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Updated: June 11, 2025
So San Domingo, Santiago, and Porto Pravda were all burnt to the ground before the fleet bore away for the West Indies. San Domingo was the oldest town in New Spain and was strongly garrisoned and fortified. But Carleill's soldiers carried all before them. Drake battered down the seaward walls.
Porter is one of heaven's blessings, sent as a messenger of "The Ship" earth, to testify in America what she saw of the Negro troops in Cuba. General Shafter put a human rope of 22,400 men around Santiago, with its 26,000 Spanish soldiers, and then Spain succumbed in despair.
As soon as the sun rose the Spaniards again opened upon us with artillery. A shell burst between Dave Goodrich and myself, blacking us with powder, and killing and wounding several of the men immediately behind us. Next day the fight turned into a siege; there were some stirring incidents; but for the most part it was trench work. A fortnight later Santiago surrendered.
In the meantime Cervera was escaping detection by the American scouts by taking an extremely southerly course; and with the information that Sampson was off San Juan, the Spanish Admiral sailed for Santiago de Cuba, where he arrived on May 19, 1898. Though Cervera was safe in harbor, the maneuver of the American fleet cannot be called unsuccessful.
Three hours' waiting made the men on the transports impatient to get ashore and in action, and every move of the warships was closely watched by the soldiers. A little before 9 o'clock the bombardment of the batteries of Juragua was begun. This was evidently a feint to cover the real point of attack, Juragua being about half-way between Baiquiri and Santiago.
As throughout the morning I had preserved a specious aspect of wisdom, and had commanded first one and then the other wing, the fight was really a capital thing for me, for practically all the men had served under my actual command, and thenceforth felt an enthusiastic belief that I would lead them aright. It was a week after this skirmish before the army made the advance on Santiago.
We know now and General Shafter should have known then that the column of reinforcements from Manzanillo was not led by General Pando, but by Colonel Escarrio, and that at the very time when Shafter, in successive telegrams, was placing it "at Palma," "six miles north," "near a break in the railroad," and "some distance away," it was actually in the Santiago intrenchments, ready for business.
After a good deal of consultation, we decided they must be some signals to the Spaniards in Santiago, from the troops marching to reinforce them from without for we were ignorant that the reinforcements had already reached the city, the Cubans being quite unable to prevent the Spanish regulars from marching wherever they wished.
We of Number Eight had suffered one delay, and we really felt that the lost time must be made up. Personal impressions in battle have been described in prose and poem until the subject is hackneyed, but it may be of interest to note that the impressions experienced by the novices in naval warfare manning the "Yankee," during the bombardment of Santiago, consisted mainly of one feeling.
While this marauding party carried fire and sword in the advance and lit up the mountain-cliffs with the flames of the hamlets, the master of Santiago, who brought the rear-guard, maintained strict order, keeping his knights together in martial array, ready for attack or defence should an enemy appear.
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