The Battle of Santiago de Cuba was fought on July 3, 1898, between a United States Navy squadron led by Rear Admiral William T. Sampson and Commodore Winfield Scott Schley and a Spanish Navy squadron under Counter-admiral Pascual Cervera y Topete during the Spanish–American War. The significantly more powerful American squadron, comprising four battleships and two armored cruisers, decisively defeated the outgunned Spanish squadron, which consisted of four armored cruisers and two destroyers, sinking all of Cervera's ships while losing none of their own. The crushing defeat sealed the American victory in the Cuban theater of the war, ensuring Cuba's independence from Spanish rule.
Beginning in 1895, American-Spanish relations worsened over Spain's suppression of the Cuban War of Independence, with the American public being agitated by exaggerated reports of Spanish atrocities against Cubans. In January 1898, the American cruiser USS Maine was sent to Cuba to protect American interests in Cuba but less than a month later exploded in Havana harbor, killing 266 sailors and inflaming American opinion. Despite a lack of proof, Spain was portrayed as the culprit in the American yellow press and two months later the US declared war on Spain.
The Americans realized that defeating the Spanish squadron stationed in Cuba was vital to ensuring victory in the war. A squadron commanded by both Sampson and Schley was dispatched to ensure success, though both commanders had different approaches naval warfare. On July 3, Cervera's squadron steamed out of the harbor of Santiago de Cuba to engage the Americans. The Spanish, totally unprepared and outgunned, made a desperate attempt to reach the open sea with the American battleships and cruisers in hot pursuit. The entire Spanish squadron was sunk with minimal casualties for the Americans, who suffered only two men killed or wounded, while their opponents lost 343 killed and 151 wounded.
The Americans pulled a total of 1,889 Spanish servicemen from the water, among them Cervera. The captured Spaniards were treated with respect and care by the Americans, and Cervera became respected by the Americans for his dignified conduct during and after the battle. Although the battle ensured the American ground campaign to overthrow Spanish rule in Cuba would end in a success, tensions soon arose between Sampson and Schley, with various parties in the United States Navy and American public debating over which commander had made the greater contribution to victory, and the dispute reached the desk of Theodore Roosevelt. The battle remains one of the most significant naval battles in American maritime history.
Background
Preliminary context
The battle marked the culmination of the Cuban Wars for Independence, which had been waged by Cuban revolutionaries against Spanish imperial power for several decades. The United States had political, economic, cultural, and ideological interests in Cuba. Within the larger context, many American political leaders, pushed by interventionist public opinion, were outraged by the publication of a private letter by Spanish Minister Enrique Dupuy de Lôme critical of US President William McKinley and by the destruction of the American armored cruiser USS Maine that was touted by newspapers at the time as the "Battleship Maine" for which a naval court of inquiry and American yellow journalism blamed Spain.
Cuban revolutionaries had staged revolts against Spanish colonial authority in the Ten Years' War (1868–1878), the Little War (1879–1880), and the Cuban War of Independence (1895–1898). During the last war, Spanish General Valeriano Weyler established a policy of interning Cubans in camps he called reconcentrados, which functioned as internment camps. The etymology behind the re- prefix is that formerly the Cubans lived in villages but now they were going to be redistributed into new villages under the hypocritical pretext that it was for their own protection. Spanish forces gathered Cubans who lived in the countryside and centralized them in camps, where they could be monitored. As a consequence, many Cubans died of disease and malnutrition. That policy did as much to paint the Spanish as barbarians to the Cuban natives and the United States as any other item of misrule by the Spanish.
With outrage over Weyler's seemingly-brutal policy and sympathy with the Cubans' struggle building, US public opinion pushed for war with Spain after the publication of the de Lôme Letter in February. Enrique Dupuy de Lôme had been appointed the Spanish Minister to the United States in 1892. In that capacity, it was his duty to refrain from allowing his personal beliefs to intervene with his public duty to support peaceful diplomatic relations between the United States and Spain. However, a letter that expressed his opposition to McKinley's foreign policy decisions was exposed, and the New York Journal translated and printed the letter. Many Americans considered it an insult to the nation and to the president.
