The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-01-16
IN SUPPORT OF MILES.
A witness Who knows that Much Beef
Was Bad.
Kansas Gin journal.

Battery b, of the Fourth United States
Artillery, returned yesterday to Fort Riley,
Kan, from a six months campaign IN Por-
to Rico. The battery Is well known TO
many people in Kansas for its exhibition
drills given at Topeka and Leavenworth
during the fall carnivals of 1891
Lieutenant Cronkhite who was in cCm-
mand said yesterday that there was cOnSid-
cradle sickness in the company after the
first month at Tampa, owing to the unsanl-
tary condition of that camp, and to the
length of time the men We're confined on
board transports, twenty-three days in ALL
where they could not get fresh meat. the
climate of Porto Rico was healthful ana the
camps generally good.
Il don't think the meat we had was en-
banned" said Lieutenant Cronkhite, who IS
very friendly to General Miles. If any
chemicals were used to preserve the meat
they were failure. There was great
deal OF complaint about the meat spoiling
and it evidently had nothing in it with
which to combat the effects of the tropical
climate 1t is certainly not the fault of the
packers if the government did not furnish
refrigerated beef
Some of the meat issued to us was very
bad. 1t would not stand the tropical eli
mate and it got so bad the men wouidn t
touch it, We were put on transports July 3
to reinforce Santiago. When we arrived we
were unloaded and almost Immediately re-
turned to the transports to join General
Miles's expedition to Porto Rico. During
the days we were EN- route to Cuba and
Porto Rico the men We're obliged to eat
the canned beef or go without.
This spoiled meat was very sickening.
was nauseated by it, and refused to touch
it, 1t was watery and stringy and had a
peculiar color. The gelatine in the cans
melted TO thin fluid in which the meat had
stood for weeks. The only way to make the
meat palatable was TO stew it, and we had
only coffee boilers, which were scarce, and
had to be used for the coffee.
This beef was not tit to eat for the rea-
son it was spoiled. On the way back from
Porto Rico some of the men ate it, but it
was too much for the most of them. In ad-
Iiton to. the repulsive appearance the odor
was scarcely to be endured, and plainly
showed ii to be spoiled.
ION the way to Porto Rico some of the
other transports had refrigerated beef. The
other batteries which were supplied with it
said some of il good and some of it was
bad. Refrigerated beef secured in Porto
Rico from native cattle which we killed
ourselves was used on our transport and on
others on the return voyage IT was good.
heard no complaints made against it.
Il don't know whether any chemicals
We're used in the canned beef supplied by
the commissary department or not. If So
they were a failure, for the beef did not
keep.
'''rhe first time I ever heard of chemically
prepared meats was at Fort Riley in 1896.
An agent for a Kansas City packing house
told me certain things were used to pre-
serve meat. Since then | was told by an
official who showed me through a packing
house in Baltimore that no chemicals were
ever used by packers for that purpose The
laws are very strict about the use Of sail
cylic acid in beer on account of the in
furious effect on the stomach and I should
think il would be injurious in beef although
/ in another form. But of course, that
proves nothing regarding the canned beaf
that spoiled on the Porto Rico expedition
We Jared well in Porto Rico when we
were allowed 70 kill and dress our own beef
We had better success with it than the
spaniards who live there They are not very