The Boys of '98 Part 29

_June 26._ The American lines were advanced to within four miles of Santiago, and the boys could look into the doomed city. It was possible to make accurate note of the defences, and most likely officers as well as men were astonished by the preparations which had been made.

There were blockhouses on every hill; from the harbour batteries, sweeping in a semicircle to the eastward of the city, were rifle-pits and intrenchments skilfully arranged. Earthworks, in a regular line, completely shut off approach to the city, and in front of the entrenchments and rifle-pits were barbed-wire fences, or trochas.

Three more charges of guncotton did the dynamite cruiser _Vesuvius_ throw into the batteries at the mouth of Santiago Harbour on the night of June 26th, and next morning the evidences of her work could be seen on the western battery, a portion of which was in ruins. The water-mains which supplied the city of Santiago were cut on the same night, and the doomed city thus brought so much nearer to capitulation.

_July 1._ Knowing that with the close of June the American army was in readiness for a decisive action, the people waited anxiously, tearfully, for the first terrible word which should be received telling of slaughter and woeful suffering, and it came on the evening of July 1st, when the cablegram given below was flashed over the wires to the War Department:

"PLAYA DEL ESTE, July 1, 1898.

"_A. G. O., U. S. Army, Was.h.i.+ngton_:

"Siboney, July 1. Had a very heavy engagement to-day, which lasted from eight A. M. till sundown.

"We have carried their outer works and are now in possession of them.

"There is now about three-quarters of a mile of open country between my lines and city; by morning troops will be entrenched and considerable augmentation of forces will be there.

"General Lawton's division and General Bates's brigade, which had been engaged all day in carrying El Caney, which was accomplished at four P. M., will be in line and in front of Santiago during the night.

"I regret to say that our casualties will be above four hundred; of these not many are killed.

(Signed) "W. R. SHAFTER, _Major-General_."

CHAPTER XI.

EL CANEY AND SAN JUAN HEIGHTS.

General W. R. Shafter, in his official report of the operations around Santiago, says:

"On June 30th I reconnoitred the country about Santiago and made my plan of attack. From a high hill, from which the city was in plain view, I could see the San Juan Hill and the country about El Caney. The roads were very poor and, indeed, little better than bridle-paths until the San Juan River and El Caney were reached. The position of El Caney, to the northeast of Santiago, was of great importance to the enemy, as holding the Guantanamo road, as well as furnis.h.i.+ng shelter for a strong outpost that might be used to a.s.sail the right flank of any force operating against San Juan Hill. In view of this, I decided to begin the attack next day at El Caney with one division, while sending two divisions on the direct road to Santiago, pa.s.sing by the El Pozo house, and as a diversion to direct a small force against Aguadores, from Siboney along the railroad by the sea, with a view of attracting the attention of the Spaniards in the latter direction, and of preventing them from attacking our left flank.... But we were in a sickly climate; our supplies had to be brought forward by a narrow wagon-road which the rain might at any time render impa.s.sable; fear was entertained that a storm might drive the vessels containing our stores to sea, thus separating us from our base of supplies, and, lastly, it was reported that General Pando, with eight thousand reinforcements for the enemy, was en route for Manzanillo, and might be expected in a few days. Under these conditions I determined to give battle without delay.

[Ill.u.s.tration: MAJOR-GENERAL SHAFTER.]

"Early on the morning of July 1st Lawton was in position around El Caney, Chaffee's brigade on the right across the Guantanamo road, Miles's brigade in the centre and Ludlow's on the left. The duty of cutting off the enemy's retreat along the Santiago road was a.s.signed to the latter brigade. The artillery opened on the town at 6.15 A. M. The battle here soon became general, and was hotly contested. The enemy's position was naturally strong, and was rendered more so by blockhouses, a stone fort and entrenchments cut in solid rock, and the loopholing of a solidly built stone church. The opposition offered by the enemy was greater than had been antic.i.p.ated, and prevented Lawton from joining the right of the main line during the day, as had been intended. After the battle had continued for some time, Bates's brigade of two regiments reached my headquarters from Siboney. I directed him to move near El Caney, to give a.s.sistance if necessary. He did so, and was put in position between Miles and Chaffee.

