The History of Cuba, vol. 4

by Willis Fletcher Johnson

General Menocal stated very frankly that the determination of the contest must be left to the local boards and to the courts for decision, and whatever that might be, regardless of any injustice that might be imposed upon him and his party, he would acquiesce, and would be the first man to shake the hand of the successful candidate. A similar statement was never made by the Liberals. They continued the cry of fraud, and openly stated that if they did not succeed a revolution would follow. The judges of the courts, excepting the chief justice of the Supreme Court, Senor Pichardo, had been appointed by Gomez, and naturally great pressure was brought to bear on them to "save the constitution," as it was called, for the Liberals. In the decisions that followed, the Conservatives stated frankly that they believed this pressure was producing manifestly unfair decisions, but made at no time any attempt to ignore them or set them aside.

The court decided that in two districts, Victoria de las Tunas, in the province of Oriente, and another town in Santa Clara, new elections must be held. In the first one the Liberals had, at four o'clock in the morning previous to the day of election, set fire to the town hall, burning all of the electoral lists, so that an election was absolutely impossible. This was probably due to the fact that Victoria de las Tunas held General Menocal in great esteem, since, owing to his personal valor in leading the charges against the Spanish army, when in command of that town, the Cubans had been victorious. In the city of Santa Clara province, the frauds claimed by both sides rendered it so impossible to determine the true result of[{332}] the election that a second election was deemed necessary. According to the records of the Liberal party, the vote of these two towns, or possibly either one of them, would determine the election, and Dr. Alfredo Zayas felt quite confident that he would be the successor of General Menocal, and openly so stated.

The Conservatives, on the other hand, said, "We can only await and abide by the decisions of the courts, and will surrender nothing until such decisions are handed down." The supporters of Dr. Zayas stated that the soldiers, who had been sent there to maintain order, had been sent there for the sole purpose of preventing the Liberals from approaching the polls. At this General Nuñez, the Vice Presidential candidate, invited Dr. Zayas, the Liberal leader, to accompany him thither and to point out any Liberal in that district who wished to vote, promising that he would furnish a machine and any protection that might be necessary to see that he and every Liberal in the district deposited his vote, and that they together would witness the count.

Dr. Zayas never had an opportunity to bring this matter to a decision, owing to the fact that General Gomez, who hated Dr. Zayas bitterly, and who had opposed him in public print more strongly than any other man, saw immediately the possibility of riding into power as the man of the hour, as the real, dominating force of the republic, and as the only man, as he expressed it, able to save the electoral campaign from becoming one of protracted discord and dispute. So he forbade Dr. Zayas to go to the town where the election was to be held, or to accept General Nuñez's invitation, and stated that he was himself tired of the whole thing, and that he was going to take his yacht and go on a fishing trip, which he did, leaving at midnight with about thirty trusted friends, including[{333}] all of the prominent Liberal leaders. Passing around Cape San Antonio, the yacht anchored off the coast near Tunas de Zaza, and there met a group of men by previous arrangement, and started a revolution or a "popular uprising," as he termed it, against the Menocal government.

In the meantime, a carefully laid plot, that had been planned months before, for seizing control of the armed forces of the island was put into execution. On Saturday night, February 14, 1917, without warning, two companies of men stationed at the Columbia barracks, at a previously arranged signal of two shots, jumped from their beds, grabbed their arms and ammunition, and started across the parade ground for the open country, of the west. Although the details of this plot were known, other loyal companies at the command of their officers were called into immediate action, charged the Liberals and captured more than half of them and killed a few of the remainder, who at first had succeeded in escaping. This was the only apparent disloyalty in the western end of the island. Matanzas, Pinar del Rio and Havana remained loyal to the government. Among the forces stationed at the City of Santiago, far removed from the immediate control of the commanding generals of the army, seeds of sedition, which consisted largely of promises of immediate promotion of all officers, were planted. Every sergeant was to be made a captain, every captain a colonel, every lieutenant a major, with promises of increased pay, and the incidental rewards that come to the successful revolutionist. This was also true of the Province of Camaguey, where, at almost the same hour that the uprising took place in Camp Columbia barracks, several companies of men seized control, made prisoners of their comrades who were loyal to the government or shot them dead, captured and imprisoned the civil[{334}] governors, intimidated the police, or made them prisoners, and took charge of the customhouse and the accumulated funds, and all moneys deposited in banks, belonging to either the state or the federal government. Incidentally all moneys that were accessible were seized at the same time, which belonged to said banks, on the ground that there was no time to discriminate. In the City of Santiago several millions of dollars were thus seized by the three or four Liberal leaders in command. These men, when the failure of the revolution became apparent, escaped from the island, carrying some two or three millions in United States currency and Cuban gold with them, and landed in Santo Domingo, where some of them were afterward captured, while the others escaped to the United States.

