Ecuador in Revolution by W. A. S.

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 7, 1912

Ecuador in Revolution

By W. A. S.

THESE are truly days of unrest, even though the winds of universal strife are being held. What will it be when the storm bursts? As I left America, the flight of our missionaries from the interior of China, amid revolution, had just been reported. The turmoil in Persia made us think of our two missionaries there, Brethren F. F. Oster and H. Dirksen. Now here is revolution in Ecuador, South America, and I am unable to get into communication with our two missionaries in Quito, Brethren W. W. Wheeler and John Osborne.

The ship on which I sailed from Panama for Guayaquil was called into Manta, an Ecuador port, to take on a thousand soldiers to aid the revolutionary party, operating from Guayaquil, against the party of the former government, operating from Quito.

The Quito forces seem to have been winning, and in a battle a few days ago, in which they say seven hundred were killed, the Guayaquil forces were driven back to within thirteen miles of this city. There the matter stands. The reenforcements by our ship, and another four hundred who came in last evening from another coast town, are expected to turn the tide. But they seem poorly equipped, and many brought down to the port, I am told by witnesses, were brought tied with cords, four abreast. They were taken by force from their villages and plantations. It is a sorry situation, and all for the profit of private parties striving for the possession of power and the gains that come with it.

As yellow fever and the plague are in the town, I stopped two days aboard ship in the harbor. I came into town last evening to secure transportation for Peru,—no meeting in Ecuador being possible,—and to see if I could communicate in any way with our brethren in Quito. All communication is absolutely cut off. We can only hope that our brethren there have means sufficient, or credit, so that they will not suffer need. Matters will doubtless be settled one way or the other soon. Pray for the workers in Quito. It is a wicked, stormy world we live in.

Last night I was kept awake by the firing of guns and pistols by the half-drunken soldiery. The commander of the thousand men who came on our ship was so intoxicated as to be unable to get about when led on board. This morning soldiers are rolling several field-guns along the street in front of the hotel, as I write. Just out on the river lies the United States man-of-war “Yorktown,” which is looked to to protect property in Guayaquil in case the revolutionists are defeated and return to the city to loot and escape as best they may.

Business is tied up, and men feel the country is going to ruin. When one sees the dirty streets and hears the mosquitoes humming outside the window-screens, it is not surprising that fever and plague abound. Our workers in Quito are high in the mountains; and it is from bases in the most healthful parts of these equatorial countries that we must work in seeking for true hearts who are looking for light.

I hope to hear of the arrival of the ship for Peru this morning.

W. A. S.