The History of Cuba Volume III Part 4

"For having dared to give utterances to principles and opinions, which, to other nations, const.i.tute the foundation of their moral progress and glory, the Cubans most distinguished for their virtues and talents have found themselves wanderers and exiles. For the offence of having exhibited their opposition to the unlawful and perilous slave trade, from which the avarice of General O'Donnell promised itself so rich a harvest of lucre, the latter satiated his resentment with the monstrous vengeance of involving them in a charge of conspiracy with the free colored people and the slaves of the estates; endeavoring, as the last outrage that an immoral government could offer to law, to reason, or to nature, to prove the object of that conspiracy, in which they implicated whites of the most eminent virtue, knowledge, and patriotism, to have been no other than the destruction of their own race.

"All the laws of society and nature trampled under foot--all races and conditions confounded together--the island of Cuba then presented to the civilized world a spectacle worthy of the rejoicings of h.e.l.l. The wretched slaves saw their flesh torn from them under the lash, and bespattered with blood the faces of their executioners, who did not cease exacting from their tortures denunciation against accomplices.

Others were shot in platoons without form of trial, and without even coming to understand the pretext under which they were ma.s.sacred. The free colored people, after having been first lacerated by the lash, were then hurried to the scaffold and those only escaped with life who had gold enough to appease the fury of their executioners. And nevertheless, when the government or its followers has come to fear some rising of the Cubans their first threat has been that of arming the colored people against them for their extermination. We abstain for very shame from repeating the senseless pretences to which they have had recourse to terrify the timid wretches! How have they been able to image that the victims of their fury, with whom the whites of Cuba had shared in common the horrors of misery and persecution, will turn against their own friends at the call of the very tyrant who has torn them in pieces? If the free colored people, who know their interests as well as the whites, take any part in the movement of Cuba, it certainly will not be to the injury of the mother who shelters them in her bosom, nor of those other sons of hers who have never made them feel the difference of their race and condition, and who, far from plundering them, have taken pride in being their defenders and in meriting the t.i.tle of their benefactors.

"The world would refuse to believe the history of the horrid crimes which have been perpetrated in Cuba, and would reasonably consider that if there have been monsters to commit, it is inconceivable that there could so long have been men to endure them. But if there are few able to penetrate to the truth of particular facts, through all the means employed by the government to obscure and distort them, no one will resist the evidence of public and official facts.

"Publicly and with arms in his hands, did General Tacon despoil Cuba of the const.i.tution of Spain, proclaimed by all the powers of the monarchy, and sent to be sworn to in Cuba, as the fundamental law of the whole kingdom.

"Publicly and by legislative act, was Cuba declared to be deprived of all the rights enjoyed by all Spaniards, and conceded by nature and the laws of nations the least advanced in civilization.

"Publicly have the sons of Cuba been cut off from all admission to the commands and lucrative employments of the State.

"Publicly are unlimited powers of every description granted to the Captains-General of Cuba who can refuse to those whom they condemn even the right of a trial and the privilege of being sentenced by a tribunal.

"Public and permanent in the island of Cuba, are those courts martial which the laws permit only in extraordinary cases of war, for offences against the State.

"Publicly has the Spanish press hurled against Cuba the threat converting the island into ruin and ashes by liberating the slaves and unchaining against her the hordes of barbarian Africans.

"Publicly are impediments and difficulties imposed upon every individual, to restrain him from moving from place to place, and from exercising any branch of industry--no one being safe from arrest and fine, for some deficiency of authority or license, at every step he may take.

"Public are the taxes which have wasted away the substance of the island and the project of other new ones, which threaten to abolish all the products of its riches--nothing being left for the opinions and interests of the country.

"Outrages so great and so frequent, reasons so many and so strong, suffice not merely to justify, but to sanctify, in the eyes of the whole world, the cause of the independence of Cuba, and any effort of her people, by their own exertions, or with friendly aid from abroad, to put an end to the evils they suffer, and secure the rights with which G.o.d and nature have invested man.

"Who will in Cuba oppose this indefeasible instinct, this imperative necessity of defending our property, and of seeking in the inst.i.tutions of a just, free and regulated government conditions on which alone civilized society can exist?

"The Peninsulars (natives of Spain) perhaps, who have come to Cuba to marry our daughters, who have here their children, their affections and their property, will they disregard the laws of nature to range themselves on the side of a government which oppresses them as it oppresses us, and which will neither thank them for the service nor be able, with all their help, to prevent the triumph of the independence of Cuba?

