Quickly, then, the Captain-General assembled the "Junta of Defense,"
composed of men most eminent in military affairs in Havana, and placed
before them the situation.[1] They resolved upon a spirited defense,
even though their soldiers were insufficiently armed and they had no
defensive works save the Morro, then about a hundred years old, and its
companion fortress called the Punta, between which two forts lay the
deep and narrow entrance to the harbor. This harbor was blocked by some
big war-ships, and a chain was stretched across the mouth, but the
English did not even essay an entrance, having landed their troops to
the east, and first marching upon the Morro from Cogimar and the town of
Guanabacao, which they took quite easily, and then sweeping over the
Cabanas hills, where the Spaniards later built the vast fortifications
which they should have constructed sooner for the defense of their
capital city.
[Footnote 1: From _Nociones de Historia de Cuba_, by Dr. Vidal Morales;
Havana, 1904.]
The Provincials arrived the last of July, and landed to the west of
Havana, where stands a small fort known as the Torreon of Chorrera,
which was defended with much valor, but compelled to surrender.
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