Just before leaving Tampa we had been brigaded with the First (white)
and Tenth (colored) Regular Cavalry under Brigadier-General S. B. M.
Young. We were the Second Brigade, the First Brigade consisting of the
Third and Sixth (white), and the Ninth (colored) Regular Cavalry under
Brigadier-General Sumner. The two brigades of the cavalry division
were under Major-General Joseph Wheeler, the gallant old Confederate
cavalry commander.
General Young was--and is--as fine a type of the American fighting
soldier as a man can hope to see. He had been in command, as Colonel,
of the Yellowstone National Park, and I had seen a good deal of him in
connection therewith, as I was President of the Boone and Crockett
Club, an organization devoted to hunting big game, to its
preservation, and to forest preservation. During the preceding winter,
while he was in Washington, he had lunched with me at the Metropolitan
Club, Wood being one of the other guests. Of course, we talked of the
war, which all of us present believed to be impending, and Wood and I
told him we were going to make every effort to get in, somehow; and he
answered that we must be sure to get into his brigade, if he had one,
and he would guarantee to show us fighting. None of us forgot the
conversation. As soon as our regiment was raised General Young applied
for it to be put in his brigade. We were put in; and he made his word
good; for he fought and won the first fight on Cuban soil.
Yet, even though under him, we should not have been in this fight at
all if we had not taken advantage of the chance to disembark among the
first troops, and if it had not been for Wood's energy in pushing our
regiment to the front.
On landing we spent some active hours in marching our men a quarter
of a mile or so inland, as boat-load by boat-load they disembarked.
Meanwhile one of the men, Knoblauch, a New Yorker, who was a great
athlete and a champion swimmer, by diving in the surf off the dock,
recovered most of the rifles which had been lost when the boat-load of
colored cavalry capsized. The country would have offered very great
difficulties to an attacking force had there been resistance. It was
little but a mass of rugged and precipitous hills, covered for the
most part by dense jungle. Five hundred resolute men could have
prevented the disembarkation at very little cost to themselves. There
had been about that number of Spaniards at Daiquiri that morning, but
they had fled even before the ships began shelling. In their place we
found hundreds of Cuban insurgents, a crew of as utter tatterdemalions
as human eyes ever looked on, armed with every kind of rifle in all
stages of dilapidation. It was evident, at a glance, that they would
be no use in serious fighting, but it was hoped that they might be of
service in scouting. From a variety of causes, however, they turned
out to be nearly useless, even for this purpose, so far as the
Santiago campaign was concerned.
We were camped on a dusty, brush-covered flat, with jungle on one
side, and on the other a shallow, fetid pool fringed with palm-trees.
Huge land-crabs scuttled noisily through the underbrush, exciting much
interest among the men. Camping was a simple matter, as each man
carried all he had, and the officers had nothing. I took a light
mackintosh and a tooth-brush. Fortunately, that night it did not rain;
and from the palm-leaves we built shelters from the sun.
General Lawton, a tall, fine-looking man, had taken the advance. A
thorough soldier, he at once established outposts and pushed
reconnoitring parties ahead on the trails. He had as little baggage as
the rest of us. Our own Brigade-Commander, General Young, had exactly
the same impedimenta that I had, namely, a mackintosh and a
tooth-brush.
Next morning we were hard at work trying to get the stuff unloaded
from the ship, and succeeded in getting most of it ashore, but were
utterly unable to get transportation for anything but a very small
quantity. The great shortcoming throughout the campaign was the
utterly inadequate transportation. If we had been allowed to take our
mule-train, we could have kept the whole cavalry division supplied.
In the afternoon word came to us to march. General Wheeler, a regular
game-cock, was as anxious as Lawton to get first blood, and he was
bent upon putting the cavalry division to the front as quickly as
possible. Lawton's advance-guard was in touch with the Spaniards, and
there had been a skirmish between the latter and some Cubans, who were
repulsed. General Wheeler made a reconnaissance in person, found out
where the enemy was, and directed General Young to take our brigade
and move forward so as to strike him next morning. He had the power to
do this, as when General Shafter was afloat he had command ashore.
I had succeeded in finding Texas, my surviving horse, much the worse
for his fortnight on the transport and his experience in getting off,
but still able to carry me.
It was mid-afternoon and the tropic sun was beating fiercely down when
Colonel Wood started our regiment--the First and Tenth Cavalry and
some of the infantry regiments having already marched. Colonel Wood
himself rode in advance, while I led my squadron, and Major Brodie
followed with his. It was a hard march, the hilly jungle trail being
so narrow that often we had to go in single file. We marched fast, for
Wood was bound to get us ahead of the other regiments, so as to be
sure of our place in the body that struck the enemy next morning. If
it had not been for his energy in pushing forward, we should certainly
have missed the fight. As it was, we did not halt until we were at the
extreme front.
The men were not in very good shape for marching, and moreover they
were really horsemen, the majority being cowboys who had never done
much walking. The heat was intense and their burdens very heavy. Yet
there was very little straggling. Whenever we halted they instantly
took off their packs and threw themselves on their backs. Then at the
word to start they would spring into place again. The captains and
lieutenants tramped along, encouraging the men by example and word. A
good part of the time I was by Captain Llewellen, and was greatly
pleased to see the way in which he kept his men up to their work. He
never pitied or coddled his troopers, but he always looked after them.
