The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1898-05-21
FLEETS AT KEY WEST.
Belated News Reports Sampson and
SchleY There Thursday.


Key West, Fla, May 10. via Jackson
Vile, Fla, May 20 delayed in trans
mission. )-Tonight sees the close of the
most intensely anxious and most vex-
atious day Key West has shown since
the war began. Everything indicates
the proximity of a big naval battle, but
with an unseen foe, which may appear
at any one of several points and poss1-
bly, strike a blow and get away before
force can be massed to crush them.
The appearance of the flying squad
ron was supplemented about $50 by
two of the dispatch boats that had been
with Admiral SIMPSONS fleet, racing
neck and neck, the Associated Press dis
patch boat Dauntless in the lead.
The necessity of cutting the cable at
Santiago de Cuba, has already been
eVinced in Key West by several Madrid
cablegramS via, London sent after the
bloody fight at Cienfuegos last week,
when the MarbleheadS boat crew cut
the cable at that point. Admiral Samp-
sons fleet arrived here at . p. m. This
confirmed the forecast made in these
dispatches Sunday as to the where
abouts and intentions of these two
fleets. Both had been slower in arriv-
ing than we'll posted naval officers
supposed at that time. All this was in
tereSting enough but not a word of it
was allowed out the cenSOr'S office and
a score of correspondents who had been
besieging the cable office all the morn
ing wilted down into the hotel veranda
chairs out of the broiling sun, helpless
to get a word of the real news of the
situation to their papers.
Naval officers for the most part were
as ignorant as the correspondents, as
to how matters stood in the world out
side of Key West and whether or not
the matters being censored, had already
not leaked out through the less re-
stricted channels at Washington. Naval
men however had less time for Specu-
latiOn, for the fleet was busily engaged
in preparing for some move, details of
which were known only to Commodore
Watson and those nearest him. Every
officer ashore was on the alert for or
derS to hurry aboard his ship.
such last night was the tate Of men
ena and the Wilmington. Hurry orders
reached them about $50 The Bancroft S
stores when word was sent him to cam
eel all provision contracts and come
aboard
The small fleet was already under way
when he reached her and the BancrOft'S S
glg was snatched up 10 her qaVltS Whle
she was steamlng out OF the harbor
Where the small fleet went is still mys-
terry, all being too slow to act as scouts
in the hunt for the Spanish fleet and not
strong enough to do more than help at
Havana, where there are already more
boats than are actually needed. The most
plausible theory advanced to account for
the quick departure that they were
to form a second line of scouts to the
suvius are supposed to be watching the
narrows of the Yucatan channel. These
two vessels moved quickly out Thursday
morning and disappeared at a leisurely
pace to the southwest; 1t may be can
Spanish fleet from here is speculative.
Key West is lamentably isolated from the
daily bulletins. The understanding of the
intention here, however, is that Sampson
counted eonhdently on hndlng the Span
did Dewey the SpaniardS at Manila. 1t
was not till daylight on the morning of
the bombardment that he learned that the
harbOr was empty.