The Philippines: Past and Present Volume I Part 32

Rather heavy resistance was encountered on the extreme right, and the turning movement did not materialize as rapidly as had been hoped. General Wheaton, who was in command of the forces about the church, finally moved to the front, and as we were directly in the rear of his line and the Insurgents, as usual, overshot badly, we found ourselves in an uncomfortably hot corner. Bullets rattled on the church roof like hail, and presently one pa.s.sed through the opening through which Major Bourns, Colonel Potter, of the engineer corps, and I were sticking our heads. Immediately thereafter we were observed by Dr. Sherman making record time on all fours along one of the framing timbers of the church toward its tower. There we took up our station, and thereafter observed the fighting by peeping through windows partially closed with blocks of volcanic tuff. We had a beautiful opportunity to see the artillery fire. The guns were directly in front of and below us and we could watch the laying of the several pieces and then turn our field-gla.s.ses on the particular portions of the Insurgent trenches where the projectiles were likely to strike. Again and again we caught bursting sh.e.l.ls in the fields of our gla.s.ses and could thus see their effect as accurately as if we had been standing close by, without any danger of being perforated by shrapnel.

After the Insurgent position had been carried we walked forward to their line of trenches and followed it east to a point beyond the La Loma Church, counting the dead and wounded, as I had heard wild stories of tremendous slaughter and wanted to see just how much damage the fire of our troops had really done. On our way we pa.s.sed the Caloocan railroad station which had been converted into a temporary field hospital. Here I saw good Father McKinnon, the champlain of the First California Volunteers, a.s.sisting a surgeon and soaked with the blood of wounded men. He was one chaplain in a thousand. It was always easy to find him. One had only to look where trouble threatened and help was needed. He was sure to be there.

On my way from the railway station to the trenches I met a very much excited officer returning from the front. He had evidently had a long and recent interview with Cyrus n.o.ble, [443] and was determined to tell me all about the fighting. I escaped from him after some delay, and with much difficulty. Later he remembered having met me, but made a grievous mistake as to the scene of our encounter, insisting that we had been together in "Wheaton's Hole," an uncommonly hot position where numerous people got hurt. He persisted in giving a graphic account of our experiences, and in paying high tribute to my coolness and courage under heavy fire. My efforts to persuade him that I had not been with him there proved futile, and I finally gave up the attempt. I wonder how many other military reputations rest upon so slender a foundation! This experience was unique. I never saw another officer under the influence of liquor when in the field.

At the time that we visited the Insurgent trenches, not all of our own killed and wounded had been removed, yet every wounded Insurgent whom we found had a United States army canteen of water at his side, obviously left by some kindly American soldier. Not a few of the injured had been furnished hardtack as well. All were ultimately taken to Manila and there given the best of care by army surgeons.

Sometime later a most extraordinary account of this fight, written by a soldier, was published in the _Springfield Republican_. It was charged that our men had murdered prisoners in cold blood, and had committed all manner of barbarities, the writer saying among other things:--

"We first bombarded a town called Malabon and then entered it and killed every man, woman and child in the place."

The facts were briefly as follows: There was an Insurgent regiment in and near a mangrove swamp to the right of this town. When it became obstreperous it was sh.e.l.led for a short time until it quieted down again. None of the sh.e.l.ls entered the town. Indeed, most of them struck in the water. Our troops did not enter Malabon that day, but pa.s.sed to the northward, leaving behind a small guard to keep the Insurgents from coming out of Malabon in their rear. Had they then entered the town, they would not have found any women, children or non-combatant men to kill for the reason that all such persons had been sent away some time before. The town was burned, in part, but by the Insurgents themselves. They fired the church and a great orphan asylum, and did much other wanton damage.

Being able to speak from personal observation as to the occurrences of that day, I sent a long cablegram direct to the _Chicago Times-Herald_ stating the facts. After my return to the United States, President McKinley was kind enough to say to me that if there had been no other result from the visit of the first Philippine Commission to the islands than the sending of that cablegram, he should have considered the expense involved more than justified. He added that the country was being flooded at the time with false and slanderous rumours, and people at home did not know what to believe. The statements of army officers were discounted in advance, and other testimony from some unprejudiced source was badly needed.

On April 2, 1899, Colonel Denby arrived, and our serious work began. The fighting continued and there was little that we could do save earnestly to strive to promote friendly relations with the conservative element among the Filipinos, and to gather the information we had been instructed to obtain.

