DISREPUTABLE METHODS IN CUBA.

Evening Post, Volume L, Issue 36, 10 August 1895, Page 2 (Supplement)

DISREPUTABLE METHODS IN CUBA.

Letters received from Havanah, Cuba, say that Marshal Campos's policy of pacification in Cuba has evidently proved a failure, and, realising the desperate condition of affairs there, he now proposes to adopt more stringent measures to defeat the insurgents. Tbe arrival of Lieutenant-Colonel Lolo Benitez at Manzanillo from Spain indicates the inauguration of a system of guerilla warfare of the most active character by the Government forces. Colonel Benitez is a Cuban by birth, but acquired a most terrible record during the last Involution, when he was at the head of a band of bandits, which committed wholesale depredations in the viciuily of Bayamo The acts of his men were not confined to Spanish subjects, but they also committed inhuman crimes against native women and children. In 1878 B6nitez warf captured by the Spanish forces and was cried and condemned to death, but big sentence was commuted to imprisonment for life, and he was depoited to the penal colony at Ceuta, Afiica, where ho has since been serving in a chain gang. He is of unquestioned courage, but possessing cruel instincts, and having a thorough knowledge of every foot of territory throughout the eastern provinces he will prove a formidable enemy to his own countrymen. It was for these reasons that his life sentence was revoked, and he was again honoured with a [ military title. His operations will be conducted around Manzanillo and i Bayamo, these districts having been placed under his jurisdiction by Marshal Campos, who also gave him secret instructions while there recently. Benitez's forces will be ; composed of the most desperate and dangerous class of criminals now confined in gaol throughout the island, who will be liberated on condition that they serve under his ; standard. The American press thoroughly condemns the course proposed by Campos of employing ■ assassins as allies or giving them i military preferment, predicting that ' if it is adopted it will insure a repetition of all the horrors of the , last Revolution, when women and I children throughout the interior became the victims of unbridled lawlessness. A well-authenticated rumour has emanated from official circles that a battalion of cavalry to arrive from Spain shortly has instructions to desert bodily to the , insurgents at the first opportunity. Their mission, when among the . rebels, will be to remove the Cuban i leaders by assassinations. Warnings have been sent to the chiefs in the interior and also to those abroad who i are contemplating joining the i revolutionists.