He helped them whenever he could, and took rather more than his full
share of hardship and danger, so that his men naturally followed him
with entire devotion. Jack Greenway was under him as lieutenant, and
to him the entire march was nothing but an enjoyable outing, the
chance of fight on the morrow simply adding the needed spice of
excitement.
It was long after nightfall when we tramped through the darkness
into the squalid coast hamlet of Siboney. As usual when we made a
night camp, we simply drew the men up in column of troops, and then
let each man lie down where he was. Black thunder-clouds were
gathering. Before they broke the fires were made and the men cooked
their coffee and pork, some frying the hard-tack with the pork. The
officers, of course, fared just as the men did. Hardly had we finished
eating when the rain came, a regular tropic downpour. We sat about,
sheltering ourselves as best we could, for the hour or two it lasted;
then the fires were relighted and we closed around them, the men
taking off their wet things to dry them, so far as possible, by the
blaze.
Wood had gone off to see General Young, as General Wheeler had
instructed General Young to hit the Spaniards, who were about four
miles away, as soon after daybreak as possible. Meanwhile I strolled
over to Captain Capron's troop. He and I, with his two lieutenants,
Day and Thomas, stood around the fire, together with two or three
non-commissioned officers and privates; among the latter were Sergeant
Hamilton Fish and Trooper Elliot Cowdin, both of New York. Cowdin,
together with two other troopers, Harry Thorpe and Munro Ferguson, had
been on my Oyster Bay Polo Team some years before. Hamilton Fish had
already shown himself one of the best non-commissioned officers we
had. A huge fellow, of enormous strength and endurance and dauntless
courage, he took naturally to a soldier's life. He never complained
and never shirked any duty of any kind, while his power over his men
was great. So good a sergeant had he made that Captain Capron, keen to
get the best men under him, took him when he left Tampa--for Fish's
troop remained behind. As we stood around the flickering blaze that
night I caught myself admiring the splendid bodily vigor of Capron and
Fish--the captain and the sergeant. Their frames seemed of steel, to
withstand all fatigue; they were flushed with health; in their eyes
shone high resolve and fiery desire. Two finer types of the fighting
man, two better representatives of the American soldier, there were
not in the whole army. Capron was going over his plans for the fight
when we should meet the Spaniards on the morrow, Fish occasionally
asking a question. They were both filled with eager longing to show
their mettle, and both were rightly confident that if they lived they
would win honorable renown and would rise high in their chosen
profession. Within twelve hours they both were dead.
I had lain down when toward midnight Wood returned. He had gone over
the whole plan with General Young. We were to start by sunrise toward
Santiago, General Young taking four troops of the Tenth and four
troops of the First up the road which led through the valley; while
Colonel Wood was to lead our eight troops along a hill-trail to the
left, which joined the valley road about four miles on, at a point
where the road went over a spur of the mountain chain and from thence
went down hill toward Santiago. The Spaniards had their lines at the
junction of the road and the trail.
Before describing our part in the fight, it is necessary to say a
word about General Young's share, for, of course, the whole fight was
under his direction, and the fight on the right wing under his
immediate supervision. General Young had obtained from General
Castillo, the commander of the Cuban forces, a full description of the
country in front. General Castillo promised Young the aid of eight
hundred Cubans, if he made a reconnaissance in force to find out
exactly what the Spanish strength was. This promised Cuban aid did
not, however, materialize, the Cubans, who had been beaten back by the
Spaniards the day before, not appearing on the firing-line until the
fight was over.
General Young had in his immediate command a squadron of the First
Regular Cavalry, two hundred and forty-four strong, under the command
of Major Bell, and a squadron of the Tenth Regular Cavalry, two
hundred and twenty strong, under the command of Major Norvell. He also
had two Hotchkiss mountain guns, under Captain Watson of the Tenth. He
started at a quarter before six in the morning, accompanied by Captain
A. L. Mills, as aide. It was at half-past seven that Captain Mills,
with a patrol of two men in advance, discovered the Spaniards as they
lay across where the two roads came together, some of them in pits,
others simply lying in the heavy jungle, while on their extreme right
they occupied a big ranch. Where General Young struck them they held a
high ridge a little to the left of his front, this ridge being
separated by a deep ravine from the hill-trail still farther to the
left, down which the Rough Riders were advancing. That is, their
forces occupied a range of high hills in the form of an obtuse angle,
the salient being toward the space between the American forces, while
there were advance parties along both roads. There were stone
breastworks flanked by block-houses on that part of the ridge where
the two trails came together. The place was called Las Guasimas, from
trees of that name in the neighborhood.
General Young, who was riding a mule, carefully examined the Spanish
position in person. He ordered the canteens of the troops to be
filled, placed the Hotchkiss battery in concealment about nine hundred
yards from the Spanish lines, and then deployed the white regulars,
with the colored regulars in support, having sent a Cuban guide to try
to find Colonel Wood and warn him. He did not attack immediately,
because he knew that Colonel Wood, having a more difficult route,
would require a longer time to reach the position. During the delay
General Wheeler arrived; he had been up since long before dawn, to see
that everything went well. Young informed him of the dispositions and
plan of attack he made. General Wheeler approved of them, and with
excellent judgment left General Young a free hand to fight his battle.