"Are not they as intimately bound up with happiness and interest of Cuba as those blood-natives of her soil, who will never be able to deny the name of their fathers, and who, in rising up today against the despotism of the government would wish to count upon their co-operation as the best guaranty of their new social organization and the strongest proof of the justice of their cause?

"Have they not fought in the Peninsula itself, for their national independence, for the support of the same principles for which we, the sons of Cuba proclaim, and which, being the same for men in all countries, cannot be admitted in one and rejected in another without doing treason to nature and to the light of reason, from which they spring?

"No, no--it cannot be that they should carry submissiveness to the point of preferring their own ruin, and the spilling of the blood of their sons and brothers, to be triumph of the holiest cause ever embraced by man--a cause which aims to promote their own happiness and to protect their rights and properties. The Peninsulars who adorn and enrich our soil, and to whom the t.i.tle of labor gives as high a right as our own to its preservation, know very well that the sons of Cuba regard them with personal affection--have never failed to recognize the interest and reciprocal wants which unite the two--nor have ever held them responsible for the perversenesses of the few, and for the iniquities of a government whose infernal policy alone has labored to separate them, on the tyrant's familiar maxim--to divide and conquer.

"We, who proceed in good faith and with the n.o.ble ambition of earning the applause of the world for the justice of our acts--we surely cannot aim at the destruction of our brothers, nor at the usurpation of their properties; and far from meriting that vile calumny which the government will endeavor to fasten upon us, we do not hesitate to swear in the sight of G.o.d and of man that nothing would better accord with the wishes of our hearts, or with the glory and happiness of our country, than the co-operation of the Peninsulars, in the sacred work of liberation.

United with them, we could realize that idea of entire independence which is a pleasing one to our minds; but if they present themselves in our way as enemies, we shall not be able to answer for the security of their persons and properties, nor when adventuring all for the main object of the liberty of Cuba, shall we be able to renounce any means of effecting it.

"But if we have all these reasons to expect that the Peninsulars, who are in nowise dependent on the government and who are so bound up with the fate of Cuba, will at least remain neutral, it will not be supposed that we can promise ourselves the same conduct on the part of the army, the individuals composing which, without ties or affections, know no other law nor consideration than the will of their commander. We pity the lot of those unfortunate men, subject to a tyranny as hard as our own, who, torn from their homes in the flower of their youth, have been brought to Cuba to oppress us on condition of themselves renouncing the dignity of men and all the enjoyments and hopes of life. If they shall appreciate the difference between a free and happy citizen and a dependent and hireling soldier, and choose to accept the benefits of liberty and prosperity, which we tender them, we will admit them into our ranks as brethren. But if they shall disregard the dictates of reason and of their own interests and allow themselves to be controlled by the insidious representations of their tyrants, so as to regard it as their duty to oppose themselves to us on the field of battle as enemies, we will then accept the combat, alike without hate and without fear and always willing, whenever they may lay down their arms, to welcome them to our embrace.

"To employ the language of moderation and justice--to seek for means of peace and conciliation--to invoke the sentiments of love and brotherhood--befits a cultivated and Christian people, which finds itself forced to appeal to the violent recourse of arms, not for the purpose of attacking the social order and the loves of fellow beings, but to recover the condition and the rights of man, usurped from them by an unjust and tyrannical power. But let not the expression of our progress and wishes encourage in our opponents the idea that we are ignorant of our resources, or distrustful of our strength. All the means united, at the disposal of the Peninsulars in Cuba against us, could only make the struggle more protracted and disastrous; but the issue in our favor could not be any the less sure and decisive.

"In the ranks of independence we have to count all the free sons of Cuba, whatever may be the color of their race--the brave nations of South America, who inhabit our soil and who have already made trial of the strength and conduct of our tyrants--the st.u.r.dy islanders of the Canaries, who love Cuba as their country, and who have already had an Hernandez and a Monies de Oca, to seal with the proof of martyrdom, the heroic decision of their compatriots for our cause.

"The ranks of the government would find themselves constantly thinned by desertion, by the climate, by death, which from all quarters would spring up among them in a thousand forms. Cut short of means to pay and maintain their army, dependent on recruits from Spain to fill up their vacancies without an inch of friendly ground on which to plant their feet, or an individual on whom to rely with security, war in the field would be for them one of extermination; while, if they shut themselves within the defences of their fortresses, hunger and want would soon compel them to abandon them, if they were not carried by force of arms.

The example of the whole continent of Spanish America, under circ.u.mstances more favorable for them, when they had Cuba as their a.r.s.enal, the benefit of her coffers, and native aid in those countries themselves, ought to serve them as a lesson not to undertake an exterminating and fratricidal struggle, which could not fail to be attended with the same or worse results.

