The International Journal of Cuban Studies
(Online) ISSN 1756-347X
My early life in Cuba
In the closing decade of the Victorian era the Empire had enjoyed so long a spell of almost unbroken peace, that medals and all they represented in experience and adventure wore becoming extremely scarce in the British Army, The veterans of the Crimea and the Indian Mutiny were gone from the active list. The Afghan and Egyptian warriors of the early eighties had reached the senior ranks. Scarcely a shot had been fired in anger since then, and when I joined the 4th Hussars in January 1895 scarcely a captain, hardly ever a subaltern, could be found throughout Her Majesty's forces who had seen even the smallest kind of war. Rarity in a desirable commodity is usually the cause of enhanced value; and there has never been a time when war service was held in so much esteem by the military authorities or more ardently sought by officers of every rank. It was the swift road to promotion and advancement in every arm. It was the glittering gateway to distinction. It cast a glamour upon the fortunate possessor alike in the eyes of elderly gentlemen and young ladies. How we young officers envied the senior Major for his adventures at Abu Klea! How we admired the Colonel with his long row of decorations! We listened with almost insatiable interest to the accounts which they were good enough to give us on more than one occasion of stirring deeds and episods already melting into the mist of time. How we longed to have a similar store of memories to unpack and display, if necessary repeatedly, to a sympathetic audience! How we wondered whether our chance would ever come - whether we too in our turn would have battles to fight over again and again in the agreeable atmosphere of the after-dinner Mess table? Prowess at polo, in the hunting-field, or between the nags, might count for something, But the young soldier who had been 'on active service' and 'under fire' had an aura about him to which the Generals he served under, the troopers he led, and the girls he courted, accorded a unanimous, sincere, and spontaneous recognition.
The want of a sufficient supply of active service was therefore acutely felt by my contemporaries in the circles in which I was now called upon to live my life. This complaint was destined to be cured, and all our requirements were to be met to the fullest extent. The danger - as the subaltern regarded it - which in those days seemed so real of Liberal and democratic governments making war impossible was soon to be proved illusory. The age of Peace had ended, There was to be no lack of war. There was to be enough for all. Aye, enough and to spare. Few indeed of the keen, aspiring generations of Sandhurst cadets and youthful officers who entered the Royal Service so light-heartedly in these and later years were to survive the ghastly surfeit which Fate had in store, The little titbits of fighting which the Indian frontier and the Soudan were soon to offer, distributed by luck or favour, were fiercely scrambled for throughout the British Army. But the South African War was to attain dimensions which fully satisfied the needs of our small army. And after that the deluge was still to come!
The military year was divided into a seven months' summer season of training and a five months' winter season of leave, and each officer received a solid block of two and a half months' uninterrupted repose. All my money had been spent on polo ponies, and as I could not afford to hunt, I searched the world for some scene of adventure or excitement, The general peace in which mankind had for so many years languished was broken only in one quarter of the globe, The long-drawn guerrilla between the Spaniards and the Cuban rebels was said to be entering upon its most serious phase. The Captain-General of Spain, the famous Marshal Martinez Campos, renowned alike for victories over the Moors and pronunciamientos to the Spaniards, had been sent to the recalcitrant island; and 80,000 Spanish reinforcements were being rapidly shipped across the ocean in a supreme attempt to quell the revolt. Here then was fighting actually going on. From very early youth I had brooded about soldiers and war, and often I had imagined in dreams and day-dreams the sensations attendant upon being for the first time under fire. It seemed to my youthful mind that it must be a thrilling and immense experience to hear the whistle of bullets all round and to play at hazard from moment to moment with death and wounds. Moreover, now that I had assumed professional obligations in the matter, I thought that it might be as well to have a private rehearsal, a secluded trial trip, in order to make sure that the ordeal was one not unsuited to my temperament. Accordingly it was to Cuba that I turned my eyes.
I unfolded the project to a brother subaltern - Reginald Barnes - who afterwards long commanded Divisions in France, and found him keen. The Colonel and the Mess generally looked with favour upon a plan to seek professional experience at a seat of war. It was considered as good or almost as good as a season's serious hunting, without which no subaltern or captain was considered to be living a respectable life. Thus fortified, I wrote to my father's old friend and Fourth Party colleague, Sir Henry Wolff, then our Ambassador at Madrid, asking whether he could procure us the necessary permissions from the Spanish military authorities. The dear old gentleman, whose long-acquired influence at the Spanish Court was unrivalled in the Diplomatic Corps, of which he was the doyen, took the greatest trouble on my behalf. Excellent introductions, formal and personal, soon arrived in a packet, together with the Ambassador's assurance that we had only to reach Havana to be warmly welcomed by the Captain-General and shown all there was to see. Accordingly at the beginning of November, 1895, we sailed for New York, and journeyed thence to Havana.