So, about eight o'clock Young began the fight with his Hotchkiss
guns, he himself being up on the firing-line. No sooner had the
Hotchkiss one-pounders opened than the Spaniards opened fire in
return, most of the time firing by volleys executed in perfect time,
almost as on parade. They had a couple of light guns, which our people
thought were quick firers. The denseness of the jungle and the fact
that they used absolutely smokeless powder, made it exceedingly
difficult to place exactly where they were, and almost immediately
Young, who always liked to get as close as possible to his enemy,
began to push his troops forward. They were deployed on both sides of
the road in such thick jungle that it was only here and there that
they could possibly see ahead, and some confusion, of course, ensued,
the support gradually getting mixed with the advance. Captain Beck
took A Troop of the Tenth in on the left, next Captain Galbraith's
troop of the First; two other troops of the Tenth were on the extreme
right. Through the jungle ran wire fences here and there, and as the
troops got to the ridge they encountered precipitous heights. They
were led most gallantly, as American regular officers always lead
their men; and the men followed their leaders with the splendid
courage always shown by the American regular soldier. There was not a
single straggler among them, and in not one instance was an attempt
made by any trooper to fall out in order to assist the wounded or
carry back the dead, while so cool were they and so perfect their fire
discipline, that in the entire engagement the expenditure of
ammunition was not over ten rounds per man. Major Bell, who commanded
the squadron, had his leg broken by a shot as he was leading his men.
Captain Wainwright succeeded to the command of the squadron. Captain
Knox was shot in the abdomen. He continued for some time giving orders
to his troops, and refused to allow a man in the firing-line to assist
him to the rear. His First Lieutenant, Byram, was himself shot, but
continued to lead his men until the wound and the heat overcame him
and he fell in a faint. The advance was pushed forward under General
Young's eye with the utmost energy, until the enemy's voices could be
heard in the entrenchments. The Spaniards kept up a very heavy firing,
but the regulars would not be denied, and as they climbed the ridges
the Spaniards broke and fled.
Meanwhile, at six o'clock, the Rough Riders began their advance. We
first had to climb a very steep hill. Many of the men, foot-sore and
weary from their march of the preceding day, found the pace up this
hill too hard, and either dropped their bundles or fell out of line,
with the result that we went into action with less than five hundred
men--as, in addition to the stragglers, a detachment had been left to
guard the baggage on shore. At the time I was rather inclined to
grumble to myself about Wood setting so fast a pace, but when the
fight began I realized that it had been absolutely necessary, as
otherwise we should have arrived late and the regulars would have had
very hard work indeed.
Tiffany, by great exertions, had corralled a couple of mules and was
using them to transport the Colt automatic guns in the rear of the
regiment. The dynamite gun was not with us, as mules for it could not
be obtained in time.
Captain Capron's troop was in the lead, it being chosen for the most
responsible and dangerous position because of Capron's capacity. Four
men, headed by Sergeant Hamilton Fish, went first; a support of twenty
men followed some distance behind; and then came Capron and the rest
of his troop, followed by Wood, with whom General Young had sent
Lieutenants Smedburg and Rivers as aides. I rode close behind, at the
head of the other three troops of my squadron, and then came Brodie at
the head of his squadron. The trail was so narrow that for the most
part the men marched in single file, and it was bordered by dense,
tangled jungle, through which a man could with difficulty force his
way; so that to put out flankers was impossible, for they could not
possibly have kept up with the march of the column. Every man had his
canteen full. There was a Cuban guide at the head of the column, but
he ran away as soon as the fighting began. There were also with us, at
the head of the column, two men who did not run away, who, though
non-combatants--newspaper correspondents--showed as much gallantry as
any soldier in the field. They were Edward Marshall and Richard
Harding Davis.
After reaching the top of the hill the walk was very pleasant. Now
and then we came to glades or rounded hill-shoulders, whence we could
look off for some distance. The tropical forest was very beautiful,
and it was a delight to see the strange trees, the splendid royal
palms and a tree which looked like a flat-topped acacia, and which was
covered with a mass of brilliant scarlet flowers. We heard many
bird-notes, too, the cooing of doves and the call of a great brush
cuckoo. Afterward we found that the Spanish guerillas imitated these
bird-calls, but the sounds we heard that morning, as we advanced
through the tropic forest, were from birds, not guerillas, until we
came right up to the Spanish lines. It was very beautiful and very
peaceful, and it seemed more as if we were off on some hunting
excursion than as if were about to go into a sharp and bloody little
fight.
Of course, we accommodated our movements to those of the men in
front. After marching for somewhat over an hour, we suddenly came to a
halt, and immediately afterward Colonel Wood sent word down the line
that the advance guard had come upon a Spanish outpost. Then the order
was passed to fill the magazines, which was done.
The men were totally unconcerned, and I do not think they realized
that any fighting was at hand; at any rate, I could hear the group
nearest me discussing in low murmurs, not the Spaniards, but the
conduct of a certain cow-puncher in quitting work on a ranch and
starting a saloon in some New Mexican town. In another minute,
however, Wood sent me orders to deploy three troops to the right of
the trail, and to advance when we became engaged; while, at the same
time, the other troops, under Major Brodie, were deployed to the left
of the trail where the ground was more open than elsewhere--one troop
being held in reserve in the centre, besides the reserves on each
wing. Later all the reserves were put into the firing-line.
