Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1898-09-23
PROTEST OF A. VOLUNTEER
he Denounces Attack on Secretary Alger
and the Department
Stories of Suffering and Neglect, He
Says, Are inefficient
Officers Blamed.
To the Editor of The Evening Star:

publicly, by statement of facts as they
| are, this unseemly abuse of the Secretary of
War and those Immediately under his su-
pervision.
Few, if any, of the writers who so brutal
ly attack Mr. Alger are acquainted with the
| daily routine of army life, even in time of
peace, and to one who thoroughly under
stands such details, the sensational at
! tempts to make political capital out of
| nothing are not only hideous for their eff
frontery and malice, but laughable for
their ignorance.
In the matter of the published complaints
of enlisted men alone, the sensational press
in New York and other cities has been do
ing itself more than proud, and the Inter
view" with poor half-starved, suffering"
Private Smith or Brown is becoming an
eyeSore in the columns of more than few
papers. Could the general public but know
the real facts of the case, such interviews
would be abandoned right speedily. From
a personal knowledge of the men and a
careful investigation [ am able to assert
with postiveness and no fear of contradic
ton that nine out of ten enlisted men who
| make SUCH brash accusations are the ones
who before the war were homeless nomadS !;
who were recruited in the missions and
municipal lodging houses of our eastern
cities.
What more natural than that one of these
men should seek to win sympathy and help
from a too SympathiZing people by relating
awful tales of woe, the greatest percentage
of which originated in the brain Of him
who tells it? Here let me state that l am
! an experienced soldier, having served in
the LIST United States Cavalry on the from
tier. 1 went through the campaign in
Cuba and suffered the hardships with the
rest of my company and regiment. l gave
up paying position; relinquished life
pension of S14 a month; left a wife in poor
health in order to enter the service and
get a taste of war l am not citing these
things for my own laudation, but to prove
that had any one real, just cause for COM
plant 1 certainly would be among the
number
I served in Alger, Thomas, Tampa and
Cuba, and l say this, that ninety-fiVe per
cent Of the suffering and illness IN the
volunteer service was due to inefficient
regimental officers. L challenge any man,
great or small, to refute this assertion by
facts. We who went to Cuba suffered
hardShipS, beside which those of the troops
in the big camps at home were as naught.
They had tents, clothing, blankets and the
full army ration. We slept, for several
weeks, under the heavens, rained on con-
tinually, and lived on what We might. And
yet no regular soldier has, to my knowl-
edge, made complaint of any discomfort
he suffered during the campaign. Most OF
Us, both regulars and volunteers, who be-
longed to the 5th Army Corps, were proud
and glad to go to Cuba, and gloried in the
fact that we were given a chance to en-
dure. Those of us who had any knowledge
of military matters before the war eX-
pected to suffer. We knew that war was
hell in all of it's phases, but we wanted
a little hell. We did not expect to attend
a picnic, nor did we expect to live in Eu-
ropean plan hotels in the campaign. In
fact, some of US, having seen active serv-
ice, half expected to starve outright.
We went to Cuba and there began our
troubles. In Tampa and Chickamauga we
had drawn the full army field ration and
grown fat upon it. If food was ill cooked,
whose fault was it? The War Depart
ment's?
lazy officers, who did not personally see
to it that cooks We're properly instructed
in their duties Every sane man knows
that the army ration is plentiful and
healthy, and every soldier who will admit
the truth must acknowledge that in Amer
lea, at least full rations were served. In
Cuba the absolutely impossible condition Of
the roads-no, trails, and poor ones at that
made it impossible for us to get full ra-
tons but after the surrender of Santiago
de Cuba every regiment, which had eff
Gent commissary and quartermaSter de-
partments had plenty of food.
Regarding the rain, 1t is we'll to state
that soldiers threw away their tents and
clothing of their own volition upon push
ing to the front, and this, too, against the
advice of all sensible officers During the
marches from Siboney to the trenches
thousands of cans of beef, beans, toma-
toes, etc, were cast aside.
True, the transports were not what we
might have hoped for, but could any gov
eminent, in so short a time, and for so
short a campaign, have done better? Did
England do better in sending Kitchener's
forces to Egypt. No. No. No.
The hospital service was excellent in Gu
ba after the surrender, and one does not
hear regulars complaining. And let me tell
you If there had been aught to complain
or, the regular army officers, who make
a business of soldering would have been
the very first to enter protests This talk
about being Shut up by the department
| Is, to use a vulgar term. all "tommy-rot."
rgraI L.
| health and comfort of their men, and they
do so. They are also required not sup
posed, To report any and all hardships the
men are suffering. And yet no complaint
comes from the regulars.
And the Is: Let look at Wikoff
much maligned and criticised. In all of
my experience 1 have never seen a finer or
more healthy camp. The water ice-cold
gushed from artesian wells from 200 to
1000 feet deep. The hospitals were excel
lent and the food good. Who complained?
why homesick, fever-prostTated men, who
were ignorant of army usages, customs and
necessities of a soldiers lfe-men who
fiOcked around reporters and told dire tales
of want and suffering. Talk of flooring for
tents was foolish We had no floors in
Cuba. Cen Wheeler himself. than whom
a more earnest, Woodworking and consci-
entious soldier never lived, would have been
the first to attack the department had there
been sufficient ground for it. Instead he
praises the camp arrangements to the sky.
The sensational press has so agitated the
mothers, wives and sisters of the country
that they are ready to believe anything
Of Secretary Alger. and yet, as he him
self says, and as every regular army off,
Ger will corroborate. much of the sickness
or the volunteers was caused uninten-
tonally tbs true by these same mothers
and sisters, who sent huge boxes of deli
cacies to their soldier relatives. Ninety
Fer cent Of the sickness In our own regi-
ment at Tampa was caused by this one
thing. Civilian physicians will also tell
you that the greater part of the sickness
endured by the volunteers since coming
from Cuba has been caused by too much
eating. With stomachs unaccustomed to
rich food the boys unthinkingly stuffed"
themselves with good things upon their ar
rival at their homes and suffer in conse-
Quence.
Let reason once mora sway the Ameri-
can people and cease all this foolish, mali
cious talk against Secretary Alger. 1t is
all fallacious and only holds US UP to the
ridicule of foreigners With nine-tenths
of the American volunteers, who are manly
truthful men, l stand ready to go through
the same experiences, If need be, tomor-
row, and you may be sure that as man of
education and intelligence 1 would not say
this If I thought we had been cruelty
treated. ROY L. QUACKENBUSH
Late first sergeant, Company B, LIST Regi-
ment Infantry, D. c. Volunteers.
Washington, D. c., Sept. 23 1898.