“ ‘It was a horrible, blood-splashed thing, and an inferno of agony. Many men lay dead, with gleaming teeth, and hands clutching their throats. Others were crawling there alive.
“ ‘I shouted to the survivors to surrender, and they held up their hands.
“ ‘Then I ran into the fort and found there a Spanish officer and four men alive, while seven lay dead in one room. The whole floor ran with blood. Blood splashed all the walls. It was a perfect hog-pen of butchery.
“ ‘Three poor wretches put their hands together in supplication. One had a white handkerchief tied on a stick. This he lifted and moved toward me. The other held up his hands, while the third began to pray and plead.
“ ‘I took the guns from all three and threw them outside the fort. Then I called some of our men and put them in charge of the prisoners.
“ ‘I then got out of the fort, ran around to the other [pg 238]side, and secured the Spanish flag. I displayed it to our troops, and they cheered lustily.
“ ‘Just as I turned to speak to Captain Haskell I was struck by a bullet from the trenches on the Spanish side.’ ”
Before five o’clock, on the morning of July 2d, the crew of the flag-ship New York was astir, eating a hurried breakfast.
At 5.50 general quarters was sounded, and the flag-ship headed in toward Aguadores, about three miles east of Morro Castle. The other ships retained their blockading stations. Along the surf-beaten shore the smoke of an approaching train from Altares was seen. It was composed of open cars full of General Duffield’s troops.
At a cutting a mile east of Aguadores the train stopped, and the Cuban scouts proceeded along the railroad track. The troops got out of the cars, and soon formed in a long, thin line, standing out vividly against the yellow rocks that rose perpendicularly above, shutting them off from the main body of the army, which was on the other side of the hill, several miles north.