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“To Richmond Pearson Hobson—the Congressional Medal of Honor, for extraordinary heroism.”

“To Richmond Pearson Hobson—advancement to the rank of Rear Admiral, in acknowledgment of his great service in sinking the Merrimac at Santiago de Cuba in the war with Spain.”

Rear Admiral Richmond Pearson Hobson.

The generation of Americans who were young in 1898 will remember this heroic naval officer as long as they live. And with good reason, for Hobson’s exploit at Santiago is one of the finest examples of discipline, courage and patriotism in the annals of America.

It has been my privilege since I was a boy in school to be able to claim the friendship of Admiral Hobson. On several occasions he has allowed me to examine his charts, maps and photographs dealing with the Merrimac sinking; and he has borne patiently and answered generously the innumerable questions I’ve asked him about the last hours of the famous ship.

One of the results of this association was the desire it aroused in me to go to Cuba and make a pilgrimage to the Merrimac’s grave. Now was my opportunity.

From Fort Jefferson, Santiago was not very far away ... a hop across the Straits of Florida to Havana, then a run of four hundred miles through the heart of the island to the eastern end.

Santiago lies on the southern coast, six miles from the open sea, at the innermost corner of the most perfect harbor in the West Indies. The bottleneck entrance is scarcely wide enough for two ships to pass, but inside there is room for all the shipping of the world.

The entrance is guarded on each side by two high sentinel-like promontories of rock. On the right side, looking from the ocean, the Spaniards in the sixteenth century built, four hundred feet above the shore, a formidable fortress and called it Morro Castle, after a similar fort guarding the harbor at Havana.

Even before war was declared between Spain and the United States, the Spaniards at Santiago, fighting the rebellious Cubans, had increased the defenses until there were one hundred cannon behind the walls and along the terraces of Morro Castle, and behind hidden earthworks on the opposite slope. The military authorities had every right to feel that no battleship could force its way in and survive the cross-fire of these massed batteries.

On reaching Santiago it was easy enough for me to hire a launch and, with one of Admiral Hobson’s charts aboard and a crew that knew every inch of the harbor, go straight to the exact spot where the Merrimac sank—a spot in the narrows leading into the inner basin.

Copyright, Ewing Galloway

The wreck of the Merrimac, photographed shortly after she was sunk in the entrance to Santiago Harbor.

The water here is about thirty-five feet deep, but so clear that with a water-glass I could discern the demolished hulk. In order to clear the channel, the Americans on their capture of Santiago dynamited the sunken ship and split the hull down the center, so that today the two halves lie on their sides, partly embedded, with their ribs exposed.

Desiring a closer view I dived overboard and held on to a heavily weighted rope which my boatmen lowered through the water. Not being accustomed to the pressure I was able to descend only some eighteen feet. But this reduced the distance to the closest part of the hulk to about twelve feet, and enabled me to note the barnacles crusted on the iron fragments and the fish swimming in and out among the ribs.

This, then, was where the gallant ship went down. But what of that agonized last voyage, through the darkness, that brought her, tortured and mangled, to this place? From what point had she started, and what had happened on the way?

From the topmost tower of Morro Castle, I knew I would be able to survey the Merrimac’s entire course. So I beached my boat and climbed the steep trail that led to the fortifications. Here, seated on a prostrate Spanish cannon, four hundred feet above the sea, I could observe the entire sweep of ocean beyond, and channel below, and harbor behind. From this commanding position I could reconstruct all that took place on that fateful night nearly four decades ago.

Immediately upon declaration of war between Spain and America, in April, 1898, Admiral Cervera, Spain’s foremost naval commander, with four speedy armored cruisers and two torpedo boats, sailed from Cadiz, headed westward across the Atlantic, eluded the American fleet, and reached Santiago. Single file, the ships steamed into the channel below me, to be greeted by the booming of the gun I sat on and the cheering of the garrison.

The American fleet, consisting of five battleships and two cruisers, learned of this move and rushed to blockade the entrance. From my tower every ship, both the American outside and the Spanish inside, would have been in clear view.

Admiral Sampson, aboard the flagship New York, immediately saw that there was no hope of forcing the entrance and going after the Spaniards within the harbor, for no hostile battleship could possibly run the deadly gauntlet of the Morro Castle guns.

