Show BATTLE OF SANTIAGO Lieutenant Wells Tells The Herald More Interesting Details MISTAKE OF SPANIARDS COULD HAVE TTATE A MUCH STRONGER RESISTANCE Outgeneraled as Well as Outfought Our Soldiers Were In the Rain Every Afternoon and Endured Great But Unavoidable Hardships The Yellow Fever Lieutenant Briant H Wells of the Second Sec-ond United States infantry whose return home from the battle of Santiago was announced an-nounced exclusively In yesterday mornings morn-ings Herald has recovered almost com pletely from the wound received during the second days battle before that doomed city When seen yesterday he looked a picture of health and said he was feeling splendidly Lieutenant Wells modestly declines to talk about his own part m the tiirht though as a member of Genera Kents division he was in the very thick of It It vs on the afternoon of July 2 about an hour before the lighting ceased that he received a flesh wound in the thIgh and was carried to th < 4rear He brings many interesting details however about the hardships of battle and the tremendous strain upon the soldiers in that disagreeable disagree-able country THE SPANIARDS MISTAKE From the nature of the surroundings where the American forces landed he believed be-lieved the Spaniards could have made a much better stand had they attacked the former as they came off the transports and during the early part of the advance ONLY ONE ROAD There was really but one road along which the entire army had to travel and his was through brush and undergrowth Had the enemy concentrated a larger force during the American advance they could almost have annihilated our army But aside from small skirmishing there was little resistance until the outskirts of Santiago proper was reached RAIN EVERY DAY Lieutenant Wells says that all the time he was in Cuba it rained heavily every afternoon We were sent out with three days rations he said a blanket and 200 rounds of ammunition As the boys marched they were drenched to the skin and had to sleep on wet blankets at night In the morning there was always a heavy dew whmile later in the day the scorchlrg sun would beat down upon us Do ou wonder that the men are contracting malarial fever And that is not all During Dur-ing the fight our rations ran out and for a time we had nothing to eat The rain would fill up our trenches but we had to star in them to protect us from the enemys fire AS TO YELLOW FEVER There is not so much yellow fever among the troops as generally supposed The great trouble is malarial compiaints If the ever should break out in its most virulous form there would be a heavy death rate for the troops are In no condition con-dition to withstand the disease being weak from the malarial ailments HOSPITAL ARRANGEMENTS The lieutenant says the hospital arrangements ar-rangements were all that could be expected ex-pected The wounded were promptly cared for and given medical attention without delay STILL FULL OF FIGHT Lieutenant Wells was taken aboard the Hudson a transport and for a week or so they cruised around among the ships of the blockading squadron On July 10 they departed for Fortress Monroe where the wounded were taken ashore He made an effort to rejoin his own regiment but as the war department did not wish to send any more men into that fever infested in-fested locality he did not secure permission permis-sion A request to join the Porto Rico expedition was also refused Lieutenant Wells Is now on waiting orders or-ders For a time he will assist in straightening straight-ening matters out in the affairs of the i national guard though he said he was not sent here for the purpose of reorganizing it He is glad to be home again |