At last the cruelest of wars was over.
The generals were having a hard time getting through the surging crowd. When they reached the lime deposit across from the arbor, they were caught short by the whine of bullets flying over their heads.
The battle was still on and the square was once again emptied out.
It was a rout.
Running back to their trenches and ducking into any spot they could find, sidling up to the riverbanks, the men were fearful and horribly disappointed. Just as victory was imminent, they were mocked by the defeated as they lay dying. These assailants of a kind that history had never seen before finally understood that the enemy’s last stronghold would eat them up. It was not enough that they had six thousand rifles and six thousand swords; the strength of twelve thousand arms, the thud of twelve thousand boots, six thousand revolvers and twenty cannons, thousands of grenades and shells—all were of no use. The executions and fires, the hunger and thirst they had thrust on the enemy were not doing the job. What had they gained in ten months of fighting and one hundred days of endless bombing? What use to them were the mountains of ruins, the destroyed churches, and the rubble of broken images, crushed altars, and shattered saints? All of this had occurred under a bright, serene sky that cast doubt on their obsession with crushing a form of deeply rooted religious belief that brought comfort to their fellow human beings.
Other measures were needed. The opponent was immune to all the forces of nature and adept at havoc and destruction. They had made plans for such an emergency and had foreseen this awful epilogue to the drama. A lieutenant, an orderly of the headquarters staff, ordered up dozens of dynamite bombs from the camp. This was the only thing left to be done. The
sertanejos
had defied all the psychology of ordinary warfare. Their resistance was emboldened by defeat and they were strengthened by starvation.
The troops were attacking the very bedrock of our race. Dynamite was the only suitable weapon. It was a tribute.
The firing stopped now and an intense silence fell over the expectant troops. Then a violent tremor shook the circumference of the settlement, running along the camp and spreading to the artillery on the hillsides, covering entire sectors with a shaking grid of seismic curves, intersecting over the ground. The pointed ruins of the churches came crashing down, walls swayed and fell, and rooftop after rooftop jettisoned into the air, forming a plume of dust to add to the smoke. Shrieks of terror came from hundreds of victims as mighty explosions shook the earth. What was left of Canudos was being torn apart.
The battalions crouched in the alleys outside the death zone were waiting for the flames and dust to subside so they could initiate their last attacks. Beams and splinters were flying all around, and a thundercloud of dust rose above them. They were not meant to accomplish this task. A heavy round a fire swept over them from the burning huts. They sought cover wherever they could: in corners, creeping along the foundations of the huts, or running back to the trenches.
Ahead, an indescribable disonance of screams and wails, curses and shouts, expressing terror and pain, anger and frustration, rose from the tortured multitude. In the glow of the fires, silhouettes could be seen running in and out. Women ran from their burning shacks, carrying babies in their arms or dragging children along as they hurried down the lanes and disappeared into the maze. People were fleeing in every direction, rolling on the ground, their clothing afire. Bodies were burning and writhing in agony. They were human torches. Overlooking the horrible scene, running about and making no attempt to hide, leaping over the bonfires and standing on the rooftops, the last defenders of the settlement shouted and gestured. They were barely visible through the smoke. Then from all around, two steps away from the line of fire, sinister figures with masks of soot and singed chests, returned to the battle. The
jagunços
were back.
These men had come to confront the enemy in the troops’ own trenches. The army troops were discouraged. They realized the futility of the bombardments, the constant firestorms, and the extreme resort of dynamiting the settlement. They lost all unity of action and of command. The bugles sounded discordantly but no one paid attention to them. It was impossible to follow their signals when conditions were changing from minute to minute. Detachments from the same company would move forward, fall back, or stop, breaking up into smaller units at every corner. They would mingle with other corpsmen as they attacked the houses or moved around them. This process was repeated again and again, with the same advances and retreats, ending in dispersion of the men. Soon small bands of soldiers were milling about, completely disoriented.
