We have said that the death of Antonio Maceo moved Cuban patriots to
redouble their efforts to atone for the grievous loss which their cause
had thus suffered. Unfortunately not all of them were capable of so
doing, while those who did so were unable to make devotion and zeal take
the place of consummate military genius. In consequence, despite the
utmost efforts of Gomez and his colleagues matters went badly for the
revolution through most of the following year. Gomez himself indeed felt
that he had lost his right arm. He was at La Reforma, near Sancti
Spiritus, at the beginning of 1897, and he summoned the other
revolutionary leaders to meet him there, to concentrate their forces,
and to plan a new campaign. They came promptly and eagerly, some of them
unfortunately thus leaving without protection important strategic points
and centers of revolutionist industry, which were pounced upon and
captured by the Spanish. When the patriot forces were thus gathered it
was expected that there would be immediately undertaken a general
advance westward, into Matanzas and Havana; for which it was believed
the Cuban army was strong enough, and which the Spanish were not
believed to be able to resist.
Instead, Gomez decided first to effect the reduction of Arroyo Blanco.
This was a small and unimportant town in the Province of Camaguey, near
the Santa Clara border; containing a Spanish garrison under Captain
Escobar. Gomez first summoned Escobar to surrender, in order to avoid
the destruction which would be caused by the bombardment of the place
with a dynamite gun, which he threatened to begin forthwith. Escobar
defied him, and the bombardment was undertaken, but proved ineffective,
and before Gomez could capture the place strong Spanish reenforcements
arrived and the attempt had to be abandoned. Thereafter Gomez contented
himself with sending several strong bands westward, to conduct guerrilla
warfare against the Spaniards wherever they could, while he himself
remained near Sancti Spiritus, also engaging in irregular operations.
There he was presently menaced by Weyler himself. That formidable foe
had practically achieved the conquest of Pinar del Rio. After Maceo's
death the Cuban forces in that province had largely dispersed, some
abandoning the struggle altogether as hopeless, and others going to the
east, to join themselves with Gomez, Garcia or other surviving leaders.
Only a few roving bands remained. Accordingly Weyler announced that the
western province was pacified. That was sufficiently true; but it was
conspicuously true in the sense expressed by Tacitus, and Byron. They
had made a solitude, and called it peace. Seldom had any comparable
region been so thoroughly devastated and desolated. Then Weyler felt
himself free to lead his army elsewhere.
He set out from Havana with an imposing array of troops, and marched
through the heart of the province and of Matanzas, into Santa Clara. On
the way there was little fighting to do, not even to beat off guerrilla
bands. His attention was given, therefore, to devastating the country,
and to driving the inhabitants into "concentration camps," where they
were doomed to starve to death by thousands. By the end of February he
was triumphantly encamped at the foot of the Guamuhaya Mountains,
between Santa Clara and Trinidad, and had the satisfaction of having
wrought vast destruction upon the property of Cubans and upon the
essential supplies of the Cuban army.
A few weeks later Quintin Bandera with a small force came from Camaguey
and, by wading through the shallow water of the Bay of Sabanabamar, got
around the trocha and joined Gomez. The latter directed him to continue
westward, and to harass the Spaniards with guerrilla attacks. This was
done, and Bandera proceeded as far as Trinidad. Then failing to receive
necessary support he turned back, and on July 4 was killed in a skirmish
at Pelayo. East of the trocha Calixto Garcia continued his formidable
career against such Spanish forces as remained in that region. He
captured Las Tunas after forty-eight hours of almost incessant fighting.
In Matanzas and Havana the revolutionary bands were badly broken up by
the Spaniards, and they seemed to lack efficient leadership. Their
leader, General Lacret, fell into an unfortunate controversy with Gomez
over his treatment of Cubans who disregarded government orders,
especially in their attitude toward the Spaniards. Gomez, remorseless,
would have had them shot as traitors, but Lacret insisted upon more
lenient treatment of them, realizing that they were almost literally
"between the devil and the deep sea" and were therefore entitled to
sympathetic consideration. The outcome was that Gomez relieved Lacret of
his command and appointed Alexander Rodriguez in his place, in Matanzas.
