Battles of the Nineteenth Century,  Page 103.

The Blockade of Cuba

             Neither exciting nor romantic was the first act of war with which the struggle between the United States and Spain began.  At New Orleans the steamship Cataluna was taking on board a consignment of a thousand American mules, purchased for Marshal Blanco’s army in Cuba.  On the afternoon of April 21^st, news having arrived of the rupture of diplomatic relations, the port authorities laid an embargo on the steamer and seized the mules, despite the protests of the captain and the Spanish agents, who argued, without effect, the war had not yet begun.

            At Key West that same afternoon all was excitement.  Ship after ship of Sampson’s fleet hauled out of the inner anchorage, and by four o’clock the greater part of the squadron was moored in line well out to seaward, waiting for the ships from the Dry Tortugas to join.  The New York, the powerful armoured cruiser which was to act as flagship, had hoisted the flag of a rear admiral, indicating the promotion of Commodore Sampson.  He and his fleet had been waiting for weeks for the order to sail, and it was still withheld for a few hours.  Next day the blockade of Cuba would be proclaimed by the President, and the fleet would proceed to make it effective.

            Ward begins as a rule nowadays without the formal declaration that was once held to the necessary legal warrant for hostile action.  In this case the American ultimatum had fixed noon on Saturday, the 23^rd, as the limit of time allowed for the Spanish reply; but the summary dismissal of General Woodford from Madrid was held to justify immediate hostilities, and on Friday, the 22^nd, the President issued, not a declaration of war, but a proclamation of the blockade of Western Cuba.

             The blockaded coast was to extend from the port of Cardenas, by Havana and Behai Honda, to Cienfuegos on the south shore of Cuba.  Neutral vessels lying in any of those ports were to be given thirty days to clear.  Neutrals approaching them in ignorance of the existence of blockade were to warn off, and the warning was to be endorsed on the ship’s papers.  If, after that, they attempted to pass the blockade they were to be liable to capture.

             At dawn on the Friday morning the fleet was under way, bound for Havana.  The flagship New York led the line, followed by the battleships Indiana and Iowa.  The gunboats and torpedo boats formed two other lines to east and west of the heavier fighting ships, and gradually increased their distance as they gained the open sea, till by noon the fleet covered many miles from right to leave.  It was a fine spring morning, with a light breeze and a long swell upon the otherwise smooth sea. 

            The monitors Puritan and Terror, the cruiser Marblehead, and gunboat Helena, and the despatch boat Dolphin was for the present left behind at Key West. 

             The fleet moved at a very leisurely rate of speed about six knots for Sampson did not mean to close in upon Havana till evening.  Meanwhile a sharp look out was kept for several Spanish merchant ships known to be on their way from the Gulf ports to the Atlantic, which if intercepted would be valuable prizes.  At a quarter to seven, when the fleet was about nineteen miles from Key West, the smoke of a steamer was seen coming up on the western horizon.  Soon after the steamer came in sight, to the south west of the fleet, and on a course that would take her diagonally across the line upon which it was moving.  From every bridge in the leading ships telescopes were directed at the stranger.  She was a large “tramp” steamer, with a black hull, her deckhouses and upper works painted white, one funnel, two masts, and the Spanish flag flying at the peak.  The gunboat Nashville, which was the nearest warship, immediately slipped out of her station and headed for the Spaniard, the black smoke pouring from her tall funnels, and the white foam flying from her bows as she rushed at full speed through the bright water.

            The merchantman held her course, evidently knowing nothing of the approaching danger.  A group of blue jackets, under the command of a lieutenant, stood about one of the quick firers in the bows of the gunboat, and when the two ships were about half a mile apart the word was given and a jet of smoke spurted from the Nashville’s side, and the sharp report of the gun rang out across the sea.  It was the first shot of the war.

             A fountain of water well ahead of the Spaniard showed where the shot had struck; but without taking any notice of it, the merchant steamer held her coarse.  Bang! Went another gun from the cruiser, this time aimed so near the bows of the tramp that her forecastle was deluge with the water thrown up by the shot as it bounded along the sea.  Such a warning could not be mistaken.  The Spanish captain stopped his engines, and within three minutes the Nashville was close alongside, her crew at quarters and a bristling row of guns threatening to sink the merchantman if he tried to escape.  A boat with an armed crew was lowered away, and in another minute ensign Magruder stood on the deck of the Spaniard.  The crew, crowded along the steamer’s rail, had watched all these proceedings with blank astonishment.  The ship was the Buenaventura, owned by Messrs. Larriago and Co., of Liverpool and Bilbao, and commanded by Captain Lucarranga, laden with timber and bound from Pascagoula, in the Gulf of Mexico, to Rotterdam.

