advance of the main body.

[Illustration: Upper End of the Calle Mendez-Vigo, Mayaguez.]

A staff officer, who had been sent ahead to select camp, reported at this
time the ground west of the Cabo Rojo road as suitable for this purpose;
but owing to the suspected proximity of the enemy, whose position had not
yet been determined, it was decided to push ahead and beyond the iron
bridge. This, despite the fact that the men had now marched 13 miles and
were very tired. Once in possession of the bridge and the high ground to
the north of it, the command would occupy a strong position, which
would make it hard to check its advance on Mayaguez. Accordingly, the
advance-guard, under Captain Hoyt, moved forward, deploying its advance
party as skirmishers and its supports into a line of squads. In this
formation it continued until it had approached the bridge within about 400
yards. At this juncture the enemy opened fire, at first individual fire.
The firing aimed at the advance-guard accelerated the march of the Eleventh
Infantry, which ... reported to the brigade commander, whose staff had
already commenced the demolition of the wire fences enclosing the road.
About the time that the brigade commander caused the deployment of
two companies to re-enforce the advance-guard,--Major Gilbraith in
command,--the enemy, from his position in the hills to the right front,
fired volleys at the main body through the interval separating the infantry
advance-guard from the cavalry, wounding a number of men, also an officer
and several horses of the brigade staff. Meanwhile the artillery battalion,
under the authority of the brigade commander, had taken up a position
to the left of the road. As the powder used by the enemy was absolutely
smokeless, and his position being, moreover, for the most part screened by
the trees along the Rio Grande, the question of the exact direction to be
given Major Gilbraith's detachment, and to the lines of battle about to be