The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-12-25
Welcome Americans and Yield to
Their Authority.
GEN. DAVIS EXPERIENCE
PEACEFUL OCCUPATION OF
PINAB DEL RIO.
Many Evidences of the Sad Condi-
tons That Have Prevailed, But
There Are Signs of Industrial Re
vival-Seven Thousand Died and
Women Are In Mourning.

|
| Correspondence of the Associated Press.
Pinar del Rio Dec. 19-The RECONSTRUCT
ton of this great tobaeco-raising, SUI
gar-g growing province has begun. Abso-
lutte peace exists, and the people are at
work. General Davis, before he left
Havana, was told that brigands prob
ably would overrun the province; that
petty dictators were taxing the viii
lagos; that insurgents had occupied the
towns and would not yield paramount
authority to. the Americans, and that
he would be infinitely vexed by obsta-
! cles in every step of restoration of civil
order among a restless people.
When General Davis. with his staff,
a battalion Of the Two Hundred and
Second New York regiment, and a sig
nal corps company reached the borders
of the province in the journey by train
from Havana, they were received at
Santiago de Las Vegas by colonel
and $50 Cuban horsemen, aligned near
the station Afterwards, behind them
were 125 young Cuban women on horse
back. Around and behind this caval-
cade townspeople gathered, shaggy
haired old men, women in black, troops
of children with flowers and small Gu
ban and American flags.
AS General Davis and his staff ap-
peared on the platform, there was a
passionate burst of ''VivaS," and bare
machetes flashed in the medley of col
ors. The cheering was so prolonged
and genuine that the Americans were
moved by it. The colonel placed him
self and his men at General Davis dis
poSaI. The alcalde of the town made
an address.
The general, who knows some con-
vocational Spanish, but not enough for
a public speech, said, through an in
terpreter, that the Cuban people had
been through great trials and suffer
ings, and that the Americans were
there to aid in securing their liberty.
A PRIESTS MISTAKE.
Surgeon Major W. ]. Kneedler had
become separated in the crowd from
General Davis and one of a committee
of priests began to read him an adj
dress of welcome, thinking the doctor
was the general. Major Kneedler, who
at first did not perceive the drift of the
address, was unable to find an opening
to stop the padre before the welcome
had been concluded.
The doctor, through a Cuban who
could speak English and Spanish, said
that, as one of the Americans with
General Davis, he regarded the Cubans
as men and brethren, and that in all
his travels he had not been in so fine a
country.
The Americans then swept through
wide spaces of deserted country. From
the train they could see occasionally
the blackened walls and tall chimney
of a ruined sugar centrale. At each of
the towns the senior Cuban officer made
known his allegiance to the proposed
order of things under the American
Drotectorate.
Pinar del Rio City gave a reception
as enthusiastic as that given at San
tiago de Las Vegas. The~Cuban COM
mander turned over the municipal and
provincial belongings.
General Davis has communicated by
letter or by messenger with the i'm
portant towns in the province. Not an
incident of brigandage or injury to per-
sonal rights has resulted. The most
fragrant crime has been the disappear
ance of some chickens. The Spanish
residents, some of whom are the we'll
TODD men of the city, had lived in the
interior between Spanish evacuation
and American occupation unframed.
The people near Pinar have torn the
wire from the trocha and have inclosed
yards and fields with it. The principal
storekeeper has painted advertisements
on two of the forts.
The town is well-fed on chickens,
fresh beef, fruit and vegetables. The
country is exhausted, but the reviviica-
ton has begun. Palm huts are building
on wasted farms. The country people
are now living chiefly on radishes
sweet potatoes, sugar cane and chick
ems and quail shot or trapped in the
thickets.
ALL IN MOURNING.
Pinar del Rio City has many pretty
houses. The population was 1900, of
which number 1000 have been buried.
The women are all in black.
Following General Davis instructions
the American officers and privates are
careful to return the SaluteS of the
Cuban soldiers who, armed and I'M
armed, are coming and going all the
time. They subsist largely on gifts of
food. Some, forced by necessity, have
sold their rifles. Mausers captured
from the Spaniards are selling for S. or
Sc. In Havana Mausers are surrepti-
tiously sold for $50 or $25.
The battalion of the Two Hundred
and Second New York regiment, under
Major Wood, is camped on high ground
and about a mile outside the city. The
landscape of rolling country and dis
tant mountains is most beautiful. The
men have been working hard cutting
grass and organizing camp. They have
not missed having fresh bread and beef
since they left Havana. Forty-two head
of cattle bought today for the camp
are grazing nearby. Guard duty is
light. One post of three men is main
tanned at the railroad station and an
other is at FL Globe Hotel, where Gen
eral Davis stops. No other guard duty
outside the camp is required. The men
expect be replaced by regulars in
the spring and allowed to go home.
Dreadful stories are told of the malaria
that develops around Pipar del Rio
with the beginning Of hot weather.
CUBANS MUST KEEP OUT.