That officer failed to command the loyalty of his troops, and the result
was that the latter generally deserted and dispersed. Mayia Rodriguez
was then ordered to the scene, but was unable to collect a sufficient
force, and remained in Santa Clara, hemmed in by the Spanish. General
Jose Maria Aguirre, who died in December, 1896, was succeeded in command
in the Province of Havana by Nestor Aranguren, who performed some
creditable minor operations, particularly against Spanish railroad
communications, but achieved nothing of real importance. His lieutenant,
General Adolfo Castillo, in the southern part of the province, was
killed in battle, in September, and was succeeded by Juan Delgado. The
Spanish General Parrado in October marched without opposition as far as
Los Palos, and there received the surrender of a small Cuban band; and
in November General Pando with a powerful army made his way without
serious opposition from Havana to the western part of Oriente.
It was during this year that Weyler's ever infamous "concentration"
policy, which was really a policy of extermination, reached its infernal
climax and was then repudiated and abandoned. This system, as already
related, was decreed on October 21, 1896. It required all Cubans, men,
women and children, to leave their homes in the rural regions and enter
concentration camps. These were simply huge pens, enclosed with fences
and barbed wire and guarded by Spanish soldiers. There the hapless
prisoners were huddled together, without shelter from the elements, and
with little or no food save such as could be procured by stealth. There
was none to be had within the enclosures, of course, and the prisoners
could not go out to get any, even if any was to be found in the
devastated country around them. Their friends outside seldom dared
approach the camps to bring them food, because as they had not
themselves surrendered as commanded by Weyler, they were liable to be
shot at sight.
Elsewhere Cubans by thousands were driven into towns and cities which
were still under Spanish control, and were there kept prisoners within
the Spanish lines. They were not quite so badly off as those in the
concentration camps, though the difference was not great. They had no
means of obtaining food, save as the municipal authorities, more
merciful than Weyler, opened "soup kitchens" and thus in charity kept
some of them from starvation. As it was the mortality from starvation,
disease and exposure was appalling. As it was reported that many of
these sufferers were American citizens, the President of the United
States asked Congress to appropriate $50,000 for their relief. This was
done, and the sum was sent to the Consul-General at Havana. He was,
however, able to reach only a small proportion of the sufferers, and
thus was presently compelled to report that he had been unable to expend
more than a fraction of the sum at his disposal. This monstrous policy
of waging war against non-combatants, including women and children, did
more perhaps than anything else to crystallize public opinion throughout
the United States against Weyler and against the Spanish government
which he represented and which was responsible for him, and to
strengthen the demand that was being made for intervention in behalf of
humanity.
This demand was made not merely by the "yellow press," which was
inspired by sordid and sinister motives, but also by the most
thoughtful, disinterested and upright men of America. Fitzhugh Lee, the
highly competent and trustworthy consul-general at Havana, officially
reported in December, 1897, that in the Province of Havana alone there
had been 101,000 of the "reconcentrados," of which more than half had
died. About 400,000 innocent and unoffending persons, chiefly women and
children, had been transformed into imprisoned paupers, to be sustained
by charity or to die of disease and famine. Senator Proctor, of Vermont,
one of the foremost members of the United States Senate, made a personal
tour of investigation in such parts of the island as were accessible,
and reported to his colleagues that "It is not peace, nor is it war; it
is desolation and distress, misery and starvation." The people of the
United States thus came to the conclusion that the Spanish were unable
to subdue the Cubans, and that the Cubans were unable to expel the
Spanish, and that the war was therefore nothing but a campaign of
destruction and extermination, which would end only when one side was
exhausted or extirpated. It was impossible that a civilized and humane
nation should regard such a spectacle at its very doors with
indifference. We have hitherto quoted the significant remarks of
President Cleveland on the subject in his message of December, 1896,
clearly foreshadowing intervention. His successor, President McKinley,
in his message of just a year later, in December, 1897, expressed in
slightly different language the identical convictions and purposes. He
said:
[Illustration: WILLIAM MCKINLEY]
"The near future will demonstrate whether the indispensable conditions
of a righteous peace, just alike to the Cubans and to Spain, as well as
equitable to all our interests so intimately involved in the welfare of
Cuba, is likely to be attained. If not, the exigency of further and
other action by the United States will remain to be taken. When that
time comes, that action will be determined in the line of indisputable
right and duty.... If it shall hereafter appear to be a duty imposed by
our obligations to ourselves, to civilization, and to humanity, to
intervene with force, it shall be without fault on our part, and only
because the necessity for such action will be so clear as to command the
support and approval of the civilized world."
