Page:Vol 4 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/565

Rh was not only suffering for the necessaries of life, but sickness had greatly increased. There were not healthy men enough for the routine of military duty. Morelos becoming informed of it, saw at once how easy it would be in such a state of things to bring matters to a quick termination by setting fire to the place. But he bethought him of the women and children, of the aged and helpless, that were in the fortress, and he determined to adopt other means, though involving some risk to himself and greater peril for his men. Let such instances as this be remarked. These men were not altogether merciless, as some delight to represent them, even though they did some times kill prisoners of war. Were not prisoners killed on either side during modern wars in other countries—men wholly innocent of any crime and hardly knowing why they were shot; killed simply by way of reprisal and revenge? I do not remember any instance where a fortress was spared out of consideration for the non-combatants in it, either in the late wars of Europe or in any other late wars.

To avoid inflicting unnecessary suffering, therefore, Morelos determined to cut off the besieged from the sea; and during the night of the 17th, Galeana was directed to surround the castle under its very guns, with a picked body of men, on the right or Hornos side. Colonel Gonzalez was ordered to do the same on the left side to meet Galeana. This perilous undertaking was successfully accomplished in spite of the active firing of the enemy, including their free use of hand grenades. Early in the morning, finding the revolutionists in posssessionpossession [sic] of the moat, and