No pen can picture the horrors that followed. The woeful scenes sent a shudder throughout the United States, and many good people demanded that the unspeakable crime should be checked by armed intervention. To do this meant war with Spain, but we were ready for that. A Congressional party visited Cuba in March, 1898, and witnessed the hideous suffering of the Cubans, of whom more than a hundred thousand had been starved to death, with scores still perishing daily. In referring to what they saw, Senator Proctor, of Vermont, said: "I shall refer to these horrible things no further. They are there. God pity me, I have seen them; they will remain in my mind forever, and this is almost the twentieth century. Christ died nineteen hundred years ago, and Spain is a Christian nation. She has set up more crosses in more lands, beneath more skies, and under them has butchered more people than all the other nations of the earth combined. God grant that before another Christmas morning the last vestige of Spanish tyranny and oppression will have vanished from the western hemisphere."
The ferocious measures of Weyler brought so indignant a protest from our country that he was recalled, and his place taken by General Ramon Blanco, who reached Havana in the autumn of 1897. Under him the indecisive fighting went on much as before, with no important advantage gained by either side. Friends of Cuba made appeals in Congress for the granting of belligerent rights to the insurgents, but strict international law demanded that their government should gain a more tangible form and existence before such rights could be conceded.
Matters were in this state of extreme tension when the blowing-up of the Maine occurred. While riding quietly at anchor in the harbor of Havana, on the night of February 15, 1898, she was utterly destroyed by a terrific explosion, which killed 266 officers and men. The news thrilled the land with horror and rage, for it was taken at once for granted that the appalling crime had been committed by Spaniards, but the absolute proof remained to be brought forward, and the Americans, with their proverbial love of justice and fair-play, waited for such proof.
Competent men were selected for the investigation, and they spent three weeks in making it. They reported that it had been established beyond question that the Maine was destroyed by an outside explosion, or submarine mine, though they were unable to determine who was directly responsible for the act.
The insistence of Spain, of course, was that the explosion was accidental and resulted from carelessness on the part of Captain Sigsbee and his crew; but it may be doubted whether any of the Spanish officials in Havana ever really held such a belief. While Spain herself was not directly responsible for the destruction of the warship and those who went down in her, it was some of her officials who destroyed her. The displacement of the ferocious Weyler had incensed a good many of his friends, some of whom most likely expressed their views in this manner, which, happily for the credit of humanity, is exceedingly rare in the history of nations.
PRESIDENT MCKINLEY AND THE WAR CABINET
PRESIDENT MCKINLEY. LYMAN J. GAGE, Sec'y of the Treasury. JOHN W. GRIGGS, Attorney General. JOHN D. LONG, Sec'y of the Navy. WM. R. DAY, Sec'y of State. JAS. WILSON, Sec'y of Agriculture. RUSSELL A. ALGER, Sec'y of War. C.N. BLISS, Sec'y of the Interior. CHAS. EMORY SMITH, Postmaster General.
The momentous events that followed are given in the succeeding chapters.