Manila, it was realized that the war must really be fought in the West. Both President McKinley and the Queen Regent of Spain had issued proclamations stating that t

monitors, and protected cruisers; the Spanish was the bet

h were small and used for scouting purposes. The largest and most efficient of these additional American ships were the subsidized St. Paul, St. Louis, New York, and Paris of the American line, of which the last two, renamed the Harvard and Yale, proved to be of great service. It was characteristic

r guns. Rumors of a projected raid by the fast Spanish armored cruisers kept the coast cities in a state of high excitement, and many sought, by petition and political pressure, to compel the Navy Department to detach vessels for their defense. The Naval War Board, however, had to remember that it must protect not only the coast but commerce also, and that the United Stat

nusual design, which was on the Pacific coast. On the 1st of March she was ordered from the Bremerton Yard, in the State of Washington, to San Francisco, and thence to report in the Atlantic. Her voyage was the longest emergency run undertaken up to that time by a modern battleship. The outbreak of the war with Spain meant the sealing of all ports in which she m

rdenas to Bahia. Key West was soon filled with Spanish prizes. On the 27th of April a brush took place between batteries at Matanzas and some of the American vessels, without loss of life on either side, except for a mule which bids fair to become immortal in history through being reported by the Spanish as their only casualty and the first of the war. Admiral Sampson, following the trad

f cruisers under Comm

the coast from the De

y be supposed," writes

but in deference to

s on th

Colon, three armored cruisers, and two torpedo boat destroyers. It was a reasonably powerful fleet as fleets went in the Spanish War, yet it is difficult to see just what good it could accomplish when it arrived on the scene of action. The naval superiority in the West Indies would still be in the hands of the concentrated American Navy, for the Spanish forces would still be divided, only more equally, between Spanish and Caribbean waters. The American v

, and the Spanish fleet was magnified by the mist of uncertainty until it became a national terror. Sampson, rightly divining that Cervera would make for San Juan, the capital and chief seaport of Porto Rico, detached from his blockading force a fighting squadron with which he sailed east, but not finding the Spanish fleet he turned

can fleet either to split into two divisions separated by eight hundred miles or to leave him free range of action. Next to San Juan he would have preferred Havana or, Cienfuegos, which were connected by railroad and near which

Cienfuegos and of Santiago are both landlocked by high hills, and Cervera had entered Santiago without being noticed by the Americans, as that part of the coast was not under blockade. Schley thought Cervera was at Cienfuegos; Sampson was of the opinion that he was at Santi

he sea was open for the passage of an American expeditionary force. Nearly the whole island of Cuba was now under blockade, and the insurgents were receiving supplies from the United States. It had been proved that the fairly even balance of the two fleets, so anxiously scanned when

hipped hastily into a semblance of fighting condition, set out eastward under Admiral Camara to contest the Philippines with Dewey. It was impossible for the United States to detach a force sufficient to cross the Atlantic and, without a base, meet this fleet in its home waters. Even if a smaller squadron were dispatched from the Atlantic round Cape H

ier Merrimac at a narrow point in the channel, where, lying full length, she would completely prevent egress. It was a delicate task and one of extraordinary danger. It was characteristic of the spirit of the fleet that, as Admiral Chadwick says, practically all the men were volunteers. The honor of the command was given to Lieutenant Richmond Pearson Hobson, Assistant Naval Constructor, who had been in charge of

lease the American fleet. This new plan contemplated the reduction of Santiago by a combined military and naval attack. Cervera's choice of Santiago