



Produced by Chuck Greif and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was
produced from scanned images of public domain material
from the Google Print project.)









CAMPAIGNING IN
CUBA

BY
GEORGE KENNAN
AUTHOR OF "SIBERIA AND THE EXILE SYSTEM"

NEW YORK
THE CENTURY CO.
1899




CONTENTS

CHAPTER                                                             PAGE

I. STARTING FOR THE FIELD                                              1

II. UNDER THE RED CROSS                                               10

III. ON THE EDGE OF WAR                                               23

IV. WAR CORRESPONDENTS AND DESPATCH-BOATS                             35

V. OFF FOR SANTIAGO                                                   44

VI. THE CUBAN COAST                                                   53

VII. THE FIGHT AT GUANTANAMO                                          65

VIII. THE LANDING AND ADVANCE OF THE ARMY                             76

IX. A WALK TO THE FRONT                                               88

X. SIBONEY ON THE EVE OF BATTLE                                      104

XI. THE BATTLES OF CANEY AND SAN JUAN                                116

XII. THE FIELD-HOSPITAL                                              130

XIII. SIBONEY DURING THE ARMISTICE                                   150

XIV. ENTERING SANTIAGO HARBOR                                        164

XV. THE CAPTURED CITY                                                171

XVI. THE FEEDING OF THE HUNGRY                                       182

XVII. MORRO CASTLE                                                   192

XVIII. FEVER IN THE ARMY                                             213

XIX. THE SANTIAGO CAMPAIGN                                           222

XX. THE SANTIAGO CAMPAIGN (_Continued_)                              237

XXI. THE SANTIAGO CAMPAIGN (_Concluded_)                             256




CAMPAIGNING IN CUBA




CHAPTER I

STARTING FOR THE FIELD


War broke out between the United States and Spain on April 21, 1898. A
week or ten days later I was asked by the editors of the "Outlook" of
New York to go to Cuba with Miss Clara Barton, on the Red Cross steamer
_State of Texas_, and report the war and the work of the Red Cross for
that periodical. After a hasty conference with the editorial and
business staffs of the paper I was to represent, I accepted the
proposition, and on May 5 left Washington for Key West, where the _State
of Texas_ was awaiting orders from the Navy Department. The army of
invasion, under command of General Shafter, was then assembling at
Tampa, and it was expected that a hostile movement to some point on the
Cuban coast would be made before the end of the month.

I reached Tampa on the evening of Friday, May 6. The Pullman cars of the
Florida express, at that time, ran through the city of Tampa and across
the river into the spacious grounds of the beautiful Tampa Bay Hotel,
which, after closing for the regular winter season, had been compelled
to reopen its doors--partly to accommodate the large number of officers
and war correspondents who had assembled there with their wives and
friends, and partly to serve as headquarters for the army of Cuban
invasion.

It was a warm, clear Southern night when we arrived, and the scene
presented by the hotel and its environment, as we stepped out of the
train, was one of unexpected brilliancy and beauty. A nearly full moon
was just rising over the trees on the eastern side of the hotel park,
touching with silver the drifts of white blossoms on dark masses of
oleander-trees in the foreground, and flooding with soft yellow light
the domes, Moorish arches, and long facade of the whole immense
building. Two regimental bands were playing waltzes and patriotic airs
under a long row of incandescent lights on the broad veranda;
fine-looking, sunbrowned men, in all the varied uniforms of army and
navy, were gathered in groups here and there, smoking, talking, or
listening to the music; the rotunda was crowded with officers, war
correspondents, and gaily attired ladies, and the impression made upon a
newcomer, as he alighted from the train, was that of a brilliant
military ball at a fashionable seaside summer resort. Of the serious and
tragic side of war there was hardly a suggestion.

On the morning after our arrival I took a carriage and drove around the
city and out to the camp, which was situated about a mile and a half
from the hotel on the other side of the river. In the city itself I was
unpleasantly disappointed. The showy architecture, beautiful grounds,
semi-tropical foliage, and brilliant flowers of the Tampa Bay Hotel
raise expectations which the town across the river does not fulfil. It
is a huddled collection of generally insignificant buildings standing in
an arid desert of sand, and to me it suggested the city of
Semipalatinsk--a wretched, verdure-less town in southern Siberia,
colloquially known to Russian army officers as "the Devil's Sand-box."
Thriving and prosperous Tampa may be, but attractive or pleasing it
certainly is not.

