Chapter 13

The _Bermuda_ sailed the next morning, March 15, with O'Brien in command, cleared for Vera Cruz. The Cubans, including General Calixto Garcia, who were to go on the expedition, were sent to Atlantic City, there to engage a fishing sloop to take them off-shore where they would be picked up by the _Bermuda_ on her way. The ship was under suspicion, and was followed down the bay by tugboats carrying United States marshals, customs officers, and newspaper reporters. O'Brien says: "They hung on to us down through the lower bay and out past Sandy Hook, without getting enough to pay for a pound of the coal they were furiously burning to keep up with us. I don't know how far they might have followed us, but when we were well clear of the Hook, a kind fortune sent along a blinding snow-storm, which soon chased them back home." General Garcia and his companions were picked up as planned, and that part of the enterprise was completed. The vessel was on its way. A somewhat roundabout route was taken in order to avoid any possible overhauling by naval or revenue ships. The point selected for the landing was a little harbor on the north coast about thirty miles from the eastern end of the island. The party included two Cuban pilots, supposed to know the coast where they were to land. One of them proved to be a traitor and the other, O'Brien says, "was at best an ignoramus." The traitor, who, after the landing, paid for his offence with his life, tried to take them into the harbor of Baracoa, where lay five Spanish warships. But O'Brien knew the difference, as shown by his official charts, between the Cape Maisi light, visible for eighteen miles, and the Baracoa light, visible for only eight miles, and kicked the pilot off the bridge. The landing was begun at half-past ten at night, and completed about three o'clock in the morning, with five Spanish warships barely more than five miles away. The United States Treasury Department reported this expedition as "successful." The vessel then proceeded to Honduras, where it took on a cargo of bananas, and returned, under orders, to Philadelphia, the home city of its owner, Mr. John D. Hart. Arrests were made soon after the arrival, including Hart, the owner of the vessel, O'Brien, and his mate, and General Emilio Nuñez who accompanied the expedition as the representative of the _junta_. The case was transferred from the courts in Philadelphia to New York, and there duly heard. The alleged offenders were defended by Horatio Rubens, Esq., of New York, the official counsel of the _junta_. One of the grounds of the defence was that the defendants might be guilty of smuggling arms into Cuba, but with that offence the courts of the United States had nothing to do. The jury disagreed. The indictments were held over the heads of the members of the group, but no further action was taken, and two or three years later the case was dismissed by order of the Attorney General of the United States.

This expedition fairly illustrates the science of filibustering in its elementary form, a clearance with some attendant risk; a voyage with possibility of interference at any time; and a landing made with still greater risk and danger of capture. The trip had been made so successfully and with such full satisfaction to the promoters that the _junta_ urged O'Brien to remain with them as long as there should be need for his services, and he agreed to do so. A department of expeditions was organized under the general control of Emilio Nuñez, with O'Brien as navigator. Credit for the numerous successful expeditions that followed lies in differing degrees with Nuñez, Palma, Rubens, O'Brien, Hart, Cartaya, and others less well known in connection with the enterprises. But for the work they did, the risks they ran, Cuba's revolution must have failed. All of them risked jail sentences, and some of them risked their lives in ways perhaps even more dangerous than fighting in the field. The success of the _Bermuda_ expedition, carried out by what may be called direct evasion, quite seriously disturbed the authorities in this country, and excited them to greater precautions and wider activity. Whatever may have been their personal feelings in the matter, it was their duty to see that the laws of the country were enforced as far as they could be. The players of the game for the Cubans met the new activities with complicated moves, many of which puzzled the watching officials, and landed a number of expeditions. Meanwhile, minor expeditions continued. The official report notes that on March 12, 1896, the _Commodore_, a 100-ton steamer, sailed from Charleston with men, arms, and ammunition, and landed them in Cuba. The _Laurada_, a 900-ton steamer, was reported by the Spanish Legation as having sailed on May 9, meeting three tugs and two lighters, off the coast, from which were transferred men and arms. The report states that "some of the men landed in Cuba, but the larger part of the arms and ammunition was thrown into the sea," which may or may not have been the case. On May 23, the tug _Three Friends_ left Jacksonville, took on men and arms from two small vessels waiting outside, and landed all in Cuba. A month later, and again two months later, the _Three Friends_ repeated the trip from Florida ports. On June 17, the _Commodore_ made another successful trip from Charleston.

