Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 21, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 December 1899 — Why Dewey Cut the Manila Cable [ARTICLE]

Why Dewey Cut the Manila Cable

Being asked by an intimate friend if he really cut the cable between Manila and Hong Kong, not to shut off the Spaniards from home orders, but rather to get beyond quick reach of the United States Navy Department, Dewey suavely said: “We had no apparatus for cabling on board ship. But even if we could have obtained it the cable company would have been obliged to refuse to receive or transmit messages in that way. It could not have afforded to do anything that would enable the Spaniards—in case they returned to poWer in Manila after the war—to withhold payment of their subsidy. Don’t you think these reasons are good enough?”—Ladies’ Home Journal.