‘And fill us up one bumper more,
Till every glass o’erruns;
Drink, if you never drank before;
The men behind the guns.’
“The dinner last night was held in the upstairs banqueting hall of the club, the same room in which the first dinner was given, and the diners occupied the same relative places that had been assigned to them two years ago around the same board. The table was a big round one. It was decorated with myriads of fragrant blossoms, banked in the centre of the table and strewn over the cloth. There were no other decorations excepting on one wall of the room hung the wheel of the Spanish ship the Reina Christina, which was lately sent to the club as a memento of the May morning in Manila Bay.”
Although Clara Barton had been the “Angel of the Battlefield” through the Civil War, when she started her great humanitarian career with the care of the forty wounded soldiers of the Sixth Massachusetts after the Baltimore fracas, and the good angel of Europe through the Franco-Prussian War and the Commune, for which she was decorated by the governments engaged, it was in the Spanish War that American soldiers knew her best and where for the first time the Red Cross symbol and service made its value known. Through her persistent efforts, the famous “American Amendment” was added to the Geneva Treaty of the Red Cross which was signed by President Arthur. The American Association of Red Cross was organized in 1881 with Miss Barton as president, a position she held until 1904. It was at President McKinley’s personal request that she carried relief to Cuba and did personal field work through the war. In his message of December 6, 1898, he expressed his own appreciation and that of the American people for her service during the Spanish-American War.
After peace was declared, the unfortunate controversy between Admirals Schley and Sampson as to the credit for the victory of Santiago led to a long investigation, the matter having been referred to a Court of Inquiry, of which Admiral Dewey was the president. This Court held daily sessions in a large building in the Navy Yard, and after forty days of investigation and thorough consideration of all the points of criticism, Admiral Dewey rendered the following opinion of the Court as a summary of all the testimony taken:
“Commodore Schley, in command of the Flying Squadron, should have proceeded with utmost dispatch off Cienfuegos and should have maintained a close blockade of that port.
“He should have endeavoured on May 23, at Cienfuegos, to obtain information regarding the Spanish squadron by communicating with the insurgents at the place designated in the memorandum delivered to him at 8:15 A. M. of that date.
“He should have proceeded from Cienfuegos to Santiago de Cuba with all dispatch and should have disposed his vessels with a view to intercepting the enemy in any attempt to pass the Flying Squadron.