Diseases Continue after Hostilities End

Courtyard of the United States' General Hospital in Santiago, Cuba.

Army Nurses and soldiers on Midway Plaisance at the First District Hospital in Huntsville, Alabama during the Spanish-American.

The Yellow Fever Hospital is pictured in Santiago, Cuba.

Our boys never tasted a drop of fresh milk all the while they were in Cuba. When I was recovering from yellow fever I had fresh milk because a quart a day was ordered for me. We knew it was fresh because at that time the natives brought the cow to the main entrance of the hospital.
-Rose Heavren

After the peace protocol ended the hostilities on August 12th, 1898, US forces continued to occupy Cuba. However, deaths from disease among the victorious American expeditionary forces in Cuba continued to rise alarmingly. In August, the Army began sending troops to Montauk Point on the tip of Long Island to recover. By September 15, this hastily improvised hospital, named Camp Wikoff, had 281 contract nurses working in 43 hospital tents. 

[Arriving at Montauk train station, nurses found patients who] were not strong enough to sit up but were lying on rough benches....  Here is where our first work began in trying to make them more comfortable by using our wraps for pillows and carrying milk and water from a nearby canteen.  These soldier[s] ... were direct from battlefield and were suffering from exposure to Malaria fever. They were very grateful for any little kindness ... and most of the nurses were given souvenirs ... which had been in the fight at San Juan Hill.
-Kittie (Whiting) Eastman