If McKinley, a less aggressive and more conciliatory man than Cleveland,
spoke a little less positively than his predecessor, in that he employed
the hypothetical form, the purport of his words was the same. The one a
Democratic President, the other a Republican President, long before that
incident of the _Maine_ which has incorrectly been regarded by some as
the cause of the American war with Spain, openly and in the most
explicit manner contemplated the prospect of forcible intervention in
Cuba and of consequent war.
Meantime Spain herself passed through a political crisis, which made a
change in her Cuban administration. Loud protests were made there
against the ruthless and inhuman policy of Weyler, but the Prime
Minister, Canovas del Castillo, was deaf to them and persisted in
retaining Weyler in command. But on August 8 Canovas was assassinated by
an Anarchist, and was succeeded by General Azcarraga, Minister of War,
who continued his policy unchanged. But on September 29 the whole
Cabinet resigned, and on October 4 Sagasta, the Liberal leader, became
Prime Minister. He promptly recalled Weyler and appointed General Ramon
Blanco to be Captain-General of Cuba in his stead. Weyler departed,
breathing wrath and hatred against Cuba and against America, and
predicting failure for his successor, even as Campos had predicted it
for Weyler himself.
Blanco arrived at Havana on November 1, 1897, with the purpose, as he
had announced before sailing, of putting sincerely into effect the
reforms which Sagasta had outlined, reforms which would, he believed, be
acceptable to the Cuban people. He found the condition of affairs in the
island to be far worse than it had been reported, or than he had
expected. The "reconcentrados" had been dying and were still dying by
tens of thousands. The soldiers had not been paid for months and in
consequence were disaffected and mutinous, and were looting to obtain
food which they had no money to buy. Both the Spanish and the Cuban
Autonomists were profoundly dissatisfied; while the Revolutionists,
though making no progress, were as implacable as ever. He at once
ordered the concentration camps to be abolished, saying that he would
not make war upon women and children, and he secured a credit of
$100,000 from the Spanish government to assist the Cuban peasantry in
the rehabilitation of their ruined farms. All American citizens were
released from prison, as were also many Cubans who were under sentence
of death. Cuban refugees and exiles were invited to return home, and
every facility possible was afforded for the resumption of sugar making
and agriculture. He then undertook to put into effect a system of home
rule which he fondly hoped would satisfy the Autonomists and would bring
the masses of the Cuban people over to the side of that party.
