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Updated: June 27, 2025
It never would do to have a newsboy tell in New York that he had beaten the correspondents of the papers he sold in the streets; nor to permit commissioned officers to take the dust of one who never before had ridden on anything but a cable car. So we all raced forward and, bunched together, swept into the main street of Coamo. It was gratefully empty.
And from far overhead, from these few figures perched on the Spanish rifle-pits, with their flags planted among the empty cartridges of the enemy, and overlooking the walls of Santiago, came, faintly, the sound of a tired, broken cheer. This is the inside story of the surrender, during the Spanish War, of the town of Coamo. It is written by the man to whom the town surrendered.
“Secretary of War, Washington:—The following received from General Wilson: “‘General Ernst’s brigade captured Coamo 8.30 this morning. Sixteenth Pennsylvania, Colonel Hulings commanding, led by Lieutenant-Colonel Biddle, of my staff, having made a turning movement through the mountains, striking the Aibonito road half a mile beyond town, captured the entire garrison of Coamo, about 150 men.
The slight opposition met by General Brooke at Guayama, General Wilson at Coamo, and General Schwan near Mayaguez, indicated that there would be little difficulty in reaching the capital, and officers and men alike felt that the capture of San Juan was a matter of but a few days. The third landing of American troops in Porto Rico took place on August 2, at Arroyo, from the St. Louis and the St.
We were now only a quarter of a mile distant from the built-up portion of Coamo, where the road turned sharply into the main street of the town. "Will General Wilson think I should have waited for him?" he shouted. The words were jolted out of him as he rose in the saddle. The noise of the ponies' hoofs made conversation difficult.
From this place are shipped the sugar and coffee produced in the northwest part of the island. There are seven or eight other ports of minor importance. The main highway of central Porto Rico runs from Ponce to San Juan, in a northeasterly direction, through Juana Diaz, Coamo and Abonito.
Although the party was small, they had arms enough to stock a regiment. They were taken before General Wilson, gave up their arms and signed a parole. There was quite a strong resistance made at Coamo, a town on the main military road between Juana Diaz and the Spanish mountain stronghold at Aibonito. General Wilson effected the capture of this place with the most consummate skill.
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