M.D.C.C.C.X.C.V.I.I.I. (1898).

       The President,                     The Secretary General,
             MARQUIS OF PALOMA.                   JUAN P.C. DOMINGUES.]

Every moment news of another battle was expected; the experience of the
first, with no better means as yet at hand, was a matter of great
concern and worry to all present. Suggestions were made and discussed.
Finally it was agreed to request more Red Cross aid by telegraph. A call
for one hundred Sisters was suggested, and Mrs. Lesser was consulted in
the matter. We had fifty trained nurses and assistants on our lists,
also women to act as matrons to distribute nourishment; we promised to
send for that number immediately, as we had sent for twenty-five
already. That morning Miss Barton, with Mr. Kennan and several of her
staff, had gone to the front, and before leaving, Miss Barton instructed
her secretary, Mr. C.H.H. Cottrell, that, at our request, he should
cable in her name for such persons and material as should be needed in
the Hospital Department. We cabled for fifty nurses, ten assistants, a
number of immune physicians, complete hospital equipment, and a quantity
of surgical material, sufficient to make at least five hundred patients
comfortable.

The work was performed almost without intermission, every surgeon
employing all his energies. The feeling in the hospital among the
members of the surgical staff was an excellent one.

The night of the third we expected to be able to rest a few hours, but
during the day the fleet had fought its battle, and a number of Spanish
wounded prisoners were taken off by the various ships. Dr. Lewis, chief
surgeon of the "Harvard," who assisted in attending the wounded at the
hospital at Siboney, invited Dr. Parker, myself and the Sisters to help
him in attending the wounded Spaniards, to which we gladly responded and
spent the night on the "Harvard."

The wounded continued to arrive for four days, many of them telling that
they had been shot on the first day of the battle, July 1, and as yet
had received 