"We, on the other hand, besides our own resources, have in the neighboring States of the Union, and in all the republics of America, the encampments of our troops, the depots of our supplies, and the a.r.s.enals of our arms. All the sons of this vast New World, whose bosom shelters the island of Cuba, and who have had, like us, to shake off by force the yoke of tyranny, will enthusiastically applaud our resolve, will fly by hundreds to place themselves beneath the flag of liberty in our ranks, and there trained to experienced valor will aid us in annihilating, once and for always, the last badge of ignominy that still disgraces the free and independent soil of America.

"If we have hitherto hoped, with patience and resignation, that justice and their own interests would change the mind of our tyrants; if we have trusted to external efforts to bring the mother country to a negotiation which should avoid the disasters of war, we are resolved to prove by deeds that inaction and endurance have not been the results of impotence and cowardice. Let the government undeceive itself in regard to the power of its bayonets and the efficiency of all the means it has invented to oppress and watch us. In the face of its very authorities--in the sight of the spies at our side--on the day when we have resolved to demand back our rights, the cry of liberty and independence will rise from the Cape of San Antonio to the Point of Maysi.

"We, then, as provisional representatives of the people of Cuba, and in exercise of the rights which G.o.d and Nature have bestowed upon every freeman, to secure his welfare and establish himself under the form of government that suits him do solemnly declare, taking G.o.d to witness the ends we propose, and invoking the favor of the people of America, who have preceded us with their example, that the Island of Cuba is, and, by the laws of nature ought to be, independent of Spain; and that henceforth the inhabitants of Cuba are free from all obedience or subjection to the Spanish government and the individuals composing it; owing submission only to the authority and direction of those who, while awaiting the action of the general suffrage of the people, are charged, or may provisionally charge themselves with the command and government of each locality, and of the military forces.

"By virtue of this declaration, the free sons of Cuba, and the inhabitants of the Island who adhere to her cause, are authorized to take up arms, to unite into corps, to name officers and juntas of government, for their organization and direction, for the purpose of putting themselves in communication with the juntas const.i.tuted for the proclamation of the independence of Cuba, and which have given the initiative to this movement. Placed in the imposing att.i.tude of making themselves respected, our compatriots will prefer all the means of persuasion to those of force; they will protect the property of neutrals, whatever may be their origin; they will welcome the Peninsulars into their ranks as brothers and will respect all property.

"If, notwithstanding our purposes and fraternal intentions, the Spanish government should find partizan obstruction bent upon sustaining it, and we have to owe our liberty to the force of arms, sons of Cuba, let us prove to the republics of America, which are contemplating us, that we having been the last to follow their example does not make us unworthy of them, nor incapable of receiving our liberty and achieving our independence.

JOAQUIN DE AGUERO AGNEW, FRANCISCO AGNERO ESTRADA, WALDO ARETEACA PINA.

"July 4, 1851."

Immediately upon the reading of this the wildest excitement ensued. The Cubans began to believe that at last deliverance was near. They flung their hats into the air, while tears streamed down their faces, and they shouted "Cuba Libre! Down with the Spaniards!" until hoa.r.s.eness compelled them to stop. Then an ominous noise, low at first, but growing nearer and nearer, broke in upon their rapturous demonstrations. Well they knew that sound, for they had heard it only too often. The Spanish soldiers were approaching, and turning, those on the outskirts of the crowd beheld column after column of infantry advancing from one direction, while a troop of cavalry was apparently about to charge the crowd from the opposite side of the square. Aguero knew that a crisis had been reached and that on the work done in the next few moments depended victory or defeat. He called upon those closest in his confidence to organize the crowd. Plans for this action had previously been completed, and the a.s.sembled people were quickly grouped into divisions each containing one hundred men. By this time the Spanish troops were only about a hundred yards distant, and they at once opened fire on the revolutionists. Aguero's company was armed, and they had brought with them extra equipment, which had been distributed among the people. The revolutionists were by no means poor marksmen; they had long been practicing in private for this very hour. They proved that they were more skilled than the picked troops of Spain, and for a time they showed astonis.h.i.+ng efficiency in thinning the ranks of the Spanish infantry. But the cavalry now charged the crowd, and this was more serious than an infantry attack because the revolutionists were not prepared to return it in kind. They stood their ground bravely, firing at the horses, thus seeking to dismount and confuse the enemy, and strange as it may seem they were successful. The cavalry commander ordered a retreat, which was accomplished in great disorder, and under a withering fire from the revolutionists, while the infantry, amazed and alarmed to find themselves no longer able to rely on the support of the cavalry, broke and fled toward Puerto Principe, from which place they had come. The little army at Naja.s.sa well knew that no help could be expected from their comrades at Puerto Principe, and therefore it seemed the part of discretion to allow the Spanish army to retreat unmolested, and for the revolutionists to take refuge in the interior of the island, where it would be more difficult to apprehend them, and where they hoped to find sympathy and support. They made their way to Guanamaquilla, where they decided to make a stand, and where, after effecting a better organization, they entrenched themselves.

