It can be easily imagined what relief this signal brought to all hands, who had been mourning the death of all these men. The Spanish officer said also that the prisoners were confined in Morro Castle. He said further that Admiral Cervera considered the attempt to run in and sink the “Merrimac” across the channel an act of such great bravery and desperate daring that he (the Admiral) thought it very proper that our naval officers should be notified of the safety of these men. Whatever the motive for sending out the tug with the flag of truce, the act was a most graceful one, and one of most chivalrous courtesy. The Spanish officer is reported to have said: “You have made it more difficult, but we can still get out.”
The daring evinced by Hobson was instantly recognized, but the importance of his achievement was not appreciated until July 3, when Cervera’s desperate attempt to escape, would, in all likelihood, have been partly successful but for the fact that his vessels were obliged to leave the harbor in single file.
Let us, however, recapitulate in their order the events which followed the sinking of the “Merrimac,” news whereof was received on June 4. On June 5, a bombardment of the Morro Castle, commanding the mouth of Santiago Harbor, took place, but no serious impression seems to have been made upon the fortress at that time, although some neighboring earthworks were destroyed. Two days later, there was a more effective bombardment of the harbor fortifications by Admiral Sampson, but the Morro Castle still held out and protected the entrance to the port by its ability to deliver a plunging fire. On June 9, it was known that twelve thousand men, or about half of our regular army, together with a number of volunteer regiments, under General Shafter, had set sail from Tampa, and, on the following day, the Spaniards began preparations for a vigorous defense of Santiago against a land force by means of carefully planned intrenchments. On June 11, a body of United States marines landed at Guantanamo Bay, and, on the three ensuing days, sustained successfully determined assaults by the Spaniards. On June 15, the “Vesuvius,” carrying a pneumatic gun, which discharges a tube loaded with dynamite, arrived off Santiago, and fully justified the expectations of her inventor by the efficient part which she took in the bombardment. Since June 7, the Spaniards had attempted to repair the Santiago forts, and had, to some extent, succeeded in doing so; consequently, on June 16, Admiral Sampson ordered the ships to open fire on them again, and, in this assault, is said to have discharged five hundred thousand pounds of metal.
It was not until June 22, or thirteen days after his departure from Tampa, that General Shafter landed his troops at Baiquiri, a point on the coast some miles southwest of Santiago. There was furious fighting during the three following days, and there was a grievous loss of life on the American side, infantry and dismounted cavalry having been ordered or allowed to attack intrenchments without artillery support. The necessity of heavy siege guns was at once clear to professional soldiers, but these could not be moved from the transports to the shore, because only one lighter had been brought from Tampa, and even that one had been lost. This loss could have been quickly repaired, had not General Shafter refused to take with him from Tampa the signal train that had been made ready for him, on the ground that he “only wanted men who could carry muskets.” The result of this indifference to a branch of the service which constitutes the eyes, ears and voice of a modern army, was that it required two days to transmit a request from Shafter’s headquarters to the point where the cable could be used. On June 29, not having, as yet, any heavy siege guns in position, and not having so surrounded the city as to prevent the re-enforcement or escape of its garrison, General Shafter telegraphed to Washington: “I can take Santiago in forty-eight hours.” On July 1 and 2, General Shafter made resolute assaults upon the Spanish intrenchments and carried many of them, advancing his own lines very much nearer the city. The advantage thus gained, however, had cost him a considerable fraction of his force. The whole number of Americans killed, wounded and missing during the land operations reached ten per cent of the number with which General Shafter landed on June 22. Of these land engagements the most notable were those of Aguadores, El Caney and San Juan.
The battle of San Juan is described as follows:
The dawn of July 1 found the troops of Wheeler’s division bivouacked on the eminence of El Pozo. Kent’s division bivouacked near the road back of El Pozo. Grimes’s battery went into position about two hundred and fifty yards west of the ruined buildings of El Pozo soon after sunrise and prepared gun pits. Grimes’s battery opened fire against San Juan a little before 8 A.M. The troops of the cavalry division were scattered about on El Pozo Hill in the rear and around the battery, without order and with no view to their protection from the Spanish fire. This condition rectified itself when the Spaniards, after five or six shots by the American battery, replied with shrapnel fire at correct range and with accurately adjusted fuses, killing two men at the first shot After some firing soon after 9 A.M. Wheeler’s division was put in march toward Santiago. Crossing Aguadores stream, it turned to the right, under General Sumner, who was in command at that time owing to General Wheeler’s illness. Scattering shots were fired by the Spaniards before the arrival of the first troops at the crossing, but their volley firing did not commence until the dismounted cavalry went into position, crossing open ground. Kent’s division followed Wheeler’s, moving across the stream, and advanced along the road in close order under a severe enfilading fire. After advancing some distance, it turned off to the left. Lieutenant Ord (killed in battle) made a reconnaissance from a large tree on the banks of the stream.
