Our War with Spain for Cuba's FreedomWhite, Trumbull
History
Our War with Spain for Cuba's Freedom
White, Trumbull
Cuba -- History; Spain -- Foreign relations -- United States; Spanish-American War, 1898; United States -- Foreign relations -- Spain
"To tell the story of the escape briefly, I came here three weeks
ago, having been told to go to Cuba and rescue from her prison
Miss Cisneros, a tenderly-reared girl, descended from one of the
best families in the island, and herself a martyr to the
unsatisfied desires of a beast in Spanish uniform. I arrived at
Cienfuegos late in September, telegraphed to a known and tried man
in Santiago de Cuba to meet me in Havana, and then went to Santa
Clara, where I picked up a second man, known to be as gritty as
Sahara, and then proceeded to Havana.
"Here I remained in almost absolute concealment, so as to avoid
the spies that dog one's steps wherever one may go, and make
impossible any clever work of this kind. Both the men who
accompanied me, Joseph Hernandon and Harrison Mallory, pursued the
same course, and remained quiet until all plans had been
completed.
"The fact that Miss Cisneros was incommunicado made the attempt
seem at first beyond the possibility of success, but we finally,
through Hernandon, who was born on the island, and speaks Spanish
like a native, succeeded in sending a note to her through an old
negress, who called upon one of her friends in the prison. A
keeper got this note through two hands to Miss Cisneros, and three
keepers later got to her a package of drugged sweets. Having
established communication with her, we began work without losing a
day."
THE PRISON LEFT BEHIND.
Mr. Decker then tells hew he rented a house adjoining the prison,
and instructed Miss Cisneros to give the drugged candies to the
other women who were in the prison with her. As soon as the drug
produced the desired effect on them, the bars of the prison were
cut from the outside, and Miss Cisneros was assisted through the
window, onto the roof of the house Mr. Decker had rented, kept in
concealment for two days, and then smuggled on board a ship, bound
for the land of liberty.
Her arrival in New York is thus described:
"Evangeline Cisneros, one week ago a prisoner among the outcast
wretches in a Havana prison, is a guest at the Waldorf hotel.
Surrounded by luxury and elegance, she is alternately laughing and
crying over the events of one short week. One week ago last night
a correspondent broke the bars of her cell and led her to liberty
over the flat roofs of the Cuban capital. It is the memory of
those thrilling few minutes that meant for her a lifetime of
captivity or a future of peace and liberty that most often occurs
to her now.
"She arrived to-day on the Ward liner, Seneca, and was taken from
the steamer by a boat at quarantine, thanks to the courtesy of the
Government and the quarantine authorities. When the Seneca sailed
from Havana there figured on the passenger list one Juan Sola. A
girl who signed the name of Juana Sola to the declaration, exacted
by the Custom House officers, was the nearest passenger to making
good the lost one. Her declaration was that she brought nothing
dutiable into the country.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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