Let us review briefly the state of Cuba at this epochal time, the ending
of 1897 and the beginning of 1898, the ultimate climax of four centuries
of Cuban history. The War of Independence had been in progress less than
three years. Five successively unsuccessful Captains-General had striven
to conquer a brave people resolved to be free. No fewer than 52,000
Spanish soldiers had lost their lives in battle or from disease, 47,000
had been returned to Spain disabled, 42,000 were in hospitals unfit for
duty, and 70,000 regulars and 16,000 irregulars still kept up the
fatuous struggle. The infamies of Weyler had destroyed by starvation and
disease 250,000 Cubans, the majority of them women and children,
reducing the population of the island to 1,100,000 Cubans intent on
independence and 150,000 Spaniards opposed to their having it. The Cuban
army consisted of 25,000 infantry and 3,000 cavalry, fairly well armed,
with some artillery. Maximo Gomez was Commander in Chief. Major-General
Calixto Garcia commanded in Camaguey and Oriente, with Pedro Perez,
Jesus Rabi and Mario G. Menocal as his lieutenants. Major-General
Francisco Carrillo commanded in Santa Clara, aided by Jose Rodriguez,
Hijino Esquerra, Jose Miguel Gomez and Jose Gonzales. In the western
three provinces Major-General Jose Maria Rodriguez commanded, with Pedro
Betancourt, Alexandra Rodriguez, Pedro Vias and Juan Lorente as his
chief aids. The civil government of the Republic had been changed
somewhat, Bartolome Maso being President, Domingo Mendez Capote
Vice-President and Secretary of War, Andreas Moreno Secretary of Foreign
Affairs, Ernesto Fonts-Sterling Secretary of Finance, and Manuel Silva
Secretary of the Interior. This organization, with its provincial and
municipal subordinates, was performing the functions of government under
great difficulties, yet much more efficiently and to a much wider extent
throughout the island, than the Spanish administration.
The uncompromising attitude of the Revolutionists, and the hopelessness
of any attempt at amicable adjustment of affairs, was at this time
strikingly shown in a tragic incident. It was in December, 1897. There
was in Havana a young Spanish officer named Joaquin Ruiz, who had
formerly served as a civil engineer, and had been intimately associated
with Nestor Aranguren, another young engineer who had become a leader of
the Revolutionists and had made himself particularly active and annoying
to the Spanish in the Province of Havana. The two were close friends,
and were both men of charming personality. The Spanish authorities in
Havana determined to use this friendship in an attempt to seduce
Aranguren into betraying or at least deserting the patriot cause. So
Ruiz was directed to open a correspondence with Aranguren, with a view
to securing a personal interview with him. Aranguren wrote to Ruiz that
he would be glad to meet him personally, but could not do so if he came
on any political errand; and he warned him that for him to come to the
Cuban camp with any proposal of Cuban surrender or acceptance of
autonomy would subject him to the penalty of death, which would
infallibly be carried out. Despite this warning, and presumably against
his own better judgment, Ruiz obeyed the orders of his superiors, and
undertook the errand. He had no safe conduct. He bore no flag of truce.
He went through no agreement between the commanding officers of the
respective sides. He went in the circumstances and manner of a spy; and
his purpose was to persuade, if possible, a Cuban officer to betray his
trust and become a traitor to his own cause.
When in these circumstances Ruiz reached Aranguren, the latter was so
distressed that it is said he burst into tears and, embracing his old
friend, exclaimed, "Why have you come? It will mean your certain death!
I cannot save you!" And such indeed was the case. Aranguren was devoted
to his friend, but still more to Cuba. Ruiz was taken before a court
martial. He made no defence. He admitted the character and purpose of
his errand. And he received the sentence of death with the fortitude of
a brave man. An attempt was made by the Spanish authorities to exploit
Ruiz as a martyr to Cuban savagery, but it recoiled upon their own
heads. It was shown that they had unworthily employed a brave and
devoted soldier in a discreditable errand, and that he had been dealt
with according to the stern but just rules of war. It was also
demonstrated that Cuban patriots were not thus to be corrupted. By a
strange turn of fate, only a few weeks later Nestor Aranguren was killed
by the Spanish during one of his daring raids against Havana. It was
said that he was betrayed by a Spaniard who had become one of his
followers for the purpose of avenging Ruiz. His body fell into the hands
of the Spanish, and, despite their former assumed wrath over the
execution of Ruiz, they treated it with all respect and interred it in
the Columbus Cemetery at Havana, close to the grave of Ruiz.
