CHAPTER XXVII.
MACEO DEAD BY TREACHERY.
A Great Leader in a Great Cause—A Modern Judas—The Worthy Son
of a Noble Sire—The Farewell Letter—An Estimate of Maceo's
Character—Rejoicing Among Spanish Supporters—Their Mistaken
Belief—Patriotic Ardor of the Insurgents.
In the death of Antonio Maceo the Cuban cause lost one of its strongest defenders. Besides being a man of acute intellect, and a general of great military skill, he had the rare gift of personal magnetism, and no one ever followed his leadership who did not feel for him the devotion which often gives courage to cowards and makes heroes in the time of need.
That his death was due to treachery there is little doubt. Doctor Zertucha, his physician and trusted friend, is accused of having betrayed him to the Spaniards. An Insurgent officer, who was with the general when he received his death wound, says that they heard gun shots in the vicinity of Punta Brava. Zertucha galloped into the brush a short distance and returned, calling to them to follow him. Maceo at once put spurs to his horse, and, followed by his aides, rode swiftly after the physician, who plunged into the thick growth on the side of the road. They had ridden only a short distance, when Zertucha suddenly bent low in his saddle and swerved sharply to one side, galloping away like mad. Almost at the same moment a volley was fired by a party of Spanish soldiers hidden in the dense underbrush, and Maceo and four of his aides dropped out of their saddles mortally wounded.
The single survivor, the one who tells this story, managed to make his way back to his own men, and brought them up to the scene of the tragedy, but the bodies had been removed, and when they were finally discovered, they had been mutilated in a most shocking manner. It was then learned that one of the victims was Francisco Gomez, a son of the Commander-in-Chief of the Cuban army, who was one of Maceo's aides. It seems that his wound was not necessarily a fatal one, but he refused to leave his dying commander, and rather than to fall alive in the hands of his foes, he committed suicide. This letter was found in his hand:
Dear Mamma, Papa, Dear Brothers: I die at my post. I did not want to abandon the body of General Maceo, and I stayed with him. I was wounded in two places, and as I did not fall into the hands of the enemy I have killed myself. I am dying. I die pleased at being in the defense of the Cuban cause. I wait for you in the other world. Your son,
FRANCISCO GOMEZ.
Torro in San Domingo.
(Friends or foes, please transmit to its destination, as requested by one dead.)
Dr. Zertucha surrendered to a Spanish officer shortly after Maceo was killed. He said that the dead leader was discouraged by the continual failures of the insurgents to make any headway against their foes; that, on account of his color, the subordinate officers in the Cuban ranks did not show proper respect for him, or obedience to his commands, and that he had purposely placed himself in range of the enemy's rifles, deliberately seeking death.
These statements are manifestly false, and go far to confirm the belief that the coward who made them had a guilty knowledge concerning the manner of the death of the brave soldier he maligned.
AN ESTIMATE OF MACEO'S CHARACTER.
A gentleman who made Maceo's acquaintance in Havana, prior to the present insurrection, gives this estimate of his character:
"Maceo was a natural politician in that he had the genius of divining popular opinion, and taking the leadership of popular movements. He was in Havana at that time sounding men and scheming for the present revolution. He was always of the sunniest disposition, closely attaching all people to him, and a man of the strictest moral integrity. He never drank wine, he never smoked, and that in a land where tobacco is as common as potatoes in Ireland, and he never played cards. He had a great abhorrence of men who drank to excess, and would not tolerate them about him.
"He always dressed, when in Havana, in the most finished style. His massive frame—he was about five feet ten inches in height and unusually broad shouldered—was displayed to advantage always in frock coat, closely buttoned, and he usually wore a silk hat. He was neat, even to fastidiousness, in his dress. He usually carried a cane.
"When Maceo took the field, however, he roughed it with his men, and dressed accordingly. When in battle he carried a long-barreled 38-caliber revolver with a mother-of-pearl handle, and a Toledo blade made in the form of a machete. The handle of this machete was finely wrought silver and turquoise shell, and had four notches in it, into which the fingers could easily fit. Maceo always had three horses with him on his marches, the favorite being a big white one."
Probably no event in the war up to that time caused such general satisfaction among the supporters of the existing government, both in Cuba and in Spain, as the death of Maceo. When Jose Marti was killed, they were certain that the loss of that leader would compel the insurrectionists to abandon hopes of success. On the contrary, it inspired them with greater determination than before. But the Spanish sympathizers learned nothing from that experience, and when it was definitely known that Maceo was no longer to be feared, they were unanimous in the belief that the end of the struggle was at hand. Subsequent events have shown how little they knew of the kind of men with whom they were at war.
"The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church," and every Cuban patriot who has fallen in this conquest of extermination has but added fuel to the fires of liberty, which are sweeping Spanish rule from the island, leaving the tyrants nothing but the ashes of their hopes.