Spanish camp

“ The camp was spread out in a circle over a wide area. Several chiefs’ lodges had been set up, countless fires were smoking, horses whinnied, mules brayed, medicine pipes (horns) tooted, and a myriad of figures moved busily, getting water, going on herd, arranging the packs, marching to and fro as if in a dance, or clustering around the fires.
[29]
These were the Spanish, were they, from the south? Scar Head had not supposed that so many could come so far, all together. The nation of the Spanish must be a great and powerful nation.
A guard saw the Iskatappe file approaching. ”

“ Bring Elvas and Fort La Lippe in view. Arrive at the first post of cavalry in rear of the147 Spanish camp. Sent from one camp to the other, till at last, about two o’clock, we reach the Colonel’s tent off Badajoz. We step into the tent and join the Colonel and other officers at dinner—a most excellent mess of rice and salt fish, in a camp kettle, and first-rate sausages. We get on most merrily. ”

“ But she was not a solitary sufferer: many a widow and orphan was made by the siege and storming of Badajos; our loss amounting, in killed and wounded, to about three thousand men.
The camp during that day, and for some days after, was like a masquerade, the men going about intoxicated, dressed in the various dresses they had found in the town; French and Spanish officers, priests, friars, and nuns, were promiscuously mixed, cutting as many antics as a mountebank. It was some days before the army could be brought round to its former state of discipline. ”

“ Leaving a sufficient number to protect the work and guard the camp, [XXVII-43] he advanced against them with the remainder of his forces, and was soon engaged in a desperate struggle. Three several times the ranks of the mountaineers were broken, and as often did they rally and attack with ever increasing fury. Only the steel and cotton armor of the Spanish forces saved them from destruction. As it was, lance and sword, bullet and bolt, reaped the usual harvest, and on the plain, saturated with blood and bespotted with mangled bodies, the Spaniards at last stood triumphant. ”

“ In October, 1899, a number of the officers and men of the Springfield companies who had served in the Cuban war began the organization of a camp of the Legion of Spanish War Veterans, an order patterned after the model of the Grand Army of the Republic and which it is to be hoped will be to the veterans of the war with Spain what the Grand Army is to the men who fought in the Civil war. The camp was named after Henry S. Lee of Springfield, whose splendid and self-sacrificing work for the benefit of the soldiers and sailors in the Spanish war will never be forgotten by them or the people. ”

“ The cities, which now claimed the Spanish general's protection, supplied the camp with an incredible number of warriors; a number which, if we admit Cortés' own estimate, one hundred and fifty thousand, could have only served to embarrass his operations on the long extended causeways. Yet it is true that the valley, teeming with towns and villages, swarmed with a population—and one, too, in which every man was a warrior—greatly exceeding that of the present day. ”

“ So that we had the whole Spanish army before us! and Major-General Morgan called out to the Colonels, "To the right! as much as you can!" that so, we might have all the enemy's army under the English Colours.
The Six Thousand English carried all the Spanish army [before it] as far as from Westminster Abbey to St. Paul's Churchyard, before ever a Frenchman came in, on either wing of us. But then, at last, we could perceive the French Horse come powdering [scattered] on each wing with much gallantry: but they never struck one stroke; and only carried prisoners back to the camp. ”

“ Santiago is a queer place. We approached the city along the road that passes by our camp. The street was narrow—not more than twenty-five or thirty feet wide—not wider than the paved portion of the street in front of our house. Many are much narrower—mere alleys in fact—but people living all along them. Across the streets trenches had been dug by the Spanish troops and barbed wire netting in front of the trenches. There were many trenches, showing what preparation they had made for a desperate resistance to our advance. The houses are nearly all one-story and have brick or stone floors. ”

“ In the rainy season the road is very heavy. In this place we found the camp of the Captain Don Joseph de Estenos, with all his people. It is a pleasant place and has many orange and lemon trees. In it we saw a large enclosure which the Indians made to keep off the Spaniards, when the latter went to despoil them fifteen years before. ”

“ Falls Church has gained a national reputation within recent years by reason of the establishment near the village of the camp for volunteer soldiers at the outbreak of the Spanish-American War. This camp was one of several of the kind established in the Southern States for the purpose of organizing an army for the invasion of Spanish territory. ”

“ This village lay at the distance of a few hundred yards from the lines of the royalist camp, and was evidently besieged by the latter. Rude earthworks could be perceived extending between the scattered suburbs, upon which a few pieces of cannon were mounted, and pointing towards the entrenchments of the Spanish encampment. Between the hostile lines the plain was unoccupied, save by the dead bodies of men and horses that lay unburied on the dusty surface of the soil. ”

“ A shot from the farthest sentry causes little or no excitement in Gomez's camp. The report throws the Spanish column into fears of attack or ambush, and it moves forward very slowly and carefully. Two pickets at such a time have been known to hold 2,000 men at bay for a whole day. If the column presses on, and General Gomez hears a shot from a sentinel near by, he will rise leisurely from his hammock and give orders to prepare to move camp. ”

“ As to our prisoners, horses, and baggage, since through all our march a troop of three hundred Spaniards had been dogging our [333] steps without daring to approach, we would leave eighty men to guard them—enough to beat four times as many Spaniards.
At nightfall we set out, leaving our eighty men, with orders to the sentinels to fire and beat the retreat and the diane at the usual times, to make the three hundred Spaniards who lurked near us think that we had not left the camp. ”

“ God only knows how long it might be; for those people are in their own country, defending their homes; and you know that they are ferocious, savage, fearless, and valiant."
"That they are, but as far as being fearless and valiant is concerned, we Spaniards are more so."
"And God knows what hunger and privation they are going to suffer!"
"Don't imagine it; but even if it should be so, give the Spanish soldier plenty of water to drink and he has all he needs. Why, the joy of that regiment as they went on board was plain to be seen! ”

