Maryland independent. [volume] (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1874-current, 1898-09-30
WEIRD BATTLE SCENES.
FAMOUS WAR CORRESPONDENTS
REcoLLEcTloNS OF cUASINA,

All the Men He Saw Shot Went Down
In Lump-The "chug'' of the Bullets
They Don't "shriekp or r"sins'-I,Iuck-
lest songs Human Bcings Ever sang.
Edward Marshall, the New York
Journals correspondent who was
wounded at Guasina, has written his
Recollection" for Scribner's Maga-
zine from which the following ex-
extracts are made;
II saw many men shot. Every one
went down in lump, without cries,
without jumping up in the air, with
out throwing up hands. They just
went down like clods in the grass.
II seemed 10 me that the terrible thud
with which they struck the earth was
more penetrating than the sound of
guns. Some were only wounded.
some were dead
"There is much that is awe-inspir-
ing about the death of soldiers on the
battlefield Almost all of us have
seen men aud women die, but they
have died in their carefully arranged
beds with doctors daintily boarding
the flickering spark; with loved ones
clustering about But death from
disease is less awful than death from
bullets. On the battlefield there are
no delicate scientific problems of
strange microbes to be solved. There
is no petting, no coddling nothing,
nothing, nothing but death. The
man lives, he is strong, he is vital,
every muscle in him is at its fullest
tension when, suddenly, 'ehugl' be is
dead. That 'chug' of the bullets
striking flesh is nearly always plainly
audible. But the bullets which are
billeted, so far as | know, do not
sing on their way. They go silently,
grimly to their mark, and the man is
lacerated or torn or dead. | did not
hear the bullet sbriek that killed
Hamilton Fish; l dill not hear the
bullets shrek which struck the many
others who were wounded while l was
near them; ! did not hear the bullet
shrek which struck me.
"lhere is one incident of the day
which shines out in my memory
above all the others now as 1 lie in q
New York hospital writing. 1t oe-
CURED at the field hospital. About q
dozen of us were lying there. A con-
tinuous chorus Of moans rose through
the tree branches overhead. The sur
geons, with hands and barred arms
dripping, an clothes literally satur-
ated, with blood, were straining every
nerve 10 pref are the wounded for the
journey down to Siboney. Behind
me lay Captain McClintock with his
lower leg bones literally ground to
powder. He bore his pain as gallant
ly as he had led his men, and that is
saying much. think Ma or Brodie
was also there. 1t was doleful group.
Amputation and death stared its mem-
bers in their gloomy faces.
Suddenly voice started softly:
My country, 'tis of thee,
Sweet land Of liberty,
Of thee sing.
"Other voices took it up:
Land where my fathers died,
Land-of- the Pilgrims pride,
"The quivering, quavering chorus,
punetuated by groans, and made spas
modic by paiu, trembled up from the
little group of wounded Americans in
the midst Of the Cuban solitude-the
pluckiest, most heartfelt song that
human beings ever sang.
"There was one voice that did not
quite keep up with the others. 1t
was so weak that 1 did not hear it un-
til all the rest had finished the line:
Let Freedom ring.
'"Then halting, struggling, faint. il
repeated slowly:
Land-ot-the Pilgrims
Let Freedom
""The last word was a woeful cry.
One more son had died as died the
fathers. -