The Arizona rough riders Item Type text; Thesis-Reproduction (electronic) Authors Herner, Charles Publisher The University of Arizona. Rights Copyright © is held by the author. Digital access to this material is made possible by the University Libraries, University of Arizona. Further transmission, reproduction or presentation (such as public display or performance) of protected items is prohibited except with permission of the author. Download date 04/10/2021 02:07:43 Link to Item http://hdl.handle.net/10150/551769 THE ARIZONA ROUGH RIDERS b y Harlan C. Herner A Thesis Submitted to the Faculty of the DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of MASTER OF ARTS In the Graduate College THE UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA 1965 STATEMENT BY AUTHOR This thesis has been submitted in partial fulfillment of require­ ments for an advanced degree at the University of Arizona and is deposited in the University Library to be made available to borrowers under the rules of the Library. Brief quotations from this thesis are allowable without special permission, provided that accurate acknowledgment of source is made. Requests for permission for extended quotation from or reproduction of this manuscript in whole or in part may be granted by the head of the major department or the dean of the Graduate College when in his judgment the proposed use of this material is in the interests of scholarship. In all other instances, however, permission must be obtained from the author. SIGNED: MsA* J'73^, APPROVAL BY THESIS DIRECTOR This thesis has been approved on the date shown below: G > Harwood P. Hinton Assistant Professor of History ACKNOW LEDGMENTS The author is indebted to all those who contributed information, encouragement, and help in the preparation of this study. Space prohibits a complete list of all who rendered assistance, but the author wishes to thank Dr. B. Sacks of Baltimore, Maryland, and Senator Carl Hayden for securing documents from the National Archives. Chris Emmett of Santa Fe, New Mexico, provided news items from the San Antonio Light and San Antonio Express. Special acknowledgment should be made of Mrs. Georgia Muir, Mrs. Mary Delanie, Robert L. Patterson, General Geoffrey Keyes, Colonel Tim McCoy, M rs. Gwendolyn Penniman, and Hermann Hagedorn for contributing information and family records. Bert Firem an of the Arizona Historical Foundation and Andrew Wallace of the Arizona Pioneers' Historical Society gave valuable assistance. Of the living Rough Riders, Arthur Tuttle rendered unusually fine cooperation as did George Hamner, Jesse Langdon, Arthur Stockbridge, and Charles Hopping. Assistant Professor Harwood P. Hinton, University of Arizona, gave invaluable help while guiding much of the research and preparation of the manuscript. Special thanks are extended to Professor John A. Carroll who iii provided his remarkable inspiration while supervising the research and compilation of the first chapter in a seminar at the University of Arizona. ABSTRACT Few m ilitary units have created more controversy than the F irst United States Volunteer Cavalry of 1898. Although originally commanded by Colonel Leonard Wood, the regiment won acclamation under Lieutenant Colonel Theodore Roosevelt. Initially to be com­ posed of men gathered from the four territories, the unit later included recruits from other areas. The idea of forming a regiment of volunteer cavalry originated in Arizona two months before the outbreak of the Spanish-American War on April 25, 1898, Conceived by Alexander Oswald Brodie, a graduate of West Point, the plan to raise an entire regiment in Arizona was widely supported. When the call for volunteers came, however, only two hundred men from Arizona could be accepted. In addition to Brodie, many were men of stature. From Prescott came William O. "Buckey" O'Neill, who was to find a dramatic death at the head of his troop below Kettle Hill in Cuba. From Yuma came towering Albert Wright, who was to bear the regimental colors-- hand-sewn by a group of Phoenix ladies--through two engagements. Hailed by Colonel Wood as the finest body of men he had ever seen together, the Arizona Rough Riders made a unique contribution to the m ilitary history of Arizona. v TABLE OF CONTENTS Chapter Page IN T R O D U C T IO N ..................................................................................... 1 I. THE CALL FOR VOLUNTEERS ............................................. 9 III. IN TRAINING AT SAN ANTONIO ........................................... 37 IE . ON TO CUBA .............................. 67 IV . LAS QUASI MAS ................................................................................. 90 V. V IC TO R Y A T SAN JU A N .............................................................. 123 VI. WAITING FOR ORDERS AT TAMPA ................................... 156 V II. F A R E W E L L TO CUBA ................................................................... 