“ When night fell and part of the army was sunk in sleep, they descended the rocks, and, rushing suddenly upon the weakest part of the camp, endeavored to break their way through and gain the city. The camp was too strong to be forced ”

“ Every bush may mask an ambuscade, and behind every rock some danger lurks. Sometimes the Spaniards—to whom experience has taught many things—may mark the exact position of the rebels by the whirl of the vultures, circling high above it, watching the time when, after the camp has broken up, they may make a descent upon the scanty fragments of victuals left behind, or upon the dead bodies of those who have perished of wounds, of starvation, perchance, or of some malignant fever. ”

“ Wherever there is road-making or rail-making to be done in Spain, you see lines of prisoners at work linked in twos and fours, under strong military surveillance; which seems a healthy and profitable prison system. We sat down on a broken wall overgrown with prickly cactus, and watched the sun set over mountain and plain, river and village, whilst our guide chatted with the soldiers about themselves, their neighbours, and their doings. A Spanish guide is not in the least conventional. He undertakes to conduct you to a certain place, and there his responsibility ends ”

“ Regardless of the missiles showered upon them, the Spaniards climbed the rugged slope, and though many a one was felled, now by a dart, now by some thundering rock or beam which crushed everything in its path, they persevered and gained the camp, which contained fully three score houses, with church, public edifices, and newly planted fields. The negroes retired to several strong points around, with the loss of quite a number, including several leaders, yet still defiant. ”

“ Our men knew that the Spaniards would try to win back the heights of San Juan, the last stronghold on the outskirts of Santiago.
At daybreak the next morning the Spaniards attacked our troops, and the fighting went on all day. A sharp attack was made in the evening, but our men still held the place. Yet they did not feel secure. The Spanish Army in Santiago was a large one, and might force our men back. Our men, though weary from marching and fighting and digging, hungry, for food was scarce, [Pg 133] wanted to hold the heights that had been so dearly won. ”

“ The late gorgeous camp was now a scene of wild confusion. The flames kept spreading from one pavilion to another, glaring upon the rich armor and golden and silver vessels, which seemed melting in the fervent heat. Many of the soldiers had erected booths and bowers of branches, which, being dry, crackled and blazed and added to the rapid conflagration. The ladies of the court fled, shrieking and half dressed, from their tents. There was an alarm of drum and trumpet, and a distracted hurry about the camp of men half armed. ”

“ A little above the uppermost of the waterfalls the country folks still point out "the black colonel's grave" some swarthy Spaniard, perhaps, who fell that day far from the cork-groves of Southern Spain. They tell too how the Spanish soldiers who surrendered themselves as prisoners of war first cast their arms into the deep pool below. ”

“ While the Christian camp, thus gay and gorgeous, spread itself out like a holiday pageant before the walls of Baza, while a long line of beasts of burden laden with provisions and luxuries were seen descending the valley from morning till night, and pouring into the camp a continued stream of abundance, the unfortunate garrison found their resources rapidly wasting away, and famine already began to pinch the peaceful part of the community. ”

“ We accordingly proceeded eastward, till the approach of night warned us to encamp. We of course took every precaution against surprise; for though the Spaniards had been so signally defeated, some roving bands of Indians attached to their cause might possibly discover and attack us. We had not only sentries placed round the camp, but we sent out vedettes to patrol the neighbourhood, and thus give due notice of the approach of an enemy. A hut was built for Norah; and Don Carlos and I lay down outside, that, in case of any sudden surprise, we might be at hand to protect her. ”

“ When night came on, and released us from the attacks of the enemy, we returned to our encampment, and attended to our wounds, which we dressed with bandages steeped in oil. There was likewise a soldier among our troops, named Juan Catalan, who charmed the wounds, and the Lord Jesus blessed this man's exertions in a manner that he invariably succeeded in his cures. Indeed, if all our wounded, each day we renewed the attack, had remained behind in our camp, none of the companies could ever have sallied out with more than twenty men at a time. ”

“ Venezuela, New Granada, and the plains of Casanare again fell into the hands of the vengeful Spaniards. In 1816, a very numerous emigration of patriots, consisting of men, women, and children, in a state of great destitution and suffering, fled to the wilderness from the persecution of the royalists, and took refuge in the camp of Paez. Many persons of distinction were to be found among the fugitives, and a system of government was established for the regulation of affairs. ”

“ Before the enemy had time to assemble, I set fire to five or six small places of about a hundred houses each, and brought away about four hundred prisoners, both men and women, fighting my way back to my camp without their doing me any harm. At daybreak the following morning, more than a hundred and forty-nine thousand men, covering all the country, attacked our camp so determinedly that some of them penetrated into it, rushing about, and thrusting with their swords at the Spaniards. ”

“ A training in the Spanish army is not exactly the thing to fit for the peaceful and toilsome monotony of industrial occupations.
The battalions of cazadores of Mérida and Barcelona, in garrison at Valencia, exhibited symptoms of discontent; but the officers were on the alert, and checked them on the spot. That is the only plan—nip the evil in the bud. It is the custom in Spain to confine troops to barracks during times of popular commotion. ”

“ I gazed at him in silence, but feeling an emotion of considerable disgust; for although well aware that to sketch any fortified place or garrison town, barrack, or citadel, was strictly forbidden, it never occurred to me that the restriction could apply to the miserable conglomeration of Spanish huts and crumbling Moorish hovels which clustered round the churches on the rock of Arcos; but in their ignorance of the arts the Spaniards, like the Turks, cannot see a difference between a little artistic sketch and a regular plan drawn for the most desperate military purposes. ”