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President Franklin Pierce wants to purchase Cuba.
Cuba is tropical island that is only 90 miles off of the coast of Florida. With it's promixty to the U.S., many Americans were interested in buying the island. President at the time, Franklin Pierce tried to buy Cuba from the Spanish, but they refused saying that 'We'd rather see it sunk in the ocean.' -
The Cuban Rebellion
After seeing all of the revolutions going on, the Cuban people decided that they didn't want to be controlled by the Spanish anymore. They wanted to become an independent country. -
Slavery Abolished in Cuba
Finally, the Cuban slaves are set free in 1886. This brings alot of attention from American investors who couldn't invest before because of the slave labor exisiting in Cuba. -
José Martí Resistance
José Martí was a cuban writer who started a resistance against Spain to try and set Cuba free. He destroyed property in Cuba, especially property that Americans invested in to, like sugar mills and plantations, try and get the U.S. to step in and set Cuba free. It worked as well. -
Yellow Journalism
Yellow Journalism is a type of journalism that is very littlely based on fact and is very extraggerated. When General Weyler was forcing Cubans into concentration camps, newspapers like 'The New York Journal' and 'New York World' were publishing stories about Cuba that were exaggerated and horrifying to get more circulation of there newspapers. This stirred up alot of anger in the American people who wanted to help the Cubans, providing more heat to the war fever. -
Valeriano Weyler's Control
To try and get Cuba under control, the Spanish government sent a general named Valeriano Weyler.. He immediately started putting Cuban people, from rural areas, in concentration camps. The camps were filled with dieased and starved Cuban people. This ended up killing thousands of Cubans. He did this to prevent them from helping the rebels. He also installed the idea that if any of these people resisted he would kill them because he would assume they were rebels. -
The De Lôme Letter
The De Lôme letter was a letter that was written by Enrique Dubuy de Lôme, the Spanish minister, that insulted President McKinely saying that he was weak and that he was "a bidder for the admiration of the crowd." Some Cuban rebels stole in from a post office in Havana and sold it the 'New York Journal' who published it and made the American people all the more eager to get revenge on Spain. -
Explosion of The U.S.S. Maine
Not that long after the De Lôme letter was published, a ship named the U.S.S. Maine was going to supposedly rescue American citzens in Cuba that were in danger and to protect the property of Americans. All the while it was really there to show Spain that Americans had Naval ships and to intimidate the Spanish. Well, the ship was destroyed after it exploded in the harbor of Havana. No one can explain the explosion, but Yellow Journalism was sure to blame the Spanish. -
War is declared on Cuba by the U.S.
McKinely asked Congress to declare war, and after just a week of debate Congress agreed. -
American Fleet in the Phillipino islands.
Instead of just going to Cuba to begin the fighting, American naval ships sailed to the Phillipines, who at the time were a Spanish colony. The first battle took place there after Commodore George Dewey gave the final command to open fire on the Spanish fleet inn Manila. They took our all the Spanish ships and then invaded the Phillipines. The Phillipino people didn't mind at all because they wanted to be independent too. -
Americans in Cuba.
Seeing how the U.S. took down the Spanish in the Phillipines, more men were ready to volunteer. These volunteers went to camps to train that had very little and inaedquate supplies. The Rough Riders were apart of the volunteered and were led by Theodore Roosevelt and Leonard Wood. -
Battle of San Juan Hill
The battle of San Juan Hill happened near Santiago Cuba. All of the new soldiers charged the hill and were victorious against the Spanish. This was the most famous and important battle of the Spanish American war. -
Spanish surrender in Manila
Filipino rebel Emilio Aguinaldo liked what the Americans were doing and decided to join them. With the help of the rebels, they got the Spanish troops to surrender in Manila. -
Ending of Spanish-American War
The Spanish finally agreed and signed a armistice. -
Treaty of Paris
United States officials met with Spanish officials in Paris to make a peace treaty to solve the conflicts between them. Spain ended up giving up and freeing Cuba and gave Puerto Rico and the Guam islands to the states. The U.S. also bought the Phillipines from Spain for 20 million dollars. -
Phillipine-American War
The Phillipine-American War began after the signing of the treaty of Paris, in which the United States annexed the islands. Americans argued that it was good for the islands because were were going to "educate the Filipinos, uplift and Christianize them." Which was fishy because the majoirity of Filipinos were Catholic. The real issue was imperialism. -
Cuba becomes a U.S. Protectorate
After the War, American troops stayed in Cuba. Rebels had feared that this would happen and that the United States would try to control them. Cuba's new government wrote an independent constitution that didn't say anything about the United States. The United States suggested the 'Platt Amendment' that pretty much said the United States did have some power over Cuba. Reluctantly, the Cubans agreed. The platt amendendment lasted for 31 years. Cuba became a U.S. protectorate.
