Adolfo Rodriguez was the only son of a Cuban farmer, who lived nine
miles outside of Santa Clara, beyond the hills that surround that
city to the north.

When the revolution in Cuba broke out young Rodriguez joined the
insurgents, leaving his father and mother and two sisters at the
farm. He was taken, in December of 1896, by a force of the Guardia
Civile, the corps d'elite of the Spanish army, and defended himself
when they tried to capture him, wounding three of them with his
machete.

He was tried by a military court for bearing arms against the
government, and sentenced to be shot by a fusillade some morning
before sunrise.

Previous to execution he was confined in the military prison of Santa
Clara with thirty other insurgents, all of whom were sentenced to be
shot, one after the other, on mornings following the execution of
Rodriguez.

His execution took place the morning of the 19th of January, 1897, at
a place a half-mile distant from the city, on the great plain that
stretches from the forts out to the hills, beyond which Rodriguez had
lived for nineteen years. At the time of his death he was twenty
years old.

I witnessed his execution, and what follows is an account of the way
he went to his death. The young man's friends could not be present,
for it was impossible for them to show themselves in that crowd and
that place with wisdom or without distress, and I like to think that,