WE HAVE A LOVELY SAIL ON THE PALATIAL KNICKERBOCKER AND REACH CUBA WITHOUT MISHAP.
OUR voyage to Cuba on Transport No. 13, unofficially known as the Knickerbocker, will long linger in our memories. The Knickerbocker was a lovely ship but her loveliness was of such a nature that it was seldom referred to without a free and unlimited use of adjectives in the ratio of more than 16 to 1. After a while it got to be a case of "Don't speak of her past, boys," and we seldom did. The present was bad enough and as for her future, all of us had grave doubts concerning it. There was a story from apparently authentic sources, that before the government, in a moment of temporary aberation, engaged the services of the Knickerbocker as a transport, she had been engaged in conveying Italian emigrants from New York to New Orleans, and her interior condition when we boarded her gave conformation of the stories.
Many words could be written concerning the Knickerbocker and our opinion of her, but as a good share of them would form language not generally used in the best society, it will be perhaps as well to draw the veil of silence over a good part of it.
Her captain's name was Betts and he was an aged individual who savored much of the sea and who evidently had been the victim of an early or late disappointment, either in love or something else, that resulted in souring him towards himself and everybody else. The name of the steward of the boat is unknown, but this did not bother the boys much, their usual designation of him being "thief" or "robber" or any term of opprobrium that came handy. If he was a poor man when the Knickerbocker sailed with us from Tampa harbor, there was no reason why he could not have returned with money enough to start a fair sized bank account, for he sold us everything there was to sell, and considerable that he had no right to, and he always charged us Klondike prices for everything. He was never under suspicion of giving away anything, not even himself. Before the voyage was half over there came near being a mutiny among the crew which had discovered, so they said, that the steward was taking the provisions destined for them and selling them to such of our boys as had money and had become weary of the luxurious and varied fare given us by the government. At the same time his extortions had become so burdensome to our boys that muttered threats against him were heard and but for some of the cooler heads among the soldiers he might have been the victim of the vengeance both of the crew and the troops.
There were thirteen staterooms on the boat and into these were crowded 32 officers. The men were "bunked" in the hold, and if there was any provision for ventilation other than the hatches, no trace was ever found of it. On the first night out the men slept on the decks and so were enabled to pass the night in considerable comfort, for if the deck planks were hard, there was at least some air and the cool sea breeze made sleeping possible. But on the second night out there came trouble. The surgeon was fearful that the night dews would have a bad effect on the men, and had been told so much of the evil effects of sleeping out in the air in tropical latitudes that he believed it best for the men to sleep below decks. He pressed his views upon the commanding officer, and the result was an order to the officer of the day to allow no men to sleep above decks on that or the succeeding nights of the voyage.
Naturally, when this order was communicated to the men, there was a protest. There was a decided difference of opinion between the men and the surgeon as to the evil results from sleeping on deck, and the men were inclined to rebel against the order. However, Capt. McDonald of B company was officer of the day, and no matter what his sympathies were, orders were orders. So soon after "taps" had sounded he and the guard made a tour of the boat and the sleepers were informed that they must retire to the bunks below and complete their slumbers. Then there was a howl of remonstrance, but it was without avail. The sleepers were rounded up and hustled below. In protest against this came all sorts of noise from the sleeping quarters. Songs and yells, and there was much satire in many of the songs, came up from below. The surgeons were alluded to as "Horse doctors" and "Salts," and one chorus that came floating up through the hatches ran something like this:
"What do they give us for stomach ache?"
"Salts."
"What do they give us for a broken leg?"
"Salts."
"What do they give us for rheumatism?"
"Salts."
And so on through a catalogue of all the various diseases incident to man or animals.
Finally the noise became so great that Capt. McDonald threatened to have the hatches closed, thus destroying the last faint chance of obtaining any air. This was met by the threat that if the hatches were closed bullets would be fired through them, but after a while the noise quieted down and the men dropped off to sleep. After that night the order to sleep below decks was pretty well obeyed as the reason for it begun to be understood by the men and they realized that it was prompted by a desire for their welfare and not to annoy them.
Not all the boys slept below, however. Emery, Morehouse and Kelly of K had managed to secrete themselves in one of the ships boats and made it their sleeping quarters all the time of the voyage. As it was covered by a tarpaulin they were well protected from the dews or rains, and in any case they managed to keep the secret so well that they were not molested.
G company suffered a terrible loss on the day we sailed. Private Mandeville, the company cook, had managed to cut himself so badly in the arm with a carving knife, during our stay at Lakeland, that he had been excused from that duty. On our last day at Port Tampa he had obtained shore leave and utilized it so well in looking at the wine when it was red, or something that had the same effect, that he was in a trance when the orders came to leave. So when the Knickerbocker sailed, G was one man short, and after the requisite ten days had elapsed Private Mandeville was put on the rolls as a deserter. Fortunately for him, it was established on our return that he was not technically a deserter, it appearing that when he woke up he had reported himself to an officer in Tampa, and had been assigned to remain with a party of the 71st New York which had likewise been left behind.
Of mascots there were many on board. First of all came one James Sargent of Washington, D. C, a young colored lad better known as "Snowball." He had come on from Washington with some District of Columbia troops and finding that they were not going immediately to Cuba or for some other reason he got on board the Knickerbocker and attached himself for better or worse to the Second Massachusetts. Any member of the regiment can answer the query as to whether it was for better or worse for the Second.
Then there were James and Willie Turner, two young white boys from Tampa who had an uncontrollable desire to hie themselves over the seas to Cuba and there end the lives of more or less Spaniards. They remained with us until the landing on the island and then divorced themselves from the Second and attached themselves to two regular regiments. Both stood the campaign in far better shape than the older men and returned to this country with enlarged views and a determination to enlist in the regulars as soon as they were of the requisite age.