Although Spain apologized on February 13, 1898, Maine exploded and sank in Havana Harbor, Cuba, two days later and killed 266 American sailors. After a hasty naval court of inquiry, the American press blamed Spain and accused it of planting a mine that sank the cruiser. The war with Spain became known as the "Correspondents' War". Journalists not only wrote stories about the conflict but also took part in the fight. In 1898, the prestige of the press ran high.
American society was changing as literacy rates increased. There was a new revolution of readers. As war zones became more open to the press, journalists wrote eyewitness accounts of what was happening. In an era before radio and television, newspapers were the main source of information, opinion, and entertainment for the American public. In New York City, where the population was about 2,800,000, the combined circulation of daily papers was about 2,000,000.
In response to the public's outcry, McKinley took action against Spain. On April 25, the United States declared war and claimed to have had no self-serving interest in Cuba, but some political and military leaders and imperialists believed that war would be an opportunity for the United States to expand territories overseas and to demonstrate its increasing naval power against a weak foe. Moreover, the United States sought to expand economic ties with Cuba for its resources in sugar and tobacco, all of which influenced America's decision to intervene. It was evident that gaining territories across the globe would increase US strength and influence and tap markets for the products of American industry.
Spanish Prime Minister Práxedes Mateo Sagasta did not seek war with the United States. He did not expect victory but knew that Spanish citizens would likely revolt if he conceded to American demands in Cuba. Meanwhile, Spanish naval leaders tried to employ a strategy that would not win the war outright but resist the US Navy as much as possible. On May 1, 1898, American and Spanish naval forces met in the Philippines at the Battle of Manila Bay, which resulted in a decisive victory for the United States. The Spanish government sent their fleet, under Admiral Pascual Cervera y Topete, to defend Cuba and keep an open line of communication with the Spanish garrison there. Cervera opposed that strategy since he believed his squadron lacked the strength necessary to engage the American squadron. He preferred to engage the Americans near the Canary Islands or to mount an attack against the American coast, but he was overruled by his superiors in Madrid. Cervera's own misgivings reveal the seriousness of the situation faced:
Lacking a clear strategy, the Spanish policymakers at home may have hoped to end the war quickly in a "glorious defeat" against the more powerful US Navy. Cervera knew better but like a good officer followed orders to the letter. There is a hint of his real views in his attack orders to the fleet. He suggests they nail their flags to the masts; that is, not even to think about lowering them in surrender. As the fleet was being massacred against superior firepower, some captains in fact ran their ships aground and surrendered to save what was left of their men.
Spanish fleet
Before taking command of the Spanish Caribbean Squadron, Cervera had served a variety of military and political roles, then retired after a dispute with opposing politicians. However, when war against the United States broke, Cervera was recalled into the Spanish Navy and given command of the Caribbean Squadron. The squadron was to be dispatched from Spain with the ultimate destination of the Caribbean, initially Puerto Rico but then changed to Cuba, to reinforce the Spanish garrison, defend the island from American invasion, and break the American naval blockade. Before the outbreak of war, Cervera attempted to inform Spanish officials of the Spanish Navy's weakness relative to the US Navy. Captain Fernando Villaamil, the Second Officer in the Ministry of the Navy and a pioneer in destroyer warfare, disagreed with Cervera's passivity and advocated Spain to offset American naval superiority by scattering the fleet and taking the initiative through quick and dispersed actions. A lack of consensus between Cervera, Villaamil, and the Spanish government put Spanish naval strategy in flux from the beginning.