On April 4, 1899, we issued a proclamation setting forth in clear and simple language the purposes of the American government. [444] It was translated into Tagalog and other dialects and widely circulated. The Insurgent leaders were alert to keep the common people and the soldiers from learning of the kindly purposes of the United States. They were forbidden to read the doc.u.ment and we were reliably informed that the imposition of the death penalty was threatened if this order was violated. In Manila crowds of Filipinos gathered about copies of the proclamation which were posted in public places. Many of them were soon effaced by Insurgent agents or sympathizers.

This doc.u.ment unquestionably served a very useful purpose. [445]

For one thing, it promptly brought us into much closer touch with the more conservative Filipinos.

We soon established relations of friendliness and confidence with men like Arellano, Torres, Legarda and Tavera, who had left the Malolos government when it demonstrated its futility, and were ready to turn to the United States for help. Insurgent sympathizers also conferred freely with us. We were invited to a beautiful function given in our honour at the home of a wealthy family, and were impressed, as no one can fail to be, with the dignified bearing of our Filipino hosts, a thing which is always in evidence on such occasions. We gave a return function which was largely attended and greatly aided in the establishment of relations of confidence and friendship with leading Filipino residents of Manila.

The Filipinos were much impressed with Colonel Denby. He was a handsome man, of imposing presence, with one of the kindest hearts that ever beat. They felt instinctively that they could have confidence in him, and showed it on all occasions.

Meanwhile we lost no opportunity to inform ourselves as to conditions and events, conferring with Filipinos from various parts of the archipelago and with Chinese, Germans, Frenchmen, Belgians, Austrians, Englishmen, Spaniards and Americans. Among the witnesses who came before us were farmers, bankers, brokers, merchants, lawyers, physicians, railroad men, shipowners, educators and public officials. Certainly all cla.s.ses of opinion were represented, and when we were called upon by the President, a little later, for a statement of the situation we felt fully prepared to make it.

Blount has charged that the commission attempted to interfere with the conduct of the war, and cites a cablegram from General Otis stating that conferences with Insurgents cost soldiers' lives in support of this contention. No conference with Insurgent leaders was ever held without the previous knowledge and approval of the general, who was himself a member of the commission.

Late in April General Luna sent Colonel Arguelles of his staff to ask for a fifteen days' suspension of hostilities under the pretext of enabling the Insurgent congress to meet at San Fernando, Pampanga, on May 1, to discuss the situation and decide what it wanted to do. He called on the commission and urged us to ask Otis to grant this request, but we declined to intervene, and General Otis refused to grant it.

Mabini continued Luna's effort, sending Arguelles back with letters to Otis and to the commission. In the latter he asked for "an armistice and a suspension of hostilities as an indispensable means of arriving at peace," stating explicitly that the Philippine government "does not solicit the armistice to gain a s.p.a.ce of time in which to reenforce itself."

The commission again referred Arguelles to General Otis on the matter of armistice and suspension of hostilities. We suspected that the statement that these things were not asked for in order to gain time was false, and this has since been definitely established.

Taylor says:--

"On April 11 Mabini wrote to General Luna (Exhibit 719) that Aguinaldo's council was of the opinion that no negotiations for the release of the Spanish prisoners should be considered unless the American Commission agreed to a suspension of hostilities for the purpose of treating, not only in regard to the prisoners, but for the purpose of opening negotiations between Aguinaldo's government and the American authorities.

"'In arriving at this decision we have been actuated by the desire to gain time for our a.r.s.enals to produce sufficient cartridges, if, as would seem to be probable, they persist in not even recognizing our belligerency, as means for furthering the recognition of our independence.'" [446]

Arguelles, on his return, was instructed to ask Otis for a--

"general armistice and suspension of hostilities in all the archipelago for the short s.p.a.ce of three months, in order to enable it to consult the opinion of the people concerning the government which would be the most advantageous, and the intervention in it which should be given to the North American Government, and to appoint an extraordinary commission with full powers, to act in the name of the Philippine people." [447]

General Otis naturally again declined to grant the request for a suspension of hostilities.