            Lucarraga told Magruder that he could do what he liked with the ship; at the same time he declared that he had not the remotest idea that his country was already at war with the United States.  When he saw the fleet he thought it was engaged in peaceful manoeuvres.  War had been only talked of as a possibility when he left Pascagoula.  The ship was now headed for Key West, with a prize crew on board, and the Nashville in company to act as an escort.  The gunboat and her prize entered the anchorage at eleven o’clock, and the sight of the Stars and Stripes flying above the Spanish flag on the first prize of the war was hailed with loud cheers from the ships and the shore.  All day long the wharves were black with crowds of people, who came down to see the captured Spaniard.  In the afternoon the Nashville sailed to rejoin the fleet.

             Meanwhile Admiral Sampson held his course towards the northern shores of Cuba.  In the afternoon the lighter ships extended in a long line east and west, the flagship and the two big ironclads in the centre heading direct for Havana, and the torpedo boats keeping up connection between them and the rest of the squadron.  Before nightfall the United States warships were thus in position to watch the whole of the coast from Bahia Honda on the west to Cardenas on the east.  It was after dark when the ships under Sampson’s immediate command came in sight of the entrance to Havana Harbour.

            The shore on that part of the coast is high and rocky, and fringed in places with outlying reefs of coral, and rugged ledges indicated only by the surf that breaks over them.  But the fathoms deep, so that a blockading fleet has neither anchoring neither ground nor shelter.  The land locked harbour of Havana is approached by a narrow cleft in the rocky coast not more than a quarter of a mile wide.  On the eastern point of the entrance stands the old weather beaten fortress known as the Moro Castle, with a tall lighthouse tower behind its seaward bastion, and below a casemated battery of heavy modern guns.  A smaller work, the Punta Fort, stands on the opposite point, with the town behind it running along the coast and the shore of the harbour.  Right and left of the entrance other batteries look out to the sea.  Powerful electric searchlights had been mounted on Morro and on some of the other forts, and soon after nightfall these revealed the New York and her two consorts, the battleships, standing in towards the shore under easy steam.

             At once the lights in the lantern of the lighthouse were extinguished, and six guns roared out from Morro, so more from the Santa Clara battery away to the westward.  On board the American ships the flashes from the batteries and the report of gun after gun booming over the sea suggested the idea that the Spaniards had opened fire on the fleet; but the ships were nearly five miles off the shore, and as no shells were heard whistling through the air, it was supposed that the enemy had misjudged the distance, and that his shot were falling short.  Some of the eager young officers were anxious to open fire in reply, but Sampson forbade it, and the Spanish guns were soon silent.  Only their powerful searchlights still played upon the fleet at intervals.

            As a matter of fact, no shotted gun had been fired from the shore that night.  The shots from Morro and Santa Clara were only signal guns loaded with blank cartridge, conveying to the garrison of Havana the tidings that “the Yankees” were at last in sight.  All day from the seaward forts anxious eyes had watched for the arrival of Sampson’s ships.  It was even anticipated that they might open fire upon the harbour and city in the coarse of the afternoon.  The sun went down, and still there was no sign of their approach.  At last the searchlight of Morro, sweeping the sea, revealed their presence.  The alarm rang out, and the guns were manned in the forts and batteries, the troops were under arms on their parades, strong patrols appeared in the streets.  It might be that the approach of the enemy would be the signal for an attack by the rebels from the landside, or for an outbreak in the city.  But there was no attempt at a hostile movement on shore.  And the enemy’s ships kept well off from the harbour mouth, drifting with silent guns, and looking, to the crowds that lined the shore, like a white ghostly fleet on the dark sea, as the glare of the searchlights revealed tail funnels, tapering masts with their fighting tops and signal yards, and below, the long rifled guns that projected from turrets and barbettes.  It was a night of wild excitement on shore; but after midnight the American ships were seen to be moving out seaward, perhaps anxious about a possible torpedo attack.  The first alarm was over, and soon Havana became used to the novel sensation of seeing from time to time the enemy’s cruisers far out upon the sea, watching the harbour mouth.