To the right the jungle was quite thick, and we had barely begun to
deploy when a crash in front announced that the fight was on. It was
evidently very hot, and L Troop had its hands full; so I hurried my
men up abreast of them. So thick was the jungle that it was very
difficult to keep together, especially when there was no time for
delay, and while I got up Llewellen's troops and Kane's platoon of K
Troop, the rest of K Troop under Captain Jenkins which, with Bucky
O'Neill's troop, made up the right wing, were behind, and it was some
time before they got into the fight at all.
Meanwhile I had gone forward with Llewellen, Greenway, Kane and
their troopers until we came out on a kind of shoulder, jutting over a
ravine, which separated us from a great ridge on our right. It was on
this ridge that the Spaniards had some of their intrenchments, and it
was just beyond this ridge that the Valley Road led, up which the
regulars were at that very time pushing their attack; but, of course,
at the moment we knew nothing of this. The effect of the smokeless
powder was remarkable. The air seemed full of the rustling sound of
the Mauser bullets, for the Spaniards knew the trails by which we were
advancing, and opened heavily on our position. Moreover, as we
advanced we were, of course, exposed, and they could see us and fire.
But they themselves were entirely invisible. The jungle covered
everything, and not the faintest trace of smoke was to be seen in any
direction to indicate from whence the bullets came. It was some time
before the men fired; Llewellen, Kane, and I anxiously studying the
ground to see where our opponents were, and utterly unable to find
out.
We could hear the faint reports of the Hotchkiss guns and the reply
of two Spanish guns, and the Mauser bullets were singing through the
trees over our heads, making a noise like the humming of telephone
wires; but exactly where they came from we could not tell. The
Spaniards were firing high and for the most part by volleys, and their
shooting was not very good, which perhaps was not to be wondered at,
as they were a long way off. Gradually, however, they began to get the
range and occasionally one of our men would crumple up. In no case did
the man make any outcry when hit, seeming to take it as a matter of
course; at the outside, making only such a remark as: "Well, I got it
that time." With hardly an exception, there was no sign of flinching.
I say with hardly an exception, for though I personally did not see an
instance, and though all the men at the front behaved excellently, yet
there were a very few men who lagged behind and drifted back to the
trail over which we had come. The character of the fight put a premium
upon such conduct, and afforded a very severe test for raw troops;
because the jungle was so dense that as we advanced in open order,
every man was, from time to time, left almost alone and away from the
eyes of his officers. There was unlimited opportunity for dropping out
without attracting notice, while it was peculiarly hard to be exposed
to the fire of an unseen foe, and to see men dropping under it, and
yet to be, for some time, unable to return it, and also to be entirely
ignorant of what was going on in any other part of the field.
It was Richard Harding Davis who gave us our first opportunity to
shoot back with effect. He was behaving precisely like my officers,
being on the extreme front of the line, and taking every opportunity
to study with his glasses the ground where we thought the Spaniards
were. I had tried some volley firing at points where I rather
doubtfully believed the Spaniards to be, but had stopped firing and
was myself studying the jungle-covered mountain ahead with my glasses,
when Davis suddenly said: "There they are, Colonel; look over there; I
can see their hats near that glade," pointing across the valley to our
right. In a minute I, too, made out the hats, and then pointed them
out to three or four of our best shots, giving them my estimate of the
range. For a minute or two no result followed, and I kept raising the
range, at the same time getting more men on the firing-line. Then,
evidently, the shots told, for the Spaniards suddenly sprang out of
the cover through which we had seen their hats, and ran to another
spot; and we could now make out a large number of them.
I accordingly got all of my men up in line and began quick firing.
In a very few minutes our bullets began to do damage, for the
Spaniards retreated to the left into the jungle, and we lost sight of
them. At the same moment a big body of men who, it afterward turned
out, were Spaniards, came in sight along the glade, following the
retreat of those whom we had just driven from the trenches. We
supposed that there was a large force of Cubans with General Young,
not being aware that these Cubans had failed to make their appearance,
and as it was impossible to tell the Cubans from the Spaniards, and as
we could not decide whether these were Cubans following the Spaniards
we had put to flight, or merely another troop of Spaniards retreating
after the first (which was really the case) we dared not fire, and in
a minute they had passed the glade and were out of sight.
At every halt we took advantage of the cover, sinking down behind
any mound, bush, or tree trunk in the neighborhood. The trees, of
course, furnished no protection from the Mauser bullets. Once I was
standing behind a large palm with my head out to one side, very
fortunately; for a bullet passed through the palm, filling my left eye
and ear with the dust and splinters.
No man was allowed to drop out to help the wounded. It was hard to
leave them there in the jungle, where they might not be found again
until the vultures and the land-crabs came, but war is a grim game and
there was no choice. One of the men shot was Harry Heffner of G Troop,
who was mortally wounded through the hips. He fell without uttering a
sound, and two of his companions dragged him behind a tree. Here he
propped himself up and asked to be given his canteen and his rifle,
which I handed to him. He then again began shooting, and continued
loading and firing until the line moved forward and we left him alone,
dying in the gloomy shade. When we found him again, after the fight,
he was dead.
