George Kennan

“ The Santiago road, after leaving the village of Siboney, runs up a wide marshy valley, full of stagnant ponds and lagoons, and sparsely set with clumps of cocoanut and royal palm. Although this valley heads in the mountains of the Cobre range, and opens on the sea through the Siboney notch, its atmosphere seems hot and close, and is pervaded by a foul, rank odor of decaying vegetation, which is unpleasantly suggestive of malaria and Cuban fever, and makes one wish that one could carry air as one carries water, and breathe, as well as drink, out of a canteen. ”

“ I cannot imagine anything more cruelly barbarous than to bring a severely wounded man back four or five miles to the hospital in a crowded, jolting army wagon, let him lie from two to four hours with hardly any protection from the blazing sunshine in the daytime or the drenching dew at night, rack him with agony on the operating-table, and then carry him away, weak and helpless, put him on the water-soaked ground, without shelter, blanket, pillow, food, or drink, and leave him there to suffer alone all night. ”

“ Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt told me that nothing interfered so much at first with his sleep in the field as the noise made by these crabs in the bushes. It is so like the noise that would be made by a party of guerrillas or bushwhackers, stealing up to the camp under cover of darkness, that it might well keep awake even a man who was neither nervous nor imaginative.
Cuban land-crabs, like Cuban vultures, are haunters of battle-fields; but they seek the dead at night, while the vultures drink the eyes and tear off the lips of an unburied corpse in the broad light of day. ”

“ The first thing that strikes a newcomer in Key West is the distinctly and unmistakably foreign aspect of the city. In spite of the English names on many of the sign-boards over the shops, the American faces on the streets, and the crowd of American officers and war correspondents smoking or talking on the spacious piazzas of the Key West Hotel, one cannot get rid of the impression that he has left the United States and has landed in some such town as San Juan de Guatemala or Punta Arenas, on the Pacific coast of Central America. ”

“ As the southeastern coast of Cuba is high and bold, with deep water extending close up to the line of surf, vessels going back and forth between Santiago and Guantanamo run very near to the land; and the ever-changing panorama of tropical forest and cloud-capped mountain which presents itself to the eye as the steamer glides swiftly past, within a mile of the rock-terraced bluffs and headlands, is a constant source of surprise and delight, even to the most experienced voyager. It is an extremely beautiful and varied coast. ”

“ The rattle of rifles and machine-guns and the booming of artillery along the line of battle died away into an occasional sputter after dark; the full moon rose into a cloudless sky, and the stillness of the jungle south of the camp was broken only by an occasional shot from a sentry or from a Spanish sharp-shooter hidden in a tree. Around the operating-tables there was a sound of half-audible conversation as the surgeons gave directions to their assistants or discussed the injuries of the men upon whom they were at work, and now and then a peremptory call for "Litter-squad here!" ”

“ Six or eight war-ships, ranging in size and fighting power from monitors to torpedo-boats, were still lying at anchor off the custom-house and the Marine Hospital; transports with stores and munitions of war were discharging their cargoes at the piers; big four-masted schooners, laden with coal for the blockading fleet, swung back and forth with the ebbing and flowing tides as they awaited orders from the naval commandant; graceful steam-yachts, flying the flag of the Associated Press, were constantly coming in with news or going out in search of it ”

“ Then they come out by the hundred, if not by the thousand; and as it begins to grow dark, the still atmosphere of the deep, lonely forest is filled with the rustling, crackling noise that they make as they scramble through the bushes or climb over the stiff, dry blades of the Spanish bayonet. I think it is not an exaggeration to say that at almost any point on the Cuban trail between Guasimas and Siboney I could stand still for a moment and count from fifty to one hundred of them, crawling out of the forest and across the path. ”

“ When, for months together, a man has lived the life of an outlaw in the woods, scrambling through tropical jungles, wading marshy rivers, and sleeping, without tent or blankets, on the ground, he cannot be expected to look like a veteran of the regular army on dress-parade in a garrison town. Many of our own men, in the later weeks of the Santiago campaign, were almost as ragged and dirty as the poorest of the soldiers who came with General Garcia to Siboney. ”

“ If everybody, without exception, who knows the climate of Cuba warns you that your soldiers must not sleep on the ground, in wet clothing, why not provide them with hammocks, rain-sheets, and extra underwear? If your own surgeon-general and the chief surgeon of your own corps advise you officially that the drinking of unboiled water will almost certainly cause disease, why not supply your men with camp-kettles? ”

“ To one who is unfamiliar with the distinctive peculiarities of Spanish-American architecture, nothing, at first, is more surprising than the contrast between the gloomy and unpromising exterior of a Cuban residence and the luxury and architectural beauty which one often finds hidden behind its grated windows and thick stuccoed walls. It is more surprising and striking in Santiago, perhaps, than in most Spanish-American cities, on account of the narrowness and filthiness of the streets on which the houses even of the wealthiest citizens stand. ”

“ It was the splendid courage and fortitude of the men that made their suffering so hard to see. As the row of prostrate bodies on the ground grew longer and longer Saturday afternoon and evening, the emotional strain of the situation became almost unbearable, and I would have exchanged all the knowledge and ability I possessed for the knowledge and skill even of a hospital steward, so that I might do something more than carry around food and water to those suffering, uncomplaining American soldiers. ”

“ When the army landed at Siboney it found there a dirty little Cuban village of from twelve to twenty deserted houses, situated at the bottom of a wedge-shaped cleft in the long, rocky rampart which forms the coast-line between Siboney and Morro Castle, and at the mouth of a low, swampy, malarious ravine or valley extending back into the foot-hills, and opening upon the sea through the notch. ”