            In the first days of the blockade, Admiral Sampson’s fleet made several captures.  Some of them were small coasting craft picked up off the north coast of Cuba; others, steamers bound for Havana.  On board of one of these were a number of Spanish officers on there to join Marshal Blanco’s army.  The blockade of the southern coast as far as Cienfuegos was not attempted till the second week of the war, and thanks to this delay a very valuable prize escaped the United States squadron.  The Spanish liner Monserrat, Captain Deschamps, had left Cadiz in the middle of April, and was more than half way across the Atlantic when her Commander heard from a passing steamer that war had begun and the Americans were blockading Cuba.  He was bound for Havana, and had on board a thousand soldiers, treasure for the army to the amount of over half a million sterling, and a cargo of quick firing guns, rifles, and ammunition.  He decided that to try to enter Havana Harbour would be too dangerous a venture, and he ran for Cienfuegos, got in safely, reached Havana by land with the treasure, and put the troops, arms, and stores ashore at Cienfuegos.  By this time United States gunboats watched the port, but Derchamps ran the blockade outwards, and got away safely to Spain, where he received a public ovation on landing.  He was summoned to Madrid, decorated by the Queen Regent herself, and then was told to take his ship to sea again after she had been converted into an armed cruiser.

            The blockade of Havana itself not as successful as might have been expected.  Even in the first week two coasting steamers ran in by creeping along in the darkness under the shadow of the cliffs at an imminent risk of shipwreck.  The American squadron also allowed the strict rule of blockade to be broken on at least one occasion in broad daylight.  One morning a large cruiser was seen steaming towards Havana.  Promptly the flagship and one of her consorts gave chase.  On board the New York some of the officers confidently identified the stranger as the Spanish armoured cruiser Vizcaya.  Others held it was the Almirante Oquendo.  The American ships were cleared for action.  At last it looked as if there was going to be a fight.  A gun from the flagship was fired as a warning to the stranger to show her colours, and up went the tricolour of Italy on one of the cruisers masts, while the Stars and Stripes were hoisted at her signal yard, and her quick firers roared out a salute.  So impressed were many of the United States officers with the idea that they were closing with an enemy’s ship, that the flags were hardly noticed, and the first gun of the salute was taken to be hostile reply.  The cruiser was the Giovanni Bausan of the Italian navy.  Strictly speaking, Admiral Sampson might have insisted on her turning back without entering Havana.  But apparently he had orders not to interfere unduly with neutral warships, and the cruiser soon disappeared in the narrow entrance below Morro Castle.

            It was curious that she approached the American fleet without showing her colours, and wilfully misled the United States admiral into chasing her.  Italian sympathy was on the whole on the side of Spain, and the cruiser steamed into the harbour with the red and golden ensign of Spain on her foremast, saluting the batteries of Cabanas as she passed in, while her band played the Spanish national anthem.  Her commander paid a visit to Marshal Blanco, and was cheered through the streets of Havana.  The Giovanni Bausan remained some days in the harbour.  Rumour said that she landed ammunition for the Spaniards, but the Italian Government officially denied this.

            The Madrid Government had protested against the capture of the Buenaventura and other ships that had gone to sea in ignorance of the blockade.  On the 24^th they proclaimed that a state of war existed, and they gave American ships in Spanish waters a month in which to get away safely.  At Matanzas the Spanish gunboats towed some American sailing ships out to sea in order to facilitate their departure.  In reply, the united States Government decided to release the earlier prizes, and in order to put matters on a more regular basis, a proclamation was issued at Washington on April 25^th declaring that a state of war with Spain had existed since the 21^st.  Spanish ships actually in American ports were given till May 21^st to complete cargoes and repairs and depart.

           On the same day the British proclamation of neutrality was issued in London.  It gave notice that warships of both belligerents would be required to leave British ports within forty-eight hours.  During the war belligerent war vessels in distress might be allowed to make temporary repairs n British ports, and might take on board enough coal to carry them to their nearest port; but they were only to be permitted to do this once in three months, so that they could not make a British port their base of operations.  A United States torpedo boat, the Bailey, recently purchased in England, was lying at Falmouth.  She had not been able to obtain a crew before the proclamation was issued: and on an attempt being made to ship some English seamen to carry her to America, the port authorities seized her, and she was laid up in the harbour rill the end of the war.  It is curious that the rules adopted at the settlement of the Alabama dispute were thus put in force for the first time to stop the fitting out of a united States was vessel.