At one time, as I was out of touch with that part of my wing
commanded by Jenkins and O'Neill, I sent Greenway, with Sergeant
Russell, a New Yorker, and trooper Rowland, a New Mexican cow-puncher,
down in the valley to find out where they were. To do this the three
had to expose themselves to a very severe fire, but they were not men
to whom this mattered. Russell was killed; the other two returned and
reported to me the position of Jenkins and O'Neill. They then resumed
their places on the firing-line. After awhile I noticed blood coming
out of Rowland's side and discovered that he had been shot, although
he did not seem to be taking any notice of it. He said the wound was
only slight, but as I saw he had broken a rib, I told him to go to the
rear to the hospital. After some grumbling he went, but fifteen
minutes later he was back on the firing-line again and said he could
not find the hospital--which I doubted. However, I then let him stay
until the end of the fight.
After we had driven the Spaniards off from their position to our
right, the firing seemed to die away so far as we were concerned, for
the bullets no longer struck around us in such a storm as before,
though along the rest of the line the battle was as brisk as ever.
Soon we saw troops appearing across the ravine, not very far from
where we had seen the Spaniards whom we had thought might be Cubans.
Again we dared not fire, and carefully studied the new-comers with our
glasses; and this time we were right, for we recognized our own
cavalry-men. We were by no means sure that they recognized us,
however, and were anxious that they should, but it was very difficult
to find a clear spot in the jungle from which to signal; so Sergeant
Lee of Troop K climbed a tree and from its summit waved the troop
guidon. They waved their guidon back, and as our right wing was now in
touch with the regulars, I left Jenkins and O'Neill to keep the
connection, and led Llewellen's troop back to the path to join the
rest of the regiment, which was evidently still in the thick of the
fight. I was still very much in the dark as to where the main body of
the Spanish forces were, or exactly what lines the battle was
following, and was very uncertain what I ought to do; but I knew it
could not be wrong to go forward, and I thought I would find Wood and
then see what he wished me to do. I was in a mood to cordially welcome
guidance, for it was most bewildering to fight an enemy whom one so
rarely saw.
I had not seen Wood since the beginning of the skirmish, when he
hurried forward. When the firing opened some of the men began to
curse. "Don't swear--shoot!" growled Wood, as he strode along the path
leading his horse, and everyone laughed and became cool again. The
Spanish outposts were very near our advance guard, and some minutes of
the hottest kind of firing followed before they were driven back and
slipped off through the jungle to their main lines in the rear.
Here, at the very outset of our active service, we suffered the loss
of two as gallant men as ever wore uniform. Sergeant Hamilton Fish at
the extreme front, while holding the point up to its work and firing
back where the Spanish advance guards lay, was shot and instantly
killed; three of the men with him were likewise hit. Captain Capron,
leading the advance guard in person, and displaying equal courage and
coolness in the way that he handled them, was also struck, and died a
few minutes afterward. The command of the troop then devolved upon the
First Lieutenant, young Thomas. Like Capron, Thomas was the fifth in
line from father to son who had served in the American army, though in
his case it was in the volunteer and not the regular service; the four
preceding generations had furnished soldiers respectively to the
Revolutionary War, the War of 1812, the Mexican War, and the Civil
War. In a few minutes Thomas was shot through the leg, and the command
devolved upon the Second Lieutenant, Day (a nephew of "Albemarle"
Cushing, he who sunk the great Confederate ram). Day, who proved
himself to be one of our most efficient officers, continued to handle
the men to the best possible advantage, and brought them steadily
forward. L Troop was from the Indian Territory. The whites, Indians,
and half-breeds in it, all fought with equal courage. Captain
McClintock was hurried forward to its relief with his Troop B of
Arizona men. In a few minutes he was shot through the leg and his
place was taken by his First Lieutenant, Wilcox, who handled his men
in the same soldierly manner that Day did.
Among the men who showed marked courage and coolness was the tall
color-sergeant, Wright; the colors were shot through three times.
When I had led G Troop back to the trail I ran ahead of them,
passing the dead and wounded men of L Troop, passing young Fish as he
lay with glazed eyes under the rank tropic growth to one side of the
trail. When I came to the front I found the men spread out in a very
thin skirmish line, advancing through comparatively open ground, each
man taking advantage of what cover he could, while Wood strolled about
leading his horse, Brodie being close at hand. How Wood escaped being
hit, I do not see, and still less how his horse escaped. I had left
mine at the beginning of the action, and was only regretting that I
had not left my sword with it, as it kept getting between my legs when
I was tearing my way through the jungle. I never wore it again in
action. Lieutenant Rivers was with Wood, also leading his horse.
Smedburg had been sent off on the by no means pleasant task of
establishing communications with Young.
Very soon after I reached the front, Brodie was hit, the bullet
shattering one arm and whirling him around as he stood. He had kept on
the extreme front all through, his presence and example keeping his
men entirely steady, and he at first refused to go to the rear; but
the wound was very painful, and he became so faint that he had to be
sent. Thereupon, Wood directed me to take charge of the left wing in
Brodie's place, and to bring it forward; so over I went.
I now had under me Captains Luna, Muller, and Houston, and I began
to take them forward, well spread out, through the high grass of a
rather open forest. I noticed Goodrich, of Houston's troop, tramping
along behind his men, absorbed in making them keep at good intervals
from one another and fire slowly with careful aim. As I came close up
to the edge of the troop, he caught a glimpse of me, mistook me for
one of his own skirmishers who was crowding in too closely, and called
out, "Keep your interval, sir; keep your interval, and go forward."