Taking advantage of the confusion, the
jagunços
gave them heavy fire. After a while, men who did not have any cover were huddling against the walls of the few dwellings that were still standing. Others had backed off a considerable distance down the lanes to the part of the compound that was controlled by the army. This was in an attempt to avoid the danger zone, but that zone was now expanding. Men on the other side of the trenches, outside the battle zone, were falling as well. It was reminiscent of the first terrible days of the siege. The slightest incaution would cost a life.
The captain commissary of the second-column command, Aguiar e Silva, stopped to let a platoon pass by behind a corner of a hut and shouted a viva of encouragement. He had hardly got the second syllable out of his mouth when he was struck by a bullet in the chest.
The commander of the Twenty-fifth Battalion, Major Henrique Severiano da Silva, suffered the same fate. He was a fine man. In the middle of the fighting he saw a child struggling in the flames and dashed through the blaze to carry it to safety. It was the one act of heroic altruism in that bloody day. But he paid for it. He died from a gunshot a few hours later.
The battle went on. It had become unnaturally torturous for both sides.
Army losses were escalating again. The spectators, who were gathered at observation points on the hill at the far side of the camp, were able to get an idea of the extent of the losses from the lugubrious procession of stretchers and hammocks coming over the hill. Emerging from the ravine, the stretcher bearers would make their way slowly upward around the houses on the slope. At the top they would start the descent along the other side to the field hospital where at one o’clock in the afternoon there were already about three hundred wounded.
The leather awning that covered the depression in the hillside could not accommodate all of them. The patients were crammed in and they spilled over onto the rocks on the southern slope. They could be seen dragging themselves along and competing with each other for the shade of the barracks. The medical staff, too few of them, ran back and forth. The wounded from previous engagements, lying in their cots or leaning on their elbows, looked anxiously at these new companions in misery. Outside on the bare ground in the hot sun were the stiff corpses of a number of officers, Lieutenant Colonel Tupy, Major Queiroz, Sublieutenants Raposo, Neville, Carvalho, and others.
The panting, sweating bearers came in and out, bending under the weight of the stretchers. They would place them down and go back to the battleground. This funereal procession threatened to continue all day because the situation was not changing. The guerrillas continued their ferocious counterattack. Successive charges were made. The bugles kept up their insistent bellowing. Huge waves of fire and metal crashed and thundered against the floodgates they were unable to break down.
The ninety dynamite bombs that had been detonated kept exploding on and off but with no effect. They had to resort to still other means. Cans of kerosene were tossed into the houses to spread the fires. This, too, was futile.
At two in the afternoon the assault stopped. The charges ceased and the attackers, on the defensive and back at their positions, experienced the disappointment of a defeat. In the stretchers and hammocks, or being carried under their armpits by their comrades, the wounded continued the climb up the hill. The exhausted bearers were staggering, leaning against the houses for support. The bullets kept coming through the night, flying all over the camp, reaching to every point of the line. They whistled through the air, making every imaginable sound. They came from the tiny circle where the
jagunços
were confined.
It was a cruel and sterile battle. Five hundred sixty-seven men had fallen, with no apparent result. After the battle died down there was as always scattered fire. The night went by with the beleaguered troops keeping watch. All they had to look forward to were more encounters, useless losses, and wasted effort.
Meanwhile the situation of the
sertanejos
had become worse. They had lost the new church and the last of their water pits. They were surrounded by huge fires that kept them penned in their last holdout. Yet at dawn on October 2, the weary conquerors were awakened by firm, sustained fire.
Notes from a Journal
That day . . .
Let us transcribe without changing a single line, the final notes from a journal written as these events were taking place.
At one o’clock a great number of new prisoners arrive. This is a clear sign that the rebels are losing strength. They were expected. Soon after midday a white flag was raised from the middle of the last group of huts. The attacks ceased immediately on our side. This was the final surrender. The bugles were quiet. A deep silence fell over the battle lines and the camp. The flag, just a rag being waved nervously in the air, was withdrawn. Shortly afterward, two
sertanejos
came out of a dark passageway and gave themselves up to a commander of one of the battalions. From there they were taken to the commander in chief at the engineering commission quarters.
