In Chile, the amazing incursions of the Peruvian ironclad, which was the center of this particular war, continued exasperating the people and the Government. Public outrage in Santiago rose to unexpected violence because the Huascar had captured or destroyed in five months a total of 17 Chilean vessels. The Minister of War was stoned as he left Congress. The Parliament bitterly attacked him and demanded changes. President Anibal Pinto reacted by appointing Rafael Sotomayor, a civilian, as the new Minister of War. Sotomayor ordered Admiral Juan Williams to lift the blockade of Iquique and to bring the ironclads, one at a time, to Valparaiso, to have their hulls cleaned by divers and their machinery overhauled. It was felt that Williams lacked the skills to command the squadron and he was also relieved. Commodore Galvarino Riveros was placed in command. The capable Captain Juan Jose Latorre, on the other hand, was appointed commander of the battleship Cochrane.
In a few weeks, most of the ships were rearmed, repaired and repainted. Not only was the squadron thoroughly reorganized but also the Minister of War moved to Antofagasta to be closer to the theater of operations. The Chilean military high command, incapable of beginning the terrestrial campaign, decided that the destruction of the Huascar was, definitively, the first priority. At that moment, Chile and its navy were not at war against Peru; they were at war against Grau and the Huascar. The whole Chilean fleet, consequently, concentrated only on one objective: To hunt and annihilate the slippery ironclad. It could not be accepted that a single ship could keep an entire country in a state of siege.
On September 30th, 1879, Commodore Riveros gathered his squadron in the Bolivian port of Mejillones. After intense deliberations with his officers he decided to start the chase of Huascar under a plan that provided for the conformation of two naval divisions, the first one, under his command, was composed of the battleship Blanco Escalada, the corvette Magellan, the schooner Covadonga and the armored transport Matias Cousiño. The second called “light division” the faster of both, under orders of Captain Latorre, was composed by the battleship Cochrane, the corvettes Loa, Chacabuco and O'Higgins and the transport Amazonas. The idea was to advance toward Huascar´s area of deployment, between Arica and Antofagasta, and to fence her. As a first step, the Chileans headed toward Arica, where they hoped to find the ironclad, and to bombard the port, forcing the Huascar to give combat.
That same day, Admiral Grau, who indeed was in Arica, sent to the Commander in Chief of the Navy, what will became his last report. He reiterated the necessity to receive the potent Palliser piercing grenades for the guns on the Coles Turret, because those were the only ones capable of piercing the armor of the Blanco Encalada and the Cochrane in the event of combat. Simultaneously, Grau received orders to leave in convoy with the corvette Union and the transport Rimac towards the South, in a seventh expedition directed to sabotage the Chilean ports between Tocopilla and Coquimbo. Once more the High Command ordered him to avoid combat with the battleships in order to keep the integrity of Peru’s only remaining ironclad.
When Rivero’s force arrived at Arica in the morning of October five, they met with the surprise that, once again, Huascar had escaped from their hands. But the Chilean Commodore this time was not going to give up, so he abandoned the port, divided his fleet according to plan, and continued the hunt for the difficult prey.
Huascar meanwhile, after leaving the Rimac in Iquique, arrived with the Union at the Galeta de Sarco. There, they captured the Chilean transport Coquimbo. Later on, they arrived to the port of that same name, 702 miles South from Arica, and not finding any military objectives, continued towards the South, until they reach the Galeta de Tongoy, a town just 160 miles North to the main Chilean port of Valparaiso. Having accomplished the objective of the expedition, commanders Grau and Garcia and Garcia directed their ships back to Peru. While the Peruvians headed home, they ignored that the fence so rigorously planned was narrowing on them. The two Chilean divisions advanced from different directions, in open position, willing to fence their prey. They were sure that Huascar should be somewhere and this time they were not going to lose her.
At dawn of October 8th, next to the coasts of Antofagasta, at Punta Angamos, 325 miles South from Arica, the Peruvians sighted three smokes advancing towards them. They were the Blanco Encalada, the Covadonga and the Matias Cousiño that, finally, had sighted the Huascar. Immediately Admiral Grau prepared an evasive maneuver towards the Southwest and ordered high speed. Making prow successively to the West and the North, in three hours the Huascar and the Union were able to escape by maintaining a distance of eight miles over their pursuers. At 07:15 hours, however the Peruvian ships sighted another three smokes from the Nor-West, those belonging to the second Chilean division, precisely from the sector, toward moments before, the ironclad had put prow. Immediately, Grau ordered to veer to the East and to increase even more the speed. However, in less than one hour the Cochrane, faster than Huascar in almost two knots, shortened distances until placing herself at scarce miles of her enemy. The battleship Blanco Encalada and the corvette Covadonga on the other hand, were coming closer, while the O'Higgins and the Loa moved to intercept the Union.
Admiral Grau prepared to veer to the North without results. Soon he understood that his ship could not avoid what evidently was a carefully prepared trap. Immediately he ordered the faster Union to continue towards Arica. Captain Garcia y Garcia reluctantly obeyed the orders. In fact, most of his officers wanted to stay and fight, but the Commander of the II Naval Division clearly understood that his wooden corvette would be easily destroyed if she engaged in combat against the battleships (1). He knew that Grau was right by ordering this course of action as the only way of saving that ship for the country. The skilled Garcia achieved this objective despite the efforts of the O'Higgins and Loa to intercept the Union.
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(1) Several officers of the Union respectfully confronted Captain Garcia y Garcia´s orders to continue to Arica and requested in written to hold a Council of War aboard the ship to decide a new course of action. The valiant but impetuous navy officers wanted to go back, fight and share the same fate as Admiral Grau and the rest of the men of the Huascar. The situation however did not end in a mutiny and discipline prevailed over the disagreements.
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