A perfect hail of bullets was sweeping over us as we advanced. Once
I got a glimpse of some Spaniards, apparently retreating, far in the
front, and to our right, and we fired a couple of rounds after them.
Then I became convinced, after much anxious study, that we were being
fired at from some large red-tiled buildings, part of a ranch on our
front. Smokeless powder, and the thick cover in our front, continued
to puzzle us, and I more than once consulted anxiously the officers as
to the exact whereabouts of our opponents. I took a rifle from a
wounded man and began to try shots with it myself. It was very hot and
the men were getting exhausted, though at this particular time we were
not suffering heavily from bullets, the Spanish fire going high. As we
advanced, the cover became a little thicker and I lost touch of the
main body under Wood; so I halted and we fired industriously at the
ranch buildings ahead of us, some five hundred yards off. Then we
heard cheering on the right, and I supposed that this meant a charge
on the part of Wood's men, so I sprang up and ordered the men to rush
the buildings ahead of us. They came forward with a will. There was a
moment's heavy firing from the Spaniards, which all went over our
heads, and then it ceased entirely. When we arrived at the buildings,
panting and out of breath, they contained nothing but heaps of empty
cartridge-shells and two dead Spaniards, shot through the head.
The country all around us was thickly forested, so that it was very
difficult to see any distance in any direction. The firing had now
died out, but I was still entirely uncertain as to exactly what had
happened. I did not know whether the enemy had been driven back or
whether it was merely a lull in the fight, and we might be attacked
again; nor did I know what had happened in any other part of the line,
while as I occupied the extreme left, I was not sure whether or not my
flank was in danger. At this moment one of our men who had dropped
out, arrived with the information (fortunately false) that Wood was
dead. Of course, this meant that the command devolved upon me, and I
hastily set about taking charge of the regiment. I had been
particularly struck by the coolness and courage shown by Sergeants
Dame and McIlhenny, and sent them out with small pickets to keep watch
in front and to the left of the left wing. I sent other men to fill
the canteens with water, and threw the rest out in a long line in a
disused sunken road, which gave them cover, putting two or three
wounded men, who had hitherto kept up with the fighting-line, and a
dozen men who were suffering from heat exhaustion--for the fighting and
running under that blazing sun through the thick dry jungle was
heart-breaking--into the ranch buildings. Then I started over toward
the main body, but to my delight encountered Wood himself, who told me
the fight was over and the Spaniards had retreated. He also informed
me that other troops were just coming up. The first to appear was a
squadron of the Ninth Cavalry, under Major Dimick, which had hurried
up to get into the fight, and was greatly disappointed to find it
over. They took post in front of our lines, so that our tired men were
able to get a rest, Captain McBlain, of the Ninth, good-naturedly
giving us some points as to the best way to station our outposts. Then
General Chaffee, rather glum at not having been in the fight himself,
rode up at the head of some of his infantry, and I marched my squadron
back to where the rest of the regiment was going into camp, just where
the two trails came together, and beyond--that is, on the Santiago side
of--the original Spanish lines.
The Rough Riders had lost eight men killed and thirty-four wounded,
aside from two or three who were merely scratched and whose wounds
were not reported. The First Cavalry, white, lost seven men killed and
eight wounded; the Tenth Cavalry, colored, one man killed and ten
wounded; so, out of 964 men engaged on our side, 16 were killed and 52
wounded. The Spaniards were under General Rubin, with, as second in
command, Colonel Alcarez. They had two guns, and eleven companies of
about a hundred men each: three belonging to the Porto Rico regiment,
three to the San Fernandino, two to the Talavero, two being so-called
mobilized companies from the mineral districts, and one a company of
engineers; over twelve hundred men in all, together with two guns.*
* Note: See Lieutenant Muller y Tejeiro, "Combates y Capitulacion
de Santiago de Cuba," page 136. The Lieutenant speaks as if only one
echelon, of seven companies and two guns, was engaged on the 24th.
The official report says distinctly, "General Rubin's column," which
consisted of the companies detailed. By turning to page 146, where
Lieutenant Tejeiro enumerates the strength of the various companies,
it will be seen that they averaged over 110 men apiece; this
probably does not include officers, and is probably an
under-statement anyhow. On page 261 he makes the Spanish loss at Las
Guasimas, which he calls Sevilla, 9 killed and 27 wounded. Very
possibly he includes only the Spanish regulars; two of the Spaniards
we slew, over on the left, were in brown, instead of the light blue
of the regulars, and were doubtless guerillas.
General Rubin reported that he had repulsed the American attack, and
Lieutenant Tejeiro states in his book that General Rubin forced the
Americans to retreat, and enumerates the attacking force as consisting
of three regular regiments of infantry, the Second Massachusetts and
the Seventy-first New York (not one of which fired a gun or were
anywhere near the battle), in addition to the sixteen dismounted
troops of cavalry. In other words, as the five infantry regiments each
included twelve companies, he makes the attacking force consist of
just five times the actual amount. As for the "repulse," our line
never went back ten yards in any place, and the advance was
practically steady; while an hour and a half after the fight began we
were in complete possession of the entire Spanish position, and their
troops were fleeing in masses down the road, our men being too
exhausted to follow them.
