Evening Star Newspaper, July 31, 1927, Page 81

‘ ‘Magnetic America Y CAPT. HERMAN ARCHER, . U.8 A LEE CHRISTMAS was perhaps the most amazing human enigma I've met In . more than a quarter cen- tury of wars and of wander- ing. He began life as one of the most ineffectual of men, a youngster with a hair-trigger temper that often ploded, so to speak, but that n forced him into any action of domina tion or control over himself or others. I dare say many who knew him in his youth rather regarded him as a tem- peramental weakling. But suddenly he found himself, He became a great fighter and leader of men—one of those children of .destiny for whom other men die with vim, a true soldier of fortune. No man ever lived who was braver, quicker to act or more resourceful in war than this same Christmas proved himself to be in Central America. For vears he was such a good warrior that he had but to present himself to al- most any political or military leader in that hotbed of revolution to be named a general on the spot and sent into the fleld. A maker of presidents. this former American railroader led forces that on five different occasions put five executives in offices by force of arms. He was wounded innume: able times. His life was indeed sim- ply a game of tag with death. “Gen Christmas Killed Again” for many years was almost a standing headline in American newspaper offic 50 often was the general reported slain. When our mutual friend, Richard rding Davis, wrote “Soldiers of For- tune” he took Christmas as the mode! for his hero, Clay. He gave this fic tiopal Christmas an inch or twe more height and a few less vears, but other- wise the picture was true. It was this: “He was a tall, broad-shouldered youth with a handsome face, tanned and dyed either by sun or exposure the wind, to a deep, ruddy brow Yet, made he was for Christmas was, as I past 30 when he got to soldiering. Here was the enigma. Born in a tiny, somno- as patiently as a deck hand on Lake Pontchartrain. He wanted to be an engineer, and after years of routine | he was given an engine on a line now |part of the Tliinois Central. His | father, Winfield Scott Christmas, had layed a hero’s part under Gen. Scott at Chapultepec in the Mexican War. One trip he was out 54 hours at a | stretch, fell asleep and let his train crash into another. But because of | his long service the road decided mot to discharge him. He went to the { railroad doctor for the examination | customary after accidents, and it was | decided he was color blind, no Jonger fit to drive an engine. They offered him a_“dead man’s job” in the vards. But Christmas shook his head. He walked into the hall, and with wet, | dazed eyes stopped before one of the | windows that looked down on the | street far below. Life seemed sud- denly to have turned to ashes. Chri 1| mas climbed upon the window ledge | and stepped off. He fell several storics to the busy street. But he did not die—fate wanted him for the wars. | "When he_recovered from "his in- | juries Lee Christmas was in that mo- ment probably more utterly beaten than eve which contrasted strangely with his|to the wharves, boarded a steamer { LEE CHRISTMAS, THE “ENIGMA” WHO TOOK TO SOLDIERING AFTER HE HAD P. bair and mustache. His most attractive feature was his eyes, which seemed to observe all that was going on, not only what was on the surface but beneath the surface, and not rudely or covertly but with the frank, quick 100k of the trained observer.” Yet Davis might have mentioned with deeper touch of truth the wide, straight mouth, clamped in Lee Christ mas’ later day into stark determin: tion #nd purpose, and the quick, sa age light that could come in those same eyes in a fight. ED THE AGE OF 30. | | about to sail, and as she went out | stood at the rail, saying good-by to | the scene of his failures, unknowing the glamour that waited at the end of the voyage. The purser asked him for his ticket, and in turn he asked list- lessly where the ship was going. At Porto Cortez, Honduras, they put him off. No one would have thought that the | auiet, humble human who drifted into | the office of the Honduran Rallroad— { & line 300 or 400 miles long then, used mostly for transport of fruit and bul- UNDERGROUND CANALS TL‘N.