The minds of this generation, exhausted, brutalized, mutilated and bored by War, may not understand the delicious yet tremulous sensations with which a young British Officer bred in the long peace approached for the first time an actual theatre of operations. When first in the dim light of early morning I saw the shores of Cuba rise and define themselves from dark-blue horizons, I felt as if I sailed with Long John Silver and first gazed on Treasure Island, Here was a place where real things were going on. Here was a scene of vital action. Here was a place where anything might happen. Here was a place where something would certainly happen. Here I might leave my bones. These musings were dispersed by the advance of breakfast, and lost in the hurry of disembarkation.
Cuba is a lovely island. Well have the Spaniards named it 'The Pearl of the Antilles'. The temperate yet ardent climate, the abundant rainfall, the luxuriant vegetation, the unrivalled fertility of the soil, the beautiful scenery-all combined to make me accuse that absent-minded morning when our ancestors let so delectable a possession slip through their fingers. However our modern Democracy has inherited enough - to keep or to cast away.
The city and harbour of Havana thirty-five years ago presented a spectacle which, though no doubt surpassed by its present progress, was in every respect magnificent. We took up our quarters in a fairly good hotel, ate a great quantity of oranges, smoked a number of cigars, and presented our credentials to Authority. Everything worked perfectly. Our letters had no sooner been read than we were treated as an unofficial, but none the less important, mission sent at a time of stress by a mighty Power - and old ally. The more we endeavoured to reduce the character of our visit, the more its underlying significance was appraised. The Captain- General was on tour inspecting various posts and garrisons; but all would be arranged exactly as we wished, We should find the Marshal at Santa Clara; the journey was quite practicable; the trains were armoured; escorts travelled in special wagons at either end; the sides of the carriages were protected by strong plating; when firing broke out, as was usual, you had only to lie down on the floor of the carriage to arrive safely. We started next morning.
Marshal Martinez Campos received us affably and handed us over to one of his Staff Officers, a young Lieutenant, son of the Duke of Tetuan, by name Juan O'Donnell, who spoke English extremely well. I was surprised at the name, but was told it had become Spanish since the days of the Irish Brigade. O'Donnell explained that if we wished to see the fighting we ought to join a mobile column. Such a column it appeared had started from Santa Clara only that morning under General Valdez for Sancti Spiritus, a town about 40 miles away beset by rebels. It was a pity we had missed it. We suggested that as it would only have made one march we could easily overtake it. Our young Spaniard shook his head: 'You would not get 5 exiles.' `Where, then, are the enemy?' we asked. 'They are everywhere and nowhere,' he replied. 'Fifty horsemen can go where they please - two cannot go anywhere.' However, it would be possible to intercept General Valdez. We must go by train to Cienfuegos, and then by sea to Tuna. The railway line from Tuna to Sancti Spiritus was, he said, strongly guarded by block-houses, and military trains had hitherto passed regularly. Thus by a journey of 150 miles we should reach Sancti Spiritiis in three days, and General Valdez would not arrive there with his troops until the evening of the fourth day. There we could join his column and follow his further operations. Horses and orderlies would be provided and the General would welcome us upon his staff as guests.
We accomplished our journey with some risk, but no accident, Sancti Spiritus, its name notwithstanding, was a very second-rate place and in the most unhealthy state. Small-pox and yellow fever were rife. We spent the night in a filthy, noisy, crowded tavern, and the next evening General Valdez and his column marched in. It was a considerable force: four battalions comprising about 3,000 infantry, two squadrons of cavalry and a mule battery. The troops looked fit and sturdy and none the worse for their marches. They were dressed in cotton uniforms which may originally have been white, but now with dirt and dust had toned down to something very like khaki. They carried heavy packs and double bandoliers, and wore large straw Panama hats. They were warmly greeted by their comrades in the town and also, it seemed, by the inhabitants.