One of the envoys was Pious Anthony, the Counselor’s acolyte and assistant. He was a tall, light mulatto with erect posture. He was very pale, lean, and flat chested. He looked resigned but proud. His face was lit up by his intelligent eyes. He had a sparse beard. He was dressed in an indigo blue tunic and in the fashion of the community he carried a staff. He and his companions were escorted by privates and followed by a curious crowd.
When he came before the general, he took off his blue linen cap with its white stripes and tassels and stood there in an attitude of respect, waiting for the victor to say the first word. Not a word of the dialogue was lost on the listeners.
“Who are you?”
I inform the doctor general that I am Antônio Beato, Pious Anthony, and I have come on my own will to turn myself in because our people have no more opinion on this matter and they cannot survive any longer.
As he spoke he twirled his cap in his hands and looked around at the bystanders.
“Good. And the Counselor?”
“The good Counselor is in heaven....”
He went on to say that the Counselor had died on September 22 of dysentery, “the runs,” as he said it, in a grotesquely comic way that caused people to burst out laughing in spite of the seriousness of the situation. He ignored this and stood motionless. His expression was calm and impenetrable. He looked straight at the general in a way that was both humble but firm. The dialogue continued:
“And your men are not willing to surrender?”
“I argued with them, trying to convince them to come but they did not want to. They are of mixed opinions. But they can’t take any more. Almost all of them are ready to collapse. They are dying of thirst.”
“And you can’t bring them in?”
“I cannot. They were ready to shoot me when I left.”
“Do you see how many men we have, all of them armed and ready?”
“I am surprised to see so many.”
His reply was either genuine or calculated. A brief expression of fear passed over his face.
“Well, then. Your people can’t hold out and they can’t get away. Go back and tell them to surrender. They will not be killed. I will guarantee their safety. They will be turned over to the government of the republic. Tell them the republic is good to Brazilians. They need to surrender without conditions.”
Pious Anthony refused to accept the mission. He gave reasons why he could not go.
At this juncture the other prisoner intervened. Until this point he had not said a word. For the first time our men had the chance to see a
jagunço
who looked well nourished and who was not the typical
sertanejo
type. His name was Bernabé José de Carvalho and he was a second-line leader. He looked Flemish. He reminded us of the Dutch who had commanded these northern territories for many years, trading with the Indians. His big blue eyes sparkled. His flat, strong head was covered with a thick mane of straw-colored hair. He had the credentials of a higher racial stock. He was not the common backwoodsman and he was married to a niece of Captain Pedro Celeste of Bom Conselho.
He appeared to be annoyed with his companion. He spoke up, insisting with the recalcitrant Anthony.
“Let’s go, man. Let’s go. . . . I’ll have a talk with them. Leave it to me.”
And they went.
The outcome of this mission was completely unexpected. The holy man returned after an hour with three hundred women and children and six weak old men. It seemed that the
jagunços
were masterfully playing their last trick. They were going to rid themselves of the useless crowd that competed for their scarce resources. This way they could prolong the conflict. Pious Anthony had perhaps performed a brilliant move. Consummate diplomat that he was, he had saved these wretched creatures from the flames and the bullets and gotten rid of them at the same time.
This was very possibly a trick. We do not ignore the fact that the clever ascetic did return with the others. This was to his advantage and may be proof of his good faith. But it could be that he was motivated to make the final sacrifice on behalf of his community by returning to camp and giving himself up to the authorities. Perhaps this was evidence of his mysticism and desire for martyrdom. There is no other way to understand the situation since the other envoy did not return and remained with the fighting men in the settlement. There he was probably organizing the next attack.