\'EL canals are by no means uncommon in KEng Bridgewater Subterranes quite different from the ot canals; indeed, there i3 nothi like it in any other part of John Brindley, the er in charge when the canal was built. in 3769, 1aid down within his coal mines a system of underground railways, all Jeading from the face of the (where the miners were the shafts which he various points in the t which the coal was shot int waiting it First o large basin was « at the entrance to the Worsly, capable of holding a n of specially constructed bar serving as a head for From this basin the bharges entere the mine by means of an under; nd canal with two semi-cire mouths, and moved for up to the various workings. quently, the canal was ¢ about 6 miles, and then in various directions with a length of nearly 40 miles Where the tunnel passed earth or coal, the arching brick work, but where it through rock it was simply out, The underground pas therefore, acted not only as a drain and water feeder for the canal itseif, but also s a means of carrying the facilities of navigation to the very beart of the mines, Worsly Basin lies at the base of a sandstone cliff several hundred feet high, covered with luxuriant vegeta- tion. The smaller aperture is th mouth of a canal which runs about a mile, and serves to prevent quite below er through was of passed the congestion which would Inevitab- \ 3y be caused by the entrance aund work) to! for egress of s0 many barges passing h a single passage. The other is the entrance to a wider which extends for several , and from which other canals diverge in various directions | The barges were long and narrow, { each holding about 10 tons of coal, and were each drawn along the tunnel | by means of staples fixed in the wall, | When the barges were empty, and con iently higher out of water, the gemen propelled themselves along sing,” as it is called, In the tunnels of early date, towing never constructed, and, rere there is used steam haul. 8 method of propelling boats it such tunnels, down to the present time consists in pushing with 4 long pole, or shaft, against the [top or the sides of a tunnel while walking from forward aft along the | out, and is generally used only in | short tunnels. “Legging” is usually performed by , one on each side of the Loat at the fore end, who lie down on their backs and push against the sides of the tunnel with their feet If the tunnel is too wide to admit of their reaching the side wall with their feet from the boat’s deck, boards pro- | jecting over the boat's side, termed H are brought into use for them to lie on. When the roof of a tunnel is low, one man can “leg” an empty boat lying down on the top of the | cabin | At tunnels where the traffic is good, | professional “leggers” are in attend- | ance, who take thelr turn assisting | boats through as required. At the old Hardcastle Tunnel a “legger” may | be engaged for less than a dollar and | a half for the passage through, which | generally takes about § hours. Tl}: canals are still in use. P oA war, | !lent town on the Amite River, 19 miles | |from Baton Rouge,” La., he worked | slaving on the railroad about his home | He wandered down | | custom, | the Island of Mallor | coast {in which the bull is sa cated to the patron {of the Virgin lion from farm and mines—a few days later was the future Lee Christmas. He had been an engineer, he said, back in the States. Would they give him a joh? Nobody, it appears, worried about color blindness in Hondur maybe they had ne and o in the end Christmas allowed to climb into a cab. time he was content, thankful. After. all, he was doing what he had always wanted to do, even if he was, far from home. . LA 2 'HEN the turn came. The revolu- tion which Manuel Bonilla had started against President Policarpo swept over the part of the country traversed by the little railroad. Gov- ernment troops took up a strong pe tion along the line, and one day & band of revolutionists boarded the train that Christmas was running and ordered him to take them to a point where they could attack the enemy. Christmas was disgusted. Even on this dinky raflroad fate wouldn't let him alone. He began driving the en- gine forward, probably cursing his as again THE SUNDAY STAR, n Soldier of Fortune a Maker of Presidents er heard of it— | For some | | ambled back to his engine, | some of the exciting things Lee Christ- WASHINGT'ON, ernment soldiers opened fire on the train. | Bullets spattered about the cab. Christmas, ducking, got “allfired mad.” He grabbed a rifle from one of the nativo soldiers and began fir- ing. Ho had never before shot any- thing bigger than a squirrel, and he as amazed to-see that he could shoot like a marksman, It was as if the spirit of his father suddenly took jon of him. The government hegan to fall back. tmas leaped from the engine and whipping the revolutionists into following him, drove that particular band of “federals” into a mountain gully, where they were faced with rrender or sure death. The *“fed- als” surrendered pronto. Christmas dropped_his rifle, began moppirg his face with the old red bandanna he had brought from the States—a symbol of raflroading he somehow loved—and . When he got back a small, fat, viva- ¢lous man with heavy mustaches and a gaudy uniform to meet him. y bursting with eager en- lorious,” “geni- us, warrior supreme’—these were | mas heard himself called. He brushed | the little man away. His engine was waliting. 