The Associated Press

TOLEDO, Ohio -- The widow of an American who was part of Fidel Castro's Cuban guerrilla army has asked that his remains be returned to his hometown.

``This is where he belongs,'' said Olga Goodwin, who also fought in the Cuban revolution but was later imprisoned.

Her husband, William Morgan, was executed by a Cuban firing squad in 1961 at age 33.

A year earlier he had been hailed as a hero of the revolt that put Castro in power. Morgan was known as the ``Yanqui Comandante'' and was promoted to major,
the highest rank to be given a non-Cuban in Castro's forces.

After the war he was mobbed on the streets of Havana by people wanting his autograph.

``He was like a rock star,'' Enrique Encinosa, a Cuban author who met Morgan in the summer of 1959, told The Blade in a three-part series that began Sunday. ``He
had that joking, light-hearted demeanor and he was very tough, very Cuban in his attitude.''

But after the revolution, Morgan began criticizing the direction of Castro and his government. He spoke out against Communism and openly questioned why Castro
was courting leaders in the Soviet Union.

Castro began a crackdown against government dissidents and had several of Morgan's former fighters arrested. The Cuban government arrested Morgan on Oct.
17, 1960, accusing him of being a spy and operative for ``foreign interests.''

U.S. State Department and FBI documents that have since been declassified contain no evidence that Morgan was associated with the CIA as the Cubans had said,
The Blade reported.

Morgan was charged with state treason and faced execution even though records show the allegations would have drawn only a nine-year sentence under Cuban
law, the newspaper said.

His wife also was convicted in 1961. She was arrested two days after his death and spent 12 years in Cuban prisons.

Years after her release, she was given permission to join the refugees who migrated to the United States in 1980. By the following year, she was living in Toledo.

``I wanted to be here because of William,'' said Goodwin, 65. ``Ever since I was in prison in Cuba, I wanted to be here.''

Morgan's remains are in a cemetery in Havana.

Goodwin said she had not received an answer to her request from the Cuban Interests Section within the Swiss embassy in Washington but will continue asking the
Castro government for a resolution.

Luis Fernandez, a Cuban press attache, said such requests have been granted.

But when told by The Blade of the request from Morgan's widow, he declined comment, referring all questions to the Cuban consulate office. Messages left at the
consulate were not returned.

``This is the last thing the Cuban government wants,'' said Eloy Gutierrez Menoyo, 68, who fought with Morgan. ``Cuba doesn't want to relive that memory.

It's not a good time.''

People who remember Morgan said he had a troubled youth.

``He was restless, always restless,'' said his sister, Carroll Costain, of Toledo. ``He couldn't stay in one place too long. ... One minute he's gone, and the next thing
he's fighting in the Cuban revolution.''

By the time he was 16, he had run away three times and was arrested on a charge of grand larceny. Records show he was asked to leave one Toledo high school
and attended two more, spending less than three months in each.

He joined the Army in 1946 and went absent without leave one year later, shortly after being transferred to Japan. He was court-martialed and sentenced to three
months at hard labor but overpowered a guard and escaped a month later.

Morgan was caught and sentenced to five years at Camp Cook, Calif.

He returned to Toledo and eventually drifted to Florida and then to Cuba, where he met and married Goodwin, his third wife.

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