arrived from Santiago. You could hear male voices. It wasn't the women.

In Cochrane, the marines were really ignorant about music. More than once Lanfranco sang 'Te recuerdo Amanda' (I remember you, Amanda). The marines had no idea what they were listening to.


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Published on: 16 October 2015

Pure, Chile, is your blue sky
pure breezes cross over you too
and your field of embroidered flowers
is the happy copy of Eden.

Majestic is the white mountain
that the Lord gave you for bulwark
and that sea that serenely bathes you
promises the splendour to come.

[Your names, courageous soldiers
who have been the pillar of Chile
are engraved on our breasts
our children will know it too.]The Pinochet regime reinstated this stanza, which had previously been in disuse for a long time. It was removed again when democracy was restored in 1990.

Sweet Fatherland, receive the vows
which Chileans swore on your altar.
May you be the tomb of the free
or their refuge against oppression.




Related testimonies:

  • They Say the Homeland Is (Dicen que la patria es)  Sergio Reyes Soto, Campamento de Prisioneros Isla Dawson, 1973 - 1974

    This song, like so many others, was not at all “captive”. The revolutionary songs we sang behind bars imbued us with a sense of freedom. Rolando Alarcón, and later Quilapayún, introduced “Dicen que la patria es” (or “Canción de soldados”) to Chile.

  • National Anthem of Chile  Boris Chornik Aberbuch, Campamento de Prisioneros Melinka, Puchuncaví, March 1975

    The Puchuncaví detention camp’s daily routine included mandatory participation in the ceremonies of raising and taking down the Chilean flag on the flagpole at the entrance to the camp.

  • National Anthem of Chile  anónimo, Cárcel de Valdivia / Cárcel de Isla Teja, September 1973

    I was detained in Panguipulli on 24 September 1973, along with 17 other young people. I was a high school student. I was also working at the forestry and logging company of Huilo Huilo, which had been taken over by the working class.

  • National Anthem of Chile  Sergio Vesely, Campamento de Prisioneros Melinka, Puchuncaví, 1975

    The Puchuncaví Prisoners Camp had a daily routine similar to that of military regiments. In a ridiculous ceremony, the flag was raised every morning at dawn and then it was taken down at nightfall.

  • National Anthem of Chile  Eduardo Ojeda, Campamento de Prisioneros Isla Dawson, September 1973

    We arrived at Dawson Island on the afternoon of 11 September. All we knew was that we had been arrested in the morning - nothing else.

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