On July 6 at this place they were attacked by six hundred Spaniards under General Lemery, and the Spanish troops were again routed, again retired in disorder, and once more the revolutionists celebrated a victory. Not only did the Spanish troops beat a hasty retreat, but they left behind them, on the field of battle, forty dead and dying.

It can be imagined with what elation the patriots celebrated this second victory. They could hardly believe in their good fortune. It was incredible that they should have prevailed against the trained forces of Spain. It was not for them, at such close contact with events, to realize that while they were fighting for their homes, for freedom, for their families, for their very lives,--for capture meant as sure death as any bullet of the enemy could bring,--after all the Spanish troops were only hirelings, fighting for pay and not for a principle, and that it has been the history of the world, since its beginning, that when the home is at stake sooner or later victory comes to its defenders.

Now the little bands of one hundred separated, and the mistake was made which proved fatal to the cause for which they had already sacrificed so much, and which seemed about to triumph. They should have waited until news of their triumph penetrated to other patriots, and until their forces had been greatly swelled in volume, before any division was made.

Meanwhile, immediately after their first victory, they had sent a courier to bear word to Lopez, through their mysterious channels of communication, of their success, urging him to communicate the good news to the junta in New York, and to hasten to their aid with a new expedition, and promising that meanwhile they would spread the revolution to all parts of the island, so that when he came again he would have no cause to complain of lack of support.

The companies of one hundred each went in a separate direction, each bent on conquest and propaganda among timid sympathizers. One party, which was led by Aguero himself, made its way to Las Tunas, and arrived there late in the evening. Aguero divided his little band into two parts and approached the town from opposite directions, sounding the cry of the revolution, "Cuba Libre!" and calling upon all good patriots to join their forces. But Spanish spies, always active, had preceded them and the garrison of five hundred soldiers was already alert. Then a catastrophe happened. The two bands of patriots, in the midst of the great confusion which their arrival occasioned, met in a dark, unpaved street, and not recognizing one another, each believed the other to be the Spaniards, and each opened fire upon the other. Too late the error was rectified. Some of the patriots had been injured by their own comrades, and the organization was in confusion; before order could be educed from this chaos, the Spanish troops were upon them, and this time it was the patriots who were put to rout.

Another of the bands of one hundred had proceeded, meanwhile, to the plains of Santa Isabel. Large numbers of patriots rallied to their a.s.sistance, but the attacking Spanish force, nearly a thousand strong, and consisting of both cavalry and infantry, cast far too great odds against them. The patriots again suffered defeat, and their losses were twenty killed and forty captured by the enemy, while the Spanish casualties were one hundred and thirty, fifty of whom were killed outright.

A third band of one hundred, which had as its commander Don Serapin Recio, made its way to Santa Cruz. They were more fortunate than had been their comrades, for when they were attacked by four companies of Spanish infantry, under Colonel Conti, they not only were victorious, but they took Colonel Conti prisoner. This triumph, however, was short lived, for Spanish reinforcements, consisting of four hundred cavalrymen, were rushed to the scene of battle, and the tide turned against the patriots. Recio was captured, fifty six revolutionists soon lay dead or dying, and as the others sought to escape a large proportion of them were taken captive.

Still a fourth band, advancing on Punta de Grandao, met with disaster, as did the fifth division which had gone toward La Siguanea in the hope of taking that place.

Only one little division of patriots, one hundred strong, remained unconquered. Aguero, who had made his escape after the defeat at Las Tunas, took command of this company. The city of Nuevitas was entered in triumph, amid shouts of welcome from the people, who in large numbers threw in their fortunes with the revolution. Don Carlos Comus led the Spanish forces against the city, and a desperate battle which raged for over three hours was fought. The ammunition of the patriots was exhausted, and fighting against frightful odds, they were almost exterminated; fewer than the original one hundred remained alive. They fled, and were speedily captured by the pursuing Spaniards.

