The Colonel of the Rough Riders
In the name of humanity, in the name of civilization, in behalf of endangered American interests, which give us the right and the duty to speak and act, the war in Cuba must stop.
President McKinley
Roosevelt had always felt the danger to the United States of maintaining a despicable or an inadequate Navy, and from the moment he entered the Navy Department, he set about pushing the construction of the unfinished vessels and of improving the quality of the personnel.
He was impelled to do this, not merely by his instinct to bring whatever he undertook up to the highest standard, but also because he had a premonition that a crisis was at hand, which might call the Country, at an instant’s notice, to protect itself with all the power it had.
Roosevelt was impressed by the insurrection in Cuba, which kept that Island in perpetual disorder. The cruel means, especially reconcentration and starvation, by which the Spaniards tried to put down the Cubans, stirred the sympathy of the Americans, and the number of those who believed that the United States ought to interfere in behalf of humanity, grew from month to month.
During his first year in office, Assistant Secretary Roosevelt busied himself with all the details of preparation. And all the while he watched the horizon towards Cuba, where the signs grew angrier and angrier.
But the young Secretary had to act with circumspection. President McKinley, desiring to keep the peace up to the very end, would not countenance any move which might seem to the Spaniards either a threat or an insult.
Early in the evening of February 15, 1898, the U. S. battleship Maine, peaceably riding at her moorings in Havana Harbour, was blown up. Two officers and 264 enlisted men were killed by the explosion and in the sinking of the ship.
The next morning, the newspapers carried the report to all parts of the United States, and, indeed, to the whole world. A tidal wave of anger surged over this Country.
“That means war!” was the common utterance.
I doubt whether Roosevelt ever worked with greater relish than during the weeks succeeding the blowing-up of the Maine. The Navy Department arranged in hot haste to victual the ships; to provide them with stores of coal and ammunition; to bring the crews up to their full quota by enlisting; to lay out a plan of campaign; to see to the naval bases and the lines of communication; and to coöperate with the War Department in making ready the land fortifications along the shore.
Having accomplished his duty as Assistant Secretary, Roosevelt resigned. He thought that he had a right to retire from that post, and to gratify his long cherished desire to take part in the actual warfare.
General Alger, the Secretary of War, had a great liking for Roosevelt, offered him a commission in the Army, and even the command of a regiment.
This he prudently declined, having no technical military knowledge. He proposed instead that Dr. Leonard Wood should be made Colonel, and that he should serve under Wood, as Lieutenant Colonel.
While Roosevelt finished his business at the Navy Department, Colonel Wood hurried to San Antonio, Texas, the rendezvous of the First Regiment of Volunteer Cavalry—the Rough Riders!
A call for volunteers, issued by Roosevelt and endorsed by Secretary Alger, spread through the West and Southwest, and it met with a quick response.
Not even in Garibaldi’s famous Thousand, was such a strange crowd gathered. It comprised cow-punchers, ranchmen, hunters, professional gamblers, and rascals of the Border, sportsmen, mingled with the society sports, former football players and oarsmen, polo players, and lovers of adventure from the great eastern cities. They all had one quality in common—courage—and they were all bound together by one common bond—devotion to Theodore Roosevelt.
Nearly every one of them knew him personally. Some of the western men had hunted or ranched with him. Some of the eastern had been with him in college, or had had contact with him in one of the many vicissitudes of his career.
I shall not attempt to follow in detail the story of the Rough Riders, but shall touch only on those matters which refer to Roosevelt himself.
Wood having been promoted to Brigadier General, in command of a larger unit, Theodore Roosevelt became Colonel of the regiment of Rough Riders.
On July 1 and 2, he commanded the Rough Riders in their attack on and capture of San Juan Hill, in connection with some coloured troops.
In this engagement, their nearest approach to a battle, the Rough Riders, who had less than five hundred men in action, lost eighty-nine in killed and wounded.
Then followed a dreary life in the trenches, until Santiago surrendered, and then a still more terrible experience, while they waited for Spain to give up the war.
Under a killing tropical sun, receiving irregular and often damaged food, without tent or other protection from the heat or from the rain, the Rough Riders endured for weeks the ravages of fever, climate, and privation.
Finally, because of Roosevelt’s insistence, the Government at Washington, without loss of time, ordered the Army home.
The sick were transported by thousands to Montauk Point, at the eastern end of Long Island, where in spite of the best medical care which could be improvised, large numbers of them died.
But the Army knew, and the American Public knew, that Roosevelt had saved multitudes of lives. At Montauk Point, he was the most popular man in America.
This concluded Roosevelt’s career as a soldier. The experience introduced to the Public those virile qualities of his, with which his friends were familiar.
William Roscoe Thayer (Arranged)