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THE CUBAN COAST

The course usually taken by steamers from Key West to Santiago lies along the northern coast of Cuba, through the Nicholas and Old Bahama channels, to Cape Maysi, and thence around the eastern end of the island by the Windward Passage. Inasmuch, however, as we were going without a convoy, and Commodore Remey had advised us to keep out of sight of land, in order to avoid possible interception by a Spanish gunboat from some unblockaded port on the coast, we decided to go around the western end of the island, doubling Cape San Antonio, and then proceeding eastward past the Isle of Pines to Cape Cruz and Santiago. Tuesday afternoon we saw the high mountains in the province of Pinar del Rio looming up faintly through the haze at a distance of twenty-five or thirty miles, and late that same evening we passed the flash-light at the extremity of Cape San Antonio and turned eastward toward Cape Cruz and Santiago. After rounding the western end of the island we had a succession of thunder-storms and rain-squalls, with a strong easterly breeze and a heavy head sea; but Thursday night the weather moderated, and at half-past six o’clock Friday morning we sighted Cape Cruz rising out of the dark water ahead in a long, transverse stretch of flat table-land, backed by mountains and terminating on the sea in a high, steep bluff.

The coast of Cuba between Cape Cruz and Santiago is formed by a striking and beautiful range of mountains, known to the Spaniards as the “Sierra Maestra,” or “Master Range,” which extends eastward and westward for more than a hundred miles and contains some of the highest peaks to be found on the island. As seen from the water its furrowed slopes and flanks are deceptively foreshortened, so that they appear to fall with extraordinary steepness and abruptness to the sea; its rocky, wave-worn base is whitened by a long line of snowy breakers; its deep, wild ravines are filled with soft blue summer haze; and down from the clouds which shroud its higher peaks tumble in white, tortuous streaks the foaming waters of unnamed and almost unknown mountain torrents. As one sails, at a distance of two or three miles, along this wild, beautiful coast, the picture presented by the fringe of feathery palms over the white line of surf, the steep slopes of the foot-hills, shaggy with dark-green tropical vegetation, and the higher peaks broken in places by cliffs or rocky escarpments and rising into the region of summer clouds, is one hardly to be surpassed, I think, in the tropics. The average height of this range is three or four thousand feet; but in many places it is much greater than this, and the summit of the peak of Turquino, about midway between Cape Cruz and Santiago, is eighty-four hundred feet above the level of the sea.

Our captain thought that we should be off the entrance to Santiago harbor about three o’clock Saturday morning, and at half-past three I was on the bridge. There was not a sign, as yet, of dawn, and although I could make out faintly the loom of high land to the northward, it was so dark on the water that nothing could be distinguished at a distance of five hundred yards, and in the absence of all lights on the coast it was almost impossible to determine our exact position. Somewhere ahead of us, or perhaps around us, in the impenetrable gloom, were twelve or fifteen ships of war; but they were cruising about in silence and darkness, and the first evidence that we should probably have of their proximity would be the glare of a search-light and the thunder of a gun. About four o’clock the lookout forward shouted to the captain, “Vessel on the port bow, sir,” and a large, dark object stole silently out toward us from under the shadow of the land. I took it, at first, for a gunboat; but it proved to be the transport Santiago, which had not yet disembarked her troops and was cruising aimlessly back and forth, as we were, waiting for daylight.

At a quarter past four the sky in the east began to grow lighter, and as the hidden sun climbed swiftly to the horizon the world about us began to assume form and color. Almost directly in front of us were two fine groups of high, forest-clad mountains, separated by an interval of perhaps ten or fifteen miles. In this gap and nearer the sea was a long stretch of lower, but still high, table-land, which extended from one group of mountains to the other and seemed to form the outer rampart of the coast. About the middle of this rocky, flat-topped rampart there was a deep, narrow notch, on the eastern side of which I could see with a glass a huge grayish-stone building, elevated a little above the level of the table-land on one side and extending down the steep declivity of the notch in a series of titanic steps on the other. I hardly needed to be informed that the notch was the entrance to the harbor of Santiago, and that the grayish-stone building was Morro Castle. Between us and the land, in a huge, bow-shaped curve, lay the war-ships of the blockading fleet, with Commodore Schley’s flagship, the Brooklyn, at one end, Admiral Sampson’s flagship, the New York, at the other, and the battle-ships Texas, Indiana, Iowa, Massachusetts, and half a dozen gunboats and cruisers lying at intervals between. The convex side of the crescent was nearest to Morro Castle, and in this part of the curve were the battle-ships Texas, Indiana, and Iowa, with the small gunboat Suwanee thrown out as scout or skirmisher in the position that the head of the arrow would occupy if the line of the blockading vessels were a bent bow eight miles long.

