Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-03-29
BY MARK SULLIVAN.
ETWEEN the day when President


20 take the island is a little less than
b years. miles capture Of Porto Rico,
as an incident OF the Spanish War, took
place In August 1899
The span in time is not great. Thou
sands who fought in the war with Spain
are still alive, including some who
played grandiose parts in 1t, among
them, for example, Richmond Pearson
Hobson OF Alabama, hero Of a spec
tacular feat. But how many of todayS
readers know who HobSon is or why he
was famous? To more than half of
living America any question about Hob
son, about any Of the heroes or battles
Of the Spanish War, is like the query
little Peterkin, in Southeys poem, asked
OF his grandfather, who had plowed up
q skull upon a battlefield where Eng
lish troops had fought
Tell me all about the war
And what they killed each other for"
"Oh. that do not know" said he,
But twas famous victory"
And even of those living Americans
40 years old or more who remember
vaguely that there was hero and that
his name vas HobSon, how many are
sure whether he was famous by an act
OF individual daring Che sunk a collier
in the mouth of Santiago harbor in an
attempt to bottle up the Spanish feet
pulsive young woman, one of crowd
on railroad station platform, who in
an ecstasy Of hero admiration kissed
him, and thereby sent the phrase Hob
sons kiss" blazing through newspaper
headlines and comic quipS, to the per-
tnAnent diminution of Hobson's real dis
ttnction?
Now Fighting Narcotics.
HobSon was one of the four or five,
20 to speak, second-line heroes Of the
Spanish War. Still alive, he devotes
himself to q crusade against narcotics.
ana only during the last month, on
FEBRUARY 81, there passed away in
Washington the widow of the one most
outstanding figure Of the Spanish War,
Admiral Dewey. But how many can
recall when we all felt thrills run up
our spines as we sang (and we all did
the ditty that Eugene Ware, the Kansas
poet laureate, wrote:
oh. dewy was the morning
Upon the first of May,
And Dewey was the admiral
Down in Manila Bay.
And dewey were the Regents eyes,
Them orbs of royal blue.
And dew we feel discouraged?
I dew not think We dew!
How many Americans under 40 know
and how many Of even those more than
40. can recall either that or any Of the
other featS or episodes that made the
Spanish War so Rlamoruus2 Surely it
really was glamorous. The spirit of
high adventure and derring-do that sur
rounds it can hardly rest merely on the
fact that those were then young who
now remember it. The gallery Of fig-
ures. gallant, heroic, picturesque, comic
or otherwise alluring who emerged from
the Spanish War was rich In color and
personality.
Gen. Shafter. who weighed some 800
pounds and directed the battle Of
Santiago from the back, not Of a
charger, but an old-fashioned buck
beard. The two admirals, Schley
and Sampson, and where they fought
n the Spanish War-ard what, SUISSE
quently, they fought each other about.
through a series Of court-martials and
oral barTicades in Congress and politics
that kept up for years. And
Admiral Cervera, the captured Spanish
admiral who won the respect and
affection of all Americans, both those
who were close to him and those who
read in the newspapers about him. by
the dignity and fine feeling with which
he and his officers comported them
selves during the months when they
were prisoners at Annapolis. Odd fig-
ures they must have seemed to that
little Maryland town. An American
navs4 officer who was in charge Of them
remembers most today their gentle
manners, their devotion TO their church,
the charm of their Castilian tongue as
they talked with each other on Summer
evenings.
And the battleship Oregon. Located
at San Francisco when war was de-
clared, its departure for the scene Of
action on the Atlantic Coast was a dis
appearance into II days of silence and
n1ystery-there was no radio then and
no Panama Canal. When, after the
Journey around Cape Horn. the oregon
emerged in newspaper headlines about
its arrival in Cuban waters, Arthur
Guiterman wrote The Rush Of the
Oregon:
''They held her South TO Magellan's
mouth,
Then East they steered her forth
Through the farther gate Of the crafty
strait,
And then they held her North
Six thousand miles to the Indian
And the oregon rushed home.
Her wake a swirl Of Jade and pearl,
Her bow a bend OF foam"
And John James Meehan, The Race
Of the Oregon"
Lights OUT And prov turned toward
the South.
And a canvas hiding each cannon s
mouth,
And a ship like a silent ghost released,
Is seeking her sister ships in the East.
when your boys shall ask what the guns
are for,
Then tell them the tale Of the Spanish
War,
And the breathless millions that looked
upon
The matches race of the Oregon"
Those were the days.
CParentheticslly, who can explain
why the more recent Great War in
spired no such poetry as that, produced
no galaxy Of romantic figures like those
OF the Spanish War? Why is IT that
the literature and plays Of the Great
War have been grim, a peSsimistlc
douche Of disillusion?)
And Col. 0ater general) Fred Funston,
who captured Aguinaldo and
THE Message TO Garcia" The phrase
was universally known. Ebert Hubbard
based upon II a preachment 70 the
Young about endurance and finishing
the Job, which TO this day holds the
worlds record for circulation and trans
1ation into foreign, tongues. But the
man who carried the message through
the Cuban Jungle, Capt. Andrew Rowan
of the Army, was never so we'll known
as Funston or HobSon. His fame SUI
fered from the inconspicuousness that
necessarily had TO attend the secrecy Of
his work. AS solitary figure landing
from all open boat of the coast, he was
the first American Army oficer to enter
Cuba after the declaration Of war, car
rying plans for cooperation with the
insurrecto general Garcia. Inciden-
tally, Gen. Garcia survived both the
bullets OF the Standards and rnisnnder-