The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-08-29
SANTIAGO Dn CUBA IN WAR TIME.

hospital ENperiences-Wor of Red
 Cross Nurses-Victims of Yellow Jack
 Pathetic Scenes and Incidents,
 Especial Correspondence of the Journal
 and Courier.
 Santiago de Cuba, Aug. 1.-Miss An- nie Wheeler, youngest daughter of Gen eral Wheeler Of Alabama-a fragile girl of twenty-four years-has charge of the female nurses in the army hos pltal of Santiago. How she became a Red Cross nurse is romantic story. The motherless girl is peculiarly devo- ted to her father. whom she calls her Sweetheart" She accompanied him and her brother to Tampa, and was daily seen riding about the camps with them on horseback. To be by her fathers side she would gladly have gone into battle; but since that could not be, she determined to do the next best thing and go to the front as a nurse, in order to remain as near to him as possible. She met with strongest opposition on every hand; but with the blood of ''the fighting Wheelers" in her veins, Miss Annie is not easily swerved from a good purpose General Wheeler earnestly protested against the project, but would not oppose a command to the dictates of his daughters conscience Some of the heads of the army abso- lutely refused her transportation to Cuba, and others denied her permission to land when she finally arrived off Santiago. Only General Miles, after re- capitulating the dangers, which she well understood, and urging her to re- turn to safety, lent his strong helping hand and enabled her to enter upon her chosen path of duty.
 When she first joined Miss Barton fe- male help was very scarce in Santiago. For week she was almost alone in the crowded waterside hospital so far as other women are concerned. There were several male attendants to lift the sick, to bring in patients and carry out the dead, besides an efficient steward and two or three visiting physicians; and now there are also four white and three colored female nurses, under Miss Wheeler's direction. Early and late she tolls, rising at a. m. and leaving the scene of her labors only at nightfall, often walking unattended through the darkened streets of Santiago-but as safe as in her own parlor under the all- protecting symbol of the Red Cross. In the hospital she is as ray of sun- shine, her slender figure dressed in girl ish white, or in blue cambric with snowy apron and 'kerchief, her curling hair brushed neatly back and blue eyes shining with earnest purpose; washing sick mems faces, writing home letters for them, administering food or medi- cine, and taking the last messages of the dying. No necessary service, how ever menial or repellant. is ever shirked by her, nor will she weary in welldo- ing. The old rule holds good, here as everywhere else in this odd old world, that the worst 'kickers'-who loudest bewail scant army rations and lack of home comforts-are those who have been least accustomed to luxury. Miss Wheeler, the child of wealth and orna- ment of society whose Washington winters are spent in the luxurious Ar lington, has never uttered one word of complaint. She is prayerful girl, who begins and ends each day on her knees beside her army cot;-and only Heaven knows how many times during the long hard days her "soul is on it's knees in the language of Hugo. The loved fath- CT and brother have been ordered to the north and she alone, of all 'the fighting Wheelers'' remain in Cuba. But she will not desert the work, wherein she was never more needed than to-day; and as for protection, there is not sol dier in our army who would not lay down his life for her if need be.
 The hospital of which I write, though created only a few weeks ago by the necessities of war is by far the best in Cuba. It is the boat-house of the swell American club, loaned for the tempora- ry purpose. It is built directly over the bay, some rods from shore and is reached by long pier. Its great ban queting hall, whose latticed walls can be raised to admit every vagrant breeze, is now closely set with army cots, and double rows of the same are ranged along the encircling verandas. The smaller apartments have all their spec ial uses, and in little ante-roOm seVe- ral oil stoves are set, over which beef tea, matted milk and gruel are pre- pared. Not an inch of space is thrilled and were the commodious building ten times as big it would be equally crowd ed,
 When I first saw this hospital, two weeks ago, the sick were lying on the bare floor; but now, thanks to the Red Cross, they are amply supplied with cots and bedding. Considerable army red-tape is squandered in getting pa tients into this haven of refuge, so that sometimes a half-conscious man, brought on mule-cart or stretcher, lies for hours in the sun at the street end of the pier, before an order can be obtained from the palace-a mile up town-for his admission to the hospital. But when once inside, a mans chances of recovery are wonderfully increased. For example, there have been but three deaths in this hospital in a fortnight, while in the fever hospital at Siboney they are dying by hundreds, and in the various field hospitals at an average rate of twenty per day. Out in the camps the sick men are yet lying on the ground, under dog tents, alternately soaked with rain, scorched in the noon- day sum- chilled to the marrow at night, unattended except by their comrades, and with nothing to eat but beans, ba- con and hard-tack, even for those dying of dysentery No wonder that fever is daily increasing among them, and yes terday, out of a whole regiment, only two men were able to report for duty.
 I spend a few hours every day in the water-side hospital where mine is the unofficial and inglorious part of cheer ;,, ttipo Ia