Our War with Spain for Cuba's Freedom

by Trumbull White

CHAPTER II.

HOW COLUMBUS FOUND THE "PEARL OF THE ANTILLES."

In gratitude of Spain to the Great Discoverer Who Gave Her a New World—How Spain's Evil Colonial Policy Lost the Western Hemisphere to That Obsolete Nation—Early Settlement of Cuba— Character of the Natives at the Time of the Discovery—Founding of the First Cities—Havana Becomes the Island Capital—Docility of the Natives and Their Extermination by Spanish Oppressors.

Cuba and Columbus are names inseparably connected. This largest and most fruitful island of the Spanish Main was discovered by the great navigator himself on the 28th day of October, 1492, only a short time after his first landing upon the soil of the western hemisphere on the island of San Salvador. There is a sentimental association to Americans in the thought that the discovery of our own continent was due to the pioneer expeditions sent from Spain. But any regret in one's mind that animosities have risen between the two nations, may be mollified by the memory that Columbus was himself an Italian, that it had required years of his efforts to induce sufficient interest on the part of Spanish monarchs to father his undertaking, and that his life in the service of Spain was marred by the basest ingratitude on the part of those whom he had served.

Upon the handsome monument erected to the memory of Columbus in
Seville by Ferdinand and Isabella, is the simple inscription, "A
Castile y Leon, nuevo mundo dio Colon"—"to Castile and Leon,
Columbus gave a new world."

This was the tardy recognition granted to the discoverer by those to whom he had made the marvelous gift. Recognition had been denied him in his life, except after years of persistent urging, second only to those years he wasted in his effort to arouse Spanish interest and enterprise. Once he was removed from his West Indian governorship and returned to Spain in chains. The titles and honors which had been promised him before, were denied after he had earned them. He was a victim of foul ingratitude, and no American need permit sentiment to blind him for the sake of Columbus.

The splendid new world which Columbus gave to Spain, was the most marvelous addition of territory that has ever come into the possession of any nation upon earth. It included the whole of South America, except Brazil, which was acquired by Portugal, and the small colonies known as British, Dutch and French Guiana. It included the whole of Central America and Mexico. It included the whole of what is now the United States west of the Mississippi river. It included the whole of the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and the peninsula of Florida to the southern limit of Alabama and Georgia, and except for a few scattered islands, it included every foot of land in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean sea, all the coral rocks, as well as the greater islands of the West Indies and the Antilles. To-day not a foot of all that enormous possession remains to Spain undisputed, except the islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico. These hundreds of thousands of square miles are inhabited by a free and peaceful people, most of them as republics, and the few exceptions under civilized and liberal colonial policies. Spain's hold on Cuba has vanished and Puerto Rico is slipping away. Spain could not preserve the gifts of Columbus.

SPAINS COLONIAL POLICIES.

The logic of events and the progress of civilization have commanded that Spain should withdraw from her possessions in the western hemisphere. Never has there been such a record of ferocity and barbarity in conquest, as that which blackens the pages of Spanish history in connection with Spain's acquisition and subjection of her newly discovered territories. Whether it was the peaceful Indians of the Antilles, the highly civilized Aztecs of Mexico, or the Incas of Peru, the policy pursued was always the same. First, treacherous friendship, then robbery and massacre, then slavery, and finally extermination, was the unvarying programme. And so, instead of winning favor and loyalty with their consequent happiness and prosperity from the native tribes, Spanish conquerors implanted in the possessors of the country an over-mastering and ineradicable hatred, which grew with association, until in colony after colony the bonds were burst by violence.

When Great Britain lost her American colonies by reason of her misgovernment and oppression of them, it was a lesson which her people never forgot. From that day, the colonial policy of the British government was altered, and the spirit of liberality and generosity began to dominate. To-day, every colony of Great Britain that enjoys representative government—Canada, Australia, Cape Colony and many others, owes to the United States the liberty which Great Britain grants.

But Spain could learn no such lessons. Her cruelty and misgovernment aroused colony after colony to rebellion ending in freedom, but her policies remained unaltered. One by one possessions of fabulous wealth dropped away until at last this old crone of nations has been left to shiver alone by her fireside, abandoned in her misery by all the children whose memory of her is nothing but that of vicious cruelty. The only pity to which Spain is entitled, is the pity that is due for her ignorance and her mistakes, not pity for the penalties that these have brought upon her.

Spain was once the intellectual leader of the world, as well as the pioneer of discovery. Spanish universities were centers of learning long before northern Europe had its intellectual birth. Spanish mariners sailed every sea and Spanish adventurers explored every land. If learning and advancement bring obligations, as they are admitted to do, it was Spain's obligation to be a leader in strife for liberty of mind and body, but the two most notable things in her history are the Spanish inquisition against freedom of thought, and the Spanish ferocities which enslaved a new world for many a year. Now she has reaped the harvest of her own misdeeds.