This was not the only incident of the sort. Only a few weeks after the
death of Ruiz a civilian named Morales went to the camp of Pedro Ruiz,
in the Province of Pinar del Rio, with proposals for compromise on the
basis of autonomy. He was promptly taken before a court martial, tried,
condemned, and put to death. Whether Blanco himself was responsible for
this policy of sending emissaries to the Cuban camp with proposals which
he would not venture to make openly in an accredited manner to the Cuban
government, did not appear. The presumption, because of his known
character, is that he was not, and indeed that he was not aware that
they were being made. There is even reason for thinking that after the
Morales case was brought to his attention, he prohibited any more such
clandestine and illegal enterprises. Tragic as the incidents were, and
especially regrettable as was the sacrifice of such a man as Ruiz, it
was well to have it made unmistakably clear that the Cubans were not
inclined to end the war by surrender or by compromise, but were intent
upon fighting it out to the end.
In such circumstances Blanco strove for the last time to defeat the
Cuban national desire for independence. He probably realized in advance
the certainty of failure. He had been Captain-General before, succeeding
Campos after the Ten Years' War and during the Little War, and he must
have known the temper of the Cuban people and the unwillingness of the
great majority of them to accept the delusive scheme of autonomy which
Spain was fitfully offering, and in which he himself never had any real
faith and which, indeed, he had never favored. But he was a loyal
Spanish soldier, of the better type, and he was personally as little
odious to the Cubans as any Spanish Captain General could be, for he had
never been notably tyrannical or cruel. The decree of autonomy was
adopted by the Spanish government on November 25, 1897, largely because
of the urgings--to use no stronger term--of the United States, and was
promulgated by Blanco in Cuba early in December. The scheme provided for
universal suffrage; a bi-cameral Legislature consisting of a Council of
eighteen elected members and seventeen appointed by the crown, and a
House containing one elected member for each 25,000 inhabitants. To this
Legislature were nominally committed most of the functions of
government. But it was provided that "The supreme government of the
colony shall be exercised by a Governor-General." That was the crux of
the whole matter. That made the Captain-General, or Governor-General as
he was thereafter to be called, the practical dictator of the island.
To this entirely illusive and delusive scheme, the remnant of the
Autonomist party gave adherence with a devotion worthy of a better
cause. The Reformist faction of the Spanish party also, though not so
readily, approved it. The intransigent Constitutionalists would have
none of it. Tenuous and futile as were its apparent concessions to the
Cubans, they were far too much for these insular Bourbons to be willing
to grant. They socially ostracised Blanco, and before the system was to
go into effect they called a convention at Havana to protest and to
foment against it. The president of the party, the Cuban-born Marquis de
Apezteguia, was indeed in favor of giving autonomy a trial. But he could
not control the party whose other members were almost unanimously
against it. They had defeated and expelled Campos. Now they resolved to
do the same with Blanco. At the convention Apezteguia was rebuked and
repudiated, though left in office. A telegram of sympathy was sent to
Weyler. Speeches were made denouncing the United States, its President
and its Congress. A resolution was adopted condemning and opposing
autonomy, and another declaring that Constitutionalists would not vote
nor take any part in public affairs.
[Illustration: ANTONIO GOVIN
Antonio Govin, born at Matanzas in 1849 and deceased in Havana in 1914,
was a jurist, publicist, orator and patriot of distinction. He was
Professor of Administrative Law at the University of Havana, and was the
author of a number of volumes on law and on Colonial history. He was one
of the founders and strong advocates of the Autonomist party and a
member of the Autonomist cabinet.]