G company had two mascots in "Rations" and "Hardtack," dogs of the cur variety. Rations did not last out the voyage, her career being cut short by some miscreant who threw her overboard one night, much to the indignation of the men of the company.
A predominating feature of the trip across was the excellent fare provided for the enlisted men by a thoughtful government. Life at sea on a steady diet of canned beef, canned beans and canned tomatoes, hardtack and ship's water is not conducive to embonpoint or a cheerful and contented disposition. In the hurry of fitting up the Knickerbocker as a transport no provision had been made to do any cooking for the men, even if there had been anything to cook, and there was not even a place where coffee, of which we had plenty, could be made. Finally after a couple of days out some vigorous "kicking" resulted in the company cooks being grudgingly allowed the use of the galley for coffee making purposes but with the poor water the coffee was hardly equal to that furnished at Delmonico's or other places where most of us had been in the habit of eating.
As to the water an entire chapter could not do justice to its qualities. There were two brands on board, one being Mississippi river fluid with an equal quantity of mud of a rich brown color in suspension. After obtaining a cupful of this mixture it was necessary to allow it to stand for some little time in order that the mud might settle to the bottom. With all its faults, however, this water when strained was sweet and drinking it did not cause remorse.
The other water had been obtained in Tampa and it was called water principally because it was contained in the water tanks. It did not look much like water and tasted still less like it. But that and the muddy fluid was all there was to drink and we had to make the best of it.
One day when the canned beef was even worse than usual and the canned beans greasier than ever there came to the vision of certain members of the Springfield companies, who happened to be looking through the skylight into the steward's pantry, a delicious looking piece of cold roast beef hanging peacefully from a hook and destined for the officers' lunch. Constant looking at that well cooked piece of fresh beef begot longing, then covetousness and desire. By a silent but unanimous vote it was decided that such a nice piece of beef would be better appreciated by hungry enlisted men than by the officers who had been getting more or less of it, at their own expense, during the voyage and the next thing was the informal appointment of a committee on ways and means to procure the aforesaid beef. An examination revealed that the skylight could be opened from the deck and further that a boathook was handy. These facts ascertained, a watch was kept until the occupant of the pantry had gone out for a moment, the skylight was quickly opened, the boathook manipulated and the piece of beef lifted to the deck. The cook re-entered the pantry just as the beef was disappearing through the skylight and the expression on his face haunted the participants in the "Disappearing beef mystery" for many hours.
Lieut Phillip C. Powers K. Co.
Captain W. S. Warriner K. Co.
Lieut. Harry H. Parkhurst K. Co.
In one corner of the upper deck that afternoon were a number of men upon whose faces rested an expression of perfect contentment and whose hands could occasionally be seen to wander over their stomachs as if to assure themselves that cold roast beef was a suitable article of diet for a voyage in the tropics. As no ill effects were recorded the question was settled satisfactorily to them but it is also on record that no more tempting bits were hung within reach of open skylights or wandering boathooks. It is also a matter of history that the officers' lunch that day was rather a poor meal and there was no cold meat on the table. But Bates didn't care.
How the Knickerbocker ever escaped being run down or colliding with some other of the vessels of the fleet is one of the mysteries of the deep. Not less than half a dozen narrow escapes are on record in the memory of the men who were on her and on one or two occasions the escapes were so narrow that a few feet either way would have done the job for the Knickerbocker and her crew and passengers. On one occasion another boat came so near to running us down that half the men were ready to jump into the sea but the other boat finally sheered off by the closest margin. The "Thirteen" hoodoo came near to finding believers among those on the Knickerbocker before Cuba was reached.
Bathing hours were established on board after the first day out, each company being allowed an hour aft each day during which the men could "turn the hose" on each other to their heart's content. As, however, there was but little salt water soap on board and that little was in the hands of the steward to be retailed by him at robber baron prices these attempts at cleanliness proved rather abortive, for it was soon ascertained that ordinary soap does not lather in salt water and the effects of the bath under these circumstances was worse if anything than in Lakeland.
So the days went on until on the 20th we saw the low outline of the Cuban coast late in the afternoon and at the same time saw the flashes and heard the dull reports of big guns which told us that the navy was having a brush with the foe. It lasted only for a few moments, but this was the first time we had heard guns fired in actual conflict and although we could see but little the rigging was crowded until long after the guns were silent. We learned afterwards that it was only a little brush some of the blockading fleet were having with a fort near Santiago but it was mighty interesting to us while it lasted. All the next day the fleet cruised about apparently aimlessly and that night the Knickerbocker "got lost." How it ever happened no one knows excepting the captain of the ship and he never volunteered an explanation so far as we knew. It was expected that we would land that day but just before dusk a dispatch boat raced up alongside and without stopping speed an officer on board shouted through a megaphone an order to Captain Betts to continue "cruising to the northwest, keeping in touch with the fleet." So off we cruised to the northwest but the rest of the order as to keeping in touch with the fleet was not carried out. The next morning when we woke up we found the Knickerbocker all alone with not a sail or line of smoke on the horizon and with apparently no one knowing where we were or what we were doing there. Inquiries of Captain Betts met with gruff and non-committal response and it was not until just before noon that we came in sight of the rest of the fleet off Daiquiri and learned that the landing had begun and that had we got there when we should the Second would have been the first regiment to land on Cuban soil. Then things were said concerning Capt. Betts and his boat that would not look nice in print.
Over on our left the big guns of the warships were pounding away at the fortifications while the small caliber guns were sending in a storm of bullets into the woods and hills along the shore, clearing them out before the landing. From the warships to the transports danced an almost steady stream of launches and small boats to assist in the landing. The invasion of Cuba by the Fifth army corps was a fact at last.