Little came of the conference between Arguelles and the commission, except that we really succeeded in convincing him of the good intentions of our government, and this promptly got him into very serious trouble, as we shall soon see. I took him to a tent hospital on the First Reserve Hospital grounds where wounded Insurgents were receiving the best of treatment at the hands of American surgeons, and he was amazed. He had been taught to believe that the Americans murdered prisoners, raped women, and committed similar barbarities whenever they got a chance. As we have seen, stories of this sort were industriously spread by many of the Insurgent leaders among their soldiers, and among the common people as well. They served to arouse the pa.s.sions of the former, and stirred them up to acts of devilish brutality which they might perhaps not otherwise have perpetrated. Arguelles told the truth upon his return, and this, together with his suggestion that it might be well to consider the acceptance of the form of government offered by the United States, nearly cost him his life. Relative to this matter Taylor says:--

"When Arguelles returned to the insurgent lines, it must have been considered that he had said too much in Manila. While he had been sent there to persuade the Americans to agree to a suspension of hostilities to be consumed in endless discussion under cover of which Luna's army could be reorganized, he had not only failed to secure the desired armistice, but had come back with the opinion that it might after all be advisable to accept the government proposed by the United States. On May 22 General Luna ordered his arrest and trial for being in favour of the autonomy of the United States in the Philippine Islands. He was tried promptly, the prosecuting witness being another officer of Luna's staff who had accompanied him to Manila and acted as a spy upon his movements (P.I.R., 285. 2). The court sentenced him to dismissal and confinement at hard labor for twelve years. This did not satisfy Luna's thirst for vengeance, and he was imprisoned in Bautista on the first floor of a building whose second story was occupied by that officer. One night Luna came alone into the room where he was confined and told him that although he was a traitor, yet he had done good service to the cause; and it was not proper that a man who had been a colonel in the army should be seen working on the roads under a guard. He told him that the proper thing for him to do was to blow his brains out, and that if he did not do it within a reasonable time the sentinel at his door would shoot him. He gave him a pistol and left the room. Arguelles decided not to kill himself, but fully expected that the guard would kill him. Shortly afterwards Luna was summoned to meet Aguinaldo, and never returned. On September 29, 1899, his sentence was declared null and void and he was reinstated in his former rank (P.I.R., 285. 3, and 2030. 2)." [448]

Colonel Arguelles has told me exactly the same story. For a time it seemed as if the views expressed by him might prevail.

"According to Felipe Buencamino and some others, the majority of the members of congress had been in favour of absolute independence until they saw the demoralization of the officers and soldiers which resulted in the American occupation of Malolos. In the middle of April, 1899, they remembered Arellano's advice, and all of the intelligent men in Aguinaldo's government, except Antonio Luna and the officers who had no desire to lay down their military rank, decided to accept the sovereignty of the United States. At about the same time copies of the proclamation issued by the American Commission in Manila reached them and still further influenced them toward the adoption of this purpose. By the time congress met in San Isidro on May 1, 1899, all of the members had accepted it except a few partisans of Mabini, then president of the council of government. At its first meeting the congress resolved to change the policy of war with the United States to one of peace, and this change of policy in congress led to the fall of Mabini and his succession by Paterno. The first act of the new council was the appointment of a commission headed by Felipe Buencamino which was to go to Manila and there negotiate with the American authorities for an honourable surrender." [449]

"Although Mabini had fallen from power, Luna and his powerful faction had still to be reckoned with. He was less moderate than Mabini, and had armed adherents, which Mabini did not, and when Paterno declared his policy of moderation and diplomacy he answered it on the day the new council of government was proclaimed by an order that all foreigners living in the Philippines except Chinese and Spaniards, should leave for Manila within forty-eight hours." [450]

Unfortunately Luna intercepted the Buencamino commission. Its head he kicked, cuffed and threatened with a revolver. One of its members was General Gregorio del Pilar. He was allowed to proceed, as he commanded a brigade of troops which might have deserted had he been badly treated, but Luna named three other men to go with him in place of those who had been originally appointed. [451] They were Gracio Gonzaga, Captain Zialcita, and Alberto Baretto. They reached Manila on May 19, 1899, and during their stay there had two long interviews with the commission.

They said that they had come, with larger powers than had been conferred on Arguelles, to discuss the possibility of peace, the form of ultimate government which might be proposed in future, and the att.i.tude of the United States government toward needed reforms.

Meanwhile, on May 4, we had laid before the President a plan of government informally discussed with Arguelles, and had received the following reply, authorizing, in substance, what we had suggested:--

"Washington, May 5, 1899, 10.20 P.M.

"Schurman, Manila:

"Yours 4th received. You are authorized to propose that under the military power of the President, pending action of Congress, government of the Philippine Islands shall consist of a governor-general, appointed by the President; cabinet, appointed by the governor-general; a general advisory council elected by the people; the qualifications of electors to be carefully considered and determined; the governor-general to have absolute veto. Judiciary strong and independent; princ.i.p.al judges appointed by the President. The cabinet and judges to be chosen from natives or Americans, or both, having regard to fitness. The President earnestly desires the cessation of bloodshed, and that the people of the Philippine Islands at an early date shall have the largest measure of local self-government consistent with peace and good order.