The battle continued with varying intensity during most of the day and until the place was carried by a.s.sault about 4.30 P. M. As the Spaniards endeavoured to retreat along the Santiago road, Ludlow's position enabled him to do very effective work, and practically to cut off all retreat in that direction.

"After the battle at El Caney was well opened, and the sound of the small-arms fire caused us to believe that Lawton was driving the enemy before him, I directed Grimes's battery to open fire from the heights of El Pozo on the San Juan blockhouse, situated in the enemy's entrenchments, extending along the crest of San Juan Hill. This fire was effective, and the enemy could be seen running away from the vicinity of the blockhouse.

The artillery fire from El Pozo was soon returned by the enemy's artillery. They evidently had the range of this hill, and their first sh.e.l.ls killed and wounded several men. As the Spaniards used smokeless powder, it was very difficult to locate the position of their pieces, while, on the contrary, the smoke caused by our black powder plainly indicated the position of our battery.

"At this time the cavalry division, under General Sumner, which was lying concealed in the general vicinity of the El Pozo house, was ordered forward with directions to cross the San Juan River and deploy to the right on the Santiago side, while Kent's division was to follow closely in its rear and deploy to the left. These troops moved forward in compliance with orders, but the road was so narrow as to render it impracticable to retain the column of fours formation at all points, while the undergrowth on both sides was so dense as to preclude the possibility of deploying skirmishers. It naturally resulted that the progress made was slow, and the long-range rifles of the enemy's infantry killed and wounded a number of our men while marching along this road, and before there was any opportunity to return this fire. At this time Generals Kent and Sumner were ordered to push forward with all possible haste, and place their troops in position to engage the enemy. General Kent, with this end in view, forced the head of his column alongside the cavalry column as far as the narrow trail permitted, and thus hurried his arrival at the San Juan, and the formation beyond that stream. A few hundred yards before reaching the San Juan, the road forks, a fact that was discovered by Lieutenant-Colonel Derby of my staff, who had approached well to the front in a war balloon. This information he furnished to the troops, resulting in Sumner moving on the right-hand road while Kent was enabled to utilise the road to the left. General Wheeler, the permanent commander of the cavalry division, who had been ill, came forward during the morning, and later returned to duty and rendered most gallant and efficient service during the remainder of the day. After crossing the stream the cavalry moved to the right, with a view to connecting with Lawton's left when he would come up, with their left resting near the Santiago road.

"In the meantime, Kent's division, with the exception of two regiments of Hawkins's brigade, being thus uncovered, moved rapidly to the front from the forks previously mentioned in the road, utilising both trails, but more especially the one to the left, and, crossing the creek, formed for attack in the front of San Juan Hill. During this formation the Third Brigade suffered severely. While personally superintending this movement its gallant commander, Colonel Wikoff, was killed. The command of the brigade then devolved upon Lieutenant-Colonel Worth, Thirteenth Infantry, who was soon severely wounded, and next upon Lieutenant-Colonel Lisc.u.m, Twenty-fourth Infantry, who, five minutes later, also fell under the terrible fire of the enemy, and the command of the brigade then devolved upon Lieutenant-Colonel Ewers of the Ninth Infantry.

"While the formation just described was taking place, General Kent took measures to hurry forward his rear brigade. The Tenth and Second Infantry were ordered to follow Wikoff's brigade, while the Twenty-first was sent on the right-hand road to support the First Brigade under General Hawkins, who had crossed the stream and formed on the right of the division. The Second and Tenth Infantry, Colonel E. P. Pearson commanding, moved forward in good order on the left of the division, pa.s.sing over a green knoll, and drove the enemy back toward his trenches.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE ATTACK ON SAN JUAN HILL.]

"After completing their formation under a destructive fire, advancing a short distance, both divisions found in their front a wide bottom, in which had been placed a barbed-wire entanglement, and beyond which there was a high hill, along the crest of which the enemy was strongly posted.

