Brookings weekly register. (Brookings, Brookings County, S.D.) 1898-1903, 1899-05-18

the same time and completed its cap
ture The commander of the regiment
said it took an hour and half for these
200 men to work over distance Of 700
yards, and during that time they lost Al
killed and wounded. None of the line
officers or men had ever heard a hostile
shot before.
Owing to the lay of the ground this
charge could be seen by the white Off
GERS and soldiers from the distance. A
member of the Fourth United States in
fantry wrote from Camp Wikoff as fol-
lows Of the crisis at the stone fort
cat this time the Twenty-fifth infantry
charged, and q grander thing never
saw in my life as a soldier. and have
been soldier since 1881. After that
charge the tale was soon told. the viii
lage and fort were ours.
The commander of the Twenty fifth
at Ell Caney was Colonel A. S. Daggett,
veteran of the civil war, who has been
in the regular army ever since and is as
enthusiastic over the black soldiers as
Colonel Burt. II was the only black
kCSlulCh ChSdSCd db NdLty.
Wheeler's cavalry division comprised
two regiments of colored troopers, the
Ninth and Tenth regulars These regi-
ments displayed gallantry at San Juan
hill fully equal to that of the white
troopers. Kent's division of infantry,
which took the San Juan blockhouse,
trenches and bridge, included the
Twenty-fourth colored regiment This
command was formed in 1869 by the
consolidation of the Thirty-eighth and
Forty-first colored troops. 1t was first
commanded by Abner Doubleday and
later by Ronald S. Mckenzie. both dis
tinguished major generals of the civil
war. General Kent himself was the
proper colonel of the regiment when he
went to Cuba, but he commanded the
division in that campaign.
The story of the charge at San Juan
hill is so well known that it is only
necessary to give any regiment its full
credit to cay that 1t was in the front
line. On the front line that day the
Twenty-fourth took its baptism of fire.
1t was brigaded with the Ninth and
Thirteenth infantry under the command
Of Colonel Wikoff, the only general Off
Ger killed at Santiago.
The Twenty-fourth had 4S0 men in ac-
tion and lost II killed and 70 wounded
There We're two officers killed and six
wounded, a total of eight casualties out
of % officers. Company d lost all of it's
officers. Captain A. c. Ducat led the
company to the blockhouse and while
fighting with q musket was shot through
beth thighs by the Mauser of a retreat
ing Spaniard. Lieutenant Gurney Of
that company was killed at the bank of
the river.
The crisis for the Twenty fourth at
San Juan was when it reached the bank
of the river. Colonel Wikoff had been
shot, and his successor, Colonel Worth,
lay in the bed Of the river wounded,
and the situation was one to try the
bravest troops. There was steady fire
Of Mausers from the blockhouse and
trenches on the hill The Spaniards saw
the black regiment advancing and did
their best to stampede 1t, thinking that
If men supposed to have so little moral
discipline could be thrown into panic
they would run back in frantic rout
and carry the whole line with them
They brought the full force of their fire
direct upon the regiment for a short
time. but the blacks didn't scare at all
Rather they stood up full length while
wading the creek, and only stopped
when they saw target for their Krag-