We steamed directly in toward the entrance to the harbor, without being stopped or questioned, and took a position in front of Morro Castle, about one thousand yards south of the battle-ship Indiana. From this point of view, with the aid of a good glass, we could make out quite distinctly the outlines of the castle, and were a little disappointed to see still floating over it the red-and-yellow banner of Spain. We had had no news for more than a week, and thought it possible that both the castle and the city were in the possession of General Shafter’s army.

The entrance to the Bay of Santiago appears, from a distance of three or four miles, to be a narrow cleft or notch in the high, flat-topped rampart which forms the coast-line. On account of an eastward curve in the channel just beyond Morro Castle, one cannot look through the notch into the upper harbor. At a distance of a quarter of a mile from the entrance, the line of vision strikes against a steep hill, which forms one side of the curving, fiord-like passage leading to the city. Owing to the great depth of water off the entrance to the bay, it is impossible for vessels to anchor there, and the ships of the blockading fleet simply drifted back and forth with the winds and tides, getting under way occasionally, when it became necessary to change position.

After breakfast I went off in a boat to the flagship New York, called upon Admiral Sampson, and obtained from him a brief account of all that had happened off that coast since the 1st of May.

Admiral Cervera, with a fleet of seven Spanish war-ships, left the Cape Verde Islands for West Indian waters on the 29th of April. On the 13th of May he was reported at the French port of St. Pierre, Martinique, and from there he sailed to Curacao, an island off the coast of Venezuela, nearly due south of Haïti. From Curacao it was thought he would be likely to go either to Cienfuegos or Havana; and on the 19th of May Commodore Schley, with the Flying Squadron, was sent to watch the former port, while Admiral Sampson, who had just returned from Porto Rico, resumed the blockade of Havana. Cervera, however, did not go to either place. Leaving Curacao on the 16th, he crossed the Caribbean Sea, and at daybreak on the morning of Thursday, May 19, he entered the harbor of Santiago de Cuba for the purpose of obtaining a fresh supply of coal. His fleet then consisted of the second-class battle-ship Cristobal Colon, the armored cruisers Vizcaya, Almirante Oquendo, and Maria Teresa, and the torpedo-boat destroyers Furor and Pluton. What he expected to do, after coaling his vessels, does not clearly appear; but certain of his Spanish friends in the United States have recently published what seems to be an authorized statement, in which they set forth his views as follows:

Admiral Cervera did not enter Santiago harbor with any intention of remaining there, or of seeking refuge from the pursuit of the American fleets. His object was merely to make some slight repairs to his vessels, obtain a fresh supply of coal, and then run out to sea. As a result of interference from Havana, however, he was prevented from carrying out his plans. No sooner had he reported his arrival in Santiago than “Captain-General Blanco communicated with Spain and asked the Minister of Marine to place Admiral Cervera and his fleet under his (Blanco’s) orders. Blanco then ordered Cervera to remain in Santiago and assist in the defense of the shore batteries. Admiral Cervera protested strongly against this, and appealed to Spain; but it is doubtful whether his appeal ever reached the government. He asked to be allowed to coal up and then leave Santiago, where he might be free to meet the American fleet, rather than to be bottled up in a blockaded harbor. He contended that he could not possibly be useful to Spain by remaining in Santiago harbor, with the certainty of American ships coming to keep him there, whereas, outside and free, his strong fleet could be of great value to the Spanish cause. The answer of General Blanco was that Admiral Cervera was now subject to his orders; that he, and not Admiral Cervera, was in command of affairs in Cuba, and that the admiral must obey his command. Cervera could then do nothing.”

If this semi-official statement of Admiral Cervera’s case is an accurate one, the Santiago campaign, which ended in the destruction of Cervera’s fleet and the capture of the city, was the direct result of General Blanco’s interference. The Spanish admiral had plenty of time to coal his vessels and make his escape before either of our fleets reached the mouth of the harbor, and if he had done so there might have been no Santiago campaign, and the whole course of the war might have been changed. But the opportunity soon passed.