3ut when he learned, next ins t, that his admirer was none other than Manuel Bonilla, leader of the revolutionists, he stared. “I'll make you an officer,” Bonilla was saying. “A captain in my army. I will make 1 rich, give you place and power once we have taken Tegu- cigalpa.” In amazement, Lee Christmas luck, when all of a sudden the . gov-!looked into the avid, bright little black | little r i cest of th; D. U, JULY 31, 1927—PART 5. R T T 3 SN — IR N “A FLYING BLADE STRUCK OFF THE HAT OE CHRISTMAS AND PINNED IT TO THE WOODEN WALL. . . . WORD WENT OUT OVER THE WORLD THAT HE HAD BEEN KILLED—BUT NEXT MORNING HE REPORTED TO * _HEADQUARTERS AS U revolution. Battl after skirmish wz for po jon of it, and Capt. Christ- mas discovered that for him fighting beat engine running all hollow. Plan- ning attacks, rushing out ahead of his men and having them follow him blindly through a hail of bullets, quell- tle, skirmi |eyes, and the eyes changed. They be-|ing incipient mutiny, snapping out came crafty, caiculating, wheedling. “You diers,” whispered Manuel Monilla. “If traitor, an enemy. you on my side, an je killed government sol- [ple as if he had studied and pra |it since babyhood. | they ‘catch you, they will kill you as a |that if he could win the railroad he They will count |would win the war. You might |tered and swore and planned. orders to soldiers—all this was as sim- iced Bonilla kept saying Christmas sput- Then as well go the rest of the way Wwith lone day he promised Bonilla he would me. You see?” Lee Christmas swore. was holy, this Bonila was right. had killed government soldiers, By all that and d in the capture of others, and the government owned the railroad! He was a marked man, foredoomed to one of those firing-squad parties, probably, if_he was seized. His safety lay, then, vith Bonilla; only by helping Bonilla win, by thus ¢hanging the government, could Lee Christmas be sure of his life and his railroad job. Yes, he even thought of his job then! By jove, Lee Christmas would fight. The next in- stant he was a captain in the army of Manuel Bonilla, P UT the most amazing part of the sil ion was still to come. The ilroad became the key to the “win the road.” Soon he had rigged up a traveling He | fort—a flat car with thick sandbag walls—and manned it with marksmen. He put this out in front of an engine, and began shooting it back and forth along the right of way. Finally he had the company’s five other engines bottled up at one end of the line. The railroad was paralyzed; the position of the government troops became unten- able and at last they were driven out. This proved the turning point. The victory brought the fickle people flock- ing to Manuel Bonilla’s standard. “The fighting engineer” and his rail- road battleship captured the popular fancy, too. Finally, Policarpo’s dwin- dling army was defeated and he him- self taken prisoner. Lee Christmas rode into Tegucigalpa at the head of the bull fight, and all world that has seen it divides itself into two parties—those who shudder and cry out the cruelty to the horses, and ombres de sangi is an old and classic expresses the people— A agains! those who exc! let it remain! But how m seckers after the primitive and strange have witnessed that pagan custom which originated the bull fight—the very beginning of the national sport of Spain of tod The sacrifice of a bull to the gods, a point in the evolution of civilized soclety not so far removed from the days of human sacrifice! High up in the rv mountain of oft the east lies the little , Whose patron saint is Sants la Madye de la rgen, of whom there is a fifteenth century wooden image above ti of the quaint old chur The fiesta rificed s dedi d is called of Spi there puchlo” of int, “la Flesta de la Madre de Se —the September Feast of the Mother nd lasts three days. n | coming fi Great excitement reigns the night preceding the feast. T ¢ up all night strol “palo,’ ce and bold as befits the occasion, while the senoritas, dark- eyed and with arms linked (the women of the island never mix with the men on publ ns) whisper among themselves and look on with awe and