Che Guevara was captured in the Bolivian highlands
On this day · 8 October 1967
After months hunted through the mountains, the famed revolutionary was taken alive in a ravine outside La Higuera.
On October 8, 1967, the Marxist revolutionary Ernesto “Che” Guevara was captured by Bolivian soldiers in a ravine outside the village of La Higuera. For months he had led a small, dwindling guerrilla band through the rugged Bolivian highlands, tracked by an army trained and advised by the United States CIA.
According to declassified records held by the National Security Archive, the firefight began around 1 p.m.; within an hour Guevara, wounded in the leg and with his rifle disabled, had fallen into the soldiers’ hands. He was marched to La Higuera and locked overnight in the schoolhouse.
“Less than an hour into the battle the object of all the Bolivian efforts had fallen into their hands.”
His captors interrogated him through the night, hoping to extract details of the insurgency. Bolivian commanders, fearing the spectacle of a trial, instead resolved to execute him — a decision carried out the following day.
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