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U.S. Attempt to Purchase Cuba
In 1854 the President of the United States, Franklin Pierce, was pressured into buying Cuba by many diplomats. The Spanish had heard about this and said that they would rather have Cuba sunk into the ocean rather than giving it up. This shows the US's interest in Cuba years before Cuba was involved in conflict. The US continued to be interested in Cuba. -
Cuban First War for Independence
This war was not successful. In 1886 though, Cuban's were able to force Spain to abolish slavery. Once slavery was abolished, Americans began putting money into Cuban sugar plantations. This is a common theme with Americans throughout history. Once we began putting money somewhere, we began wanting the land. -
Jose Martí Led Cuba’s Second War for Independence
Jose Martí was a Cuban Politician activists. He had dedicated his life to the Cubans in the effort to gain their independence. In his efforts as a revolutionary activists, he did things like destroying property (especially the American sugar mills). He was caught and expelled at the age of 16. He was a big supporter of Cuba Libre -
The Yellow Press began to shape American public opinion with respect to Cuba’s Civil War
The Yellow Press used eye catching headlines and dramatically written news articles in order to draw attention to their paper. The Yellow Press was a very popular paper that got people worked up over situations. Alhough the events that were written about were important, a lot of the news was written purely to stirr up emotion. By doing this, the Yellow Press was able to make big bucks and continue to spread this information. -
Valeriano Weyler was sent to Cuba by Spain
Spain sent Valeriano Weyler to stop the rebellion by taking the rural population and putting them in concentration camps. His plan with this was that if people were outside of the concentration camps then Spain could shoot them because they could assume they were with the rebellion. However, Spain didn’t take into account that the concentration camps would run out of resources. Eventually people had to leave the concentration camps because they were forced to get food. -
Publication of the De Lóme Letter
When Mckinley became president in 1897, people wanted the U.S. to intervene in the Cuban struggle. Mckinley wanted to avoid war and it seemed to be a success until, the De Lóme Letter was written by Enrique Dupuy de Lóme, the Spanish Minister to the US. It was then leaked by a Cuban rebel to the New York Journal. The De Lóme Letter criticized McKinley and called him weak and bitter on what he thought was a success at avoiding war. -
Explosion of the USS Maine
February 15, 1898
After the De Lome Letter, President McKinley ordered the USS Maine to bring US citizens back to the US from Cuba. The Maine was also sent to Cuba to protect land owned by the United States. On February 15, 1898, the ship was blown apart in Havana killing 260 men. Nobody really knows who blew up the Maine. However, in 1898, a newspaper claimed that the Spanish were behind it. -
U.S. Declares War On Spain
In April 20, 1898 Congress agreed to declare war on Spain. Ten days later the U.S. Navy steamed over to the philippines which was and surprised them and laid waste to their boats. Afterwards they set up camp on shore. This was due to the slowly building tension between the two countries.