"_Hay_." [452]

Our proclamation of April 4, 1899, was also taken up at their request and was gone over minutely, sentence by sentence. We were asked to explain certain expressions which they did not fully understand.

They told us that it would be hard for their army to lay down its arms when it had accomplished nothing, and asked if it could be taken into the service of the United States. We answered that some of the regiments might be taken over and employment on public works be found for the soldiers of others.

We endeavoured to arrange for an interview with Aguinaldo, either going to meet him or a.s.suring him safe conduct should he desire to confer with us at Manila.

They left, promising to return in three weeks when they had had time to consider the matters under discussion, but they never came back.

Shortly thereafter there was an odd occurrence. Soon after our arrival we had learned that Mr. Schurman was a man of very variable opinions. He was rather readily convinced by plausible arguments, but sometimes very suddenly reversed his views on an important subject.

At the outset Archbishop Nozaleda made a great impression upon him. The Archbishop was a thoroughgoing Spaniard of the old school, and entertained somewhat radical opinions as to what should be done to end the distressing situation which existed. After talking with him Mr. Schurman seemed to be convinced that we ought to adopt a stern and b.l.o.o.d.y policy, a conclusion to which Colonel Denby and I decidedly objected.

A little later he made a trip up the Pasig River with Admiral Dewey and others and had a chance to see something of the aftermath of war. It was not at all pretty. It never is. I was waiting for him with a carriage at the river landing on his return and had hard work to keep him away from the cable office. His feelings had undergone a complete revulsion. He insisted that if the American people knew what we were doing they would demand that the war be terminated immediately at any cost and by whatsoever means, and he wanted to tell them all about it at once. By the next morning, however, things fortunately looked rather differently to him.

Mr. Schurman acquired a working knowledge of the Spanish language with extraordinary promptness. Shortly thereafter Colonel Denby and I discovered that when Filipinos came to see the commission in order to impart information or to seek it, he was conferring with them privately and sending them away without our seeing them at all.

Soon after we had made our formal statement of the situation to the President, Mr. Schurman had an interview with an Englishman who had been living in Insurgent territory north of Manila, from which he had just been ejected, in accordance with Luna's order. This man told him all about the mistakes of the Americans and evidently greatly impressed him, for shortly thereafter he read to us at a commission meeting a draft of a proposed cablegram which he said he hoped we would approve. It would have stultified us, had we signed it, as it involved in effect the abandonment of the position we had so recently taken and a radical change in the policy we had recommended. Mr. Schurman told us that if we did not care to sign it, he would send it as an expression of his personal opinion. Colonel Denby asked him if his personal opinion differed from his official opinion, and received an affirmative reply. We declined to approve the proposed cablegram, whereupon he informed us that if his policy were adopted, he and General Aguinaldo would settle things without a.s.sistance from us, and that otherwise he would resign. He inquired whether we, too, would send a cable, and we told him certainly not, unless further information from us was requested. He sent his proposed message, in somewhat modified form, and received a prompt reply instructing him to submit it to the full commission and cable their views.

He did submit it to Colonel Denby and myself at a regularly called commission meeting, argued that in doing this he had obeyed the President's instructions, and vowed that he would not show it to General Otis. I showed it to the General myself, allowing him to believe that I did so with Mr. Schurman's approval, and thus avoided serious trouble, as he had been personally advised from Washington of the instructions to Mr. Schurman. The General then joined with Colonel Denby and myself in a cablegram setting forth our views, and so this incident ended.

Mr. Schurman did not resign, but thereafter we saw very little of him. He made a hasty trip to the Visayas and the Southern Islands and sailed for the United States shortly after his return to Manila, being anxious to get back in time for the opening of the college year at Cornell.

Colonel Denby and I were instructed to remain at Manila, where we rendered such a.s.sistance as we could give, and continued to gather information relative to the situation, the country and the people. In this latter work we were given invaluable help by Jesuit priests, who prepared for us a comprehensive monograph embodying a very large amount of valuable information, and furnished us a series of new maps as well. The latter were subsequently published by the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey in the form of an Atlas of the Philippines.

Early in September we had a most interesting interview with Sr. Jose de Luzuriaga, a distinguished and patriotic Filipino from western Negros, where American sovereignty had been accepted without resistance. Up to that time it had been possible for the people of Negros to keep out Tagalog invaders. Sr. Luzuriaga a.s.sured us that so long as this condition continued, there would be no trouble, and he was quite right.

Aguinaldo's agents eventually gained a foothold there for a short time, and did some mischief, but it did not result very seriously.