Battle of Cienfuegos Battle of Cienfuegos The Battle of Cienfuegos, or the Raid on Cienfuegos, was an engagement of the Spanish–American War, intended by the United States Navy to tighten its blockade of Cuba. The Spanish were using undersea cables as a means to communicate with not only the rest of Cuba, but also the Spanish command. These cables had many key junctions, namely, a shore near Cienfuegos. The cables connected to Havana, the port of Santiago, and then branched off to other Caribbean islands such as Jamaica. The cables were run out from an easily located house which contained a critical hub
Battle of Santiago de Cuba and later research by historians, have suggested that nearly 85% of the Spanish ammunition at Santiago was utterly useless, either defective or simply filled with sawdust as a cost-saving measure for practice firing. The American ammunition had no such issues of lethality. "Vizcaya" continued the fight until overwhelmed, and by the end of the engagement she had been struck as many as 200 times by the fire from "Brooklyn" and "Texas". "Brooklyn" had closed to within when she finally delivered an round which, according to witnesses, may have detonated a torpedo being prepared for launch. A huge explosion ensued, "Vizcaya"