THE EARLY SETTLEMENT OF CUBA.

Every one knows that Columbus was not looking for a western hemisphere, but for the Orient, and that when he found Cuba he believed he had reached the East Indies and the islands of gold and spice which had been reported from that mysterious land. His first island discoveries he believed to be the outlying portions of that eastern archipelago and when the natives told him of a greater land near by, which he reached a few days later, he believed that at last he had reached Cipango, as Japan then was called.

The first name given to the island was Juana, in honor of Prince Juan, the son of Ferdinand and Isabella of Aragon and Castile. After Ferdinand's death, in his honor the name was changed to Fernandina. Still later it received the name of Santiago, as a mark of reverence for the patron saint of Spain, and another change was made a few years afterward, when the inhabitants, as a proof of their piety, called it Ave Maria, in honor of the Holy Virgin. In spite of all this effort at establishing a Spanish name, the original Indian name of Cuba, which it bore when the great navigator first landed on its shores, has asserted itself triumphantly through all the centuries and is now ineradicable.

According to the accounts given by Spanish writers who were contemporary with the discovery, and the century immediately following, the aboriginal inhabitants of Cuba were a generous, gentle, hospitable people, by no means energetic, but heartily cordial and courteous to the strangers who reached their shores. The mildness of their climate did not stimulate them to much activity in cultivation of the soil, because tropical fruits and vegetables came with scarcely an effort on the part of the natives. Their implements and utensils were crude and their life simple.

The system of government was by no means complicated. The island was divided into nine independent principalities, each under a Cacique, all living in harmony, and warfare being almost unknown. Their religion was a peaceful one, without human sacrifices or cannibalism, but the priests had great power through their pretense of influence with spirits good and evil.

Of all the people discovered by the Spanish in their colonization of the western hemisphere, the Cubans were the most tractable to the influences of Christianity so far as their willingness to accept the doctrines was concerned. Christianity, as practiced by the Spanish conquerors, was scarcely that of the highest type of the faith, and the inducements to accept it were somewhat violent. Nevertheless it must be noted that it is from Spanish sources this testimony as to the docility of the Cuban natives comes. Under these circumstances it becomes a magnified crime that the Spanish conquerors absolutely exterminated the hundreds of thousands of native Cubans whom they found at the time of the discovery, and that within little more than a century, there was absolutely not a trace of native stock to be found anywhere in the island.

When Columbus first rested his eyes on the island of Cuba it seemed to him an enchanted land. He was charmed with its lofty mountains, its beautiful rivers, and its blossoming groves, and in his account of the voyage he said: "Everything is green as April in Andalusia. The singing of the birds is such that it seems as if one would never desire to depart. There are flocks of parrots that obscure the sun. There are trees of a thousand species, each having its particular fruit, and all of marvelous flavor."

Columbus was first of the opinion that he had found an island, but after following the shores for many miles he concluded that it was a continent. He retained the latter belief until his death, for it was not until 1508 that the island was circumnavigated, when it was discovered that it was of about the same area as England. In a subsequent expedition he reached the coast of South America, but he had no appreciation of the magnitude of that continent, and to him Cuba was the grandest of his discoveries in the New World.

Cuba was twice visited by Columbus after its discovery, in April, 1494, and again in 1502, and these visits but confirmed his first opinion regarding the salubrity of the climate and the wealth of the soil. His sailors wrested from the natives large sums of gold and silver, and this led to the mistaken belief that mines of great richness were within their grasp.

SPAIN'S HEARTLESS TREATMENT OF COLUMBUS.

Biography furnishes no parallel to the life of Columbus. Great men there have been who have met with injustice and disappointments, but there is perhaps no other instance of a man whom disappointments and injustice did not dishearten and disgust; who had his greatness recognized in his lifetime, and yet was robbed of the rewards that it entitled him to.

It is probable that before his death Columbus confided his belief in the wealth to be found in Cuba to his son Diego Columbus, for in 1511 the latter fitted out an expedition for the purpose of colonizing the island. This company consisted of about 300 men, under Diego Velasquez, who had accompanied the great explorer on his second voyage. The first settlement was made at Baracoa, in the extreme eastern section, and this village was regarded as the capital of the colony for several years. In the meantime extensive settlements had been made by the Spaniards in the island of Jamaica, and in 1514 the towns of Santiago and Trinidad were founded on the southern coast of Cuba, in order that the inhabitants of the two colonies might be brought into closer communication. As immigration increased, other towns of importance sprung up, and the island became the base for the various operations against Mexico. Baracoa grew largely in population, and the towns of Puerto Principe and Sancti Espiritus were established in the central section, and San Juan de los Remedios on the north coast. In July, 1515, the city of San Cristobal de la Habana was planted, deriving its name from the great Discoverer, but this name was transferred in 1519 to the present capital, and the original town was called Batabano.