But he also knew that the channel leading into the harbor was so narrow that a three-hundred-foot ship, sunk athwart, would bottle it up completely, and prevent the exit of the Spanish fleet. Naval Constructor Hobson, then twenty-seven years old, likewise aboard the New York, insisted he could carry out this daring plan, though he knew it would probably mean—because of the hundred guns that would be trained upon him—his death, and the death of every man accompanying him. Nevertheless Sampson decided that Hobson should make the attempt.

Being a naval engineer, Hobson knew exactly what to do.

He chose the Merrimac (a coal collier named after the celebrated Civil War ironclad), because she was long enough—three hundred and thirty feet—to close the channel when properly sunk, and because she was strong enough (he hoped) to withstand, for the few minutes necessary, the concentrated hail of shells that would be poured into her as she approached and passed the deadly batteries.

The general plan was very simple. At night, in the moonlight, Hobson would steer his ship straight at the entrance, and down the channel to the narrowest point. That point, clearly visible from my tower, just to the right of the base of the Morro bluff, was some fifteen hundred feet in from the mouth. Here he would drop his anchors, and then sink the Merrimac by means of eight torpedoes lashed alongside, twelve feet below the water-line. Any one of the torpedoes should tear a hole in the hull of the ship big enough to scuttle it.

In case a miracle did happen, and anyone survived the sinking, there was to be a lifeboat towed behind.

Now for a crew.

Who would volunteer?

The regular crew of the Merrimac numbered sixty-four. There was no reason to take—and kill—them all. In fact Hobson made his plans so that only seven men besides himself would be necessary.

From the Merrimac’s own crew there were sixty-four volunteers. Of these Hobson chose four—Phillips, a machinist, thirty-two years old; Kelly, a watertender, twenty-nine; Clausen, a cockswain, twenty-eight; and young Deignan, twenty-one, a quartermaster. Hobson told these four exactly what they must expect: that they would be the point-blank target for a hundred guns and would in all probability be blown to pieces. Did they—before it was too late—wish to be excused?

Most certainly not!

Three more were needed. The Iowa, commanded by “Fighting Bob” Evans, was asked to contribute one volunteer. Every single man—over six hundred—stepped forward, and begged to be allowed to serve on the Merrimac. Evans finally chose a thirty-year-old seaman named Murphy.

From the New York (every man on this ship had likewise volunteered) Hobson selected Charette, thirty-three, an expert gunner’s mate familiar with torpedoes, and Montague, thirty-one, the chief master-at-arms.

The crew was now complete.

Hobson was to stand on the bridge and signal his men by means of ropes attached to their wrists. He anticipated there would be such a roar of exploding shells that he would not be able to shout his commands.

Murphy was to lie on the fo’castle head and cut the lashings of the forward anchor when the narrowest point of the channel was reached. At the same time he must set off torpedo No. 1, at the extreme bow.

Charette, at the forward hatch, was to fire No. 2 and No. 3.

Deignan, the baby of the crew, but the well-chosen quartermaster, after putting the helm hard aport to swing the ship across the channel, was to go down from the wheelhouse and explode No. 4.

Clausen at No. 5.

Phillips in the engine room, and Kelly in the boiler room, on a signal from the bridge were to stop the engine, knock the sea-cocks wide open and come on deck. Phillips was then to fire No. 6 and No. 7, Kelly No. 8.

Montague was to wait aft, ax in hand, ready to drop the stern anchor.

By midnight the Merrimac had crept within two miles of the Morro. The Spanish garrison, watching from my battlement, saw her dim shadow moving along. But they were accustomed to these night maneuverings. Hobson planned to sink his ship at four o’clock in the morning—the moon would then be setting—and be gone when the time came to escape in the rowboat. If the rowboat were smashed, and they had to swim, they were to try to meet in a sea-cave, directly below the castle, the cave into which I could hear the waves booming at this very moment.

Half-past three. With no lights showing anywhere, the last of the regular crew departed in a launch. The eight men left aboard stripped off their jackets and put on their life-preservers. They intended to save their lives if they could.

