San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-02-05
WORSE THAN BRUTES.
SPANISH BUTCHER PENS ARE MADE
PUBLIC SHOWS.
Prisoners Shot Down While Crowds Of
Noisy Greasers Stand by and Look on
Amid Martial Band Music

New York, Feb. "a special to the
World from Havana, via Key West,
Fla, says:
The sharp ring of Spanish rifle shots
from the gray walls of the Cabanas
unfailng regularity. This is the hour
of execution. The mornings program
was varied Monday by double exc
cution, with an added chapter of cru
elites.
The condemned We're Enrique Held
ers Osma, a lad of 10 years, and An
tonic PedrOmO GuZman. They were
charged with rebellion and incendiar-
| ism.
OSna, handsome youth, carried
the true patriots heart In an on
gagement the horse of his chief. Pc
rez, was shot, Osma quick as thought
but barely in time, gave his own horse
10 Ierez and thee hief escaped. The
lad by desperate chance. also escaD-
ed.
a few weeks afterward. he and
GuZZman We're captured.
An execution is a semi-public show
and people whOc ross the bay TO wit
ness it are permitted to gather on the
outer walls of the fortress. On Mon
day they saw again the usual careless
ana even jaunty preliminaries of
death.
A band played lively air, marched
| cheerily into the Enclosure. Six hun
dred troops followed and with the in
ner walls as one of the sides, formed
hollow square.
Eight soldiers separated from the
ranks took n stand on Il mound form
ing n slight elevation in the square.
They had drawn the short straws the
night before and were to be execution
ers.
Six priests appeared in double line.
Between them were young Osma and
his fellow prisoner. with hands tied
behind their backs.
They stumbled and would have fal-
| len but for the assistance or the
priests. They knelt to the ground
| with their faces to the wall and their
backs to the eXecutioners. The band
ceased playing. A priest stepped for
ward and gently stroking the boys
cheek, whispered n few words of hope
and retired to the lines.
The eXecutionerS moved ten feet
forward, the rifles raised, the COM
mand given. Six shots rang out and
two bodies fell forward to the ground.
The boy was not dead, his left arm
| twitched and vibrated. Even the sol
| diers. used to scenes of execution,
| turned their heads, and a groan of
| horror went mp from the spectators
| along theg reat ledge of the wall
above. 1t was a gruesOme, blood
chilling scene, but it was only for a
| moment. Another command was
given and two of the firing party,
who were willing to give ''mercy
shots" stepped forward. One placed
his rife almost at the boys back, and
fired. 1t was over at last
The spectators returned to the city
barely in time to see a crowd about
a crying, hysterical young woman.
| Mingling with the strains of music
were walls of despair and grief from
| Guzman's wife. The shots were still
ringing in her ears when she read the
name of her husband in the awful
daily bulletin Eel Capila," which
means I'm the chapel" 1t is pub
lished in the evening papers and is a
| list of those who are TO be executed
the next morning.
This grief-stricken woman had not
seen the list until the sound of the
shots told her that another order OF
death had been carried out. Two lit
tlec hildren, igonrant of the cause of
grief. were at their mothers side,
when the crowd drew near and ascer-
tanned the meaning of her wild, inco-
herent cries.
A few moments later a priest was
delivering a letter to an aged, white
haired, old woman. 1t was dated the
night before and began: Dearest
Mother: Tomorrow l die; a patriot
for the freedom of Cuba"
The old woman, the lads mother.
tainted without reading further, Tor
it was her first information that her
l. L.. Il Ia