After a respectful interval we presented ourselves at the General's headquarters. He had already read the telegrams which commended us to him, and he welcomed us most cordially. Suarez Valdez was a General of Division. He was making a fortnight's march through the insurgent districts with the double purpose of visiting-the townships and posts garrisoned by the Spaniards, and also of fighting the rebels wherever and whenever they could be found. He explained, through an interpreter, what an honour it was for him to have two distinguished representatives of a great and friendly Power attached to his column, and how highly he valued the moral support which this gesture of Great Britain implied. We said, back through the interpreter, that it was awfully kind of him, and that we were sure it would be awfully jolly. The interpreter worked this up into something quite good, and the General looked much pleased. He then announced that he would march at daybreak. The town was too full of disEtase for him to stay for one unnecessary hour. Our horses would be ready before daylight. In the meanwhile he invited us to dinner.
Behold next morning a distinct sensation in the life of a young officer! It is still dark, but the sky is paling. We are in what a brilliant though little-known writer has called 'The dim mysterious temple of the Dawn'.* We are on our horses, in uniform; our revolvers are loaded, In the dusk and half-light, long files of armed and laden men are shuffling off towards the enemy. He may be very near; perhaps he is waiting for us a mile away. We cannot tell; we know nothing of the qualities either of our friends or foes. We have nothing to do with their quarrels. Except in personal self-defence we can take no part in their combats. But we feel it is a great moment in our lives-in fact, one of the best we have ever experienced, We think that something is going to happen ; we hope. devoutly that something will happen; yet at the same time we do not want to be hurt or killed. What is it then that we do want? It is that lure of youth-adventure, and adventure for adventure's sake. You might call it tomfoolery. To travel thousands of miles with money one could ill afford, and get up at four o'clock in the morning in the hope of getting into a scrape in the company of perfect strangers, is certainly hardly a rational proceeding. Yet we knew there were very few subalterns in the British Army who would not have given a month's pay to sit in our saddles.
However, nothing happened. Daylight slowly broadened, and the long Spanish column insinuated itself like a snake into the endless forests and undulations of a vast, lustrous landscape dripping with moisture and sparkling with sunshine. We marched about 8 miles, and then, it being near nine o'clock and fairly open country having been reached, a halt was called for breakfast and the siesta. Breakfast was an important meal. The infantry lighted fires to cook their food; the horses were off-saddled and put to graze; and coffee and a stew were served at a table to the staff. It was a picnic. The General's aide-de-camp at length produced a long metal bottle in which he made a beverage which he described as 'runcotelle'. It is only in later years that the meaning of this expression, which I so well remember, has been revealed to me. It was undoubtedly a 'rum cocktail'. Whatever its name, it was extremely good. By this time hammocks had been slung between the trees of a thicket. Into these hammocks we were now enjoined to retire. The soldiers and regimental officers extended themselves upon the ground after, I trust, taking the necessary military precautions, and everyone slept in the shade for about four hours.
At two o'clock the siesta was over. Bustle arose in the silent midday bivouac. At three in the afternoon we were once more on the way, and marched four hours at a speed of certainly not less than 2 and three quarter miles an hour. As dusk was falling we reached our camping ground for the night. The column had covered 18 or 19 miles, and the infantry did not seem in the least fatigued. These tough Spanish peasants, sons of the soil, could jog along with heavy loads over mere tracks with an admirable persistence. The prolonged midday halt was like a second night's rest to them.
I have no doubt that the Romans planned the time-table of their days far better than we do. They rose before the sun at all seasons. Except in wartime we never see the dawn. Sometimes we see sunset. The message of the sunset is sadness; the message of the dawn is hope. The rest and the spell of sleep in the middle of the day refresh the human frame far more than a long night. We were not made by Nature to work, or even to play, from eight o'clock in the morning till midnight. We throw a strain upon our system which is unfair and improvident. For every purpose of business or pleasure, mental or physical, we ought to break our days and our marches into two. When I was at the Admiralty in the War, I found I could add nearly two hours to my working effort by going to bed for an hour after luncheon. The Latins are wiser and closer to Nature in their way of living than the Anglo-Saxons or Teutons. But they dwell in superior climates.