The Merrimac, a black wraith on the shining sea, began to move in toward the gash in the black hills of the shore, rapidly gaining speed. Straight down the path of moonlight she steamed—straight toward these Spanish guns—straight toward her fiery doom.

I tried to picture her, headed for the entrance below me. I tried to picture the tenseness of the crew. What a great moment for boy Deignan, steering his immortal ship right through the dragon’s jaws. Twenty-one! How his eyes must have shone! How his heart must have pounded from exultation and glory!

And Phillips and Kelly below, waiting with straining ears for the signal to stop the engine....

And the other four, crouching, ready to pounce on their anchors and torpedo keys when they have the word....

And Hobson, on the bridge, nerves taut, but self-possessed as steel machinery.

These men see Morro Castle drawing higher in the sky. Ship and shore are now only five hundred yards apart—four hundred. The Spanish sentinels pacing my battlement must certainly be alarmed. The ship is no longer just suspicious—it is obviously about to try to force the entrance, and coming on at full speed.

Aboard her the crew is wondering: When will those Spanish devils open fire—when—when? This dangling on the edge of doom ...

Two hundred yards—one hundred ...

Flash! A gun roars right at the water’s edge, from an almost invisible Spanish picket boat. Flash! Flash! Viperish streaks of fire, straight at the Merrimac’s rudder. Whir! Clang! A shell strikes steel. The Spanish gunners rush out from their shelters. The entire Morro slope awakens with a blazing roar simultaneously with the batteries opposite. Two volcanoes of flame burst from the two hillsides.

The oncoming Merrimac, staggering under the rain of screaming and exploding shells, is passing below, so close to the Morro slope that the garrison is firing at her bridge with pistols.

Hobson gives the signal to Phillips. He stops the engine. Kelly opens the sea connections, and geysers of water flood the engine room.

While the seven-thousand-ton ship is still driving on under its own momentum, the two men below race up the ladder and take their posts by the torpedo batteries.

By now the frenzy of firing and the blazing powder from five score Spanish guns are lighting up the night. The hills shake and spout fire. And the Spanish cruisers, anchored inside, behind that round little island a half-mile deeper in the channel, let go their biggest guns with a roar that splits the firmament. The Merrimac is enclosed in flames. Shells shriek through her, leaving huge holes in the steel plates; shells explode inside, flinging up her decks with an insane crash; shrapnel sweeps the bridge and fo’castle—who could hope to live through such a murderous assault?

Captain Evans aboard the Iowa, out there on the moonlit ocean, watches until the Merrimac is shut from his view. For him it is “a most dreadful sight—what hell must look like with the lid off.” Convinced that Hobson and his men have gone forever, he looks away.

But Hobson and his men are not, by a series of miracles, gone forever—not yet. They are actually getting past the Morro, and though burned, dazed and shell-shocked by the hurricane of fire, not one of them is out of the fight.

But the Merrimac itself is mangled and dying. One moment more and she will be in a position in which Hobson wants her to die.

“Hard aport,” he yells to Deignan through the roar of the bombardment.

Deignan obeys, but there is no response from the ship.

“Hard aport, I say,” in desperation.

“The helm is hard aport, sir, and lashed!”

The steering gear has been shot away!

And the Merrimac is still moving on, six knots an hour, down the flaming channel.

The anchors! Hobson gives the signal to Murphy. There is a blow from the ax—and the bow-anchor falls.

And one second afterward, as planned, torpedo No. 1 goes off with a blast that out-roars the Spanish shells.

Charette, waiting a lifetime in the last ten minutes, tries to set off No. 2 and No. 3.

Dead silence. His two firing switches have been blown to bits.

Deignan leaps down from the bridge to fire No. 4.

There isn’t a shred of a connection left.

Only Clausen’s No. 5 goes off.

Phillips and Kelly, aft, find a great hole in the deck where their firing switches had once been.

And worse. Not only has the stern-anchor lashing been blasted away, but the anchor as well. And in a moment more the chain holding the anchor at the bow is likewise shot in two.

The Merrimac has lost every means of control, has become a helpless hulk. She has sunk into the water almost to the level of her deck, but is still maddeningly buoyant, drifting with the incoming tide farther and farther up the ever-widening channel, straight toward those spouting Spanish battleships waiting behind Smith Island.

