When ordered to Tampa to command the first Cuban expedition, he continued: 

“I took the troops that I thought best fitted and prepared for that service.  There were some magnificent regiments of volunteers, but to part of them I had issued arms only two or three days before.  They were not properly equipped, and lacked experience.  As I had the choice, I took all of the regulars that were there, and with them three regiments of volunteers.  They were magnificent men, as perfect as men could be, but, as you know who served in ’61, poorly prepared to take care of themselves at first.  You recollect it was months before we were prepared, and we made numerous mistakes that led to sickness and death.  The same things have occurred again, and they always will continue with troops that are not used to the field, and in this campaign men were taken directly from their camps immediately after being mustered in, and put into the most difficult campaign of modern military history.

“I practically had the entire regular army of the United States, twenty of the twenty-five regiments of infantry, five of the ten regiments of cavalry, and five batteries of artillery, with three regiments of volunteers, the Seventy-first New York, the Second Massachusetts, and the regiment known as Roosevelt’s rough riders.  The last were practically seasoned soldiers.  They were men from the frontier, men who had been accustomed for years to taking a little sack of corn meal on their saddles, and a blanket, and going out to sleep out of doors for a week or a month at a time.  Of course, they knew how to care for themselves in camp.

“Early in June I was called to the telephone in Tampa, and told from the President’s mansion in Washington to proceed immediately with not less than 10,000 men to Santiago; that news had been received that day that the fleet of Cervera was surely within that harbor, and that if 10,000 men could be placed there at once the fleet and the city could be captured in forty-eight hours.  The horses and mules had been taken off from the ships as well as the men, and the time consumed in reloading the horses and mules allowed me to embark 17,000 men nearly.  That was very fortunate for me and our cause.”

On arrival off Santiago, he, “with Admiral Sampson, went down the coast about twenty miles, and saw General Garcia, and asked him his opinion of the country, what his force was, and whether he was disposed to assist.  I found him very willing and very glad to offer his services at once, with 3,000 men that he had with him and another thousand that he had up the country a little further, which were to join us immediately.  In sailing along the coast, looking for a landing place, I selected two places—­Siboney, a little indentation in the coast about twelve or thirteen miles east of Santiago, and another little bay about eight miles further east, where small streams entered into the sea, making a valley and a sandbar about 150 to 200 yards in extent.  All the rest of the coast is abrupt, perpendicular walls of rock from ten to thirty feet high, against which the waves were dashing all the time, and where it is utterly impossible to land.