171 V U L R E T U R N T O A R IZ O N A .................................................................. 197 REFERENCES ....................................................................................... 218 vi INTRODUCTION The winds of revolt that swept Latin America in the early part of the nineteenth century touched but briefly on Cuba. It was not until seventy-five years later that this island, the last major Spanish colony in the Am ericas, finally broke away from Spain. In the process of gaining their independence, the Cubans drew the United States into a brief but important war with Spain. In the United States the rising feeling of im perialism played its part in the coming of the war, but other factors also were significant. The frontier was gone, the Indian wars were over, and the nation was turning from an agrarian to an industrial society. The political leaders were looking for new issues. In this era of change and instability, the armed rebellion in Cuba became an emotional topic of discussion from coast to coast. ^ 1. For general accounts of the causes of the Spanish- American War, see Samuel Flag Demis, A Diplomatic History of the United States (4th ed., New York, 1961), 432-50; Alexander DeConde, A History of American Foreign Policy (New York, 1963), 339-48; and Richard W. Leopold, The Growth of American Foreign Policy; A History (New York, 1962), 167-79. For detailed informa­ tion on the situation in Cuba and a description of war preparations in the United States, see W alter Mi His, The M artial Spirit; A Study of Our War with Spain (Boston, 1931). An excellent analysis of the growing desire to acquire foreign possessions in the late nineteenth century may be found in Julius W. Pratt, The Expansionists of 1898: The Acquisition of Hawaii and the Spanish islands (Baltimore, lyj6). 1 2 When they realized that the course of the nation finally wae plotted for war, young men flocked into the Volunteer Army, The 15th of February, 1898, began like any other day for the officers and crew of the U.S.S. Maine. With their vessel anchored in Havana Harbor on the northwest coast of Cuba since January 25, the crew followed a well-established routine. That evening Captain Charles D. Sigsbee sat down to write a letter to his wife. Shortly after taps the captain finished him letter and glanced at hie watch. It was twenty minutes before ten. At that moment there was a tremendous explosion and the ship began to settle. Stumbling through the dark, debris-strewn passageways, Sigsbee managed to make his way to the main deck, where he supervised rescue operations. Within fifteen minutes all survivors had been taken to neighboring ships, and the Maine was abandoned. Aboard the City of Washington, a commercial transport, Sigsbee wired his prelim inary report to Secretary of Navy John D. Long, concluding with the forlorn plea: "Public opinion should be suspended until further report. 2. A. C. M. Azoy, Charge: The Story of the Battle of San Juan Hill (New York, 1961), 14, 16, 17, 20. The Maine boasted a displace­ ment of 6, 680 tons and could travel at a top speed of seventeen knots. Its prim ary armament consisted of four ten-inch guns. Donald W. Mitchell, History of the Modern American Navy from 1883 through Pearl Harbor (New York, 1946), 19. Of the crew of three hundred and fifty, two hundred and fifty-two were killed in the explosion. MiUis, M artial Spirit, 105. 3 The circum stances which brought the Maine to Havana grew out of a revival of the periodic attempts by the Cubans to free their island. Early in the nineteenth century there had been several desultory revolts, but the mass of Negro slaves along the coast and poor whites in the mountains had not supported the revolutionary movements. The United States, however, offered a nearby sanctuary, and many Cuban patriots took refuge there between revolutions. The Cubans found the citizens of the United States generally sympathetic to their cause. On several occasions the Cubans even were able to arouse adventerous American filibustering 3 expeditions. The ten-year revolt from 1868 to 1878 saw Spain commit a political blunder by hanging some Americans captured while gun-running. The resulting furor caused Secretary of State Hamilton Fish to warn Spain either to affect a reconciliation on the island or prepare for intervention by other governments. Three years later, in 1878, a change of government in Madrid finally brought peace to the island. As before, however, the die-hard revolutionary leaders took refuge in the United States and continued 4 to p lo t. 3. Frank Freidel, The Splendid Little War (Boston, 1958), 4 - 6 . 4, Mi Ilia, M artial Spirit, 14-15 4 At their headquarters in New York City, the Cuban Revolutionary Party under Jose Julian M arti, waited for an opportunity to launch another revolt. It came in 1893 when the panic ruined the sugar business in Cuba. The following year the sugar industry suffered another set back when the Wilson tariff restored duty on that Cuban staple.