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Home Town Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Last Address Boise, Idaho
Date of Passing Jul 17, 1936
Location of Interment Morris Hill Cemetery - Boise, Idaho
First Sergeant W. H. Abendroth, 72, Indian fighter and veteran of foreign campaigns, died early Friday morning at a local hospital.
Sergeant Abendroth's death was attributed to heart trouble which was caused by yellow fever contracted in a Cuban campaign.
As instructor of Boise ROTC, in 1919 and 1920, Sergeant Abendroth ended his active military career which commenced when he enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1887 at Fort Sherman, Idaho. Mr. Abendroth was one of the organizers and charter member of the Boise chapter Veterans of Freign Wars. Since 1906, he made his home in Boise when he was not engaged in foreign campaigns.
FOUGHT SIOUX
Sergeant Abendroth saw service in the Sioux Indian wards in the Black Hills and the campaign against the Apache Indians in 1885 and 1886. At this time he was a member of G Troop 4th Cavalry. He served in H Troop 8th Cavalry during the Spanish-American War.
During the Philippine uprising in 1903-4-5 Sergeant Abendroth was with the K troop of the 14th cavalry. He retired from active service in 1911 after spending 30 years as a soldier. While the World war was being waged he again gave active service in the army as military instructor at the Univeristy of Idaho.
Description The Spanish–American War (Spanish: Guerra hispano-estadounidense or Guerra hispano-americana; Filipino: Digmaang Espanyol-Amerikano) was a conflict fought between Spain and the United States in 1898. Hostilities began in the aftermath of the internal explosion of the USS Maine in Havana harbor in Cuba leading to United States intervention in the Cuban War of Independence. American acquisition of Spain's Pacific possessions led to its involvement in the Philippine Revolution and ultimately in the Philippine–American War.
Revolts had been occurring for some years in Cuba against Spanish rule. The U.S. later backed these revolts upon entering the Spanish–American War. There had been war scares before, as in the Virginius Affair in 1873. In the late 1890s, US public opinion was agitated by anti-Spanish propaganda led by newspaper publishers such as Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst which used yellow journalism to call for war. The business community across the United States had just recovered from a deep depression, and feared that a war would reverse the gains. They lobbied vigorously against going to war.
The US Navy battleship Maine was mysteriously sunk in Havana harbor; political pressures from the Democratic Party pushed the administration of Republican President William McKinley into a war that he had wished to avoid.[9] Spain promised time and time again that it would reform, but never delivered. The United States sent an ultimatum to Spain demanding that it surrender control of Cuba. First Madrid declared war, and Washington then followed suit.
The main issue was Cuban independence; the ten-week war was fought in both the Caribbean and the Pacific. US naval power proved decisive, allowing expeditionary forces to disembark in Cuba against a Spanish garrison already facing nationwide Cuban insurgent attacks and further wasted by yellow fever. Numerically superior Cuban, Philippine, and US forces obtained the surrender of Santiago de Cuba and Manila despite the good performance of some Spanish infantry units and fierce fighting for positions such as San Juan Hill. Madrid sued for peace with two obsolete Spanish squadrons sunk in Santiago de Cuba and Manila Bay and a third, more modern fleet recalled home to protect the Spanish coasts.
The result was the 1898 Treaty of Paris, negotiated on terms favorable to the US which allowed it temporary control of Cuba and ceded ownership of Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippine islands. The cession of the Philippines involved payment of $20 million ($575,760,000 today) to Spain by the US to cover infrastructure owned by Spain.
The defeat and collapse of the Spanish Empire was a profound shock to Spain's national psyche, and provoked a thorough philosophical and artistic revaluation of Spanish society known as the Generation of '98.[ The United States gained several island possessions spanning the globe and a rancorous new debate over the wisdom of expansionism. It was one of only five US wars (against a total of eleven sovereign states) to have been formally declared by Congress.
