Existing comment:
RETURN OF THE CONQUERORS. TYPIFYING OUR VICTORY IN
THE LATE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR, SEPTEMBER 29, 1899.[Q]
As a fitting close to the grand pictorial illustration of our marine history, this canvas represents one of the most magnificent pageants ever seen on our waters, in commemoration of the victorious close of the last great war, in which our navy added fresh leaves to its laurel wreath of heroic achievement. It, at the same time, depicts the culminating stage in the evolution of naval construction from the time when the Norsemen in their drakkars, and Columbus in his caravels, braved the perils of the ocean, until the steel-clad battleships of Dewey and Schley and Sampson met in conflict the no less formidable floating fortresses of Cervera and Montojo. It is a picture of to-day, with the well-defined outlines of the Statue of Liberty in allegorical suggestion at the mouth of the great river up which the little "Half Moon" first sailed, also on a September day, just two hundred and ninety years before. It suggests -- in the great, grim, steel-clad leviathans of the ocean steaming up the river, with their powerful armament and each representing millions of dollars in its construction, along the shores of the second largest city in the world, and with flags and banners flying proudly from every mast and spar -- not only the victory of our arms but the growth of the nation, from the sparse settlements in the days of the Pilgrim Fathers[Pg 106] to a population of 80,000,000 souls, and from the thirteen little struggling provinces, at the outbreak of the Revolution, to the forty-five great States and four Territories of the Union, with its possessions even beyond the confines of the continent -- imperial in its power and greatness, not dreamt of even when, only about a century before, Paul Jones and Decatur and Captain Reid performed the feats of daring which are immortalized in the earlier of these paintings.
It typifies, as the artist himself points out in his title, our conquering arms -- in the very motion of the proud battleships, as in majestic array, representing both the Pacific and North Atlantic squadrons, they seem to sweep gradually forward and onward within full view. If Mr. Moran had never painted anything else, this picture would stamp him as a surpassing genius. The grouping of the great vessels and the indication of their vast number, the brilliancy of the water and the whole coloring are matchless. It suggests in the proud procession of the ships-of-war, in perspective, as far back as the eye can reach, a gathering of almost the entire navy, and is in that respect far more than a mere photographic representation of the actual occurrence. In this picture he represents the "Olympia" as the principal object, the nearest in the foreground, her hull in gleaming white, with the suggestion of the figure of Admiral Dewey standing on the bridge, with her sister ships of like hue following in her wake; while another line, on the left of the picture, headed by the "New York" and "Brooklyn," and with Admirals Sampson and Schley on board, appears in more sombre hue, only second in importance, however, to the "Olympia." Such a picture could only be produced by an artist of the most poetic and imaginative instincts as well as a close student of the actualities; for while it is to a certain extent allegoric of the event which it records and the memories connected with it, nothing could be[Pg 107] more real or faithful than the reproduction of our iron-clads, with all the detail of armament, turret, tackle, anchor, port-holes and even the national coat of arms on the prow. Even the signal of the "Olympia," "Remember the Maine," and the answering signal of the "Brooklyn," "The Maine is avenged and Cuba is free," can be seen flying from their yards.
The events which are recalled by this painting are so recent that it would seem superfluous to refer to them at all, and yet, in continuation of the historic outline presented in these pages, it may be of interest to record that the battle of Manila was fought on May 1, 1898; that not a single life was lost on the American side and only a few men wounded, without any material injury to the American ships, consisting of four cruisers and two gunboats, while the whole Spanish fleet, under the command of Admiral Montojo, consisting of seven cruisers and five gunboats, was destroyed, with the exception of two, and these were captured, and that our ships, in addition, silenced and captured the formidable shore batteries on Cavite Point. Furthermore, that our naval operations came to a close off Santiago Harbor on July 3, 1898, through the destruction or capture by our fleet -- under the command of Admirals Schley and Sampson, consisting of four battleships, one armored cruiser and two converted yachts, one of them the "Gloucester," under the command of the intrepid Richard Wainwright -- of the entire Spanish fleet, consisting of four powerful armored cruisers of the highest class and two torpedo boat destroyers, under the command of Admiral Cervera.
Space forbids even a passing reference to the instances of individual heroism displayed during this war by the officers and men of our ships, as for example that of Lieutenant Richmond P. Hobson, all of which are conjured up by a contemplation of this painting. It is also impossible to refer at length to the reception itself to[Pg 108] Admiral Dewey and the other officers and men of our fleets, of which the naval procession constituted only one feature; but no eye-witness can ever forget the march of the returning victors in the land parade on September 30, 1899, as it passed under that masterpiece of American sculpture, the arch located at Madison Square.
There were also some touching incidents connected with this celebration. Among them, and as suggested by this picture, should be mentioned the fact that a sailor by the name of Bartholomew Diggins presented Admiral Dewey with the blue flag of Admiral Farragut, which had been in the possession of Diggins, who had served with Dewey under Farragut in the Civil War, and this flag flew from one of the mast-heads of the "Olympia" as she steamed up the river in the van of the magnificent array.
How doubly glorious will appear this splendid ovation to our heroes immortalized in this picture, if the war, from which they are shown returning as conquerors, shall result in a full realization of the noble motive, which inspired it, of liberation and not of conquest, and we may in patriotic pride address Columbia in the words of Timothy Dwight:
"To conquest and slaughter let Europe aspire; Whelm nations in blood, and wrap cities in fire; Thy heroes the rights of mankind shall defend, And triumph pursue them, and glory attend!"
With this picture the artist closes the commemoration of our naval achievements in the four great periods of our history, the War of the Revolution, the War of 1812, the Civil War, and the Spanish-American War of 1898, to which the last six pictures of the series are devoted, as the preceding six illustrate the dawn of our history[Pg 109] from the first landing of the white man to the settlement of the Pilgrim Fathers -- preceding all of which is the mysterious and unfathomable past symbolized by the trackless "Ocean," the first of these paintings.
From the time that Eirek the Red sailed to the bleak shores of Greenland down to the brilliant exploit of Admiral Dewey in the Philippine Islands, how true it is, in view of each and every one of the events immortalized in this unequalled series of paintings, that, in the words of Bishop Berkeley,
"Westward the course of empire takes its way!"
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