At about one o’clock, after a delay of nearly two hours’ waiting for the troops to reach their positions, the whole force advanced, charged, and carried the first line of intrenchments. They were afterward formed on the crest and there threw up intrenchments facing the second line at a distance of from five hundred to one thousand yards.
We pass to the memorable naval combat of July 3, which annihilated Cervera’s squadron, and dealt the deathblow to Spain’s hope of making head against America on the sea. There is, of course, no foundation for the report that Admiral Cervera resolved to fly because he knew that Santiago would be immediately taken. The truth is that, on July 2, he received peremptory orders from Madrid to leave Santiago at once, no matter what might be the consequences; to engage the American fleet, and to make his way, if possible, to Havana, where he would raise the blockade. These orders he did his best to execute on the morning of July 3, having been informed by signal that Admiral Sampson’s flagship, the “New York,” and a large part of the American fleet, were lying at some distance toward the east, and that only the “Brooklyn,” “Texas” and “Iowa” would have to be encountered if the escaping ships moved westward. There was a mistake in this computation, for the “Oregon” also took an important part in the action, and so did the little “Gloucester,” a converted yacht, which did not hesitate, single-handed, to engage both of the torpedo-boat destroyers. With such information as he could procure, however, Admiral Cervera believed that his ships could outsail all of those blockading the mouth of the harbor, except the “Brooklyn,” and that, if the “Brooklyn” could be disabled, some, at least, of his vessels could escape. Accordingly, orders were issued by the Spanish admiral to proceed at full speed to the westward after clearing the entrance, and to concentrate fire upon the “Brooklyn.” In the attempt to carry out this programme, the four warships, “Maria Teresa,” “Almirante Oquendo,” “Vizcaya” and “Cristobal Colon,” followed by the torpedo-boat destroyers “Pluton” and “Furor,” in the order named and in single file, pushed with all steam up through the narrow passage which had been left by the sunken “Merrimac.” The concerted endeavor to disable the “Brooklyn” failed, and it turned out that both the “Oregon” and “Texas” were faster than the “Cristobal Colon,” which was much the swiftest of the Spanish squadron. The “Maria Teresa,” the “Almirante Oquendo” and the “Vizcaya” were successively riddled and put hors de combat by the rapid and accurate firing of the American ships, and were beached by their officers to avoid, not so much surrender, as the danger of explosion. The “Cristobal Colon” succeeded in reaching a point about fifty miles from Santiago, when it was headed off not only by the protected cruiser “Brooklyn,” but also by the ironclads “Oregon” and “Texas.” From that moment, escape was seen to be impossible, so the commander beached his ship and hauled down his flag. This closing incident of the battle took place at 1.20 P.M., almost exactly four hours after the leading vessel of the escaping column, the “Maria Teresa,” had passed the Morro. Meanwhile, the little “Gloucester,” under Commander Richard Wainwright, had stopped both of the torpedo-boat destroyers, received their fire, and detained them until an ironclad came up.
It will be observed that the Spanish squadron did not have to contend with the whole of the American fleet, but that, on the contrary, the forces engaged were, on paper, much more nearly equal than is generally understood. The Americans had the first-class battleships “Oregon” and “Iowa,” the second-class battleship “Texas,” the protected cruiser “Brooklyn,” and the converted yacht “Gloucester.” The Spaniards, on their part, had one armored cruiser, three protected cruisers, and two torpedo-boat destroyers. It is certainly a remarkable fact, and one almost without a parallel in naval annals, if we except Dewey’s achievement at Manila, that not a single one of the Spanish vessels should have managed to escape. The honor of the almost unique victory at Santiago belongs, beyond a doubt, to Commodore Schley, for, at the beginning of the action, Admiral Sampson, in his flagship, the “New York,” was out of sight, and he remained out of signal distance until almost the end.
Almost immediately after these incidents an expedition under command of General Miles proceeded to Porto Rico, where, on the southwest coast, at the little village of Guanica, a landing was effected on July 25.