LATIN AMERICA'S AMAZONS

Oamaru Mail, Volume XXVIII, Issue 8291, 21 September 1903, Page 4

LATIN AMERICA'S AMAZONS

(Xew York San.) When patriotic citizens are called to arms in the United States and other highly civii Used parts, the girls are left behind. It is not. so everywhere. In Venezuela, Colombia Hayti, San Domingo, Bolivia, Nicaragua anci some of the less advanced Latin-American countries the entire family sometimes goes to war. It happens this way. A revolution js in progress, and there is an urgent demand for troops by both sides. A group of halfcivilised Indians are tilling the fields. A hand of soldiers comes along, (surrounds them, and marches them off to fight for a cause about which they know and care nothing- "Bat my wife, my boys, senor!" wails the peon to the commandant* who has captured torn. "What is" to Tjecome of them?**. The family troops up weeping and j begs the officer to let the man go. The offi- : cer looks at them thoughtfully and sees that the boys are strapping lads of twelve to fourteen, and that the wife is a- fine strong woman.' "So, I must take your, man," he tells her, "but, if you like', you and the toys can come too. They are.6trong enough to march and carry rifles and : ypu can do the cooking for us and.loftk after.tHe.wounded." So it comes about -that the entire family marches off to the front, happy and cheerful again. There are no hardier people in the world than the Indians of-Central America, Colombia,' and Venezuela; Even the : women think nothing of marching thirty miles a day over rough mountain tracks, carrying rifles, a heavy cartridge belt, a ma-' chete and a- packloa3 of miscellaneous bagcage. Sometimes a guerilla band will enlist all the members of a, family, from, the

youngest boy of ten to the grandfather of | seventy. And they will march and fight j side by side—husband and wife, mother, J and daughter, .father and* son, uncles, aunts, cousins, and grandparents. During the recent civil war in Colombia, when the Government was very hard pressed for troops, it was a common practice to surround country churches on Sunday and forcibly enlist the entire congregation, except old people and infants unable to march. The armies with which President Castro has made his great fight against the Mates revolutionists in Venezuela- comprise a large proportion of mere boys, whose ages range as low as eight and nine, and every com- : pany of his soldiers has from a dozen to twenty women attached to it. They are generally Indians or mulattos, and they march with the baggage train. When Castro's" army marched home to Caracas lasti January in triumph, after defeating the revolutionists, a. few days before Christmas, foreigners had a good chance to .etudy its make-up. Firs* came a fife and bugle band, composed of half a dozen ragged Indian boys, blowing a triumphal march for all they were worth. Behind them, riding proudly, on a stolen mule, acoppar-colorsd General carried a huge Venezuelan flag, its gaudy stripes of red, j blue and yellow flaunting proudly in the sunlight. He was dressed in a pair of tattered red trousers, with a broad gold stripe, a blue service blouse' like that of the United ■States army, an old palmleaf hafc with a ribbon of the Venezuelan colors twisted round. it, and a pair of alpargattas —the native canvas sandal, which exposes the toes and heel A 'Mauser Tifle was .slung ever his shoulder, an Andino machete, ..'ith a gaily colored scabbard, hung on one side and brass-hilted regulation sword on the other, while the belt around his waist contained a heavy revolver and enough cartridges for a Maxim gun. The army followed in single file, Generals and colonels marching along on the-flanks in n-enerous profusion. There was a field officer to every half dozen men, but you could hardly tell the field officers from the rank and file. The officers were dressed in odds and ends of uniform from nearly every army in.the world. The rank and file made no pretence at uniform, but wore anything they happened to have picked up. Some went half-naked. The Indians, who made up the bulk of the army wore their favorite alpargattas ; but a few negroes and mulattos went barefooted. They all marched along sturdily at a' swinging quickstep—almost a trot—although they had covered thirty miles.that day and gone through a fortnight's hard campaigning. Each man carried, a Mauser, a belt full of cartridges, a machete or sword, and perhaps a blanket, a mess kettle and a tin pan. The Venezuelan soldier has to be his own commissariat service, or go without. There were scores of little boys> eight or ten years old, carrying cut-down -Mausers, and stepping out as bravely and sturdily as the rest. An even stranger sight to a foreigner's eyes was a company of Indian , and mulatto women, well armed, who march- i ed at the rear of the army with the baggage train. Here and there a whole family marched together—women and men, boys and girls, all mixed up. There was no attempt to enforce military order. If the soldier liked to enjoy the society of women folk and children on the march, the General didn't think it was up to him to interfere. Indeed, it was good business for the E-epu' lie, as all the members of the family were quite ready to fight whenever the need arose. They cost nothing to feed, for the army had no official commissariat. It lived on the country. The soldiers foraged themselves with the help of their children and women folk. Nearly every man in the force had a little loot to show, if it was only a skinny fowl or a bunch of plantains on his Mauser rifle. The fortuaa of war often brings m*n to the front with surprising rapidity in these republics. The family that goes to war ragged and shoeless may, in a few short weeks or months, become one of the greatest in the land. A man may be a ragged Indian peasant one year and a distinguished General the next. When President Castro fought his way to supreme power in Venezuela, many men went up on the crest of the wave with him. One of them, General Louis Otalora, used to be the village barber at Castro's home in the Andes. He still shaves the President as part of his military duties. Another friend of Castro, and old Indian who liad fought well, was made Minister of War. He immediately purchased a gorgeous uniform, with lots of gold and silver lace on it, and then walked into his wife's room to show her his finery. She died on the spot. Her heart was weak, and the joy of seeing him so magnificently arrayed was too much for her. Th'sse family troops are sometimes guilty of atrocities, and the boys and women are often worse than the men. It is not unusual for a lad of fourteen or sixteen to be made an officer if he lias distinguished himself in battle, or happens to be related to the President. Dae of the most noted guerilla generals in Venezuela is under 17, and colonels and captains may be found even younger. Naturally, these youngsters, unrestrained by discipline and with practically absolute power to do as they like when campaigning, sometimes abuse their authority. In the streets of Barcelona, one of the principal towns of Venezuela, the other day, one of Castro's young Indian officers was asked for a small coin by a little .boy who begged in the streets. He drew his revolver and shot the boy dead on the spot. Nextday two boy officers were walking along the street, when one of them taunted the other with being a bad shot. The latter lifted his carbine and fired at the head of a child who was looking out of a top-storey window, killing him instantly. Some foreigners accused these officers to General Velutini, Castro's right hand man, but they were never punished. When they do such tiling's in the streets of a crowded city, it- is not difficult to imagine their conduct- when out campaigning. In Hayt-i, several years ago, the late General Manigat, who was then little more than a boy, went- through the streets of Jacmel with fifty ragged, barefooted, negro soldiers at his back. As lie put it, he wa<= "suppressing a slight local disorder." In plain English, he was murdering half the people in sight. He said to the soldiers. '•Shoot this man!" and "Shoot this woman <" until nearly a hundred people were left dead on the sidewalks. The women warriors often are far more savage than the men, especially if their husbands or lovers have fallen in battle.