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Show The Great Escape • 9 The cells in Punta Carretas were not all bars for walls; they didn't even have bars for doors. Then walls were a foot-and-a-half thick and made of field brick, a brick somewhat bigger than I'm used to, but not as tall and certainly not as hollow as a cinder block. The cells had thick wood-and-metal doors with a small metal grate and opening for food and conversation. There was a toilet in one corner, bunk beds on one wall, and sometimes a desk. Not even the visitation room had bars until after July 17, 1971, when Raul Bidegain, a Tupamaro leader, walked out of prison while his younger brother, who had come to visit him, remained in his place. From their woodwork classes, the Tupamaros collected metal wires and shims. These they used to scrape away the mortar between the field bricks in then cell walls. Originally, then purpose was to break off the back side of a brick so they could hide censored newspapers and magazines, but once everybody started doing it, they realized that if they could perforate a small hole through to the next cell, then men on both sides could hold the ends of a twisted wire, which they would pull back and forth, eating away the mortar between a group of several bricks, until they could remove a section of wall and pass from one cell to the next. They disposed of the mortar dust in then toilets or on the soccer field, and they covered the evidence of then work by stuffing paper in the cracks between the bricks and plastering and painting the surface, or sometimes strategically placing a poster. They got the plaster from then families in bags marked "flour." And though it was more complicated, they were also able to connect the cells at the far end of the corridor top-to-bottom by perforating the fioor/ceiling and creating a removable camouflaged hatch. They didn't get caught because they had negotiated with the warden an end to surprise cell inspections, claiming that it made them nervous. Given the schedule of cell inspections, they knew they had a little over half a month to complete their escape tunnel. They had also, through negotiations and pretensions, managed to get cell transfers for all the companeros who would participate in the escape. The Tupamaros were on the second and third floors of the four-story |