The Spanish American War
“Splendid!”
Places of Importance
Cuba
• Spanish Colony Since 1515• Home to massive Sugar & tobacco plantations• Very profitable, Spain doesn’t want to give it
up.• Slavery a big business, only abolished in 1886.• Native Cubans want independence, war
fought between 1868-1878, Spain Wins, keeps Cuba.
US Interest in Cuba
• Monroe Doctrine: Europe to the Europeans, America to the Americans, US Influence.
• US offers to buy Cuba 1854, Spanish say no.• US interested in sugar, tobacco plantations, fat
stacks of cash.
Say You Want A Revolution
• Between 1878-1895, seventeen years of peace in Cuba, American investment boom, island becomes more dependent on US.
• In 1895 Cubans try again at the revolution thing, lead by Jose Marti, expat who lived in the US. Didn’t want American Involvement.
The Rebels
WAR!!!!
• Marti is killed shortly after the beginning of the war, however it grinds on, becoming a guerilla conflict.
• Eventually the Spanish call on Valeriano “the butcher” Weyler. He separates rebels from civilians with use of concentration camps, thousands die.
Yellow Journalism
• American sentiment is tilted towards the Cubans in part because of exaggerated stories of Spanish cruelty peddled by newspaper magnet William Randolph Hurst, a Practice called “yellow journalism”
• Hurst once said “give me the pictures and I will give you the war”
Remember the Maine!!!!
• With tensions boiling the USS Maine is sunk by a mysterious explosion in Havana Bay. It was in Cuba to protect American lives and property. No one knows exactly what happened, but Hearst thinks it was the Spanish.
• The US president asks for a declaration of war against Spain & gets one.
• The cry rings out, “remember the Maine! To hell with Spain!”
American Entry
• In response to the Declaration of war Commodore Dewy steams a USN fleet not to Cuba, but to another Spanish possession, the Philippines, which was also facing a native rebellion, beats the Spanish fleet at the Battle of Manila Bay and with native help takes the Philippines.
Riding Rough
• After Manila US Army Forces Land in Cuba and Puerto Rico.
• Colonel Theodore Roosevelt leads his cavalry unit to victory at the battle of San Juan Hill.
• The US wins the War in only a few months.• Spain Cedes Rico and the Philippines to US,
Cuba becomes US protectorate.
Questions• Imperialism….• • Progress, Social Darwinism, Trade, Industrial Revolution,
Christianity, A.T. Mehan• • 1) Pick one of the above topics and connect it to the Spanish
American war. • • 2) 2 big terms, Yellow Journalism and the Monroe Doctrine, a)
define both terms b) do you think these will come back up in future history?