The eradication of Spanish, the revolutionaries' language. American-promoted Filipino. IV

General Wood, at a recent banquet in Manila, is reported as making the following definition of a stable government:

A stable government means civic courage, courts of justice which give equal opportunities to the senator as well as to the simple tao, resources ready for disposal at any moment they are needed by the country, organization which will enable the country to defend its integrity, adequate hospitals all over the Islands which are not found in the provinces we have just visited, social organization which shows keen human interest in the protection of the needy and the poor, effective public sanitation, common language, and many others.
[underscoring supplied]

Diogenes, with his lamp, searched for less than this! All of the requirements mentioned by General Wood would be desirable in the Philippines; so they would be in the United States. Could either country ever fulfil them in the eyes of a hostile critic? Do any of the existing governments of the world to-day fulfil them? Would not the "common language" bar Switzerland, where there are four official languages, -French, German, Italian and Romansh? One fourth of the Canadians speak French, and English is hardly understood in Quebec. Would the Canadians relish this test as applied to them? Are they unfit for independence because they have not a "stable government"? Have they "adequate hospitals" throughout the provinces, and an "organization which will enable the country to defend its integrity" against all comers? Has Belgium? Has the millennium yet arrived in any part of this troubled globe? I seriously doubt it.

Author: Harrison, Francis Burton, 1873-1957.Publication Info: New York,: The Century co., 1922.

The eradication of Spanish, the revolutionaries' language. American-promoted Filipino. III

Patriarchal or feudal life in the remote districts was still the order of the day. Authority, always of powerful influence in Malay history, was elevated to the rank of a religion. In the villages a modified form of self-government was permitted, though the local priest was always the power behind the throne and the court of last resort. Schools were maintained by the padres, and instruction given in the native tongue, -in rare instances in Spanish. These schools were, however, skilfully used by the Spanish to accentuate and develop the differences in local dialects. Theirs was the principle "Divide and rule." Originally all speaking the Malay tongue, the Filipinos were encouraged through these centuries to enlarge and enrich the local differences of pronunciation, until to-day the Ilocano, the Tagalog and the Visayan can hardly converse with one another except through English or Spanish. The grammars written by the priests accomplished their purpose. Writing was discouraged by them except upon the religious themes prescribed by the priest himself. Dr. Niewen, of theyouthful but rapidly growing Educational Department of Java, upon his second visit of inspection to the Philippines recently, told me that in Java, in twenty years, the people had broken down the differences between their five dialects and fused them all again into one Malay tongue; it was his opinion that we could, with our much larger public-school system in the Philippines, amalgamate the large number of local dialects into one tongue within five years of teaching in the primary grades.

Francis Burton Harrison, 1922

The eradication of Spanish, the revolutionaries' language. American-promoted Filipino. II

On the other hand, I met no one, American or Filipino, teacher or layman, who believes that English can become the vernacular of the country, and the authorities do not seem to expect that it can or will. On this account, I paid close attention to the dialects of the several provinces, compared their books, and gathered phonographic records of them. These seven or eight dialects are not essentially different: they are only variations of Tagalog, and whoever knows one can easily acquire the others. The recently published exhaustiveTagalog grammar of Lendoyro says: "The similarity between Tagalog and the other dialects is such as to make it easy for natives from different parts to understand each other by using their respective dialects for general conversational topics."
I roughly calculate that half the words are identical in all and many of the other words have some resemblance, while the grammatical forms are the same. The mutual unintelligibility arises from variation in intonation and accent and from the difference in perhaps 40 per cent of the words.
I made an appeal through my teacher, Mr. Lope K. Santos, Tagalog editor of El Renacimiento, to all native editors and writers to hold a conference and make an attempt to fuse these dialects into a uniform or common one; first, by agreeing on the alphabet and spelling of words; second, by eliminating all Spanish words where a native substitute could be used; third, by collaborating and unifying the vocabularies of the dialects. This conference was held on September 3, 1903, and will doubtless result in some good. As strongly as I can I appeal to the Government, both in Washington and in Manila, to aid in this work of fusion. The editors to whom I spoke in Luzon and in the Visayas approved the movement. The publishers of the numerous popular books which are found for sale in every market place in the islands can easily be induced to cooperate. Men like Tolentino, who is in Bilibid prison pending his appeal on the charge of writing a seditious play, ought to be employed in such work. The constabulary can imprison such men, but I would win them and use them. Which is better politics?

Govt. print. off., 1904] David Jessup Doherty

The eradication of Spanish, the revolutionaries' language. American-promoted Filipino. I

The first vocabulary of Filipino appeared in 1915. It was published by the American Philosophical Society. Its author, Eusebio T. Daluz.