admiration, At the first streak of dawn the bull can be heard bellowing in the moun- tains—the men have found it! With much shouting, and running in a head- long course down the mountainside, they at last corral it near the entrance to the village. Standing at bay, snort- ing di pawing the ground, t BRINGING raged animal is finally lassoed by the horns, and the bolder of the maidens who have followed the men into the mountains present the wreath of flowers which is placed on the bull's head. Then the descent into the village begins—and what a descent! The paths are boulder-strewn, the rocks cruel and jagged; but the men seem PO sessed with the old spirit of savagery, the same spirit that fought and drove the Moors from their beloved island: They leap from crag to crag, the bull snorts and bellows, pulling and strain- ing magnificently to rid itself two leading ropes and the check o] ehind, - gt s R How magnificently virile seems this furious animal, with flowers wreathed on its horns—a fit offering to the gods! Down they come. into the pueblo, where, of course, all the village pop- ulation is Sacrifice Which Was Origin of Bull Fight Survives in Spanish Island’s Celebration LL the world Is acquainted with the | | {amounted to martial |intended him for a soldier he itched | that trouble | able A | with the pledge that he would return | | |armies, but for once everything went Louisiana Railroad Man Who Just Escaped Being Complete Failure Became Effective Fighter in Guerilla Revolutions— Standing Headline at One Time Was “Gen. Christmas Killed Again™—Pathetic Experience of Life Was When Poor Health Caused Rejection by Own Country in World War. | threatening to desert him. | sions, and in th | Bonilla’s men. In the white palace | Bonilla made the former railroader a | brigadier general, and named him at | ame time police chief of the city. or days the city was under what | aw, and so| Christmas became, by virtue of his | position, judge and jury. | But Christmas wasn't satisfled. It | 1s if, having found so unexpect- | edly that fate apparently had always ime. Word came | as brewing in Venezuela, President Castro wanted some erican soldier of fortune to reorganize his army against possible revolt. Gen. Christmas went, at last, to Bonilla, and sealing their friendship to make up for lost that forces whenever and lead a s in danger, resigned that country, but b | the border than | war on Hondu a strip o |border of th | Christmas has apa and took command pute had arisen and on the mutual two little countries, cned back to Teguci- of the inst him. Bonilla fled for his life. | tmas got out of Tegucigalpa | with about 200 men. Still full of fight, {he planned to reach the mountain fastnes: and there rally hils shat- tered forc But at Mani, two days away, the lenemy caught up with him. It was a case of thousands against hundreds, but with Christmas the best strategy s always to strike first. He ordered his little force to attack. He led them in an attempt to cut through the strengthening cordon of the enemy. | The fight was short and sharp. Sixty of his men were killed, 100 wounded and the rest scattered. Wounded, he was taken prisoner and ged back to the very prison into he had thrown ex-President Policarpo. * K K % HE next morning he was marched out to the old wall where losing warriors and Presidents were usually |shot. A climax made for the motion pictures ensued. During the night Christmas managed to get word to Guy Moloney, the present police chief of New Orleans, who had served with him through several battles. When awn came it appeared that even this friend haa failed him, or else could do nothing to save him. Still Christmas fought on—with surprising subtlety and craft. He hit upon the idea of in- | sulting his captors, of enraging them, in hope of delay The firing squad drew up; the ironi- cal Nicaraguan captain asked if he wanted his body shipped home. Christ- mas began his stream of insults. He called the captain and his men, with deep calculation, all the vile things he could think of; he insulted their in- telligence as soldiers, their women, their country. The Nicaraguans—in their hearts the subtle savagery of an Indian ancestry blended with the fierce pride of Spanish blood that also ran in their veins—became frantic. They pounded his face while his hands were hound, and he laughed at them, and continued his taunts. They drew away to consider what tortures would wash away this gringo's insulting epithets. They glared, sneered, told him in detail all the cruel things they | Orleans, ) Cortez; but he soon found he needed a stronger chief