Sen. Rawlins:
... In burning towns, what would you do? Would the entire town be destroyed by fire or would only offending portions of the town be burned?
Gen. Hughes:
I do not know that we ever had a case of burning what you would call a town in this country, but probably a barrio or a sitio; probably a half dozen houses, native shacks, where the insurrectos would go in and be concealed, and if they caught a detachment passing they would kill some of them.
Sen. Rawlins:
What did I understand you to say would be the consequences of that?
Gen. Hughes:
They usually burned the village.
Sen. Rawlins:
All of the houses in the village?
Gen. Hughes:
Yes everyone of them.
...
Sen. Rawlins:
If these shacks where of no consequence what was the utility of their destruction?
Gen. Hughes:
The destruction was a punishment. They [inhabitants] permitted these people to come in there and conceal themselves and they gave no sign. It is always -
Sen. Rawlins:
The punishment in that case would fall, not upon the men, who could go elsewhere, but mainly upon the women and little children.
Gen. Hughes:
The women and children are part of the family, and where you wish to inflict punishment you can punish the man probably worse in that way than in any other.
Sen. Rawlins:
But is it within the ordinary rules of civilized warfare?
