ouncil of officers, hoping by
united action of a more or less public character to wake up the
Washington authorities to the actual condition of things. As all the
Spanish forces in the province of Santiago had surrendered, and as
so-called immune regiments were coming to garrison the conquered
territory, there was literally not one thing of any kind whatsoever
for the army to do, and no purpose to serve by keeping it at Santiago.
We did not suppose that peace was at hand, being ignorant of the
negotiations. We were anxious to take part in the Porto Rico campaign,
and would have been more than willing to suffer any amount of
sickness, if by so doing we could get into action. But if we were not
to take part in the Porto Rico campaign, then we knew it was
absolutely indispensable to get our commands north immediately, if
they were to be in trim for the great campaign against Havana, which
would surely be the main event of the winter if peace were not
declared in advance.

Our army included the great majority of the regulars, and was,
therefore, the flower of the American force. It was on every account
imperative to keep it in good trim; and to keep it in Santiago meant
its entirely purposeless destruction. As soon as the surrender was an
accomplished fact, the taking away of the army to the north should
have begun.

Every officer, from the highest to the lowest, especially among the
regulars, realized all of this, and about the last day of July,
General Shafter called a conference, in the palace, of all the
division and brigade commanders. By this time, owing to Wood's having
been made Governor-General, I was in command of my brigade, so I went
to the conference too, riding in with Generals Sumner and Wheeler, who
were the other representatives of the cavalry division. Besides the
line officers all the chief medical officers were present at the
conference. The telegrams from the Secretary stating the position of
himself and the Surgeon-General were read, and then almost every line
and medical officer present expressed his views in turn. They were
almost all regulars and had been brought up to life-long habits of
obedience without protest. They were ready to obey still, but they
felt, quite rightly, that it was their duty to protest rather than to
see the flower of the United States forces destroyed as the
culminating act of a campaign in which the blunders that had been
committed had been retrieved only by the valor and