accomplish all these purposes, it must destroy the Spanish Navy.
To achieve this end, it would have to work upon the principle of
concentration and not dispersion.

For several months before the actual declaration of war with
Spain, the Navy Department had been effecting this concentration.
On the 21st of April, Captain William T. Sampson was appointed to
command the forces on the North Atlantic station. This included
practically the whole fleet, except the Pacific squadron under
Dewey, and the Oregon, a new battleship of unusual design, which
was on the Pacific coast. On the 1st of March she was ordered
from the Bremerton Yard, in the State of Washington, to San
Francisco, and thence to report in the Atlantic. Her voyage was
the longest emergency run undertaken up to that time by a modern
battleship. The outbreak of the war with Spain meant the sealing
of all ports in which she might have been repaired in case of
emergency. Rumors were rife of Spanish vessels ready to intercept
her, and the eyes not only of the United States but of the world
were upon the Oregon. A feeling of relief and rejoicing therefore
passed through the country when this American warship arrived at
Key West on the 26th of May, fit for immediate and efficient
service.

The fleet, though concentrated in the Atlantic within the region
of immediate hostility, was divided for purposes of operation
into a major division under the immediate command of Admiral
Sampson and a flying squadron under Commodore Schley.* The first
undertook the enforcement of the blockade which was declared on
the 21st of April against Cuba, and patrolled the northern coast
from Gardenas to Bahia. Key West was soon filled with Spanish