While these and other minor expeditions were going on, the department of expeditions in New York was busy with a more extensive enterprise. An order was placed for 3000 rifles, 3,000,000 rounds of ammunition, 3 12-pound Hotchkiss field-guns and 600 shells, _machetes_, and several tons of dynamite. The steamer _Laurada_ was chartered, and the ocean-going tug _Dauntless_ was bought in Brunswick, Georgia. A part of the purchased munitions was ordered to New York, and the remainder, two car loads, shipped to Jacksonville by express. Ostensibly, the _Laurada_ was to sail from Philadelphia to Jamaica for a cargo of fruit, a business in which she had at times engaged. Her actual instructions were to proceed to the vicinity of Barnegat, about forty miles from New York, and there, at sea, await orders. The arms and ammunition came down from Bridgeport on the regular boat from that city, and were left on board until night. There was no particular secrecy about the shipment, and detectives followed it. But when, at dark, the big gates of the dock were closed and locked and all seemed over for the day, the watchers assumed that nothing would be done until the next day, and went away. But, immediately after their departure, a big lighter slipped quietly into the dock across the wharf from the Bridgeport boat, a swarm of men appeared and, behind the closed gates, in the semi-darkness of the wharf, rushed boxes from steamer to lighter. The work was finished at midnight; a tug slipped up and attached a hawser to the lighter; and the cargo was on its way to Cuba. Johnny O'Brien was on the tug. The _Laurada_ was met off Barnegat, as arranged, and the cargo and about fifty Cubans put on board of her. She was ordered to proceed slowly to Navassa Island where the _Dauntless_ would meet her. General Nuñez and O'Brien returned to New York on the tug, and while the detectives suspected that something had been done, they had no clue whatever to guide them. Nuñez and O'Brien started immediately for Charleston, with detectives at their heels. The _Commodore_, a tug then owned by the Cubans, lay in the harbor of that city, with a revenue cutter standing guard over her. She was ordered to get up steam and to go through all the motions of an immediate departure. But this was a ruse to draw attention away from the actual operations. Rubens, meanwhile, had gone to Jacksonville where he busied himself in convincing the authorities that the tug _Three Friends_ was about to get away with an expedition. With one revenue cutter watching the _Commodore_ in Charleston, the other cutter in the neighborhood was engaged in watching the _Three Friends_ in Jacksonville, thus leaving a clear coast between those cities. In Charleston were about seventy-five Cubans waiting a chance to get to the island. O'Brien states that about twenty-five detectives were following their party. Late in the afternoon of August 13, while the smoke was pouring from the funnels of the _Commodore_, the regular south-bound train pulled out of the city. Its rear car was a reserved coach carrying the Cuban party, numbering a hundred or so. Detectives tried to enter, but were told that it was a private car, which it was. They went along in the forward cars. At ten o'clock that night, the train reached Callahan, where the Coast Line crossed the Seaboard Air Line. While the train was halted for the crossing, that rear car was quietly uncoupled. The train went on, detectives and all. The railroad arrangements were effected through the invaluable assistance of Mr. Alphonso Fritot, a local railway man whose authority enabled him to do with trains and train movement whatever he saw fit. He was himself of Cuban birth, though of French-American parentage, with ample reason, both personal and patriotic, for serving his Cuban friends, and his services were beyond measure. By his orders, when that train with its band of detectives had pulled away for Jacksonville, an engine picked up the detached car and ran it over to the Coast Line. A few miles away, it collected from a blind siding the two cars of arms and ammunition shipped some days before, from Bridgeport. A little further on, the line crossed the Satilla River. There lay the _Dauntless_, purchased by Rubens. Steam was up, and a quick job was made of transferring cargo and men from train to boat. Another tug brought a supply of coal, and soon after sunrise another expedition was on its way to Cuba. All this may be very immoral, but some who were on the expedition have told me that it was at least tremendously exciting.

On August 17, the passengers and cargo were landed on the Cuban coast near Nuevitas. The tug then proceeded to Navassa Island to meet the _Laurada_. Half of the men and half of the cargo of the steamer were transferred to the tug, and all were safely landed in a little cove a few miles west of Santiago. The landing was made in broad daylight. There were a number of Spanish naval vessels in Santiago harbor, and the city itself was filled with Spanish troops. The tug then returned for the remainder of the _Laurada's_ passengers and cargo, all of which were landed a few days later at the place of the earlier landing. The _Laurada_ went on to Jamaica and loaded with bananas, with which she sailed for Charleston. Arrests were made as a result of the expedition, and the owner of the ship, Mr. John D. Hart, was convicted and sentenced to sixteen months in the penitentiary. After serving four months of his term, a pardon was secured. He is said to be the only one, out of all those engaged in the many expeditions, who was actually convicted, and his only offence was the chartering of his ships to the Cuban revolutionists. The _Dauntless_ was seized on her return to Jacksonville, but was soon released. An effort was made to indict O'Brien, but there was too much sympathy for the Cubans in Florida, where the effort was made. A number of minor expeditions were carried out in the next few months, by the _Dauntless_, the _Three Friends_, and the _Commodore_, the latter being wrecked in the last week in December.

