Young Wil-liam was not long to lead a life of peace; for in 1861 he, then but a boy of eight-een, left his books and his home, and went to the war. Many sto-ries prove how brave he was while there; but two will show you why he rose so fast from the ranks. At one time the guns had been left on the road, af-ter a great fight; and it would be a hard task to go back near the foe to get them. But, young Mc-Kin-ley said, "The boys will haul them;" and he and a few oth-ers went back for them and brought them into our lines. Then he was at one time two miles from the fight, in charge of the food; he was quite safe; but he thought our men would fight bet-ter, if they had some cof-fee and food. So he filled a cart and drove straight to the lines, where our brave men were hard at work. Was this not a brave act? To risk his life for the sake of tak-ing food and drink
to the worn men. He worked his way straight to the front and came out of the war a cap-tain. He went home at once and took up the stud-y of law in Can-ton; one of his first speech-es was for the rights of the black men; he said that they should have the same right to vote that white men had; and he was ev-er on the side of the black man. In 1869 Mc-Kin-ley was mar-ried to Miss I-da Sax-ton. They were both very young when their two lit-tle chil-dren died. The young law-yer did all he could to cheer his wife; and she was as brave as he, and did not let her grief keep him from his work. He rose fast in his state, and held high place more than once; then, in 1877, he was sent to Congress. In 1891 he was made gov-ern-or of O-hi-o; and in 1897, he had made such a great name for him-self that he was put up for pres-i-dent by the Re-pub-li-cans, and e-lect-ed. Just as he came in-to of-fice, the strife in Cu-ba was at its height; and men here in our great, free land had much pit-y for the Cu-bans, who were try-ing to get free from Spain, just as we had tried to shake off the hand of Eng-land long years a-go. The Span-ish rule grew worse and worse, as Spain found that Cu-ba would not give in. At last Gen-er-al Wey-ler, a harsh and cru-el man, was sent there to force peace on an-y terms; but Gen-er-al Go-mez knew his foes well, and his brave men fought with a strength born of a great hate for Spain. By and by, when Spain saw she could not win the day, she sent word that if Cu-ba would lay down her arms, she could have the rights for which she had asked in vain in the past.
WILLIAM McKINLEY.
But it was too late; Cu-ba had no faith in Spain, and would now be free from her hard yoke. There was much want in the big towns of Cu-ba at this time, for Wey-ler had made all the poor folks, who had lived in peace on their small
farms, come in-to the towns. He said they gave help to the Cu-ban troops, and so he forced them to leave their homes and would on-ly let them bring with them just the few things that they could put on their backs. Then he had their lit-tle homes, and their crops which they had raised with care, all burned to the ground. He had lit-tle food to give this great host of poor peo-ple, and ma-ny died in the streets for the want of bread. You may be sure that our great land saw the pain and want down in Cu-ba, and longed to give aid; but an act of help on our part would mean war with Spain, and this Mc-Kin-ley did not wish. But there came a day when a great cry went up through the U-nit-ed States at a foul deed done in the bay of Ha-va-na. Our great war ship, the "Maine," was blown up by a bomb, as she lay at an-chor in the har-bor. The thought of our poor men sent to such a death raised the cry of war in all hearts. "Re-mem-ber the Maine," was the war-cry; and men cried for war at once with Spain. But Mc-Kin-ley gave Spain one more chance to stop the fight and free Cu-ba; this she would not do. So on A-pril 21st, 1898, once more the U-nit-ed States had to make read-y for war. From all the states men poured in and camps sprang up here and there, where the men were taught to load and fire their guns. Off at Hong-Kong, in charge of our war-ships, was brave Ad-mi-ral Dew-ey. He knew that the Span-ish fleet was in Ma-ni-la Bay, near the Phil-ip-pine Is-lands, which were ruled by Spain; the loss of these ships would be a great blow to Spain just at this time; so Dew-ey steered his ships there to strike a blow for his coun-try.
It was night when he reached the spot, and be-fore the Span-iards knew he was near, six of his great ships had slipped past their forts. Then a fierce fire poured on him from
the forts; but it did not do much harm. At last the Span-ish fleet saw him, and at once the ships o-pened fire; but Dew-ey's flag-ship, the "O-lym-pi-a," sent out such a storm of shot and shell, that the first of the Span-ish ships was sunk, and all on board killed.