In 1518 the capital was fixed at Baracoa, which had by this time become a city of considerable importance, and the diocese of the colony. In 1522 both the seat of government and the bishopric were removed to Santiago de Cuba. In 1538 Havana was reduced to ashes by a French privateer; and to prevent a similar disaster in future, the Castillo de la Fuerza, a fortress which still exists, was built by Fernando de Soto, governor of Cuba, and afterwards famous for his explorations in the southern and western portions of North America, as well as for the discovery of the Mississippi.

Using a modern expression, this great fortress, added to her almost perfect harbor, gave Havana a wonderful "boom," and the city experienced a remarkable growth. The Spanish merchantmen were actively employed in carrying the wealth of Mexico to the Peninsula, and Havana was a convenient port for them to secure supplies of provisions and water. In 1549 Gonzales Perez de Angulo was appointed governor of the island, and he was so impressed with the beauties of the city, that he chose it as his residence. Several of his successors followed his example, and in 1589 it was legally made the capital of Cuba.

EARLY GOVERNMENT OF CUBA.

The early records of the island were kept in so imperfect a manner that it is not possible to give an accurate account of the early governors and their lieutenants. It is certain, however, that the seat of government was at Santiago de Cuba, and that Havana and other towns of minor importance were ruled by lieutenants. In 1538, Hernando de Soto, adelantado of Florida, and also governor of Cuba, landed at Santiago, and remained a few days before proceeding to the mainland. On his departure he left the government of the island in charge of a lady, Dona Isabel de Bobadilla, and gave her for a colleague Don Juan de Rojas, who had at one time been lieutenant governor of Havana. It is from this date that the gradual transference of the seat of power from Santiago to Havana may be said to have arisen.

Don Antonio de Chavez assumed the government in 1547, and he it was who gave Havana its first regular supply of water, bringing it a distance of about six miles from the river Chorrera.

The early settlers devoted themselves principally to the raising of cattle, paying very little attention to agricultural pursuits, or in fact to any means of livelihood that called for manual labor. Much time and money was wasted in explorations for gold and silver, but these were invariably unsuccessful, for while the precious metals have occasionally been found in the island, the quantity has never been sufficient to repay the labor of the search.

A LETTER WRITTEN BY COLUMBUS.

Nothing more interesting for the conclusion of this chapter can be offered than Columbus' own account of his first view of the island of Cuba. It is as follows

"When I reached Juana, I followed its coast to the westward, and found it so large that I thought it must be mainland, the province of Cathay; and as I found neither towns nor villages on the sea coast, but only some hamlets, with the inhabitants of which I could not hold conversation, because they all immediately fled, I kept on the same route, thinking that I could not fail to light upon some large cities or towns. At length, after the proceeding of many leagues, and finding that nothing new presented itself, and that the coast was leading me northwards (which I wished to avoid, because the winter had already set in, and it was my intention to move southwards; and because moreover the winds were contrary), I resolved not to wait for a change in the weather, but to return to a certain harbor which I had remarked, and from which I sent two men ashore to ascertain whether there was any king or large cities in that part. They journeyed for three days, and found countless small hamlets, with numberless inhabitants, but with nothing like order; they therefore returned. In the meantime I had learned from some other Indians, whom I had seized, that this land was certainly an island; accordingly, I followed the coast eastward for a distance of 107 leagues, where it ended in a cape. From this cape I saw another island to the eastward, at a distance of eighteen leagues from the former, to which I gave the name of La Espanola. Thither I went and followed its northern coast, (just the same as I had done with the coast of Juana), 118 full miles due east. This island, like all others, is extraordinarily large, and this one extremely so. In it are many seaports, with which none that I know in Christendom can bear comparison, so good and capacious that it is a wonder to see. The lands are high, and there are many lofty mountains, with which the islands of Tenerife cannot be compared. They are all most beautiful, of a thousand different shapes, accessible, and covered with trees of a thousand kinds, of such great height that they seem to reach the skies. I am told that the trees never lose their foliage, and I can well understand it, for I observed that they were as green and luxuriant as in Spain in the month of May. Some were in bloom, others bearing fruit, and others otherwise, according to their nature. The nightingale was singing, as well as other little birds of a thousand different kinds, and that in November, the month in which I was roaming amongst them. There are palm trees of six or eight kinds, wonderful in their beautiful variety; but this is the case with all other trees and fruits and grasses. It contains extraordinary pine groves and very extensive plains. There is also honey and a great variety of birds, and many different kinds of fruits. In the interior there are many mines of metals, and a population innumerable."