The age-herald., 1899-03-19

over them and here and there there were Impressions in which few inches of stag nant 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 were nearly famished from thirst. The Spanish officer gave up the search and sank on the rocks exhausted. The Gloucester officer and myself finally came upon the wounded man lying in @ pool of stagnant water, which had turned red from his own blood. He was a com mon sailor or fireman from the Fulton, and he had a hole in him large enough to have been made by six-inch shell.
 PiteousIy Plead for Water
 He was plainly dying, though he was con- scious, but he was too weak to speak plain ly and all that could get from him was cry for "agua,' "agua," (water), and had nono to give him. He kept moving his hands about in the pool and washing the bloody stagnant water over his wounds. The Gloucester officer remained with him and l returned to the beach to see if my boat had come back from the Wanda" l found 1t waiting for. me, and that Cap tain Martin had sent with it 0 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 present said that they could take care or Ine WOunQeu man, anQ WOulu ldhc to the Gloucester if they could, as soon as their launch should come for them. Ac- cordingly I turned the chair over to them, got into my boat and returned to the Wan da.
 I do not know what became of the wounded Spanish sailor. 1 never heard of him afterwards; but believe that he must have died in the pool where I left him be- fore the sailors on shore could get him in the chair and take him to the Gloucester. If he did die in the pool, which 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 1t was no time nor occasion to be overpar- ticular about dead man, as 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 upholstered 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 Incoming tide should throw them against the rock bound shore.
 Left the Wanda's Chair
 When the Gloucester sailors finally re- turned to their own vessel they undoubted- ly left the Wandas chair on the shore, and I believe there is not the slightest doubt that that chair afterwards 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 or the Americans found him, which was not remarkable, as there were very few Ameri- cans 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 cap tured knew the admirars hiding place they did not divulge it to the Americans. It 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 prefer- red to have the spirit leave him While ne was still O free soldier of Spain rather than die a prisoner in the hands of his coun' try'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 It seems hardly possible that General Wood and the other American of- ficers can be mistaken in their identifica- ton of the body, but if they are there can be but one theory in regard to 1t, and that is that the body was that of the sailor whom left lying in the pool and for whom the chair was sent ashore. He may nave been placed in the chair by the American sailors and died there before he could De taken to the Gloucester. But this theory | regard as extremely doubtful, and at any rate its truth or falsity can be demonstrat- ed by the Gloucester officer and the sailors who remained on shore after lett.
 Not the PIuton's Captain
 But when the report of the finding of the body was first received here from Santiago it was said to be that of the Pluton's cap tain I felt confident that that could not be correct, for had the strongest reasons Tor believing the contrary, reasons which were founded on the fact that less than an hour ralo tad ir, going I was introduced by Lieutenant-Com- mander Wainwright, the commander of the Gloucester, to a Spanish officer, entirely uninjured, who represented himsel1 as the captain of the Fulton. He was afterwards taken to the United States with the other Spanish prisoners, and, as far as know, was returned to Spain when the war was over.
 When I got back to the Wanda after hav- ing left the chair on shore with the Gloucester sailors, was very much sur prised to find that during my absence three officers and six sailors belonging to the Fulton had taken refuge aboard the Wanda They had easily escaped from the small guard of American sailors on shore, and had put out to the Wanda in one Of the Pluton's boats, which had noated ashore.
 Their reason for going to the Wanda was that the yacht had British registry and flew the British flag. but her flag was the only thing British about her, fact Wnlch the Spaniards did not know. She had a big-hearted Yankee skipper In Captain Mil Ter and when the boat load of half drown ed and half starved Spaniards came along side. he forgot all about the color or the Wanda's flag and the possibility or any annoying complications that these span iards might cause us.
 Ships Chasing the Col n
 He could have directed them to go to the Gloucester, which was then not more than a mile away, standing by the exploding yrecks of the Maria Teresa and Oquendo receiving more prisoners than she could take care of, while the Brooklyn, oregon Texas and New York,~were chasing the Cristobal Colon along the coast fifty miles to the westward.
 But Captain Miller did not repulse the annea,;ng Spaniards His instinct of hu- manity was too strong and he told them to come aboard. Not only that. but he gave them dry clothing and food and drink. So when I came over the side of the Wanda found our "Jackies'' pouring Jamaica rum down the throats of the six Spanish sailors tv,t hi In