As soon as I got away, however, from the hotel and into the streets of
the town, I saw at almost every step suggestions of the serious and
practical side, if not the tragic side, of war. Long trains of four-mule
wagons loaded with provisions, camp equipage, and lumber moved slowly
through the soft, deep sand of the unpaved streets in the direction of
the encampment; the sidewalks were thronged with picturesquely dressed
Cuban volunteers from the town, sailors from the troop-ships, soldiers
from the camp, and war correspondents from everywhere; mounted orderlies
went tearing back and forth with despatches to or from the army
headquarters in the Tampa Bay Hotel; Cuban and American flags were
displayed in front of every restaurant, hotel, and Cuban cigar-shop, and
floated from the roofs or windows of many private houses; and now and
then I met, coming out of a drug-store, an army surgeon or hospital
steward whose left arm bore the red cross of the Geneva Convention.

The army that was destined to begin the invasion of Cuba consisted, at
that time, of ten or twelve thousand men, all regulars, and included an
adequate force of cavalry and ten fine batteries of field-artillery. It
was encamped in an extensive forest of large but scattered pine-trees,
about a mile from the town, and seemed already to have made itself very
much at home in its new environment.

The first thing that struck me in going through the camp was its
businesslike aspect. It did not suggest a big picnic, nor an encampment
of militia for annual summer drill. It was manifestly a camp of
veterans; and although its dirty, weather-beaten tents were pitched here
and there without any attempt at regularity of arrangement, and its camp
equipage, cooking-utensils, and weapons were piled or stacked between
the tents in a somewhat disorderly fashion, as if thrown about at
random, I could see that the irregularity and disorder were only
apparent, and were really the irregularity and disorder of knowledge and
experience gained by long and varied service in the field. I did not
need the inscriptions--"Fort Reno" and "Fort Sill"--on the army wagons
to assure me that these were veteran troops from the Plains, to whom
campaigning was not a new thing.

As we drove up to the camp, smoke was rising lazily into the warm summer
air from a dozen fires in different parts of the grounds; company cooks
were putting the knives, forks, and dishes that they had just washed
into improvised cup-boards made by nailing boxes and tomato-crates
against the trees; officers in fatigue-uniform were sitting in
camp-chairs, here and there, reading the latest New York papers; and
thousands of soldiers, both inside and outside the sentry-lines, were
standing in groups discussing the naval fight off Manila, lounging and
smoking on the ground in the shade of the army wagons, playing hand-ball
to pass away the time, or swarming around a big board shanty, just
outside the lines, which called itself "NOAH'S ARK" and announced in big
letters its readiness to dispense cooling drinks to all comers at a
reasonable price.

The troops in all branches of the army at Tampa impressed me very
favorably. The soldiers were generally stalwart, sunburnt,
resolute-looking men, twenty-five to thirty-five years of age, who
seemed to be in perfect physical condition, and who looked as if they
had already seen hard service and were ready and anxious for more. In
field-artillery the force was particularly strong, and our officers in
Tampa based their confident expectation of victory largely upon the
anticipated work of the ten batteries of fine, modern field-guns which
General Shafter then intended to take with him. Owing to lack of
transportation facilities, however, or for some other reason to me
unknown, six of these batteries were left in Tampa when the army sailed
for Santiago, and the need of them was severely felt, a few weeks later,
at Caney and San Juan.

Upon my return from the camp I called upon General Shafter, presented my
letter of introduction from the President, and said I wished to consult
him briefly with regard to the future work of the American National Red
Cross. He received me cordially, said that our organization would soon
have a great and important work to do in Cuba in caring for the
destitute and starving reconcentrados, and that he would gladly afford
us all possible facilities and protection. The Red Cross corps of the
army medical department, he said, would be fully competent to take care
of all the sick and wounded soldiers in the field; but there would be
ample room for our supplementary work in relieving the distress of the
starving Cuban peasants, who would undoubtedly seek refuge within our
lines as soon as we should establish ourselves on the island. He
deprecated and disapproved of any attempt on the part of the Red Cross
to land supplies for the reconcentrados under a flag of truce in advance
of the army of invasion and without its protection. "The Spanish
authorities," he said, "under stress of starvation, would simply seize
your stores and use them for the maintenance of their own army. The best
thing for you to do is to go in with us and under our protection, and
relieve the distress of the reconcentrados as fast as we uncover it." I
said that I thought this was Miss Barton's intention, and that we had
fourteen hundred tons of food-stuffs and medical supplies on the steamer
_State of Texas_ at Key West, and were ready to move at an hour's
notice. With an understanding that Miss Barton should be notified as
soon as the army of invasion embarked, I bade the general good-by and
returned to the hotel.

In an interview that I had on the following day with Colonel Babcock,
General Shafter's adjutant-general, I was informed, confidentially, that
the army was destined for "eastern Cuba." Small parties, Colonel Babcock
said, would be landed at various points on the coast east and west of
Havana, for the purpose of communicating with the insurgents and
supplying them with arms and ammunition