The record-union., 1899-03-20

my mongre1 Spanish We could under
stand each other very well. In the next
few minutes I did some very rapid
fire. interviewing with both the Amerl-s
can and Spanish officer. Then asked
the Gloucester officer about the wound
ed man, but he had lost him for the
time being and the three OF US com
menced a search for him. There was
no shade nor vegetation OF any kind
where we were 1t was bluff COW
cred with rocks, SO hot from the scorcn-
ing sun that they blistered the feet In
walking over them and here and there
there were depressions in which Jew
inches of stagnant water remained from
the last rainfall. We wandered over
these rocks for fully fifteen minutes
searching for the wounded man. The
heat was almost intolerable and all OF
US We're nearly famished from thirst
The Sapnish officer gave up the search
and sank on the rocks exhausted. The
Gloucester officer and myself came up
on the wounded man lying in pool
of stagnant water, which had turned
red from his own blood. He was a
common sailor or fireman from the
Pluton and he had hole in him large
euOuSn 10 nave p0eH liidQC Wy q 9i<>
inch she'll. He was plainly dying,
though he was conscious, but he was too
weak to speak plainly and all that
could get from him was cry Tor
aqua aqua Cwater), and I had none
to give him. He kept moving MS
hands about in the pool and WashlnS
the bloody stagnant water over his
wounds The Gloucester officer re-
manned with him and | returned to the
beach to see if my boat had come BACK
from the Wanda. 1 found it waiting
for me and that Captain Miller had sent
with it a wicker steamer chair which
had been used on our after deck. This
was the nearest approach to a litter
that could be found on the Wanda. The
few Gloucester sailors who Were pres
ent said that they could take care OF
the wounded man and would take him
to the Gloucester if they could as soon
as their launch should come for them
Accordingly I turned the chair over to
them, got into my boat and returned to
the Wanda.
II do not know what became Of the
wounded Spanish sailor. / never heard
of him afterwards; but I believe that
he must have died in the pool where l
left him before the sailors on shore
could get him in the chair and take
him to the Gloucester. If he did die in
the pool, which 1 cannot doubt, owing
to his frightful wounds and the fact
that he lay in the burning sun so long
without surgical attention, it is not
likely that he found any other tomb,
for it was no time nor occasion to be
dead men were rather numerous in that
locality then, and the unfortunate
sailor whose mangled body was left
lying in his own blood on the sun
bhstered rocks of Cuba shared no
worse fate than scores Of others whose
bodies I saw that day floating in the
sea, either to become food for sharks
or to be ground to pieces when the in
coming tide should throw them against
the rock bound shore
when the Gloucester sailors finally
returned to their own vessel they un-
doubtedly left the Wanda's chair on
the shore, and I believe there is not
the slightest doubt that that chair af-
terward became the death couch and
then the tomb of Admiral Villamil. He
was doubtless lying near us at the time
l was on shore, but none Of the Ameri-
cans found him, which was not re-
markable as there were very few
Americans on shore, and he could
easily have been concealed behind the
rocks along the beach or in the thick
brush back of them If the Spanish
sailors who had been captured knew
the Admirals hiding place they did not
divulge it to the Americans 1t may
be that it was by the officers own or
ders that his men had carried him to
some lonely spot in the thicket where
he preferred to have the spirit leave
him While he was still a free soldier
of Spain, rather than die a prisoner in
the hands of his country's enemies
Whether he was placed in the chair
before or after he was dead can be told
only by the Spanish sailors who placed
him there and they only also can tell
whether they left him alone to die or
waited beside him until after the
breath left his body. 1t seems hardly
possible that General Wood and the
other American officers can be mis-
taken in their Identification of the
body, but if they are there can be but
one theory in regard to it, and that is
that the body was that of the sailor
whom l left lying in the pool and for
whom the chair was sent ashore He
may have been placed in the chair by
the American sailors and died there be-
fore he could be taken to the Glouces-
ter. But this theory I regard as ex-
tremely doubtful, and at any rate its
truth or falsity can be demonstrated
by the Gloucester officer and the sail
ors who remained on shore after leest.
But when the report of the find
ing of the body was first received here
from Santiago, and it was said to be
that of the Pluton's Captain, 1 felt
confident that that could not be cor
rect. For I had the strongest reasons
for believing the contrary, reasons
which We're founded on the fact that
less than an hour after the occurrences
related in the foregoing I was intro
duced by Lieutenant Commander
Wainwright, the commander of the
Gloucester, to a Spanish officer, entire
ly uninjured. who represented himself
as the Captain of the Pluton He was
afterward taken to the United States
with the other Spanish prisoners, and,
as far as I know, was returned to
Spain when the war was over.
when 1 got back to the Wanda af-
ter having left the chair ON shore with
the Gloucester sailors, I was very much
surprised to find that during my alb
sence three officers and six sailors be-
longing to the Pluton had taken ref
uge aboard the Wanda. They had
easily escaped from the small guard of