The San Francisco call., 1898-10-07
VERY BAD MANAGEMENT.

l MINNEAPOLIS, Oct. 6.-Arthur l. 1 Pehler, the staff correspondent of the | Journal wires at 8:30 this morning 1 from Walker, Minn.: l got in very
 late from the expedition on the Flora. | We started out to carry supplies and | rations to the troops. It was very dark 1 off shore. We signaled for an hour, Corporal Nettlekoven using the code in
 use at Santiago, but either the troops have been driven inland or there is not a man of them left. No answering
 signal of any sort was received, all | though we lay off and on the whole 1 length of the headlands.
 To land was an impossibility in the | dark, as the endorsements from 1 Brainerd had not arrived and there was only one old Winchester rifle on the boat 'Reddy Lazard, captain of the Flora, is a dead game" man, and he would have landed. but there is no possible doubt that the small force on the boat would have been annihilated if this had been done. There were men on board who preferred to die in an eff fort at rescue, however futile it might have been. We had our blankets and rations for the bluecoats. If any of
 
 the open. A heavy frost prevailed there. There is not so much as cof- fee bean to divide between the whole command this morning.
 At a later date 1 am going to tell the whole truth about this expedition. l never knew of such gross mismanage- ment or witnessed such criminal obsti
 macy as has been exhibited here. The men of Bacon's command were taken
 out under conditions that would dis
 grace a militia sergeant, were he re- sponsible for them. Every life that has been lost here is a useless sacri- flee It broke my heart to see the poor fellows dropping. Had a proper force been sent here in the first place not a
 shot would have been fired. I have hopes that Bacon may have intrenched himself, and that the failure to answer signals last night was due to hls de- termination not to betray his location
 The men had 120 rounds of ammuni-
 tion each. I hardly think they have exhausted their supply.
 The newspaper correspondents, Brill, Beaton and Knappen, are still with the troops. I went with our force deter mined to save them if possible, but it was impossible to locate them. Inn mediately on my return from Bear Is- land l sent my chartered steamer with
 Gus Botulcu, friend of the Chippe-
 was, who has Chippewa blood in his
 veins, to pick the newspaper men up if there is any such thing. He is now on
 that mission, and as he is absolutely fearless l have strong hopes. Unarmed, i'll clad. out of condition, without food
 or drink, the press representatives with Bacon are in desperate straits.
 Corporal Nettlekoven, the sharp
 shooter, is worth his weight in gold He dropped couple of bucks over on the point yesterday evening with his Krag- Jorgensen at 2000 yards. Both the Indians were distinctly seen to stagger and collapse after he had shot at them. Our fighting preacher is worthy of distinguished mention. After the pilot
 was shot and had gone aboard the Flora, according to the marshals in- structions, Rev. MT. Chandler took the tiller and with storm of Winchester balls whistling around hls head,
 brought the boat into port.
 Tinker. the inspector took refuge in the pilot house. A ball drove through the woodwork, perforated the inspec>
 tors coatsleeve in two places and also struck him in the leg. My own pilot,
 Oscar, who was shot yesterday while we were off Bear Island, is doing well. He will recover, as will Harris, the