of police at Teguci- salpa, so he again called Christmas to that post. And Christmas, now a @'Artagnan of 50, ruled with a hand of iron, suppressing several minor up- risings with ruthless force. He even ruled Bénilla on many an occasion by Bonilla gave him mining and other conces- next vear or so he is reputed to e made a consider- able fortune. He had become a na- tional hero; he could, quite probably have made himself president; he could have returned to the United States and settled down in peace and plenty, but the old war call still played siren * % % % A vision that haunted him so long— that of a United States of Central America. He obtained leave of ab- sence from Bonilla and came to New quite presumably to organ ize, with Honduras as a base, this greatest of all his filibusters, It was an alluring idea—no doubt he could have found much American money to back it—but it was just about this time that America entered the World War. In a way, T know of nothing more pathetic in all the history of soldiers than Lee Christmas’ part in that struggle. He had worn many uni- forms, had fought under many flage, but never had he served under his own flag, nor worn the uniform of his own people. And he wanted, suddenly and flercely, to do those things befors he died. He went to Washington. He trisd to get into the Army. He was refused TUndismayed, he spent days in dogged effort to see President Wilson, and only his tremendous earnestness got him, in those busy, trying times, past the underlings. President Wil heard, was touched, and granted h plea—with the proviso, of course, th the Army doctors find him physical fit. S0 Lee Christmas left the Capital of his own country happier, probably, than he ever -had been in all his re- markable, turbulent life. No dpubt he saw himself leading American soldiers, under the Stars and Stripes. But the Army doctors told him he was too old—he was then 54—and told him too that the seeds of tropical fever—a cumulative poison that white men often gather in the hot coun- tries—was in his system, and that he must be quiet as well as careful if he would retain his health. Christ- mas begged that they forget these things, and flnally the Army agreed to take him into the Intelligence Service, and sent him, of all places, to Central America. Thus Lee Christmas, soldier, in heart and spirit, if not in formal military training, as ever lived, did serve his own country— secretly, in a way, and in mufti; and they say he served it well. But it was true Lee Christmas' fighting days were done. The old fever grew on him these last year: his health failed and his fortune su fered. In 1922, he made a last trip to Central America—he had been back in the States for treatment— going to Guatemala, no longer hunt- ing war, but to look into mining prop- erties. He fell il and was rushed back to New Orleans. Long months in the hospital, and he appeared to recover. A year passed, probably the most peaceful of his adult days, with his family. But in August, 1923, he collapsed in the street. Round him then gathered the chosts of the old hardships, of old jungle sicknesses, of old wounds and infections he had whipped in his youthful days, to take at last their inevitable toll. Round him, tooy gath- ered the loyal friends of his fighting days, the soldiers of fortune, like Guy IN there came before the as great a intended doing to him. They whetted Moloney, ready to war for him again, HOW CHRISTMAS FIRST BE- CAME A GE“FRAL. HE LEAPED FROM THE OCOMOTIVE CAB AND PUT 10 FLIGHT A DE- TACHMENT OF REGULAR SOL- DIERS WHO HAD STOPPED THE REVOLUTIONISTS" TRAIN. knives and brought in braziers of burning coal. Christmas talked on grimly, hopelesly. Just’in time Moloney and a band of American soldiers of fortune smashed their way into the place, bested the surprised firing squad, and carried Christmas away. They fled that night safely into Guatemala. * oK ok % UT Lee Christmas couldn't keep quiet very long. Soon he was back in New Orleans. He was, it ap- pears, planning his biggest and best Central American filibuster. News- paper men noticed an increasing num- ber of known soldiers of fortune whis- pering around the tables of certain old cafes, where filibusters always used to gather. Next, they discovered that mysterious parties had purchased the old United States gunboat Hornet. Christmas denied that the ship was to take arms and ammunition to Porto Cortez for a new uprising. But the | ship cleared suddenly, took on sup- | plies down the coast and turned up at Porto Cortez. Next day, Christmas and Bonilla slipped out of New Or- leans, to be heard