Don Stark At Santiago

Don A. Statk, the wounded Aun Arbor soldiei beíore Santiago, arrived at Fortress Monrofi, Va., on tue City of Washington, which bronght a larga nnruber of sick and vvonnded soldiers inoluding 28 froru Miohigan, to that place last Thursday. Dr. Nanorede was the surgnon in charge of the wounded on the ship and Dr. F. W. Palmer, of Brooklyn, an old Washtenaw connty boy, by the way, was hospital steward. Dr. Palmer, a dispatoh to tbe Detroit Triboae says, looks 10 yeais older than he did wheD he sailed on the Yale for Cuba a montta ago. He gives the following aecount of the part Miohigau took in the battle in whiuh Stark was wounded. "The wonder is that our regiment waa uot out to pieces. We were ordeied to Aguadores to distraot the euprny's attention frora tbe inain attack. After leaving the train, our men foond thuiselves between the ooean on one side and a wall of perpendicular rock on the other. A few bushes growing at the water's edge furnished our only prot9otioü. Conoealed behiud the rocks, the Spaniards picked out our men whenever i,hey showed themselves. To fire in return was not only fruitless, but hopeless folly, the smoke from our Springfields betraying our piesenoe to the enemy, while their smokeless aruïnunition effeotively conoealed their whereabouts. "Gen. Duffield and his men did all that could be asked of them and more. The crossing of the railroad bridge, the failure to aooomplish whioh has been nufavorably commented upon, was physically impossible. The bridge was not there to cross. It had been destroyed long before. The river was 1,600 feet wide and very deep."tTo ford it was impossible. "The men held their position froru 10 until 4 o'clock. The Spaniards secured a machine gnn moonted on a band car, and started shelling our lines. The shells esoaped the flrst battalion in front and feil among the second and third biinging up the rear. What damagé tbey would havewrought it would be difñoult to state, had not a small gunboatfrom Admiral Sampson's fleet oome to our rescue, and by driving the Spaniards given us a chance to retire. The reoord for that day was 2 killed, 7 seriously wounded and 30 otherwise disabled. No men oonld have been more brave. Those who were wounded only laughed, and urged on the others. Jokes were bandied as though the boys were at a picnic. When Don Stark naa nis arm snoi on, suma oí toe uuye who thought they wore getting too clase wirbin tbe range of the Spanish gons prooeeded to scatter. "'You're damned fine soldiers, yon are,' declared Stark, holding np the bleeding stamp of his sbattered arm, while with tbe other he tried to poise his musket. " Dr. Palmer also says that dnring the fighting froru July 3 to 4 the surgeons worked 18 houis a day without stopping even for food. The long line of operating tables were supplied with new patients as qniokly as old ones were removed. He says tbat the list of dead bas been greaty nnderestimated, and that victims of tbose first days of tbe siege of Santiago will number at least 2,000. Tbe doctor had the good fortune to drese the wounds of one of the Spanish officers taken prisoner, wbo was afterwards exchanged for one of Hobson's party. Thougb unable to express his thanks in English, the Spaniard showed bis appreoiation by tendering Palmer a Spanish gold ooin, which bas been sent as a souvenir to a young lady in Ann Arbor. John Fitzgibbons, the Evening News correspondent, desaribes the same part of the battle of Aguadores. After delineating tbe lay of tbe ground aud recounting tbe bursting of the shell wbiob wounded Stark he says: "Two or three minutes after this abell burst. Gen. Duffield, Lieut. Wiloox and The News oorrespondent started down the same track. Tbey did not notice the dead and dying men nntil they were within 100 feet of them. Stark was holding up the inangled stump of his arm and calling for sorne one to tie it, so the flow of blood could stop. Within half a minute a shell struck the bluff and sent down a shower of dirt. In the next half minute anotber shell came up the track. It sttuck the ground not 30 feet from where Gen. Duffield and The News correspondent were walking, but the earth was soft and the ooncussion was not strong enough to cause an explosión. Gen. Duffield was the only one who didn't duck. He continued on down tbe track. Tbe otbers haviug heard that people lying down aren't as likely to be hit by an exploding shell as when standing dropped to tbe ground. No more shells came, but the wounded men said afterwards that they heard bullets wbizzing over tbem while they were stretched on the gronnd. "When the five men of Co. L feil, the otbers in front olosed up the gap with all tbe promptuesa of veterans. A moment before the shell exploded Col. Boynton, who was ou top of an ore car, told Maj. Webb to get his men up on the edge of the busbes out of reacb of tbe shells. Maj. Webb gavo the order, and then the shell came. The men jninped for the hushes, for the bullets were ooming thick up the defile between tbe oars aud tho bluff. They left their blanket rolls and haversacks aloug side of the track. Por two hours they remained in the bushes." "The wounded Amerioans were oarried into the only box cars on the track. It was an hour and a balf after ftawsoq, Curtis and Stark had been injured before Drs. Naucrede and Vaughan tarned from the front. Before the first shot was flred they went along the beach to the mouth of the river to be ready to oare for the wounded, for it was'assumed that it was the men in the first tank who would be hit first. Stark's hand was fonnd where he feil, and it wasn't even soratohed. It was buried at the foot of the bluff. Rawson was so enthnsed by the flring of the Kew York tbat be had himself piopped up in the hospital oar wbere he oonld look out of the door at the snip. Stark was feeling so oheerful that he talked about the engagement and said he didn't want to leave Cuba nntil the Spaniards had been thoroughly wbipped." A Fortress Monroe dispatch to the Bvening News says: Private Don Stark, of Ann Arbor, who had bis right arm shot off and hip wonnded in the Aguadores flght, is able to limp around the streets here ciad in a snit of pajamas borrowed from an offioer at the fort (neaily all the boys arrived bare alinost naked. ) He is easily the bero of the buur. Ladies flock around him and beg leave to take snap shots with cameras, while the men all want to buy bim drinks. Stark's gun whioh was badly twisted by a shell, is also the object of considerable interest. Stark says he was standing in line with Seabright, Wilson and Frank Lawton, of Lawton, when the shell exploded right in front of tbern, killing Seabright and Wilson and maiming the other two.