Nothing daunted, these gallant men pushed on to drive the enemy from his chosen position, both divisions losing heavily. In this a.s.sault Colonel Hamilton, Lieutenants Smith and s.h.i.+pp were killed, and Colonel Carroll, Lieutenants Thayer and Myer, all in the cavalry, were wounded. Great credit is due to Brigadier-General H. S. Hawkins, who, placing himself between his regiments, urged them on by voice and bugle-call to the attack so brilliantly executed.

"In this fierce encounter words fail to do justice to the gallant regimental commanders and their heroic men, for, while the generals indicated the formation and the points of attack, it was, after all, the intrepid bravery of the subordinate officers and men that planted our colours on the crest of San Juan Hill and drove the enemy from his trenches and blockhouses, thus gaining a position which sealed the fate of Santiago.

"In the action on this part of the field, most efficient service was rendered by Lieutenant J. H. Parker, Thirteenth Infantry, and the Gatling gun detachment under his command.

"The fighting continued at intervals until nightfall, but our men held resolutely to the position gained at the cost of so much blood and toil.

"On the night of July 1st I ordered General Duffield, at Siboney, to send forward the Thirty-fourth Michigan and the Ninth Ma.s.sachusetts, both of which had just arrived from the United States.

"All day on the second the battle raged with more or less fury, but such of our troops as were in position at daylight held their ground, and Lawton gained a strong and commanding position on the right. About ten P. M. the enemy made a vigorous a.s.sault to break through my lines, but he was repulsed at all points.

"On the morning of the third the battle was renewed, but the enemy seemed to have expended his energy in the a.s.sault of the previous night, and the firing along the line was desultory."

Such is the official report of the battle before Santiago, where were killed of the American forces twenty-three officers, and 208 men; wounded eighty officers, and 1,203 men; missing, eighty-one; total, 1,595.

An account of any engagement is made more vivid by a recital of those who partic.i.p.ated in the b.l.o.o.d.y work, since the commanding officer views the action as a whole, and purely from a military standpoint, while the private, who may know little or nothing regarding the general outcome, understands full well what took place immediately around him. Mr. W. K.

Hearst, the proprietor of the New York _Journal_, told the following graphic story in the columns of his paper:

"I set out before daybreak this morning on horseback with Honore Laine, who is a colonel in the Cuban army. We rode over eight miles of difficult country which intervenes between the army base, on the coast, and the fighting line, which is being driven forward toward Santiago.

"Pozo, as a position for our battery, was ill chosen. The Spaniards had formerly occupied it as a fort, and they knew precisely the distance to it from their guns, and so began their fight with the advantage of a perfect knowledge of the range.

"Their first sh.e.l.l spattered shrapnel in a very unpleasant way all over the tiled roof of the white house at the back of the ridge. It was the doors of this house which we were approaching for shelter, and later, when we came to take our luncheon, we found that a shrapnel ball had pa.s.sed clean through one of our cans of pressed beef which our pack-mule was carrying.

"We turned here to the right toward our battery on the ridge. When we were half-way between the white house and the battery, the second sh.e.l.l which the Spaniards fired burst above the American battery, not ten feet over the heads of our men. Six of our fellows were killed, and sixteen wounded.

"The men in the battery wavered for a minute; then rallied and returned to their guns, and the firing went on. We pa.s.sed from there to the right again, where General Shafter's war balloon was ascending. Six sh.e.l.ls fell in this vicinity, and then our batteries ceased firing.

"The smoke clouds from our guns were forming altogether too plain a target for the Spaniards. There was no trace to be seen of the enemy's batteries, by reason of their use of smokeless powder.

"Off to the far right of our line of formation, Captain Cap.r.o.n's artillery, which had come through from Daiquiri without rest, could be heard banging away at Caney. We had started with a view of getting where we could observe artillery operations, so we directed our force thither.

"We found Captain Cap.r.o.n blazing away with four guns, where he should have had a dozen. He had begun sh.e.l.ling Caney at four o'clock in the morning.

It was now noon, and he was still firing. He was aiming to reduce the large stone fort which stood on the hill above the town and commanded it.

Captain O'Connell had laid a wager that the first shot of some one of the four guns would hit the fort, and he had won his bet. Since that time dozens of sh.e.l.ls had struck the fort, but it was not yet reduced. It had been much weakened, however.