The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-08-10
AMERICAS GENEROUS OFFER
WILLING To RELEASE ALL
SPANISH PRISONERS.
Spain Can Have Cervera's Sailors By
Taking Them Home-Ofer Has
Not Been Accepted.

New York, Aug. "a special to the
| Tribune from Washington says: The
/ United States has magnanimously of
| fered to parole the 1900 Spanish naval
prisoners taken at the destruction of
Spain is ready to repatriate them.
With the exception of the officers, who
are, enjoying American hospitality
within the limits of Annapolis, the
bulk of these prisoners are confined to
the naval station at Portsmouth,
where they have the liberty of large,
picturesque island and are comfortably
quartered and fed in temporary build
, ingS erected especially for their use
The offer of this government was
made regardless of the approaching
elimination of peace negotiations, and
simply with a view of sending home
a large number of national guests
who had considerably over-stayed their
welcome and become burdensOme upon
the host. These Spaniards have suf-
fered scarcely any of the restraints
usually imposed upon prisoners of
war, but have been cared for as ten
derby as if they had been Americans.
The most of them were terribly de-
bilitated from privationS they had
suffered, and a large percentage have
had to be nursed and cared for in hos
Spain in the pitiful condition they pre-
Sented when they sought refuge from
their burning ships and from the Gu
bans, aboard the American naval yes
sells, they have been fully restored to
health and vigOr. and the offer of the
United States contemplates giving
them back TO Spain more able bodied
than they were when they left the pc
ninsula six months ago.
Although this striking instance Of
American generosity to a helpless enc
my was officially laid before the Ma
drid authorities, through the repre-
sentative of a neutral nation, some
days ago, no response whatever has
been received beyond the simple ac-
acknowledgements, with the statement
that it would receive consideration
There was every reason to believe that
Spain would eagerly embrace the op-
portunity to secure these prisoners,
constituting as they do the flower of
the naval force, as an important source
of strength to the government at this
time, in case domestic dissatisfaction
assumed dimensions which could be
controlled only with much difficulty.
The offer, however, did not contem-
plate the gratuitious transportation of
the men to Spanish territory, as in the
case of Torafs garrison at Santiago,
but provided only for their delivery
on neutral vessels, under guarantees
OF security in the ports of the United
States, and perhaps the Spanish delay
is caused by the difficulty of securing
single transport at the present time
During the next two or three months
the prisoners will be a source of little
or no concern to the United States,
the trouble and cost of maintaining
them being confined to the furnishing
of food and clothing, but as winter ap-
proaches it will be necessary as early
as Nov. to erect more substantial
buildings for keeping them warm. or
1t may be necessary to transfer them
10 the south. 1t is a remarkable fact
that Spain does not possess a single
American prisoner to offer in exchange
for the number of Spaniards who have
been captured in the Philippines. as
we'll as in the West Indies, and this
inequality makes the present offer of
parole all the more charitable on the
part of this government