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Origin and Conduct of Cuban Wars: Spain

The revolutionary manifesto says, the compact Spain proposed with the Cubans through Campos, the acceptance of which closed the struggle--Campos duly returning to Spain and Gomez retiring to San Domingo--"was a snare and deceit." Cuba being "granted the liberties of Porto Rico, which had none," and the manifesto continues: "On this deceitful ground was laid the new situation, throughout which has run a current of falsehood and hypocrisy. Spain, whose mind had not changed, hastened to change the name of things. The captain-general was called governor--general. The royal decrees took the name of authorizations. The commercial monopoly of Spain was named coasting trade. The right of banishment was transformed into the law of vagrancy. The brutal attacks of defenseless citizens were called 'componte.' The abolition of constitutional guarantees became the law of public order. Taxation without the consent or knowledge of the Cuban people was changed into the law of estimates (budget) voted by the representatives of Spain. "The painful lesson of the ten--year war had been entirely lost on Spain. Instead of inaugurating a redeeming policy that would heal the recent wounds, allay public anxiety, and quench the thirst for justice felt by the people, who are desirous to enjoy their natural rights, the metropolis, while lavish in promises of reform, persisted in carrying on, unchanged, its old and crafty system, the groundwork of which continues to be the same, namely: To exclude every native Cuban from every office that could give him any effective influence an intervention in public affairs; the ungovernable exploitation of the colonists' labor for the benefit of Spanish commerce and Spanish bureaucracy, both civil and military. To carry out the latter purpose it was necessary to maintain the former at any cost."

The chapter of historical indictment of Spain, charging upon her the blood of Cuba, that is most lurid is "The Book of Blood--An Authoritative Record," and it does not need that the words "Book of Blood" should be printed in red ink, as in the rule, to make it horrible. It, according to the title page, records "the policy adopted by modern Spain to put an end to the war for the independence of Cuba," and the date of publication is 1873, showing that it was issued in the midst of the ten years' conflict, and purports to give the earlier parts of the story of that protracted struggle. "The Book of Blood" opens with a reference to the Virginius massacre, and promises a rough sketch of the carnival of blood that took place "during the governments of Generals Lersundi, Dulce, Caballero de Rodas, Ceballos, Pieltain and, last but not least, Jovellar, those three last being representatives of the Spanish Republic." This remark about the representatives of the Spanish Republic requires the comment that in the contests for liberty in Spain there has not been the brotherly disposition one would expect in the inhabitants of the Peninsula to share with those of the Island, and the sense of wrong thus aroused in Cubans has been a very influential element in feeding the fires of insurrection. The bulk of the dreadful book is occupied with the names of the dead who have died for the cause of Cuba. The frightful lists have every appearance of authority, and are fortified by convincing documents.

There is a reserve in paragraphs of the preface which is all the more startling because standing in the midst of denunciations without qualification. We quote:

We adjoin a note of those delivered by the captain--general to the military courts as guilty of treason. We do not know the exact fate of those unfortunates. It is known, however, that many of them have mysteriously disappeared, and their families are sure that they have found an obscure grave in the burial grounds of the Cabana or El Principe.