She’s grounded. A fresh avalanche of shells is hurled at her from a battery not two hundred feet away. But Hobson’s heart leaps up. His daring thrust is not yet parried. His ship is settling, and may block the passage after all, there by Estrella Point.

But in another moment the cursed tide lifts her, and down the channel she drifts once more, still pursued by the storm of shells.

A mine goes off! The Merrimac receives the full shock of the blast. She is lifted upward ten feet, quivers and, groaning, sinks back again. Hobson prays that her back is broken. Such is not the case. The water-filled compartments have prevented.

As for the Merrimac’s tormented crew, they seem invulnerable, crouching together on the shattered deck waiting for the next shell to annihilate them all.

Already their ship is fifteen hundred feet past the narrowest point. But her course is almost run. She is sinking fast. And two Spanish battleships now lie in wait. As she staggers helplessly past, her forward deck awash, four torpedoes are shot into her submerged bow from a distance less than her own length. The explosions hurl up a column of blinding light and twisted steel. This is the coup de grace.

The Merrimac plunges down by the bow in a roaring cauldron of bursting boilers, shells, mines, torpedoes, of escaping steam and flames—in a place where the channel is nearly five hundred feet wide.

The eight Americans, wounded and stunned but still miraculously alive, are thrown off the deck as the ship, in sinking, turns on her side. The rowboat has long since been smashed, but the wreckage of a life-raft is in reach. All eight cling to this raft, with just their faces exposed above the water that is still churned by shells.

But the firing is now ceasing, and the moon is dipping behind the hills. In complete darkness nobody makes a move. The Americans know they cannot swim against the tide, back down the channel and out to sea. Shaking with cold they hold onto their raft for four endless hours, hoping that when they are taken prisoners at dawn it will be by some responsible Spanish officer.

It is eight o’clock before an armed Spanish launch draws cautiously alongside. It finds the Merrimac’s men, literally almost dead—first the flames, and now the freezing. They are taken aboard by a fine-looking elderly Spanish naval officer. He expresses keen admiration for the Americans’ bravery, and asks their commander for his name and rank:

“Richmond Pearson Hobson, Ship-Constructor, U.S. Navy,” was the reply. “And may I ask,” he added, “the same question of you who have taken us prisoners?”

“I am Pascual Cervera y Topete, Admiral of the Spanish Fleet.”

From my perch on top the Morro I had been able to follow, in my mind’s eye, every move of Hobson’s desperate adventure. And now, still in the Morro, I was close to the aftermath, for Hobson was brought to this fortress and imprisoned in the cell directly beneath the battlement to which I had climbed to watch the Merrimac go by. After visiting that cell, I feel sure that Hobson will not soon forget his detention there—its dreariness, its age, its spiders. But there is another reason too, for here it was that Charette said to him: “I have come, sir, to present the compliments of the Merrimac’s crew, and to say that we would do it all over again—for you.”

Hobson’s exploit has been called a “heroic failure.” Hobson himself wept bitter tears of disappointment when, after all the hell he and his men had gone through, he failed in his main objective.

But subsequent events proved that for the American cause, the Merrimac had been sunk in the best possible place, for it still so nearly closed the channel that the blockaded Spanish ships did not dare try to escape at night—their original intention. And even by day, at the time of their final sortie, they had to come to a dead stop in order to shave past the sunken hulk—a fatal move, for it gave the Americans waiting outside just the time needed to get up steam, man their guns and go racing to the complete destruction of the Spaniards and the quick ending of the war. Except for the Merrimac, all the Spanish vessels, with their superior speed, might have escaped.

Each one of the Merrimac’s crew was given, immediately, the Congressional Medal of Honor; and the same medal was given to Hobson later when officers became eligible for the award. Of the immortal eight, four are still alive, all of whom are now between sixty and seventy years old. Deignan, the boy quartermaster, was the first to go—in 1906.

As for Hobson himself, a special act of Congress, in 1934, authorized his appointment and retirement in the grade of Rear Admiral “in acknowledgment of his great service in sinking the Merrimac—one of the most gallant acts of bravery and self-sacrifice ever known in any Navy in the history of the world.”