The evening herald. [volume] (Shenandoah, Pa.) 1891-1966, 1898-05-25
LETTER FROM THE "YALH''
A Former Resident of Town writes About
Her.

John Sweeney, former resident of Lost
Creek and who was at one time bartender at
the Ferguson house annex is now one Of the
ciew on the United States auxiliary cruiser
Yale ~ formerly the Paris" and writes au
interesting letter to his many friends in this
town and vicinity. The letter is dated Porto
Ri'c May 11th
The writer says he is well and is having a
nice time on the big vessel, with lots of room
aud plenty of good food. He adds, 1--WE
each have our own staterooms with bathtubs
attached. There are only twenty-five
marines on board. All the rest are stewards,
cooks and walters. They are English and
German. We have had Spanish man of-war
after us every day since we have been here.
The Yale is being used rs a despatch boat.
We remain here until the 18th, and then leave
for Key West On the 9th we passed within
half a mile Of the fort at san Juan. They
would have fired on us but we kept out
of reach We have the Paris captain and
a naval captain as well. We cruised around
the island OF Porto Rico until the next morn
ing when we passed the fort of San Juan
with our own colors. We were not quite past
when we had to get mp steam and dust, for a
Spanish man .ofwHr was after us but we are
too fast for any of them. We went
on and met a Danish steamer, which
we stopped and over-hauled. We found that
the steamer was chartered by the New York
Herald. She had two reporters on board.
They gave us the news That two Spanish
steamers were coaling up at st. Thomas, so
we laid for them until evening when one
came along the coast. We went after her.
but she got around boud and among rocks.
f... L.. pI
saw the oihtr coming. She spicd us and trie d
TO get away, hut We were too fast for her.
We had to fire five or sis shots to stop her.
We went on board and found she was loaded
with general cargo The captain sais the
whole thing was worth Sl5O,OOO. There were
two families on board as passengers We
hauled down the Spanish flag and hosted the
glorious Stars and Stripes on her Two
marines and crew took her to Key West
The Yale is grand ship-one of the fastest
on the waters. We have lots of fun with
the Spaniards. We have chase every
day. We passed their fort (San Juan
yesterday and they fired three shots at us
but you bet we were far away. At night time
we patrol in the dark without lights on
board This is not very pleasant. We are
all right so long as nothing breaks down on
the engines. There is none of them can
catch us. We have four guns on board-twC
forward and two aft. This is the only battery
we have on board. The captain is talking Of
going to Philadelphia and getting more
guns, so that we can do some fighting
We might have captured two more steamers
/ but had no guns heavy enough to show fight
A troop ship came along the other day with
eight hundred troops for San Juan. She
gave us a great bluff. We skipped out of hei
way She followed us for two hours We
thought sure she had heavy guns. The next
day we met the Herald reporters and they
said she did not have a gun on board. We
may be able to see some fighting in a couple
of days. We are keeping track of the Span
ish fleet and we go to Key West and report