The Career of Leonard Wood

by Joseph Hamblen Sears

"'Just shove them back, sentry,' said General Wood, quietly.

"Around swung the rifle, and, in much less time than is taken in the telling, a way was cleared in front of the door.

"'Now shoot the first man who places his foot upon that step,' added the General, in his usual deliberate manner. Then he turned and strolled back to the palace and his writing. Within an hour the mob had dispersed, subdued by two men, one rifle and a riding-whip. And the lesson is still kept in good memory."

"One day about the middle of November the native calentura or fever, from which General Wood suffered greatly, sent him to his home, which is on the edge of the town, earlier than usual. He had no sooner reached the house than he was notified by telephone that a bloody riot had occurred at San Luis, a town 20 miles out on the {121} Santiago Railway. The fever was raging in the General, his temperature exceeding 105, and he was so sick and dizzy that he staggered as he walked. But with that indomitable will that had served him on many a night raid against hostile Apaches, he entered his carriage and was driven back to the city. He picked up his chief signal officer, Captain J. E. Brady, at the Palace and hastened to the building occupied by the telegraph department of the Signal Corps on Calle Enramadas. Captain Brady took the key at the instrument.

"'Tell the operator to summon members of the rural guard who were fired on, and the commanding officer of the Ninth Immunes,' ordered the General, tersely. Thenceforward, for three hours General Wood sat there, questioning, listening, issuing orders, all with a promptness and certainty of judgment that would have been extraordinary in a man quite at his ease; yet all the time, as he could not help showing in mien and features, the raging fever was distressing to the point of agony. Those about him could not but marvel at the man's resolution and endurance. The {122} following day, although still racked with fever, he went by special train to San Luis and investigated the affair in person.'" [Footnote: Fortnightly Review.]

The basis of the great work, however, as General Wood has himself repeatedly said in conversation and in print, was to effect all this regeneration without causing the Cubans to look upon the American Army and the American control as they had for years looked upon the Spanish Army and the Spanish control. That his success here in the most difficult phase of the whole prodigious enterprise was absolute has been testified to in innumerable ways and instances.

Only one or two of these can be given here, but they are illuminating in the extreme and they suggest the success of the methods of the man who had been put in charge of this difficult work.

Death amongst the Spanish soldiers had been very heavy from yellow fever and pernicious malaria and the course of the troop-ships which carried them back to Spain was marked by long lists of burials at sea. These ships carried with them most of the nurses and nursing sisters to {123} care for the sick and dying during the voyage. It was a great drain on the nursing force at Wood's disposal in Santiago. He, therefore, hit upon the idea of offering to pay for the return trips of these nurses if they would come back at once; with the result that most of them gladly accepted and rendered splendid service in Santiago to the sick as a token of their appreciation of the military governor's act. This did much to establish friendly relations between Americans, Spaniards and Cubans who had so short a time before been enemies.

Another vital point was the relations of the invaders with the Church. It had never been contemplated that a Catholic viceroy should be replaced by a Protestant. This viceroy had so many intimate relations with the Catholic Church in which he represented the Catholic king that it was absolutely necessary for whatever American happened to be governor to play the game regardless of what his own religious scruples might be. As an interesting example of how well this was handled by Wood the story of Bishop Bernaba is a charming instance.

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