Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1898-03-28
SENATOR PROCTOR'S SPEECH IN
THE SENATE ON CUBA.


Proctor's recent speech on Cuba. Mr.
Proctor after sketching the geography
of Cuba and the ! cation of the six
provinces, said:
"My obs4ry lions were confined to
the four western provinces which
constitute about one-half the Island.
The two eastern ones are practically
in the hands Of the insurgents except
the few fortified towns. These two
large provinces are spoken of today
as Cuba Libre.' Havana, the great
city and capital of the Island, is, in
eyes of the Spaniards and many Gu
bans, all Cuba as much as Paris is
France. But having visited it in
peaceful times and seen its sights, the
tomb OF Columbus, the forts Cabana
and Moro Castle, did not care to
repeat this, preferring trips in the
country. Everything seems to go on
much as usual in Havana. Quiet pre-
walls and except for the frequent
squads of soldiers marching to guard
and police duty and their Astounding
presence in all public places, one sees
little signs of war. Outside Havana
all is changed. It is not peace or is it
war. tits desolation and distress, mis-
cry and starvation. Every town and
village is surrounded by a trocha
(trench), sort of rifle pit. These
trochas have at every corner and at
frequent intervals along the sides
what are called forts, but which are
really small block houses, many of
them more like sentry box. loop
holed for musketry and with guard
of from one to ten soldiers in each.
The purpose of these trochas is to
keep the recOncentradOS in as we'll as
to keep the insurgents out. From all
the surrounding country the people
have been driven into these fortified
towns and held there, to subsist as
they can. They are virtually prison
yards and not unlike one in general
appearance, except the walls are not
so high and strong but they suffice,
where every point is in range Of
soldiers rifle, to keep in the poor
reconcentradoes women and children.
Every railroad station is within one
these trochas and has an armed guard.
Every train has an armored freight
car, loop holed for musketry and filed
with soldiers and with, as l observed
the case, pilot engine mile or so
in advance. There are frequent block
houses enclosed by trocha, and with
guard, along the railroad track.
With this exception there is no human
life or habitatien between these forth
fed towns and villages and through
out the whole of the four western
provinces, except to very limited
extent among the hills where the
SpaniardS have not been able to 60 and
drive the people to the towns and burn
their dwellings. [ saw no house or
hut in the 400 miles of railroad rides
from Pinar Del Rio province in the
west. across the full width of Havana
and Mantanzas Provinces, and to
Sagua La Grande on she north shore
of Santa Clara, except within the
trochas. There are no domestic ami
mails Or crops on the rich fields and
pastures except such as are under
guard in the immediate vicinity of
the town. In other words the Span
iards hold in these four western prov
inces just what their army sits on.
Every man, woman and child and
every domestic animal, wherever
their columns have reached, is under
guard and within their SO called for
tifications. To describe one place is
to describe all. To repeat, tits neither
peace nor war. 1t IS concentration
and desolation This is the 'pacifed'
condition of the four western provinc
eS.
All the country people in the four
western provinces, about 100000 in
number, remaining outside the forti-
fed towns when Weyler's order was
made, were driven into these towns,
and these are the reconcentrados.
They were the peasantry, many of
them farmers, some land owners,
others renting lands and owning more
or less stock, others working on es
tates and cultivating small patches;
and even a small patch in that fruitful
cline will support family. 1t is but
fair to say that the normal condition
of these people was very different
from that which prevails in this coun-
try. Their standard of comfort and
prosperity was not high, measured by
our own; but according to their stan
dards and requirements their condi-