SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR: BATTLE OF SANTIAGO FLAG.

SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR: BATTLE OF SANTIAGO FLAG.
Cuba: Flag dated July 3, 1898.
A late nineteenth century Cuban linen flag, 410 x 610 mm, inscribed in ink "Battle of Santiago July 3 1898," the linen flag somewhat faded, with the ink faded to brown, edges slightly torn and worn. Framed.

An emotive relic from the famous sea battle between the USA and Spain, fought off Santiago, Cuba, on July 3 1898. This naval battle marked the culmination of the Cuban Wars of Independence from the Spanish, and the beginning of US influence on the island. Cuban revolutionaries had been fighting for independence from Spain since 1868, and the spark that involved the States was the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana Harbor in February 1898, apparently from a mine attached to the hull. Public opinion whipped up by the Newspaper Baron Randolph Hearst and others, over the Spanish policy of "concentration" camps for Cubans, also provoked the US into action. They sent the North Atlantic Squadron and the Flying Squadron to Cuba, with battleships and armored cruisers. The Spanish Caribbean Squadron under Cervera, was holed up in the port of Santiago, with a ring of American ships blockading the port. For more than a month they faced off, but on July 3rd the Spanish tried to slip out of port. the American fleet engulfed the Spanish ships in a hail of shell fire, and the Spanish Squadron was chased out to sea. By the end of the day, all the Spanish ships had been sunk, losing 300 men, and 1,800 taken prisoner, while the US fleet lost one man killed and one wounded. Within two weeks the Spanish negotiated a Treaty in Paris and lost possession of Cuba. This flag was probably waved by Cuban crowds when the American naval forces came ashore.