In February, 1897, another complicated manoeuvre was successfully executed. This involved the use of the _Bermuda_, the _Laurada_, and no less than seven smaller auxilliary vessels, tugs, lighters, and schooners. Rut the _Laurada_ landed the cargo on the north-eastern coast of the island. As O'Brien tells the story, this successful expedition so angered Captain-General Weyler, then the ruler of the island, that he sent a message to the daring filibuster, through an American newspaper man, somewhat as follows: "Tell O'Brien that we will get him, sooner or later, and when we do, instead of having him shot along with his Cuban companions, I am going to have him ignominiously hanged from the flag-pole at Cabaña, in full view of the city." Cabaña is the old fortress across the bay, visible from nearly all parts of Havana. To this, O'Brien sent reply saying: "To show my contempt for you and all who take orders from you, I will make a landing within plain sight of Havana on my next trip to Cuba. I may even land an expedition inside of the harbor and take you away a prisoner. If we should capture you, which is much more likely than that you will ever capture me, I will have you chopped up into small pieces and fed to the fires of the _Dauntless_." A few months later, this little Irishman, whom Weyler denounced as a "bloodthirsty, dare-devil," and who may have been a dare-devil but was not bloodthirsty, actually carried out a part of this seemingly reckless threat. He landed a cargo within a mile and a half of Morro Castle.

By this time, vessels of the United States navy were employed, supplementing the work of the Revenue Service. This, of course, added both difficulty and danger to the work. In March and April, several expeditions were interrupted. For the Spanish blockade of the Cuban coast, there was only contempt. Captain O'Brien told a naval officer that if the navy and the revenue cutters would let him alone he would "advertise the time and place of departure, carry excursions on every trip, and guarantee that every expedition would be landed on time." In May, 1897, two carloads of arms and ammunition were shipped from New York to Jacksonville, but, by the authority of Mr. Fritot, they were quietly dropped from the train at a junction point, and sent to Wilmington, N.C. Their contents were transferred to the tug _Alexander Jones_, and that boat proceeded nonchalantly down the river. Soon afterward, an old schooner, the _John D. Long_, loaded with coal, followed the tug. Two revenue cutters were on hand, but there was nothing in the movements of these vessels to excite their interest. Off shore, the tug attached a towline to the schooner that was carrying its coal supply, its own bunkers being crammed with guns and cartridges. Off Palm Beach, General Nuñez and some sixty Cubans were taken from a fishing boat, according to a prearranged plan. Two days later, at an agreed upon place, they were joined by the _Dauntless_ which had slipped out of Jacksonville. The excursion was then complete. About half the cargo of the _Jones_ was transferred to the _Dauntless_ and was landed, May 21, a few miles east of Nuevitas. A second trip took the remainder of the cargo of the _Jones_ and most of the Cuban passengers, and landed the lot under the very guns, such as they were, of Morro Castle, and within about three miles of the Palace of Captain-General Weyler. All that time, a force of insurgents under Rodriguez and Aurenguren was operating in that immediate vicinity, and was in great need of the supplies thus obtained. Some of the dynamite then landed was used the next day to blow up a train on which Weyler was supposed to be travelling, but in their haste the Cubans got one train ahead of that carrying the official party. The row that Weyler made about this landing will probably never be forgotten by the subordinates who were the immediate victims of his rage.

These are only a few of the many expeditions, successful and unsuccessful, made during those three eventful years. The Treasury Department report of February 28, 1898, gives seventeen successful operations. As a matter of fact, more than forty landings were made, although in a few cases a single expedition accounted for two, and in one or two instances for three landings. The experiences run through the entire gamut of human emotions, from absurdity to tragedy. The former is illustrated by the case of the _Dauntless_ when she was held up by a vessel of the United States navy, and boarded by one of the officers of the ship. He examined the tug from stem to stern, sat on boxes of ammunition which seemed to him to be boxes of sardines, stumbled over packages of rifles from which butts and muzzles protruded; and failed utterly to find anything that could be regarded as contraband. The mere fact that a vessel is engaged in transporting arms and ammunition does not, of necessity, bring it within reach of the law. But that particular vessel was a good deal more than under suspicion; it was under the closest surveillance and open to the sharpest scrutiny. The temporary myopia of that particular lieutenant of the United States navy was no more than an outward and visible sign of a well-developed sense of humor, and an indication of at least a personal sympathy for the Cubans in their struggle. Tragedy is illustrated by the disaster to the steamer _Tillie_. One day, late in January, 1898, this vessel, lying off the end of Long Island, took on one of the largest cargoes ever started on a filibustering expedition to Cuba. The cause is not known, but soon after starting a leak developed, beyond the capacity of the pumps. A heavy sea was running, and disaster was soon inevitable. The cargo was thrown overboard to lighten the ship and the vessel was headed for the shore on the chance that it might float until it could be beached. The water in the ship increased rapidly, and extinguished the fires under the boilers; the wind, blowing a high gale, swung into the northwest, thus driving the now helpless hulk out to sea. Huge combing waves swept the decks from end to end. O'Brien tells the story: "We looked in vain for another craft of any kind, and by the middle of the afternoon it seemed as though it was all up with us, for there was not much daylight left, and with her deck almost awash it was impossible that the _Tillie_ should keep afloat all night. The gale had swept us rapidly out to sea. The wind, which was filled with icy needles, had kicked up a wild cross-sea, and it was more comfortable to go down with the ship than even to think of trying to escape in the boats." At last, when there seemed no longer any hope of rescue, the big five-masted schooner _Governor Ames_ came plunging through the heaving seas, and, by masterly seamanship and good fortune, backed by the heroism of her commander and crew, succeeded in taking off all except four, who went down with the ship. But the work went on. There is not space here to tell of the several vessels whose names, through the engagement of the craft in these enterprises, became as familiar to newspaper readers as are the names of ocean liners today. A few months later, the United States Government sent its ships and its men to help those who, for three hard years, had struggled for national independence.

