Apr 12, 2018 - Sale 2473

Sale 2473 - Lot 203

Price Realized: $ 562
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 300 - $ 400
(SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR.) Memoir of a soldier engaged in guerilla warfare in the Philippines. 5-[67] manuscript pages on the rectos of unbound sheets, 8 x 5 inches; lacking the first 4 leaves and an indeterminate number at end, several leaves quite worn, each crudely taped or pasted to modern paper, and then crudely cropped at the top edge without loss of text. Np, circa 1902
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The author was a soldier with the 21st United States Infantry, Company K, possibly a corporal. His account begins in August 1898 at Camp Hobson, Lithia Springs, GA; in September he is transferred to Plattsburgh, NY, rejoining the bulk of his regiment, which had suffered heavy losses in Cuba. An epic train ride across the country and then a boat from San Francisco brought them to Manila on 11 May 1899. Their first combat was the capture of an insurgent outpost at Guadaloupa Ridge on 9 June--the most dramatic passage in the memoir. The writer was sent with another soldier to gather up some supplies that had been left behind, but they were separated from the regiment with no food or water. They made a makeshift fort from some old haversacks, and fought off a band of "Chinamen" who ventured too close, Going out in search of water, they found several dead and mortally wounded soldiers from a Negro regiment: "Found one poor cuss shot through the hip. He could not move. I gave him some hard tack and he gave me water, then I went back to our haversacks." Another disoriented soldier was found wandering without most of his clothing, brandishing a bottle of wine and an axe. They crawled through the brush for a mile and eventually rejoined their regiment, where their captain threatened to have them court-martialed for losing their haversacks (pages 33-41). Later while hospitalized, he was befriended by Señora Edna Luna, cousin of an insurgent general, who took him out riding daily: "She was stuck on me, and that is no lie. I think I ought to go back and hook up with her, as she has all that is required. She is hansome & plenty of money" (page 45). The disabled soldier was transferred back to the States on 15 May 1900 (page 48), visiting Japan en route to San Francisco, then to recover at Hot Springs, Arkansas, concluding in Vancouver Barracks, Washington circa July 1901. This combat took place just a generation after the Civil War, but feels more like a Vietnam War script than a Civil War diary, including a certain wisecracking cynicism and disregard for authority. It's not a pretty artifact, and the author remains unidentified, but it is a vivid account of his time in the jungle.