The arrival of the prisoners was a touching event. Anthony led the way. His posture was erect, he kept his eyes lowered, and he walked with the slow cadence that is customary in religious processions. He waved his long staff in his hand as if it were an enormous baton for a funeral procession. The line of prisoners formed a long line that curved down the slope of the hill, kept going in the direction of the camp, and stopped a hundred yards beyond the first-column headquarters. It was an ugly assembly of repulsive bodies dressed in rags.
Our men looked at them remorsefully. They were shocked and moved. In this short truce the settlement was putting in front of them their legions of harmless, crippled, mutilated, starving souls in an assault that was harder to take than any barrage of enemy fire. It was hard for them to acknowledge that these weak, helpless people were the ones living in the huts during the three-month bombardment. The dark faces and filthy, emaciated bodies covered with wounds, scars, and gashes made the victory they so longed for shallow and shameful. They now saw the reward of all the battles they had fought, the reversals they had experienced, and the lives they had wasted. Here were their prisoners, an assortment of human jetsam. It was tragic and disgusting in the extreme.
There was not an able-bodied man among them, no one able to carry a weapon. There were nothing but women, ghosts of women, young girls prematurely aged, the young and old alike in their ugliness, filth, and state of extreme malnourishment. The children could barely stand on their bowed legs. They clung to their mothers’ backs or to their withered breasts. They were dragged by the hand. The lineup of children and old people was endless. There were few men among them, only invalids, who had swollen waxy faces, bent over double, wobbling as they walked.
There was one old man who had to be propped up by his companions and who held up the line. He seemed to be there against his will. Twisting to free himself, he turned back and waved his shaking arms at the settlement. He might have left sons there to participate in the final struggle. Only he was weeping. The others had stony faces. To these rough woodsmen, this terrible episode was just one of many tragedies of backlands existence. Some of the crowd bared their heads as they passed through the curious groups of soldiers. One was an eighty-year-old man who was not stooped like the others. He walked slowly, stopping now and then to look back at the church. He kept this up while saying the rosary, for he was a true believer. He was perhaps hoping for the miracle he had been promised.
Some of the sick could not walk more than one or two steps before they would collapse. They had to be carried by the arms and legs, taking four soldiers each. They did not make a sound but lay still, with their eyes open as if they were dead. Little children ran up and down the line, crying and calling for their parents who were either there or dead in the settlement below. Tiny toddlers were carried on the soldiers’ backs. These men who had just half an hour before been fighting in the trenches were playing nursemaid and trying to figure out how to carry a child.
There was a skinny hag, perhaps the most horrible witch in the backlands, who was the only one to lift her head and look the crowd in the face. Her tangled white hair was filled with clumps of earth and it fell over her bare shoulders. She was restless and angry, active in spite of her advanced age. She broke into a run and forced her way through the group of refugees. She carried a small child in her thin arms, her granddaughter, great-granddaughter, or possibly her great-great-granddaughter. The child was in horrifying condition. The left side of its face had been torn away some time ago and the jawbone stood out from the wound. The right side of her face was lit up by a lovely smile, which obliterated the terrible gash on the other side. This was the most ghastly sight of the entire campaign, to see the old woman barging through the line of sad creatures.
The procession stopped next to the cavalry squadron tents inside the four lines of a military square. Then for the first time the men had a chance to see the Canudos population. Aside from the ravages left by the war and starvation, there was a remarkable similarity among the facial features of the prisoners. There were few whites or pure Negroes. The likeness came from a mixture of the three races. The predominant type was the
pardo
, a mixture of Kaffir, Portuguese, and Tapuia. They had bronzed faces, stiff or curly hair, and square torsos. Occasionally there was a profile with straight lines, indicating that the person had come from a higher racial stock. Around them were the soldiers, also of many racial types, the white man, the black man, the mulatto, and
cafuzo
, with all color gradations. There was a contrast to be noted: The strong race had been reduced, in the boundaries of the square, to these indefinable mestizos, who had been broken by the war. They were broken and humiliated. From the miserable crowd came whining, plaintive voices asking for charity. They were consumed by the hunger and thirst of many days.