Complete defeat had now overtaken the revolutionists, who so boldly on July 3 had declared their independence of Spain, and thrown a defiant gauntlet before the Spanish power. By the end of July not a single one of the original army remained at large to tell the story; they had all been killed, captured, or frightened into cowed and silent obedience to Spanish rule. Of those who had fallen into the hands of the Spaniards, every one was tried by military tribunal, and sentence pa.s.sed upon them.

Two courts sat in judgment on the offenders, one at Puerto Principe and the other at Trinidad, at which latter the Captain-General, Jose de la Concha, presided. Under his dictation sentence of death was p.r.o.nounced upon Jose Isidore Armenteros, Fernando Hernandez and Rafael Arcis, all recognized as prime movers in the revolution. Ignacio Belen Perez, Nestor Cadalso, Juan O'Bourke, Abeja Iznaga Miranda and Jose Maria Rodriguez were sentenced to ten years' imprisonment, which was to be suffered abroad, and they were forever banished from Cuba, while the same terms were imposed on Juan Hevia and Avelind Porada, whose sentences, however, were shortened to eight years each, and Pedro Jose Pomarcz, Foribio Garcia, Cruz Birba and Fernando Medinilla were also banished, and condemned to two years' imprisonment. All sentences went into effect on August 18. It is interesting to note in pa.s.sing a fact which seems quite in keeping with the Spanish character as demonstrated by the administration of the island; the men who were condemned to death were led out into a field by the name of Del Negro, near the city of Trinidad, and _shot in the back_.

The court which sat in judgment at Puerto Principe tried the leader of the revolutionists, and brave Joaquin Aguero was condemned to die by the garrote. The same sentence was imposed on Jose Thomas Betancourt, Fernando de Zayas and Miguel Benavides; while Miguel Castellanos and Adolfo Pierre Aguero were sentenced to ten years' imprisonment, which sentences were all decreed to take effect on August 12.

It was impossible, even with the strict censors.h.i.+p which the Spanish Captain-General maintained over the island, to keep reports of the stirring events which were taking place from leaking forth into the outer world. Of course, Lopez and the junta at New York learned of them through the channels known only to themselves, and the news, spreading to all parts of the United States, caused tremendous excitement. Great interest was manifested, particularly in the southern states, and in New York City, where the members of the Cuban junta had begun to stir up a considerable amount of interest in and sympathy for the Cubans. The New York papers dispatched correspondents to obtain the true story of the rebellion, but the reporters had difficulty in getting into the country, and encountered still greater obstacles in dispatching what news they could gather to their respective sheets. They were hampered in their efforts by Spanish officials and Spanish spies were always at their heels.

While the main uprising had been in the vicinity of Puerto Principe, incipient rebellions and sympathetic insurrections occurred in other parts of the island, which were quickly quelled by overwhelming forces of Spaniards, and the news of which was confined as much as possible to the immediate vicinity of the uprisings. At Trinidad a mob a.s.sembled on horseback, crying vengeance on the Spanish oppressors, but they were soon driven from the city and obliged to take to cover on a densely wooded hill, where their movements were so hampered by underbrush that they were perforce compelled to abandon their mounts, and soon surrendered to superior numbers. It was suspected that the inhabitants of Havana, or rather the revolutionary sympathizers in that place, were about to revolt, but the guard was redoubled, the crowd was overawed by numbers of well armed troops, and the movement, if it ever had been contemplated, never materialized. However, many of the wealthy inhabitants, fearing that they might be seized on suspicion of complicity with the revolutionists, hastily fled to their estates in the country.

The New York _Herald_, which for a long time had been sympathetically inclined toward the revolutionary party in Cuba, on July 16, 1851, printed the following report, which was based on facts gathered by its correspondent:

"I consider that, in a political point of view, this island was never in a more critical state than it is at this present moment. The Creoles of Cuba have at length thrown down the gauntlet of defiance to the authority of Spain."

This statement was followed by a long account of the engagements between the revolutionists and the forces of Spain. On July 22 the same paper, under the guise of reporting conditions, issued what was really a call of "The United States to the rescue," which in part read as follows:

"The revolution of Cuba has changed from chrysalis to full grown fly.

The first blood has been spilled. Cuba, some seem to think, has had her Lexington.... The revolution having begun, it cannot go backward and it is more than probable that the days of Spain's rule are at least to be much embarra.s.sed. The government counts 14,000 troops, and no more, in all the island, and may, perhaps, be able to raise as many more from the Spanish population; but their fleet is a good one, comprising some twenty vessels, of which six are steamers. _Whether the struggle be a long one or a short one, will depend on the 'aid and comfort' the Cubans receive from the United States, in the shape of guns, pistols, powder, ball and men that can teach them to organize and manoeuvre._"