On April 29, Cervera steamed from Cape Verde. Panic gripped the American people, who did not know what his ships might do: attack the largely-undefended East Coast while the fleet sailed about in an effort to engage him; prey upon American shipping; or perhaps sail up the Potomac and set fire to Washington, DC. Ultimately, Cervera did none of those but managed to evade the US fleet for several weeks, confounded his American counterparts, and recoaled in the process before he finally sought refuge in the harbor of Santiago de Cuba. On May 29, 1898, an American squadron sighted Cervera's newest ship, the cruiser Cristóbal Colón, and immediately established a blockade around the mouth of the harbor. The Spanish soon found themselves "blockaded closely by an American semicircle of ships about six miles from the Morro by day, and moving discreetly closer after nightfall." Moreover, by early July, the Spanish were nearly surrounded at Santiago from the east by an advancing American army numbering some 16,000 soldiers, 3,000 Cuban insurgents to the west, and the American fleet to the south.
The Spanish squadron consisted of the cruisers Almirante Oquendo, Vizcaya, Infanta Maria Teresa, and Cristóbal Colón in addition to Villaamil's destroyers Plutón and Furor. The cruisers displaced approximately 7,000 tons each, but they were not heavily armored, and their armament did not match the Americans. With the exception of Cristóbal Colón, which was more lightly armed, the cruisers' main armament consisted of two 11 in (279 mm) guns each and a secondary armament of ten 5.5 in (140 mm) guns. Cervera's fleet was at a further disadvantage relative to the Americans because of the condition of its ships. The breech mechanisms in many of the Spanish guns were dangerously faulty and caused jams and other mishaps. Many of the ships' boilers were in need of repair. Several ships, including Viscaya, desperately needed bottom-cleaning as they were suffering from extra drag from fouling. The most well-protected ship in Cervera's fleet, the second-generation armored cruiser Cristóbal Colón, had not even had her main battery installed and carried wooden dummy guns instead.
Finally, Cervera's crews were poorly trained. They lacked experience and practice in gunnery drills, and their training had emphasized rapid fire at regular intervals but the Americans favored more deliberately-aimed fire. Relative to the Americans' fleet, which consisted mainly of modern battleships, Cervera's force was lightly armed, a result of recent budget cuts but also a naval policy that for many years favored the construction of light swift ships to patrol the far-flung oceanic empire.
With Cervera's fleet bottled in Santiago, Captain General Ramon Blanco y Erenas, the top military commander in Cuba, ordered it to sortie from the harbor along the coast westward to Cienfuegos. In Cervera's eyes, escape from the bay seemed nearly impossible. He strongly considered fleeing under protection of night but opted to sail by day instead to ensure the safe navigation of his ships through Santiago's narrow channel. On July 3, 1898, Cervera, aboard his flagship Infanta Maria Teresa, led the Spanish fleet out of the safety of the Santiago harbor at 7 min intervals.
American fleet
The primary elements of the American forces in Cuban waters were initially divided between two commands: Rear Admiral William T. Sampson of the North Atlantic Squadron and Commodore Winfield Scott Schley, commanding the "Flying Squadron". Although the two combined squadrons outnumbered the Spanish fleet, victory was not achieved solely by American numerical superiority. Rather, victory resulted from strategic and tactical decisionmaking in addition to the general superiority of the American forces. As the historian James C. Rentfrow argues, the American victory at Santiago was, in many ways, the culmination of an "ongoing process towards [the North Atlantic Fleet's] construction as a combat unit."
At the head of the American fleet were Sampson's armored cruiser USS New York and Schley's armored cruiser USS Brooklyn. New York and Brooklyn, although only armored cruisers, were well-armed for their class. Schley's flagships were powerful cruisers, but the primary firepower of the American fleet resided in its battleships USS Indiana, USS Massachusetts, USS Iowa, and USS Texas. The American battleships were modern steam-powered and steel-hulled coast defense battleships all built within the decade. The oldest and least powerful of them was Texas, a near-sister ship to the Maine, which had exploded in Havana Harbor in February. The ships were armed with 12 in (305 mm) and 13 in (330 mm) guns and could steam at speeds up to 17 kn (31 km/h). Off Santiago, Schley's "Flying Squadron" was merged into the larger fleet under Sampson's overall command.