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The Crisis in Cuba: Havana

Mr. Macho, a mulatto, seventy-one years old. Timoteo Ceferino, son of the foregoing, aged seventeen. Castellanos, thirty-five years, married, arrested on his way to Havana market. Matias Darias, arrested on his way home after selling his goods. Juan Machina, married, farmer.

This is indeed a chapter from another "Book of Blood," and this terrible story continues with the statement of an eye witness of the shooting of the eight men whose names are in the first list above; "these eight men were arrested on April 1st and 2d by Lieut. Sequi, assisted by two soldiers and a municipal guard, who has since been hanged by the insurgents. They were all innocent, hard-working people. I saw the soldiers tie their arms and take them to the police station. Margarito Zarzas, who was arrested just after he had completed a coffin for a woman, was dragged to the station with a rope around his neck. I was told that the prisoners were beaten, but I did not see that. Next day the nine prisoners were marched to a small fort made of loose bricks on a hill overlooking the railway track. I heard that they were to be put on a train at 1.30 o'clock in the afternoon and carried to Havana, and I went to the track to see my neighbors depart. As I approached the railway I saw Lieut. Sequi and two soldiers hurrying towards the little fort on horseback. "When I advanced I could see a double rank of Spanish soldiers of the Princesa Battalion, stretching from the foot of the hill on which the fort stands across the track to a small gully about seven feet deep. Beyond the gully is a large cedar tree, and between them was a freshly-dug trench. It made my blood run cold. I knew what the trench was for. To the right of the gully was a line of soldiers. Presently I saw the two Cejas brothers leave the fort surrounded by soldiers. They were taken across the track between the double ranks and down into the gully out of my sight. Then I heard a volley fired in the gully. I ran home and ordered my wife to conceal the children and lock the doors of my house. "The screaming of the prisoners in the fort, who had heard the volley, induced me to approach the track again. This time I saw Domingo Lugonez and Margarito Zarzas brought down the hill. They were tied together. Lugonez was crying. I could hear him scream again and again: 'For the sake of your own mothers don't kill me! Have pity on me! Oh, my good mother, my poor mother! For God's sake don't kill me!' "The prisoners were driven into the gully, and again I heard a volley. After that I stayed with my children. We could hear other volleys as each of the prisoners was taken out and shot. Then the train arrived from Havana, and just before it reached the village I heard two quick volleys and two single shots. That day I left the place with my family. The troops were killing all my neighbors. "The orders are given by the military commandant of Minas, whose name is Narciso de Fondesviela. This is a plain statement of the facts. On the next day the official reports declared that the Spanish troops at Campo Florida had ambushed a body of insurgents and killed ten of them without losing a man. "Four days ago the soldiers shot Jose Flores, a married farmer, and Feliciano Sosa, married, carpenter, thirty-eight years old, and also threw their bodies into the boiler. Since then the troops have been forced to dig a trench for the corpses, and the odor from the decaying bodies in the boiler prevents them from going near it. "I have confined my despatch to one little farming district close to Havana. The same stories reach me from all parts of the Island. But I have set down nothing without investigation. Imagine the scenes in the interior. No wonder foreign correspondents are not allowed to accompany the Spanish columns and are nearly all bottled up in Havana. "I take no sides in this war, and have no wish to harm the Spanish name. Many of the royal officers are men of fine character. But it is time to let the world know that America has an Armenia almost within sight of her shores." While this is under my eye, I receive a letter from Havana, written by a man whose name would be known to many people in the United States as carrying with it the certainty of truthfulness--and he is not a Cuban or Cuban sympathizer--mentioning in a casual business way, news from a plantation in the vicinity of Havana, that several of the servants had been shot--among them three elderly black men, when going unarmed about the fields attending to their accustomed work. This communication, of which no correspondent in Havana has the least knowledge--it is from a source entirely independent and impartial--and is confimation unimpeachable.