Following this routine, we marched for several days, through wonderful country, without a sign or sound or sight of war. Meanwhile we got quite friendly with our Spanish hosts; and speaking execrable French in common, though from different angles, we managed to acquire some understanding of their views. The Chief of the Staff, Lieut.-Col. Benzo, for instance, on one occasion referred to the war 'which we are fighting to preserve the integrity of our country'. I was struck by this. I had not, no doubt owing to my restricted education, quite realized that these other nations had the same sort of feeling about their possessions as we in England had always been brought up to have about ours. They felt about Cuba, it seemed, just as we felt about Ireland. This impressed me much. I thought it rather cheek that these foreigners should have just the same views and use the same sort of language about their country and their colonies as if they were British. However, I accepted the fact and put it in my mental larder. Hitherto I had (secretly) sympathised with the rebels, or at least with the rebellion; but now I began to see how unhappy the Spanish were at the idea of having their beautiful `Pearl of the Antilles' torn away from them, and I began to feel sorry for them.
We did not see how they could win. Imagine the cost per hour of a column of nearly 4,000 men wandering round and round this endless humid jungle; and there were perhaps a dozen such columns, and many smaller, continuously on the move. Then there were 200,000 men in all the posts and garrisons, or in the block-houses on the railway lines. We knew that Spain was not a rich country as things went then. We knew by what immense efforts and sacrifices she maintained more than a quarter of a million men across 5,000 miles of salt water -a dumb-bell held at arm's length. And what of the enemy? We had seen nothing of them, we had not heard even one rifle let off; but they evidently existed. All these elaborate precautions and powerful forces had been brought into being as the result of repeated disasters. In these forests and mountains were bands of ragged men not ill supplied with rifles and ammunition, and armed above all with a formidable chopper-sword called a 'machete' to whom war cost nothing except poverty, risk and discomfort-and no one was likely to run short of these. Here were the Spaniards out-guerrilla-ed in their turn. They moved like Napoleon's convoys in the Peninsula, league after league, day after day, through a world of impalpable hostility, slashed here and there by fierce onslaught.
We slept on the night of November 29 in the fortified village of Arroyo Blanco. We had sent two battalions and one squadron with the main part of the convoy to carry provisions to a series of garrisons. The rest of our force, numbering perhaps 1,700 men, were to seek the enemy and a fight. The 30th November was my 21st birthday, and on that day for the first time I heard shots fired in anger, and heard bullets strike flesh or whistle through the air.
There was a low mist as we moved off in the early morning, and all of a sudden the rear of the column was involved in firing. In those days when people got quite close together in order to fight, and used - partly, at any rate - large-bore rifles to fight with, loud bangs were heard and smoke-puffs or even flashes could be seen. The firing seemed about a furlong away and sounded very noisy and startling. As, however, no bullets seemed to come near me, I was easily reassured. I felt like the optimist 'who did not mind what happened, so long as it did not happen to him'. The mist hid everything from view. After a while it began to lift, and I found we were marching through a clearing in the woods, nearly 100 yards wide. This was called a military road, and we wended along it for several hours. The jungle had already encroached avidly upon the track, and the officers drew their machetes and cut down the branches or, in sport, cut in hair the great water-gourds which hung from them and discharged a quart of cold crystal liquid upon the unwary.
On this day when we halted for breakfast every man sat by his horse and ate what he had in his pocket. I had been provided with half a skinny chicken. I was engaged in gnawing the drumstick when suddenly, close at hand, almost in our laces it seemed, a ragged volley rang out from the edge of the forest. The horse immediately behind me-not my horse-gave a bound, There was excitement and commotion. A party of soldiers rushed to the place whence the volley had been fired, and of course found nothing except a few empty cartridge cases, Meanwhile I had been meditating upon the wounded horse. It was a chestnut, The bullet had struck between his ribs, the blood dripped on the ground, and there was a circle of dark red on his bright chestnut coat about a foot wide. He hung his head, but did not fall. Evidently, however, he was going to die, for his saddle and bridle were soon taken off him. As I watched these proceedings I could not help reflecting that the bullet which had struck the chestnut had certainly passed within a foot of my head. So at any rate I had been 'under fire'. That was something. Nevertheless, I began to take a more thoughtful view of our enterprise than I had hitherto done.