            On the day when the war began the American liner Paris, one of the auxiliary cruisers, was at Southampton, getting ready for her return voyage to New York, and as yet unarmed.  She started next day with a number of passengers on board.  Rumour said that there were Spanish torpedo boats waiting for her in the Channel, and for some days there were the wildest reports as to her fate.  But she crept along the south coast of Ireland, ready, if challenged, to slip into neutral waters, and then took a northerly course across the Atlantic, and reached New York in safety, without having once seen an enemy.

             In order to keep the sequence of events clear, it may be noted here that on Saturday April 23^rd, the President called out, by proclamation, 100,000 volunteers; and the concentration of a large volunteer army at Chickamauga in Tennessee at once began.  These movements, and the preparations for the invasion of Cuba, will be related in detail when the military operations are dealt with.  At this stage of our story it makes the narrative clearer if we confine out attention to the naval aspect of the war.  For the first week the Spanish Atlantic squadron remained at St. Vincent in the De Verde Islands, and the United states Pacific squadron stayed in Mirs Bay on the Chinese coast, opposite to Hong Kong.  From Cuba there came only news of insignificant captures of merchant ships by the blockading squadron.  The newspapers had led the public in the United States to believe that the rupture of negotiations would be immediately followed by an attack on Havanna.  But Admiral Sampson knew better than to encourage his fleet prematurely with the formidable batteries that guarded the narrow entrance, which was known to be further protected by a system of mines.  Even if he had forced the pass, he could not take possession of a city held by 50,000 regulars without the co-operation of a large land force; and though the newspapers talked gaily of an army being ready in a week or ten days, the men at the head of affairs knew that it would require a much longer time.  It is true that the Admiral might have bombarded Havana; but to inflict any real injury on the place would have meant the expenditure of an enormous amount of valuable ammunition, which would take some time to replace, and after all, would give no result that could seriously affect the coarse of the war.  To burn a number of houses, shops, and warehouses would not make Marshal Blanco relinquish his hold upon Havana.  In familiar phrase, Havana was not bombarded because “the game was not worth the candle.”

             The first American ship took place on Tuesday, April 26^th, outside Cardenas.  Why exactly happened is not easy to say with certainty in the face of contradictory accounts.  In any case it was a very insignificant affair, only worth noting because in all wars a certain importance attaches to the first exchange of shots, just as in the story of the Franco-German war one turns with some interest to the little skirmish between cavalry patrols outside the village inn at Nierderbronn.

            Amongst the Spanish ships in the Cuban ports were half a dozen little steel gunboats, each seventy-five feet long, and carrying a small Nordenfeldt quick firer and a Maxim gun.  They had been built in 1895 at Wivenhoe, in Essex, for patrol duty on the Cuban coasts.  One of these, the Ligera was at Cardenas.  Outside the bay there is a perfect network of coral reefs, islands, and rocks, forming a natural breakwater extending for miles.  Slipping in and out among the islands the Ligera came upon an American torpedo boat, which was watching the port. The two ships exchanged six or seven shots.  One of them went through the funnel of the Ligera, which received no other damage.  The United States ship then went off under full steam, and the Spaniards claimed a first success.  Which was the American torpedo boat has never been officially stated.  It is only certain that the Cushing, one of the few torpedo craft attached to Sampson’s fleet, ran into Key West with her engines so badly damaged that she had to go to Norfolk for repairs.  The official account of her injuries was that the young officer in charge had overstrained her engines by putting her to too high a speed.  The Spaniards claimed that the fire of the Ligera had disabled her.  The American account is the more likely of the two to have been correct.  The Ligera and her consorts at Caraenas showed later on that they could shoot with deadly accuracy at even so small a target as a torpedo boat; but, on the other hand, if the Cushing had shown any shot marks when she came into Key West, all the censorship in the world would not have prevented the enterprising local reporters from giving a full description of her injuries.  The presumption is that she showed no such traces of Spanish shellfire, and the experience of even the best trained natives goes to show that nothing is easier than to disable by overwork the delicate machinery of a torpedo boat’s engine room.