XII

_THE STORY OF SUGAR_

Chemically, sugar is a compound belonging to the group of carbohydrates, or organic compounds of carbon with oxygen and hydrogen. The group includes sugars, starches, gums, and celluloses. Sugar is a product of the vegetable kingdom, of plants, trees, root crops, etc. It is found in and is producible from many growths. As a laboratory process, it is obtainable from many sources, but, commercially, it is derived from only two, the sugar cane and the beet root. This statement, however, has a certain limitation in that it omits such products as maple sugar, malt sugar, milk sugar, and others having commercial or chemical uses on a limited scale. But it is only with the crystallized sucrose, the familiar sugar of the market and the household, that we are dealing here. The output of the other sugars is measurable in hundreds or even thousands of pounds, but the output of the sugar of commerce is measured in millions of tons. Long experience proves that the desired substance is most readily, most abundantly, and most cheaply, obtained from the juices of the plant commonly known as sugar cane, and from the vegetable known as the sugar beet.

The mechanical processes employed in producing sugar from cane and from beets, are practically the same. They are, broadly, the extraction or expression of the juices, their clarification and evaporation, and crystallization. These processes produce what is called "raw sugar," of varying percentages of sucrose content. Following them, there comes, for American uses, the process of refining, of removing the so-called impurities and foreign substances, and the final production of sugar in the shape of white crystals of different size, of sugar as powdered, cube, loaf, or other form. In the case of cane sugar, this is usually a secondary operation not conducted in the original mill. In the case of beet sugar, production is not infrequently a continuous operation in the same mill, from the beet root to the bagged or barrelled sugar ready for the market. The final product from both cane and beet is practically the same. Pure sugar is pure sugar, whatever its source. In the commercial production, on large scale, there remains a small fraction of molasses or other harmless substances, indistinguishable by sight, taste, or smell. With that fraction removed and an absolute 100 per cent. secured, there would be no way by which the particular origin could be determined. For all practical purposes, the sugar of commerce, whether from cane or beet, is pure sugar. It is doubtful if an adulterated sugar can be found in the United States, notwithstanding the tales of the grocer who "sands" his sugar, and of the producer who adds _terra alba_ or some other adulterant. In some countries of Europe and elsewhere, there are sugars of inferior grades, of 85 or 90 or more degrees of sugar purity, but they are known as such and are sold at prices adjusted to their quality. Sugars of that class are obtainable in this country, but they are wanted almost exclusively for particular industrial purposes, for their glucose rather than their sucrose content. The American household, whether the home of the rich or of the poor, demands the well-known white sugar of established purity.

There is still obtainable, in this country, but in limited quantity, a sugar very pleasantly remembered by many who have reached or passed middle age. It was variously known as "Muscovado" sugar, or as "plantation sugar," sometimes as "coffee" or "coffee crushed." It was a sugar somewhat sweeter to the taste than the white sugar, by reason of the presence of a percentage of molasses. It was a superior sugar for certain kitchen products, for pies, certain kinds of cake, etc. It has many times been urged in Congress that the employment of what is known as the Dutch Standard, now abolished, excluded this sugar from our market. This is not at all the fact. The disappearance of the commodity is due solely to change in the mechanical methods of sugar production. It would be quite impossible to supply the world's sugar demand by the old "open kettle" process by which that sugar was made. The quality of sugar is easily tested by any one who has a spoonful of sugar and a glass of water. If the sugar dissolves entirely, and dissolves without discoloring the water, it may be accepted as a pure sugar.