All the next day we pursued the trail. The woods, which before had borne a distant resemblance to an English covert, now gave place to forests of bottle-stemmed palm trees of all possible sizes and most peculiar shapes. Three or four hours of this sort of country led us again to more open ground, and after fording the river we halted for the night near a rude cabin which boasted a name on the map. It was hot, and my companion and I persuaded two of the younger staff officers to come with us and bathe in the river which encircled our bivouac on three sides, The water was delightful, being warm and clear, and the spot very beautiful. We were dressing on the bank when suddenly we heard a shot fired at no great distance. Another and another followed, and then came a volley. The bullets whizzed over our heads. It was evident that an attack of some sort was in progress.
We pulled on our clothes anyhow, and retired along the river as gracefully as might be and returned to the General's headquarters. When we arrived, there was a regular skirmish going on half a mile away, and the bullets were falling all over the camp. The rebels were armed mainly with Remingtons, and the deep note of their pieces contrasted strangely with the shrill rattle of the magazine rifles of the Spaniards. Alter about half an hour the insurgents had had enough, and went off carrying away with them the wounded and dead, with which it was hoped they were not unprovided.
We dined undisturbed in the verandah, and retired to our hammocks in the little barn. I was soon awakened by firing. Not only shots but volleys resounded through the night. A bullet ripped through the thatch of our hut, another wounded an orderly just outside. I should have been glad to get out of my hammock and lie on the ground, However, as no one else made a move, I thought it more becoming to stay where I was. I fortified myself by dwelling on the fact that the Spanish officer whose hammock was slung between me and the enemy's fire was a man of substantial physique; indeed one might almost have called him fat. I have never been prejudiced against fat men. At any rate I did not grudge this one his meals. Gradually I dropped asleep.
After a disturbed night, the column started early in the morning. A mist gave cover to the rebel marksmen, who saluted us as soon as we got across the river with a well-directed fire. The enemy, falling back before us, took advantage of every position. Though not very many men were hit, the bullets traversed the entire length of the column, making the march very lively for everybody. At eight o'clock the head of the Spanish column debauched from the broken ground into open country. A broad grass ride with a wire fence on one side and a row of little stunted trees on the other ran from the beginning of the plain to the enemy's line. On each side of the ride were broad fields of rank grass, waist-high. Halfway up the ride, which was about a mile long, and on the right-hand side, was a grove of about a hundred palm trees. At the end of the ride and at right angles to it was a low, long hill, surmounted by a rail fence and backed by the dense forests. This was the enemy's position, which the General resolved immediately to attack.
The tactics were simple. As the leading Spanish battalion got clear of the broken ground, two companies were thrown forward on each flank and extended. The cavalry went to the right of the ride and the artillery proceeded up the centre. The General, his staff, and his two British visitors, advanced solemnly up the ride about 50 yards in the rear of the firing line. The second battalion followed the guns in column of companies. For 300 yards there was no firing, Then from the distant crest line came a lot of little puffs of smoke, followed immediately by the report of the insurgent rifles. Twice this happened, and then the enemy's fire became continuous and spread right and left along his whole position. The Spanish infantry now began to reply and advanced continually. The firing on both sides became heavy. There were sounds about us sometimes like a sigh, sometimes like a whistle, and at others like the buzz of an offended hornet. The General and his staff rode forward until the smoke-crested crackling fence was only four or five hundred yards away, Here we halted, and sitting mounted, without the slightest cover or concealment, watched the assault of the infantry. During this period the air was full of whizzings, and the palm trees smitten by the bullets yielded resounding smacks and thuds. The Spaniards were on their mettle; and we had to do our best to keep up appearances, It really seemed very dangerous indeed, and I was astonished to see how few people were hit amid all this clatter. In our group of about twenty, only three or four horses and men were wounded, and not one killed. Presently, to my relief, the sound of the Mauser volleys began to predominate, and the rebel fire to slacken, till it finally ceased altogether. For a moment I could see figures scurrying to the shelter of the woods, and then came silence. The infantry advanced and occupied the enemy's position. Pursuit was impossible owing to the impenetrable jungle.
As our column had now only one day's rations left, we withdrew across the plain to La Jicotea. Spanish honour and our own curiosity alike being satisfied, the column returned to the coast, and we to England. We did not think the Spaniards were likely to bring their war in Cuba to a speedy end.
* George R. Aberigh-Mackay (1914) Twenty-one Days in India
Winston S. Churchill (1930) Originally published as Chapter VI in My Early Life, London: Thornton Butterworth, pp 74-87. Reproduced here with permission of Curtis Brown Ltd, London on behalf of The Estate of Winston Churchill
Copyright: Winston S. Churchill
