The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-05-08
SOLDIERS STEPPED FORTH AND FIRED AT THE KNEEI1


trado viii sometimes betray the Samar-
itan who helps him. A faithful mule
carried me into Guadalupe at > O'Clock
IN the afternoon, the siesta hour. / had
come from the coast many miles away,
over the hills. As I rode into the town,
I said TO the mule: The next artist
Thc Is given an order to illustrate
Dantc's Inferno ought to come here.
He could draw from life, pictures mora
Internal than a mere human mind
could conceive"
Reconcentrados lay everywhere I'M
der The broiliuG sun The mule picked
his way between human heaps that
looked ike SO many little mounds of
rags. Skeleton less and arms protruded
from out the heaps. Soft means of
mothers and the wailing of little chill
dren save evidence of so many living
deaths.
TALh WITH THE COMMANDANTE.
I presented my credentials to the
eommandante. He was the most genial
Spanish official I had met between Ha-
vana and Guadalupe. When he smiled
his face was all kindness. When he
spoke OF the reconcentrados tears we'll
"a from his eyes. Yet around his
mouth and chin were the cruel line of
a nature as stern as it was cOmmisera-
tive. He told me that the hospital was
full, always full; there was room in
its wards Tor only 200 patients, and
only one doctor for all. All who en-
tered that place Of sickness came out
of IL, not cured, but dead. Three thou
sand human beings. mostly women
and children, had passed away in that
town III as many months. Nearly all
had died Of starvation and exposure.
When the cemetery was fun, they be-
hTT7-s-f77rr in ha 81 fr7r 70
bacco fields on the hillsdes.
But it was the siesta hour. The COM
mandante excused himself. saying he
would rest awhile and advised me TO do
the same
The commentaries house was in the
center Of town Round about was a
circle Of the houses of those who had
owned the tobacco fields. Beyond these
homes Of the Well-to-do were hundreds
Of hutS IN these lived the reconcen-
IradOs. several families in each, or as
MANY as could huddle within and not
pull the roughly constructed frame of
palm stalks down about their heads
Outside the circle of huts We're the
blackened fields and hills On the tops
of these hills. at intervals of 200 yards,
was small circle of houses that look
ed like sentry boxes. They were really
little forts. with four soldiers in each.
Beyond the forts were, heaven only
knows how many insurgent guerillas
lynx-eyed human watch dogs. always
lurking and waiting for a chance to
swoop upon one of the little forts.
slay the garrison Of four and dash back
into the bushes.
At this moment not a soldier was in
sight. Perhaps all were sleeping like
the cOmmandante. Or perhaps the SOL
diers always remained inside the bar
Ticades surrounding their forts. fearing
: l,.+ 70 e-t0 cid would no
the bullets Of the lurking insurgents.
For such is warfare in Cuba's hills to-
day: much the same sort of warfare
our American forefathers knew when
each man who stepped from his door
way was likely to become a target for
the arrows of the lurking and invisible
redskins.
/ was making a mental note of this
picture of war and misery when sud
denly / saw a human form on the hill
tor over which l had just come. The
peculiar shape of the white hat worn
by this aDDarition told me it was a
soldier IN the middle of the white road
he stopped. lowered burden from his
shoulders to the ground. What was
that soldier doing there, and what was
the nature of his apparently heavy
burden? From my perch on the bal
cony beckoned to the sentry who was
pacing up and down in front of the
conlmandante' house. The sentry
came up TO the balcony, took one look |
in the direction Of my pointing finger |
then rushed into the house. The next !
moment the communicate appeared. |
With q field glass he surveyed the /
figure on the hilltop.
He is carrying something" / said, 1
as watched the man in the distance |
re-shouled his burden and begin de-
scending the HILL
4 dead man" said the comman- !
dante.
And he closed the glasses thought !