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Updated: May 26, 2025
The commandante's house was in the center of the town. Round about was a circle of the houses of those who had owned the tobacco fields. Beyond these homes of the well-to-do were hundreds of huts. In these lived the reconcentrados, several families in each, or as many as could huddle within and not pull the roughly constructed frame of palm stalks down about their heads.
Finding that one of the prizes had a cargo of plantains and bananas, and that most of the fishing-smacks were provided with salt-water tanks in which they had thousands of pounds of living fish, Miss Barton and her staff determined to purchase from them such quantities of these perishable commodities as they were willing to sell at a low nominal price, and use such food to increase and diversify the rations furnished to the fifteen hundred Cuban refugees and reconcentrados on shore.
When the Consuls left they put food enough in the possession of these Americans to last them from ten days to two weeks. The fate of these unfortunates can only be imagined. From the prejudice which existed toward the American reconcentrados the Consuls know that they would be the last to receive any consideration when the blockade began to bear heavily.
The Americans thought that it was empty, for Clif had stumbled and fallen with a crash over a pile of dry sticks and rubbish. But when he rose to his feet to listen anxiously there was no movement or sign that anybody had heard him. "It probably belonged to some of the reconcentrados," he muttered. He was about to turn and give the word to proceed.
No order or permission from General Blanco can save the lives of many of them. Indeed, many are too far gone to be saved by the best care and treatment. "There was no indication of a cessation of hostilities by the insurgents. If they do not voluntarily cease, their tactics are such that Spain cannot conquer them, if at all, before the reconcentrados will have had the finishing stroke.
But all the people of Matanzas are not reconcentrados, and even in the midst of war's alarms they find time for amusement, as the following description of a carnival ball will prove: "It was our good fortune to be in Matanzas during the last three days of the Carnival; and while the whole time was occupied by noisy processions and grotesque street masqueraders, the crowning ceremonies were on the last Sunday night.
The necessity for a change in the condition of the reconcentrados is recognized by the Spanish Government. Within a few days past the orders of General Weyler have been revoked. The reconcentrados, it is said, are to be permitted to return to their homes and aided to resume the self-supporting pursuits of peace.
There are still a few of the reconcentrados about the streets now, but starvation has ended the misery of most of them, and their bones have been thrown into the trenches outside of the city. "Starvation now faces the Spanish citizens themselves. Havana is a graveyard. Two-thirds of the inhabitants have fled. The other third is beginning to feel the pangs of hunger.
At this a very few persons, possibly some of the reconcentrados, found employment. "All along the railroad, as far as could be seen, were stretches of the most fertile and beautiful country, with very few trees, even on the low mountains, and most of these royal palms.
The condition of the reconcentrados in Havana had grown steadily worse. The mortality increased among this wretched class, who had taken to begging morsels of food. Nobody in Havana except a few higher officers knew that the Spanish fleet was annihilated at Manila, and the story was believed that the Americans were beaten there.
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