General Rubin also reports that he lost but seven men killed. This
is certainly incorrect, for Captain O'Neill and I went over the ground
very carefully and counted eleven dead Spaniards, all of whom were
actually buried by our burying squads. There were probably two or
three men whom we missed, but I think that our official reports are
incorrect in stating that forty-two dead Spaniards were found; this
being based upon reports in which I think some of the Spanish dead
were counted two or three times. Indeed, I should doubt whether their
loss was as heavy as ours, for they were under cover, while we
advanced, often in the open, and their main lines fled long before we
could get to close quarters. It was a very difficult country, and a
force of good soldiers resolutely handled could have held the pass
with ease against two or three times their number. As it was, with a
force half of regulars and half of volunteers, we drove out a superior
number of Spanish regular troops, strongly posted, without suffering a
very heavy loss. Although the Spanish fire was very heavy, it does not
seem to me it was very well directed; and though they fired with great
spirit while we merely stood at a distance and fired at them, they did
not show much resolution, and when we advanced, always went back long
before there was any chance of our coming into contact with them. Our
men behaved very well indeed--white regulars, colored regulars, and
Rough Riders alike. The newspaper press failed to do full justice to
the white regulars, in my opinion, from the simple reason that
everybody knew that they would fight, whereas there had been a good
deal of question as to how the Rough Riders, who were volunteer
troops, and the Tenth Cavalry, who were colored, would behave; so
there was a tendency to exalt our deeds at the expense of those of the
First Regulars, whose courage and good conduct were taken for granted.
It was a trying fight beyond what the losses show, for it is hard upon
raw soldiers to be pitted against an unseen foe, and to advance
steadily when their comrades are falling around them, and when they
can only occasionally see a chance to retaliate. Wood's experience in
fighting Apaches stood him in good stead. An entirely raw man at the
head of the regiment, conducting, as Wood was, what was practically an
independent fight, would have been in a very trying position. The
fight cleared the way toward Santiago, and we experienced no further
resistance.
That afternoon we made camp and dined, subsisting chiefly on a load
of beans which we found on one of the Spanish mules which had been
shot. We also looked after the wounded. Dr. Church had himself gone
out to the firing-line during the fight, and carried to the rear some
of the worst wounded on his back or in his arms. Those who could walk
had walked in to where the little field-hospital of the regiment was
established on the trail. We found all our dead and all the badly
wounded. Around one of the latter the big, hideous land-crabs had
gathered in a gruesome ring, waiting for life to be extinct. One of
our own men and most of the Spanish dead had been found by the
vultures before we got to them; and their bodies were mangled, the
eyes and wounds being torn.
The Rough Rider who had been thus treated was in Bucky O'Neill's
troop; and as we looked at the body, O'Neill turned to me and asked,
"Colonel, isn't it Whitman who says of the vultures that 'they pluck
the eyes of princes and tear the flesh of kings'?" I answered that I
could not place the quotation. Just a week afterward we were shielding
his own body from the birds of prey.
One of the men who fired first, and who displayed conspicuous
gallantry was a Cherokee half-breed, who was hit seven times, and of
course had to go back to the States. Before he rejoined us at Montauk
Point he had gone through a little private war of his own; for on his
return he found that a cowboy had gone off with his sweetheart, and
in the fight that ensued he shot his rival. Another man of L Troop who
also showed marked gallantry was Elliot Cowdin. The men of the plains
and mountains were trained by life-long habit to look on life and
death with iron philosophy. As I passed by a couple of tall, lank,
Oklahoma cow-punchers, I heard one say, "Well, some of the boys got it
in the neck!" to which the other answered with the grim plains proverb
of the South: "Many a good horse dies."
Thomas Isbell, a half-breed Cherokee in the squad under Hamilton
Fish, was among the first to shoot and be shot at. He was wounded no
less than seven times. The first wound was received by him two minutes
after he had fired his first shot, the bullet going through his neck.
The second hit him in the left thumb. The third struck near his right
hip, passing entirely through the body. The fourth bullet (which was
apparently from a Remington and not from a Mauser) went into his neck
and lodged against the bone, being afterward cut out. The fifth bullet
again hit his left hand. The sixth scraped his head and the seventh
his neck. He did not receive all of the wounds at the same time, over
half an hour elapsing between the first and the last. Up to receiving
the last wound he had declined to leave the firing-line, but by that
time he had lost so much blood that he had to be sent to the rear. The
man's wiry toughness was as notable as his courage.
We improvised litters, and carried the more sorely wounded back to
Siboney that afternoon and the next morning; the others walked. One of
the men who had been most severely wounded was Edward Marshall, the
correspondent, and he showed as much heroism as any soldier in the
whole army. He was shot through the spine, a terrible and very painful
wound, which we supposed meant that he would surely die; but he made
no complaint of any kind, and while he retained consciousness
persisted in dictating the story of the fight. A very touching
incident happened in the improvised open-air hospital after the fight,
where the wounded were lying. They did not groan, and made no
complaint, trying to help one another. One of them suddenly began to
hum, "My Country 'tis of Thee," and one by one the others joined in
the chorus, which swelled out through the tropic woods, where the
victors lay in camp beside their dead. I did not see any sign among
the fighting men, whether wounded or unwounded, of the very
complicated emotions assigned to their kind by some of the realistic
modern novelists who have written about battles. At the front everyone
behaved quite simply and took things as they came, in a
matter-of-course way; but there was doubtless, as is always the case,
a good deal of panic and confusion in the rear where the wounded, the
stragglers, a few of the packers, and two or three newspaper
correspondents were, and in consequence the first reports sent back to
the coast were of a most alarming character, describing, with minute
inaccuracy, how we had run into ambush, etc. The packers with the
mules which carried the rapid-fire guns were among those who ran, and
they let the mules go in the jungle; in consequence the guns were
never even brought to the firing-line, and only Fred Herrig's skill as
a trailer enabled us to recover them. By patient work he followed up
the mules' tracks in the forest until he found the animals.