On the 20th of May the news of Cervera’s appearance at Santiago was reported to the Navy Department in Washington, and Secretary Long immediately cabled it to Admiral Sampson by way of Key West. On the following day, May 21, Sampson sent the Marblehead to the southern coast of Cuba with an order directing Commodore Schley to proceed at once to Santiago unless he had good reason to believe that the Spanish fleet was really in Cienfuegos. When this order reached Schley, on the 23d of May, he felt sure that he had Cervera “bottled up” in Cienfuegos harbor, and he did not become aware of his error until the 25th. He then proceeded with his fleet to Santiago, but did not reach there until the 26th. Cervera had then had a whole week in which to coal his vessels and make his escape. That he fully intended to do this seems to be evident from the statement of Mr. Frederick W. Ramsden, British consul at Santiago, whose recently published diary contains the following entry, under date of May 23: “The Spanish fleet is taking in coal, water, and provisions in a hurry, and it is evident that it is preparing to go to sea, probably to-night or in the morning, as I hear the pilots have been ordered for this evening.”

If Cervera had gone to sea on the evening of May 23, or the morning of the 24th, as was plainly his intention, he would have made his escape without the slightest difficulty, because Admiral Sampson was then cruising off Havana, while Schley was still blockading Cienfuegos. What would have been the course of the war in that event, it is impossible to say; but General Shafter would certainly have been held at Tampa until the Spanish fleet had been overtaken and destroyed, and then, very likely, the army of invasion would have landed at some point nearer to Havana. Admiral Cervera, however, for some reason not yet positively known, remained in Santiago a whole week, and at the expiration of that time it is doubtful whether he could have made his escape, even had he wished to do so, because Commodore Schley, with the Flying Squadron, was off the entrance to the harbor. Six days later, when Schley’s squadron was reinforced by the powerful fleet of Admiral Sampson, Cervera’s last chance of escape vanished, and there was nothing left for him to do but assist the forts and the garrison to defend the city to the last, or make a desperate and almost hopeless attempt to break through the line of the blockading fleet.

Late in May, while Admiral Sampson was still cruising off Havana, he sent an order, by the captain of the New Orleans, to Commodore Schley, directing the latter to “use the collier Sterling to obstruct the [Santiago] channel at its narrowest part leading into the harbor,” so as to make the escape of the Spanish fleet absolutely impossible. “I believe,” he said, “that it would be perfectly practicable to steam this vessel into position, drop all her anchors, allow her to swing across the channel, and then sink her, either by opening the valves, or whatever means may be best.”

Commodore Schley, for some reason, did not obey this order; but as soon as Admiral Sampson reached the mouth of Santiago harbor, he proceeded to carry out the plan himself. At three o’clock on the morning of June 3, Lieutenant R. P. Hobson, with a volunteer crew of seven men, ran the steam-collier Merrimac into the mouth of the harbor, under a heavy fire from the Spanish batteries, dropped her anchors in mid-channel between Churruca Point and Smith Cay, opened her sea connections, exploded a number of torpedoes hung along her sides at the water-line, and when she sank, hung on to a raft attached by a rope to the sunken vessel. They were rescued from this position by the Spaniards and thrown into Morro Castle, but were treated with the consideration and courtesy to which their gallantry entitled them. On the afternoon of the same day, Admiral Cervera, who with his own hand had dragged Hobson from the water, sent his chief of staff out to the New York, under a flag of truce, with a letter to Admiral Sampson, in which he informed the latter that the lieutenant and his men were safe, and referred in terms of admiration and respect to their courage and devotion to duty.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, the object for which Lieutenant Hobson and his men risked their lives was not attained. The Merrimac failed to swing around so as to lie transversely across the channel, but sank in such a way as to place her hull parallel with the middle of it and near its eastern edge. This left plenty of water and plenty of room for vessels to pass on the western, or Smith Cay, side. Egress, however, although still possible, was extremely difficult and dangerous, on account of the strictness and closeness of the blockade which was established when Admiral Sampson arrived and took command of the combined fleets. The battle-ships and larger vessels, which formed the outer line of the blockade, were disposed in a semicircle around the mouth of the harbor, at a distance of four or five miles, with the flagship New York at one end of the line and the Brooklyn at the other. Inside of this semicircle, and much nearer the entrance, were stationed two or three small cruisers or gunboats, whose duty it was to watch the mouth of the harbor incessantly and give instant warning of the appearance of any hostile vessel. At night, when the danger from the Spanish torpedo-boats was greatest and when Cervera’s fleet was most likely to escape, a powerful and piercing search-light was held constantly on the mouth of the narrow canon between Morro and Socapa; the battle-ships closed in so as to diminish the radius of their semicircle by nearly one half; the cruisers and gunboats, under cover of the blinding radiance of the search-light, moved a mile nearer to the mouth of the harbor; and three steam-launches patrolled the coast all night within pistol-shot of the enemy’s batteries. In the face of such a blockade it was virtually impossible for Cervera to escape, and almost equally impossible for his torpedo-boats to come out of the harbor unobserved, or to reach any of our larger vessels even if they should venture out. Long before they could get across the mile and a half or two miles of water that separated the harbor entrance from the nearest battleship, they would be riddled with projectiles from perhaps a hundred rapid-fire guns. Torpedo-boats, however, did not play an important part on either side. Our own were prevented from entering the harbor by a strong log boom stretched across the channel just north of the Estrella battery, and those of the Spaniards never even attempted to make an aggressive movement in the period covered by the blockade. Admiral Cervera evidently thought that the chance of accomplishing anything by means of a torpedo-boat attack was too remote to justify the risk.