“ The marine picture presented by the harbor with all these monitors, cruisers, gunboats, yachts, transports, troop-ships, torpedo-boats, colliers, despatch-boats, and Spanish prizes lying at anchor, with flags and signals flying in the clear sunshine and on the translucent green water of the tropics, was a picture of more than ordinary interest and beauty, and one that Key West, perhaps, may never see again. ”

“ Almost any other naval commander, after destroying a hostile fleet and reducing all the batteries that defended a hostile city, would have wished to crown his victory and enjoy his triumph by entering the harbor in advance of all other vessels and on one of his own ships of war; but Admiral Sampson, with the modesty and generosity characteristic of a great and noble nature, waived his right to be the first to enter the city, and sent in the State of Texas, flying the flag of the Red Cross and carrying food and relief for the wounded, the starving, and the dying. ”

“ The two features of Key West scenery that appear, at first glance, to be most salient, and that contribute most to the impression of strangeness and remoteness made by the island as a whole, are, unquestionably, the color of the water and the character of the vegetation. The ocean in which the little coral key is set has a vividness and a delicacy of color that I have never seen equaled elsewhere, and that is not even so much as suggested by the turbid, semi-opaque water of the Atlantic off the coast of Massachusetts or New Jersey. ”

“ Men, women, and children ran down to the water's edge, waving their hats and handkerchiefs or brandishing their arms in joyous welcome, and even old, gray-haired, and feeble women, who could not get as far as the shore, stood in front of their little houses, now gazing at us in half-incredulous amazement, and then crossing themselves devoutly with bowed heads, as if thanking God that siege and starvation were over and help and food at hand. ”

“ The American people, certainly, are both able and willing to pay for the proper support and equipment of their army. If it had cost five million dollars, or ten million dollars, to supply every company in General Shafter's command with hammocks, waterproof rain-sheets, extra clothing, and camp-kettles, the money would have been appropriated and paid without a grumble or a murmur. We are not a stingy people, nor even an economical people, when the question is one of caring for the men that we send into the field to fight for us. ”

“ There was only one line of very bad road from Daiquiri and Siboney to the front, and along that line had to be carried, with an utterly insufficient train of mules and wagons, all the food and ammunition needed by an advancing army of more than sixteen thousand men. In loading the mules and wagons preference was given to stores and supplies that could be used in killing Spanish soldiers rather than to stores and supplies that would be needed in caring for our own, and the result was the dreadful and heartrending state of affairs in that hospital at the end of the second day's fight. ”

“ In order to ascertain what progress our forces were making in their march on Santiago, and to get an idea of the difficulties with which they were contending or would have to contend, I determined, about nine o'clock, to go to the front. It was impossible to get a horse or mule in Siboney, for love or money; but if our soldiers could march to the front under the heavy burden of shelter-tent, blanket roll, rifle, rations, and ammunition, I thought I could do it with no load at all, even if the sunshine were hot. ”

“ Egan afterward gave him water through a stomach-tube. If there was any weakness or selfishness, or behavior not up to the highest level of heroic manhood, among the wounded American soldiers in that hospital during those three terrible days, I failed to see it. As one of the army surgeons said to me, with the tears very near his eyes: "When I look at those fellows and see what they stand, I am proud of being an American, and I glory in the stock. The world has nothing finer." ”

“ It is just as much the business of a commanding general to know that he has medicines and ambulances enough as it is to know that he has food and ammunition enough. He is the man who plans the campaign, and, to a certain extent, predetermines the number of sick and wounded; he is the man who makes requisition upon the War Department for transports, mules, and wagons enough to carry the army and its equipment to the field where it is to operate ”

“ Cuban and American flags were displayed in front of every restaurant, hotel, and Cuban cigar-shop, and floated from the roofs or windows of many private houses; and now and then I met, coming out of a drug-store, an army surgeon or hospital steward whose left arm bore the red cross of the Geneva Convention.
The army that was destined to begin the invasion of Cuba consisted, at that time, of ten or twelve thousand men, all regulars, and included an adequate force of cavalry and ten fine batteries of field-artillery. ”

“ I should like to ask Spanish permission and protection to land and distribute food now on the State of Texas. Could I be permitted to ask to see them under flag of truce? If we make the effort and are refused, the blame rests with them; if we fail to make it, it rests with us. ”

“ Every man to his trade; and the landing of supplies from thirty or forty transports, in small boats, on an unsheltered, surf-beaten coast, is not the trade of an army quartermaster. Lieutenant-Colonel Humphrey and Major Jacobs undoubtedly did all that they could do, with their knowledge and experience, and with the limited facilities that General Shafter had provided for them, to get supplies ashore; but the results were not gratifying, either to observers at Siboney, or to soldiers at the front. ”

“ A general of brigade who has had wide and varied experience in many parts of the United States, and whose name is well and favorably known in New York, said to me in the latter part of July: "The whole army is suffering from malnutrition. The soldiers don't get enough to eat, and what they do get is not sufficiently varied and is not adapted to this climate. A soldier can live on hardtack and bacon for a while, even in the tropics, but he finally sickens of them and craves oatmeal, rice, hominy, fresh vegetables, and dried fruits. ”

“ In the first two months of the war the corps of field correspondents, in proportion to its numerical strength, lost almost as many men from death and casualty as did the army and navy of the United States. The letters and telegrams which they wrote on their knees, in the saddle, and on the rocking, swaying cabin tables of despatch-boats while hurrying to West Indian cable-stations were not always models of English composition, nor were they always precisely accurate ”