from again when war broke out, shortly afterward, in Honduras. Back in Louisiana, Christ- mas and others were indicted for fit- ting out a filibustering expedition against “a country with which the United States was at peace.”” The ‘Washington Government ordered the battleship Tacoma to Honduran waters ;to watch the Hornet—to see that she ‘was not used to violate American neu- trality. But all this did not worry Lee Christmas. He had, indeed, become a soldier, and he planned his most mas- terly campaign. He gathered one army in Nicaragua and one night shot it across the border, with Tegucigalpa as its goal. At the same time he ap- peared with a force of Americans and alien soldiers of fortune off Porto Cortez. By morning that town was his. The first army marched on the capital while Christmas led 5,000 men on Ceiba, an important center. Aided DOWY THE BULL FROM THE MOUNTAINS. villagers, who rarely eat meat, glut- ting themselves on the flesh of the sacrificed animal, The village orches- tra comes forth with its massed in the plaza. And|and % ‘chirimeas’ and a then the flesta passes through a phase | sort of buffoonery; pistols and crackers are fired under the frenzied and all the men, boys and gra included, “torear” the animal in a mimic bull fight until it is weak with exhaustion, after which it is penned in the Cosa Consistorial or town hall, until the butcher comes and humanely of the|kills it. “The flesta continues two days more in dancing and the L ) intre; Seant’s nobes] and was nched in great numbers. ‘To the strains they dance native costumes-—with much snapping of fingers—the *‘bolero” and the “jota, with the stately grace unspolled people. 4 ‘spontaneo d primitive I u;“l:”m of & simple, And 8o ends the b Mother of the ‘most untouched by his friend, Guy Moloney, one of the best machine-gun fighters of that early time, Christmas, after placing his various detachments about the town and telling them to expect no|H. further orders from him, but to do ‘what he mad told them to do in the beginning or die, rushed into the town with a picked force of Americans. ‘Through a hail of bullets they stormed the seawall, behind which the enemy The machine gun, in Moloney’s hands, did terrible execution, and after a three-hour fight, in which the gov- ernment general was slain, the city fell. Davila agreed to a peace confer- .nm.e:l.!h mh l:hll. -mally gave up im e end Once Bonilla. took £ ¥As a reward, he mads Ch even against death. fight was on. The doctors said he had pernicious anemia; that only blood transfusions could save him. Moloney gave his blood to save his old chief. The jun- gle ghosts crept away, to bide their time; they knew. Presently, they closed in again. Lee Christmas fought for his life. Again Moloney gave his blood. The shadows were forced back once more. For a time the fs- sue was in doubt. Another attack, more blood transfusions, a little :fi:pxt‘e! (Then sudden and final vic- 'y for the things of toey for { gs of the jungle and Lee Christmas had surrende the end. but he went out wi::afl’m: Sure and serene faith that death was y enemy by the only enemy before whom he had (Copyright. 1027.) . THE RAMBLER (Continued from Second Page.) His last great be paid to freedmen desiring to emi- grate to Hayti or Liberia was adopt- ed, 27 yeas, 10 nays. The nays were: Senators Chandler, Michigan; Clark, New Hampshire; Fessenden, Maip Foster, Connecticut; Grimes, Iowa; Hale, New Hampshire; Howard, Michi- gan; Morrill, Maine; Pomeroy, Kansas, and Sumner, Massachusetts. These were the uncompromising abolitionists in the Senate. Now we come to the vote on the District emancipation bill. It was carried—yeas, 29; nays, 14. The yeas were: Messrs. Anthony, Rhode Island; Browning, Iilinois; Chandler, Michigan; Clark, New Hampshire; Collomer, Vermont; Dixon. Connecticut; Doolittle, Wisconsin: Fes- senden, Maine; Foot, Vermont; Foster, Connecticut; Grimes, Iowa; Hale, New Hampshire; Harlan, Iowa; Ira Harris, New York; Howard, Michigan; T. O. Howe, Wisconsin; King, New York; . S. Lane, Indiana; J. H. Lane, Kansas; Morrill, Maine; Pomeroy, Kansas; Sherman, Ohlo; Sumner, Massachusetts; Ten Eyck, New Jer- sey; Trumbull, Illinois; B. F. Wade, Ohio; Wilkinson, Minnesota; Wilmot, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts. - and Henry Wilson, Those who voted against the Dis- trict emancipation bill were: Senators Bayard, Delaware; Carlile, Virginia; Dovl[l. R, souri; Kennedy, Maryland; Latham, Californta; McDougal, California; smith, Oregon; Kentucky; Henderson, Mis- ristmas | Will governor of the province about Porto' and Wright, Indiana.. e