On the 6th of June Admiral Sampson bombarded the shore batteries and the mouth of the harbor for two hours and a half, destroying a number of houses on Smith Cay, setting fire to the Spanish cruiser Reina Mercedes, which was moored near the end of the Socapa promontory, and killing or wounding twenty-five or thirty officers and men on the cruiser, in the batteries, and in Morro Castle. The earthwork batteries east and west of the entrance did not prove to be very formidable and were quickly silenced; but the submarine mines in the narrow channel leading to the upper harbor, which prevented our fleet from forcing an entrance, could not be removed without the cooeperation of a land force. All that Admiral Sampson could do, therefore, was to bombard the harbor fortifications now and then, so as to prevent further work on them; occupy the lower part of Guantanamo Bay, forty miles east of Santiago, as a coaling-station; and urge the government in Washington, by telegraph, to send the army forward as speedily as possible.

The fleet of transports which conveyed General Shafter’s command to the southern coast of Cuba arrived off the entrance to Santiago harbor at midday on the 20th of June, after a tedious and uneventful voyage of five days from the Dry Tortugas around the eastern end of the island. General Shafter at once held a conference with Admiral Sampson and with the Cuban general Garcia, who had come to the coast to meet the fleet, and, after considering every possible line of attack, decided to land his force at two points, within supporting distance of each other, ten or fifteen miles east of the entrance to Santiago harbor, and then march toward the city through the interior. The points selected for debarkation were Siboney, a small village about ten miles east of Morro Castle, and Daiquiri, another similar village five miles farther away, which, before the war, was the shipping-port of the Spanish-American Iron Company. From Daiquiri there was a rough wagon-road to Siboney, and the latter place was connected with Santiago by a narrow-gage railroad along the coast and up the Aguadores ravine, as well as by a trail or wagon-road over the foot-hills and through the marshy, jungle-skirted valleys of the interior.

When we reached the entrance to Santiago harbor in the Red Cross steamer State of Texas on the 25th of June, the Fifth Army-Corps or most of it had already landed, and was marching toward Santiago along the interior road by way of Guasimas and Sevilla. The landing had been made, Admiral Sampson told me, without the least opposition from the Spaniards, but there had been a fight, on the day before our arrival, between General Wheeler’s advance and a body of troops supposed to be the rear-guard of the retiring enemy, at a place called Guasimas, three or four miles from Siboney, on the Santiago road. Details of the fight, he said, had not been received, but it was thought to be nothing more than an unimportant skirmish.

In reply to my question whether he had any orders for us, or any suggestions to make with regard to our movements, he said that, as there seemed to be nothing for the Red Cross to do in the vicinity of Santiago, he should advise us to go to Guantanamo Bay, where Captain McCalla had opened communications with the insurgents under General Perez, and where we should probably find Cuban refugees suffering for food. Acting upon this suggestion, we got under way promptly, steamed into the little cove of Siboney to take a look at the place and to land Mr. Louis Kempner of the Post-Office Department, whom we had brought from Key West, and then proceeded eastward to Guantanamo Bay.