In the face of these circumstances, Blanco organized his Autonomist
Cabinet. The date was January 1, 1898. The place was the historic throne
room of the Captain-General's palace. There were present beside the
Cabinet the various foreign consuls and the dignitaries of the Roman
Catholic Church. A small crowd of the people gathered outside, but the
public in general paid little attention to the event. Yet the Cabinet
which then came into brief existence was a body of men that in other
circumstances would have commanded most favorable attention. The nominal
head, President of the Cabinet without portfolio, was José Maria Galvez,
a lawyer and orator, the author of the Autonomist manifestoes of 1879
and 1895. The real head, the most forceful and influential member, not
only, indeed, of the Cabinet but of the whole Autonomist party, was Dr.
Rafael Montoro, the "Cuban Castelar" as his friends used to call him. He
had long been an advocate of real autonomy, he had been the chief
founder of the Autonomist party, he had been a Cuban Deputy to the
Spanish Cortes, he had signed the Autonomist manifestoes of 1879 and
1895, and he had approved the insular reforms proposed by Canovas del
Castillo. As lawyer, orator, scholar, writer, he had no superior if
indeed a peer in Cuba. It was the inscrutable tragedy of a great career
that he identified himself with the Autonomist movement. He was Minister
of Finance. The Minister of Justice was Antonio Govin, also one of the
original Autonomists, a man of great courage and ability, who on the
failure of the Autonomist regime left Cuba and settled in the United
States. Francisco Zayas, an accomplished educator, was made Minister of
Instruction. Laureano Rodriguez, a Peninsular Spaniard, was Minister of
Agriculture, Labor and Commerce. Eduardo Dolz, a Reformist, was also a
member, who was supposed to be the special representative of the Spanish
crown. Two other men, not Ministers but high in Autonomist councils,
Senors Amblard and Giberga, were regarded by the Spanish party as
traitors who were really in league with the Revolutionists. Blanco swore
in these Ministers, addressed them with an exhortation to support
autonomy and to suppress the revolution, and gave them as the watchword
of their administration "Long live Cuba, forever Spanish!"
For a few days the glamor and the illusion lasted. Some inconspicuous
revolutionists yielded to Spanish blandishments and surrendered; to whom
the honest and chivalrous Blanco granted in good faith the amnesty which
he had promised. Some Cuban refugees returned from the United States.
The Autonomists--the few who still remained; for the majority had by
this time joined the Revolutionists, gone into exile, or been
imprisoned--declared their adherence to the new order of affairs and
professed satisfaction with it. Apparently they accepted at face value
the explanations which were voluminously put forth by the government, to
the effect that the system was practically identical with that of
Canada, under which that country had long been contented, loyal and
prosperous. Technically, no doubt, there was a tolerably close analogy
between the two. It was quite true that the powers reserved to the
Spanish crown in Cuba through the Governor-General were similar to those
reserved to the British crown in Canada through the Viceroy. But the
decisive factor in the case, which the Autonomists apparently ignored,
was this, that while in Canada it was an unwritten but unbroken law
that the crown did not exercise its powers save in accordance with the
will of the people, it was morally certain that in Cuba the Spanish
crown would exercise its powers to the full, whether the people liked it
or not. The Cuban Autonomists in the United States, where many of them
deemed it prudent to remain, did not suffer from the illusions of their
compatriots in Cuba, and generally expressed dissatisfaction with the
scheme, or at least reserved their judgment upon it.
The Spanish Reformists in Cuba also approved the scheme. They had
deserted and betrayed Campos, and had been ignored by Weyler. Now they
struggled to return to public recognition and influence. True, they had
never before wanted or approved autonomy. But they saw that now they
must do so or remain in retirement. So they joined hands with the Cuban
Autonomists, congratulated the Spanish government, and pledged their
loyalty to Blanco. This gave the Spanish government ground for its
exultant belief that these two parties had united in its support, and
would probably control the island in behalf of autonomy.