Among the wounded who walked to the temporary hospital at Siboney
was the trooper, Rowland, of whom I spoke before. There the doctors
examined him, and decreed that his wound was so serious that he must
go back to the States. This was enough for Rowland, who waited until
nightfall and then escaped, slipping out of the window and making his
way back to camp with his rifle and pack, though his wound must have
made all movement very painful to him. After this, we felt that he was
entitled to stay, and he never left us for a day, distinguishing
himself again in the fight at San Juan.
Next morning we buried seven dead Rough Riders in a grave on the
summit of the trail, Chaplain Brown reading the solemn burial service
of the Episcopalians, while the men stood around with bared heads and
joined in singing, "Rock of Ages." Vast numbers of vultures were
wheeling round and round in great circles through the blue sky
overhead. There could be no more honorable burial than that of these
men in a common grave--Indian and cowboy, miner, packer, and college
athlete--the man of unknown ancestry from the lonely Western plains,
and the man who carried on his watch the crests of the Stuyvesants and
the Fishes, one in the way they had met death, just as during life
they had been one in their daring and their loyalty.
On the afternoon of the 25th we moved on a couple of miles, and
camped in a marshy open spot close to a beautiful stream. Here we lay
for several days. Captain Lee, the British attache, spent some time
with us; we had begun to regard him as almost a member of the
regiment. Count von Gotzen, the German attache, another good fellow,
also visited us. General Young was struck down with the fever, and
Wood took charge of the brigade. This left me in command of the
regiment, of which I was very glad, for such experience as we had had
is a quick teacher. By this time the men and I knew one another, and I
felt able to make them do themselves justice in march or battle. They
understood that I paid no heed to where they came from; no heed to
their creed, politics, or social standing; that I would care for them
to the utmost of my power, but that I demanded the highest performance
of duty; while in return I had seen them tested, and knew I could
depend absolutely on their courage, hardihood, obedience, and
individual initiative.
There was nothing like enough transportation with the army, whether
in the way of wagons or mule-trains; exactly as there had been no
sufficient number of landing-boats with the transports. The officers'
baggage had come up, but none of us had much, and the shelter-tents
proved only a partial protection against the terrific downpours of
rain. These occurred almost every afternoon, and turned the camp into
a tarn, and the trails into torrents and quagmires. We were not given
quite the proper amount of food, and what we did get, like most of the
clothing issued us, was fitter for the Klondyke than for Cuba. We got
enough salt pork and hardtack for the men, but not the full ration of
coffee and sugar, and nothing else. I organized a couple of
expeditions back to the seacoast, taking the strongest and best
walkers and also some of the officers' horses and a stray mule or two,
and brought back beans and canned tomatoes. These I got partly by
great exertions on my part, and partly by the aid of Colonel Weston of
the Commissary Department, a particularly energetic man whose services
were of great value. A silly regulation forbade my purchasing canned
vegetables, etc., except for the officers; and I had no little
difficulty in getting round this regulation, and purchasing (with my
own money, of course) what I needed for the men.
One of the men I took with me on one of these trips was Sherman
Bell, the former Deputy Marshal of Cripple Creek, and Wells-Fargo
Express rider. In coming home with his load, through a blinding storm,
he slipped and opened the old rupture. The agony was very great and
one of his comrades took his load. He himself, sometimes walking, and
sometimes crawling, got back to camp, where Dr. Church fixed him up
with a spike bandage, but informed him that he would have to be sent
back to the States when an ambulance came along. The ambulance did not
come until the next day, which was the day before we marched to San
Juan. It arrived after nightfall, and as soon as Bell heard it coming,
he crawled out of the hospital tent into the jungle, where he lay all
night; and the ambulance went off without him. The men shielded him
just as school-boys would shield a companion, carrying his gun, belt,
and bedding; while Bell kept out of sight until the column started,
and then staggered along behind it. I found him the morning of the San
Juan fight. He told me that he wanted to die fighting, if die he must,
and I hadn't the heart to send him back. He did splendid service that
day, and afterward in the trenches, and though the rupture opened
twice again, and on each occasion he was within a hair's breadth of
death, he escaped, and came back with us to the United States.
The army was camped along the valley, ahead of and behind us, our
outposts being established on either side. From the generals to the
privates all were eager to march against Santiago. At daybreak, when
the tall palms began to show dimly through the rising mist, the scream
of the cavalry trumpets tore the tropic dawn; and in the evening, as
the bands of regiment after regiment played the "Star-Spangled
Banner," all, officers and men alike, stood with heads uncovered,
wherever they were, until the last strains of the anthem died away in
the hot sunset air.