History of the Gatling Gun Detachment, Fifth Army Corps, at Santiago / With a Few Unvarnished Truths Concerning that Expedition

by John H. Parker

Priv. J. Shiffer had been selected as corral boss of the detachment. The most picturesque figure, the most boyish member, and as brave a soldier as ever shouldered a musket; broad of shoulder, stout of limb, full of joke, as cheerful as a ray of sunlight, this man was the incarnation of courage and devotion. He loved a mule. He was proud of the job. With the instinct of a true teamster, he had snapped up the best pair of mules in the whole corral and was out before the detachment commander had selected a single mule. This team was as black as Shiffer’s shoes and as strong as a pair of elephants. They were worked harder than any other team in the 5th Army Corps, and when they were turned in to the quartermaster in August, they were as fat, as sleek, as strong, and as hardy as on the day they were taken from the corral in Baiquiri. The other three teamsters were like unto the first. They were all handy men. They were as capable of fighting or aiming a gun as of driving a team. Any one of the four could take a team of mules up a mountain-side or down a vertical precipice in perfect safety. They could do the impossible with a team of mules, and they had to do it before the detachment reached the firing-line. The success of the battery was to depend to a very large degree upon the coolness, good judgment, and perfect bravery of these four teamsters.

Calvary Picket Line.

It should be noted that the use of mules was an experiment. The “scientific” branch of service has always held that the proper animal to draw a field-piece is the horse. They expatiate with great delight upon the almost human intelligence and sagacity of that noble animal; upon his courage “when he snuffeth the battle afar,” and upon the undaunted spirit with which he rushes upon the enemy, and assists his master to work the destruction of his foes. The Artillery claims that mules are entirely too stubborn, too cowardly, and too hard to manage for the purpose of their arm of the service. It was also an experiment to use two mules per gun. The Engineer Department had reported that the road to the front was impassable for wheeled vehicles, and even the general had apparently thought that four mules per gun would be necessary. The necessity of economizing mules, and the opinion of the detachment commander that two mules per gun would be sufficient, had led to the issue of that number. Those who despise the army mule for the purposes of field artillery know very little of the capacity of this equine product of Missouri when properly handled. It was demonstrated that two mules can pull a Gatling gun with 10,000 rounds of ammunition, loaded down with rations and forage, where eight horses are required to draw a field-piece; and that mules are equally as easy to manage under fire as horses.

The landing was completed and the detachment organized at 3 p. m., having rations, forage, and ammunition complete. There was no tentage, except the shelter-halves which some of the men had brought with them. Capt. Henry Marcotte, retired, the correspondent of the Army and Navy Journal, requested permission to accompany the detachment, which was granted, and soon all were en route for the front, entrusted with the task of opening the way for wheeled transportation and of demonstrating the practicability of the road for army wagons and field artillery.

For the first mile the road was excellent. It lay through one of the most fertile parts of the most fertile island in the world. A little stream trickling along the side of the road furnished plenty of water for both men and animals. At the end of the mile the detachment found a steep hill to descend. The Ordnance Department, which designed and built the carriage for the Gatling guns, had never foreseen the necessity for a brake, and it was therefore necessary to cut down bushes from the roadside and fasten the rear wheels by placing a stout pole between the spokes and over the trail of the piece. This locked the wheels, and the guns were thus enabled to slide down the steep hill without danger of a runaway. From this point the road became a narrow defile. The rank jungle closed in upon the trail, the long barbed leaves of the Spanish bayonet hung across and lacerated the legs of the mules until the blood trickled down to the hoofs; the boughs of the trees hung down over it so that even the men on foot had to stoop to pass under them, and the tortuous path winding in and out amid the dense tropical undergrowth made it impossible to see in places more than twenty-five or thirty yards ahead at a time.

The advance guard, consisting of all the members of one gun crew, had been organized at once upon starting, and this guard moved along the road about two hundred and fifty yards in advance of the detachment, scouting every path vigilantly to the right and left, and keeping a constant, careful lookout to the front. Their orders were, in case of encountering the enemy, to scatter in the underbrush, open fire with magazines, so as to produce the impression upon the enemy that there was a large force, and then slowly fall back upon the battery. The plan was, upon the first alarm, to bring the two leading guns into battery upon the road, with the fourth gun ready to be opened to either flank, while the gun crew of the third gun, which formed the advance guard, were to act as infantry support to the battery. It was hoped that the enemy would follow the advance guard as it retreated, and it was believed that the Gatling gun battery could take care of two or three regiments of Spaniards without help if necessary.

This form for the march had been adopted as the result of mature reflection. The general had offered a cavalry escort of two troops, and Gen. Sumner had rather urged the use of an escort, but it was desired to demonstrate that a battery of machine guns, properly manned and equipped, is capable of independent action, and does not need the assistance of either arm of the service. In fact, the Gatling gun men would have been rather pleased than not to have had a brush with the enemy without the assistance of either infantry or cavalry. But it was not to be.

The march was continued until darkness fell over the landscape, and the battery arrived at a beautiful camping-place about one mile east of Siboney, where a break in the water-pipe near the railroad track gave an ample supply of excellent water, and a ruined plantation, now overgrown with luxuriant sugar-cane, provided ample forage for the mules. The two troops of cavalry, which had been offered and refused as an escort, had reached this camping-place some time before, so that the wearied members of the detachment found pleasant camp-fires already throwing their weird lights and shadows over the drooping branches of the royal palm.