But there were still the Constitutionalists to be reckoned with. They
were implacable. They had shown in their convention a few weeks before
their hostility to autonomy. They had ostracised Blanco. Now they
proceeded to further extremes. They organized riotous disturbances in
Havana, and made violent demonstrations against Blanco and, which was in
some respects more serious, against the American government and the
American citizens in Cuba. So ominous did these disturbances become at
the middle of January that the Consul-General, Fitzhugh Lee, was driven
to request the sending of a war ship to Havana harbor for the protection
of American citizens. In consequence, on January 24 the cruiser _Maine_
was sent to Havana. This action was taken after consultation with the
Spanish government, in which that government expressed great pleasure at
the prospect of thus having a friendly visit of the American vessel to
Cuban waters, and arranged to have its own cruiser the _Vizcaya_ make a
return visit to New York.
This was not satisfactory, however, to the Spanish Minister at
Washington, Senor Dupuy de Lome, who having failed to bring President
McKinley to his own point of view of Cuban affairs, showed plainly his
animosity against that gentleman, and wrote a letter to a personal
friend characterizing the President as a vacillating and time-serving
politician. This letter through some clandestine means was placed in the
hands of the United States Secretary of State, who at once sent for the
Minister and asked him plumply if he had written it. The latter of
course acknowledged that he had. Thereupon the Secretary cabled to the
American Minister at Madrid to request the Spanish government to recall
the offending envoy. This the Spanish government would doubtless have
done, but for the fact that De Lome forestalled such action by cabling
his resignation an hour before the dispatch of the Secretary of State
reached Madrid. The Spanish government then sent Senor Polo y Bernabe to
be its Minister at Washington.
[Illustration: THE BAY AND HARBOR OF HAVANA
The capital of Cuba is seated upon the shore of a spacious and beautiful
bay, the entrance to which is between the two bold headlines crowned
respectively by the Morro Castle and La Punta fortress, while the domes
and spires of the great city have for a background the central mountain
range of the island. The harbor of Havana is one of the most secure and
commodious in the world, and in commercial importance, measured by
tonnage of shipping, ranks among the foremost in the Western
Hemisphere.]
There next occurred the greatest and most mysterious tragedy of the
entire revolutionary period. On the evening of February 15, at twenty
minutes before ten o'clock, a violent explosion occurred under or in the
forward portion of the _Maine_ as she lay in Havana harbor, sufficient
to lift the hull some distance above its normal level. A few seconds
later another and more violent explosion followed, which so completely
destroyed the forward part of the ship that most of it could never
be found. The remainder of the vessel almost immediately sank, in about
six fathoms of water. Of the complement of 360, two officers and 264 men
were killed, and of the remainder 60 were wounded. Captain Sigsbee,
commander of the _Maine_, telegraphed to Washington that all judgment
upon the matter should be suspended until after full investigation.
Blanco telegraphed to Madrid that the catastrophe was doubtless due to
an accident within the ship, and the Madrid government promptly
expressed regret and sympathy.
In the United States there was a great outburst of grief and rage. Even
the most restrained and conservative could not help a degree of
suspicion of foul play, though of course not on the part of the Spanish
government. A semi-criminal faction, in the "yellow" press, clamored
furiously for war, charging Spaniards, even the Spanish government, with
direct and malicious responsibility for the tragedy, and even publishing
the grossest of falsehoods for the sake of inflaming popular sentiment.
Too large a proportion of the nation was swayed by these latter sordid
and sinister influences. But at least the government kept its head, and
acted with admirable discretion; though for so doing the President
incurred the virulent animosity of the chief clamorer for war, an
animosity which was persistently maintained until it culminated in the
incitement of a criminal Anarchist to assassinate the President.
When the explosion occurred, and Blanco learned what it was, it is said
that he shed tears and exclaimed, "This is the beginning of the end!"
