Florida and the Spanish-American War of 1898

Our first taste of war was when we broke camp at Mobile preparatory to going to Miami. The orders

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were given early in the morning. About 7 o'clock every tent fell simultaneously to the ground and until late that evening there was not a man that did not stand unsheltered in a terrific down-pour of rain.

Our next taste was a few days later, when we slept on the hard ground under the stars and the fitful showers that persisted in watching and watering that land's end. Later on, such experiences became unworthy of note or complaint.

We had heard glowing accounts of Miami on our way down there. Our information, however, was secured mostly from railroad folders. To us, in anticipation, its chief charm was that Havana was not two-hundred miles away, and that Miami was the one spot in all the wide world where a certain oil- and railroad-magnate could in any satisfactory degree enjoy his modest gains.

In fact, there was a most magnificent and gorgeously appointed hotel right in the midst of a perfect paradise of tropical trees and plants. But one had to walk scarce a quarter-mile until one came to such a waste wilderness as one has conceived only in rare night-mares. The men bravely set to work. They dug the stumps, cleared the rank palmetto growth and tried to pile the coral rock. When they were not thus employed they drilled through uncleared land and swamp two miles further away.

The hardships endured here were undeniable. There was 4 o'clock reveille, 5 to 8 drill, 12 o'clock dinner, 1 to 5 drill, then supper, then to bed in the same clothing that had been worn all day, dirty, ill-smelling, wet from excessive perspiration, and intended only for wear in northern climates. What other causes operated to bring about the diseases which soon broke

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out, undoubtedly the hard drill under such conditions as few negroes in all the country experienced, and the quality and insufficient quantity of clothing played the leading part weakening the men when they needed all their strength.

The water was doubtless pure before the troops arrived but it could be the matter only of a week at the most when it would be poisoned, for hardly a sanitary precaution had been taken by those who laid out and planned the camp.

Picture the situation in its leading features - midsummer, a desert country practically, for even the barest necessities for sick or well could be obtained from a point nearer than a day's journey, 7,500 men thrown in upon a town of perhaps 750 inhabitants, winter-clad, impelled to observe rigorous drill regulations, officers and enlisted men having both to learn to care for themselves and for others at the same time, hospital crowded, sick dying – it was no wonder that there was an utter indifference as to the war going on across the narrow straits.

It was said in extenuation that the men were being acclimated. And now it is said that the Sirdar Kitchener led an army into the Soudan and suffered practically nothing. But he knew how. The zealot has yet to appear who can say that the average volunteer officer of the Spanish-American war knew how.

The regimental and company commanders had nothing to do with most of the errors. They could only obey and soften, if possible, the rigor of orders. And others full of pity could only look on with sealed lips. It is a satisfaction to say that the government rectified the blunders of its agents as soon as possible. Had the

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six regiments been there ten weeks, as they were there only five, the results would have been appalling.

The men became absolutely indifferent to the impulses which led them to enlist. They saw one and another dropping from the ranks, carried to their sun-blistered and rain-soaked tents, then to the hospital, and heard morning after morning at dawn the funeral march from some regiment or other.

To-day Miami is a bitter memory to many a home in our state and Texas and Alabama.