s
being completely intermingled--white regulars, colored regulars, and
Rough Riders. General Sumner had kept a considerable force in reserve
on Kettle Hill, under Major Jackson, of the Third Cavalry. We were
still under a heavy fire and I got together a mixed lot of men and
pushed on from the trenches and ranch-houses which we had just taken,
driving the Spaniards through a line of palm-trees, and over the crest
of a chain of hills. When we reached these crests we found ourselves
overlooking Santiago. Some of the men, including Jenkins, Greenway,
and Goodrich, pushed on almost by themselves far ahead. Lieutenant
Hugh Berkely, of the First, with a sergeant and two troopers, reached
the extreme front. He was, at the time, ahead of everyone; the
sergeant was killed and one trooper wounded; but the lieutenant and
the remaining trooper stuck to their post for the rest of the
afternoon until our line was gradually extended to include them.

While I was re-forming the troops on the chain of hills, one of
General Sumner's aides, Captain Robert Howze--as dashing and gallant
an officer as there was in the whole gallant cavalry division, by the
way--came up with orders to me to halt where I was, not advancing
farther, but to hold the hill at all hazards. Howze had his horse, and
I had some difficulty in making him take proper shelter; he stayed
with us for quite a time, unable to make up his mind to leave the
extreme front, and meanwhile jumping at the chance to render any
service, of risk or otherwise, which the moment developed.

I now had under me all the fragments of the six cavalry regiments
which were at the extreme front, being the highest officer left there,
and I was in immediate command of them for the remainder of the
afternoon and that night. The Ninth was over to the right, and the
Thirteenth Infantry afterward came up beside it. The rest of Kent's
infantry was to our left. Of the Tenth, Lieutenants Anderson, Muller,
and Fleming reported to me; Anderson was slightly wounded, but he paid
no heed to this. All three, like every other officer, had troopers of
various regiments under them; such mixing was inevitable in making
repeated charges through thick jungle; it was essentially a troop
commanders', indeed, almost a squad leaders', fight. The Spaniards who
had been holding the trenches and the line of hills, had fallen back
upon their supports and we were under a very heavy fire both from
rifles and great guns. At th