Despite his message to his government, he probably feared that there had
been foul play, and he realized what effect, in any case, the incident
would have upon Spanish-American relations. As for the Cuban
revolutionists, both in Cuba and in the United States, they were almost
stunned by two emotions. The hideous atrocity of the thing was
overwhelming, and they grieved at the loss of the American sailors as
though they themselves had been Americans. At the same time they could
not be blind nor insensible to the almost certain sequel. They felt
that, as Blanco said, it was the beginning of the end, and that now
American intervention was practically assured.
The Spanish government proposed a joint investigation into the disaster,
but the United States government declined and conducted a thorough
investigation of its own, through a board of eminent official experts.
The report was that the loss of the ship was not due to any accident or
to any negligence on the part of the officers and crew. The first
explosion was external to the hull, as if caused by a torpedo or mine,
and it caused the second explosion, which was that of the ship's
magazines. The Spanish government then conducted an investigation of its
own, resulting in a report that both explosions were within the ship and
were presumably purely accidental. It may be added that a final
examination in after years, when a cofferdam was built about the hulk
and it was floated and then taken out to sea and sunk in deep water,
fully confirmed the report of the American investigating board.
It is to be recalled that Ramon O. Williams, who had only a little while
before retired from the office of American Consul-General at Havana, and
was particularly well informed and judicious, earnestly warned the
United States government against sending a ship to Havana, because the
harbor was very elaborately mined, and there was a bitter and truculent
feeling among the Spaniards against the United States; wherefore the
danger of some untoward occurrence was too great to be incurred without
a more pressing necessity than was then apparent. But despite his
warning the _Maine_ was sent. She was conducted by a Spanish official
pilot to her anchorage at a buoy between Regla and the old custom house.
Whether a mine was attached to that buoy or not is unknown, though Mr.
Williams was confident that one was. His theory was that some malignant
Spanish officer, who had access to the keyboard of the mines, perhaps
through connivance with some other fanatic, watched to see the tide
swing the ship directly over the mine and then touched the key and
caused the explosion. That would account for the enormous hole which was
blown in the side of the ship, and which could not have been caused by
any little mine or torpedo which might have been floated to the side of
the ship, but must have been produced by a very large mine planted deep
beneath the hull.
The findings of the American board of investigation were reported
officially to the Spanish government, and the President in a message to
Congress expressed confidence that Spain would act in the matter
according to the dictates of justice, honor and friendship. The Spanish
government replied that it would certainly do so, and it presently
proposed to submit the whole subject to investigation by impartial
experts, and to determination by arbitration. But this proposal was not
made until April 10, when so much else had occurred to strain relations
between the two countries that it could not be entertained by the United
States.
Meantime the Autonomist government in Cuba, with a devotion that was
pathetic to behold, persisted in its efforts to justify its existence.
An electoral census was taken, though of course it could not cover more
than a small fraction of the island, and on March 27 an "election" of
Cuban Deputies to the Cortes was held. In fact there was no popular
voting at all. A list was prepared of eligible candidates, twenty of
them being Autonomists and Reformists, or supporters of the government,
and ten representing the Constitutionalist opposition. The list was
submitted to the Governor-General and approved by him, and the
candidates were declared to have been duly elected. Jose Maria Galvez,
the president of the Autonomist cabinet, reported to the President of
the United States that the new government was satisfactorily performing
its functions, and entreated him to give no encouragement to the
revolutionists which would militate against its success. In April there
was another "election" for members of the two houses of the Insular
Legislature. On May 4 that Legislature met, chose Fernando del Casco as
President of the Assembly, and confirmed the Autonomist cabinet in its
place; and it continued patiently and valiantly to hold sessions, make
laws, and act as though it were a real government, exercising real
authority over the island, all through the period of the American war
with Spain and the practical siege of the island by the American navy.
When the Spanish forces yielded and a protocol for peace was signed, on
August 12, the Legislature held its last meeting, and was declared
dissolved by Blanco in October. The Autonomist Cabinet continued to
exercise its functions, at least nominally, until the end of Spanish
sovereignty in Cuba.