Securing control of Santiago de Cuba, and having access to the cables, the rebels immediately wired to the revolutionary headquarters in New York, which had been established by Dr. Orestes Ferrara, one of the moving figures in the previous uprising of 1906, in company with Dr. Raimundo Cabrera, for the dissemination of news favorable to the Liberal side. Matter was issued, to be used in the American papers, for the purpose of preparing the United States for the usurpation of the government of Cuba by General Gomez, and defending such action on the ground that it was the only solution of a bad electoral muddle, and that the real choice of the people was General Gomez, who should have been, and was ultimately, the leader of their party. It was said that Dr. Zayas, without justification, had usurped and endeavored to maintain the permanent control of the Liberal party, and that his lack of popularity had been indicated by his defeat four years before. The entire island was represented, and especially the army, as having voluntarily gone over[{335}] to the side of the Liberals. General Gomez was pictured as having landed and by previous arrangement placed himself at the head of 12,000 men, who were marching upon the City of Havana; while the President of the republic was variously reported as having been shot, and afterward as having fled in abject fear from the palace, and as having at last found shelter in the home of the American minister, Mr. William E. Gonzales. It was added that Havana was under the control of the Liberals, as was the remainder of the island, and that all that was necessary was the triumphant march of General Gomez into the capital, where he would assume authority as Liberal Dictator until the island should assume its normal and peaceful condition, when another election would be called, in which the people would have an opportunity to choose and place the power in the hands of the only real man of destiny, General Gomez.

In the Province of Camaguey, the insurgents followed the same program as did those in Oriente, intimidating the police, by firing two volleys into police headquarters and assassinating those men who were forming a council, the civil government and various other officers having been imprisoned. They took immediate control of the railroads, and the rolling stock, placed Liberal or disloyal troops on trains, and started them across the border to Santa Clara, where they joined General Gomez, who, with his men, was marching north to the railroad.

In the meantime, General Menocal and the loyal troops of the island, in the west, started a vigorous campaign to prevent the island from falling into the hands of the rebels. Officers whose loyalty was beyond question were placed in command of troops, and sent at once into Santa Clara, Camaguey and Oriente, and one of Cuba's gunboats, with a company of 300 men, was dispatched to the[{336}] City of Santiago de Cuba, to drive the disloyal element from that place. Colonel Pujol was sent to take measures to restore order in Camaguey. Colonel Collazo and Lieutenant Colonel Lozama and other officials known for their courage, efficiency and valor were placed in command of three separate bodies of troops, with orders to surround Gomez, and give him and his supporters immediate battle, and capture or annihilate them. These men were equipped with machine guns, well armed and prepared for a campaign of extermination, if necessary. In the meantime, the Secretary of Government, Colonel Hevea, who, according to the Cuban law has control over and is responsible for order in the interior districts, traveled by locomotive and automobile, day and night, reporting to the President all that occurred, and giving those orders which seemed wise for suppressing the uprising. The American Minister, representing the sentiment of the United States, which seriously deprecated Cuba's falling into the revolutionary habit, visited the palace every day, with his military aide, then Major Wittemeyer, kept in close touch with Washington, and reported every change in the drama that was being presented in Cuba. In the meantime, one of the Cuban officials had effectively thwarted General Gomez in his proposed triumphant march into Havana, by blowing up the large bridge over the Zaza river, thus preventing the insurrectionists from gaining control of the railroads in the western half of the island.

Realizing the grave danger that threatened Cuba in the destruction of the cane through fire, which had already begun on a large scale, and in the stealing, and killing of both cattle and horses on the part of the insurrectionists, Major Wittemeyer, with the authority of the War Department in Washington, communicated to President[{337}] Menocal the fact that the United States government would gladly land whatever force was deemed necessary to assist in the maintenance of order and the protection of property. This offer the President refused, stating that he believed that there was a sufficient force absolutely loyal to his government to control the situation, adding that he was thoroughly aware of the plans of the Liberals, that he was in close touch with his own command and was confident that his officers would succeed in quelling the insurrection in a comparatively short time. He added that he thought it wise for the government of Cuba to demonstrate its ability to maintain itself, and to suppress any uprising that might occur of that nature, and thus avoid the rather unpleasant task, on the part of the United States, of being compelled to interfere with the personal and political affairs of their sister republic.

That General Menocal's prediction was based on sound logic was demonstrated by the fact that within twenty-three days the forces of ex-President Gomez were surrounded, defeated and captured. The General, his son, his aides and his entire staff were taken prisoners and brought to Havana and placed in the penitentiary on Principe Hill. In General Gomez's saddle bags were found military orders instructing his chiefs to burn every sugar plantation on the Island not known to be the property of Liberals, and tear up every mile of railroad, together with information demonstrating that he was preparing to blow up every bridge through the island, thus attempting to prevent the government from sending forces against him. This work of destruction, in so far as possible before the capture, had been carried out to the letter. The railroads along which the revolutionists had control were out of commission for several months, and much valuable property was destroyed.[{338}]