CERTIFICATE OF APPROBATION

CERTIFICAMOS que este Vocabulario Filipino-Inglés fué aprobado y adoptado oficialmente por la Academia de la Lengua Filipina en sesión ordinaria celebrada el día 7 de Marzo de 1915. Y para que conste firmamos la presente en Manila, 1. F., hoy veintidós de Mayo del año del Señor de mil novecientos quince.

SOFRONIO G. CALDERON, Presidente de la "Akademyang Wikàng Pilipino".

REFRENDADO: PAUL L. STANGL, B. S, M. Ph., Secretario interino y Vice-Secretario de la 'Akademya ng Wikàng Pilipino".


PREFACE

This historical, constructional period, in which the national ideals seem to acquire definite form; when national boundaries are tending to become defined more and more along lines of ethnical cleavage and entities group on race affinity; when the consciousness of a world mission becomes the logical fruit of widespread education, and each racial unit tends to arrange itself upon its natural base, to develop more fully and take its proper place in the concert of world powers to bear its share of the burden and the heat of the day in bringing to richer fruition the heritage of man; this is the time of creating new factors of linguistic development. In this epoch the natives of the Philippines, after being, for over three centuries shut off by a worse than Chinese wall of exclusion of progress, tight bound by the swaddling clothes of religious and secular prejudice, whereby growth was hindered, have at last been freed of the trammels, and in less than two decades have taken enormous strides forward on the path of national greatness. It is at such time, when the trammels of dialects and other variants of speech are most strongly made manifest, and prove the test of true national fitness. A united Germany with its people speaking diverse dialects was only solved by making one of them the standard and from the rest enriching it, making it the virile expression of national consciousness.The world has seen no strong nation adopt the language of another people; still less that of a race alien in thought, feeling, speech and habit. Hence, however well meaning it may be to try or implant the English speech in these islands as a common medium, it is so obviously a violation of all psychic and ethnic unities, that can never, in the opinion of the writer, be a lasting success. Hence a solution along those lines that centuries of experience has proven to be the only logical, because natural one, that of a developed national language based on national stock and material, enriched and perfected, but akin to the native spirit of rich and poor alike, is the only one that, in the end, will succeed. Whatever the place of English, no doubt important in the economic development of land and people, a national malasian language is bound to be the proper vehicle of a united Filipino people. Hence a book like the present, which gives concrete form to this innate aspiration, and whatever its present imperfections, which definitely shapes the raw material along plausible, stable lines of development, is worthy of applause, study and support. It can only be recomended to the thoughtful study of friend and foe alike, in order that it may fulfil its mission of aiding in the solution of that important question, the future language of the Filipino people. May it meet with success, and that each successive edition be a vast improvement on the preceding one, is the earnest wish of

PAUL L. STANGL, B. S. M. Ph.

The price of blood. I

"The time is rapidly approaching," says Hon. John Barret, President Cleveland's minister to Siam, "when Japan, China, Korea, Siam, and the Philippines will consume every pound of the South's surplus cotton, manufactured or raw, and make her absolutely independent of the British or European market. Every farmer, laborer, and manufacturer in the South have deep concern in America's Asiatic opportunity. There should not be a discordant note from the Roanoke to the Rio Grande in support of a policy to extend, protect and control the markets of Orient."

Friday, December 1, 1899 Akron Pioneer Press

American fury in the Philippines.XLIX / Extermination

On the eve of the Samar campaign, the war was clearly degenerating into mass slaughter. It was hardly precise to call it “war” any longer. The Americans were simply chasing ragged, poorly armed bands of guerrillas, and failing to catch them, were inflicting the severest punishment on those they could catch _ the people of the villages and barrios of the theater of operations.
In late September [1901], in the town of Balangiga, Samar, American troops had for some time been abusing the townspeople by packing them into open wooden pens at night, where they were forced to sleep standing in the rain. Several scores of guerrilla General Vincent Lukban’s bolomen infiltrated the town and on the morning of September 28, while the Americans were eating their breakfast, Lukban’s men suddenly fell upon them. Heads dropped into breakfast dishes. Fifty-four Americans were boloed to death, and few of the eighteenth survivors escaped serious injury.
The Balangiga massacre initiated a reign of terror the likes of which had not yet been seen in this war. General [“Howling Jake”] Smith, fresh from his “victories” in Northern Luzon and Panay, was chosen to lead the American mission of revenge. Smith’s order to his men embarking upon the Samar campaign could not have been more explicit: “Kill and burn, kill and burn, the more you kill and the more you burn the more you please me”. It was, said Smith, “no time to take prisoners”. War was to be waged “in the sharpest and most decisive manner possible. When asked to define the age limit for killing, Smith gave his infamous reply: “Everything over ten”. Smith ordered Samar to be turned into a “howling wilderness” so that “even the birds could not live there”. It was boasted that “what fire and water [i.e. water torture]….had done in Panay, water and fire would do in Samar.” The now-familiar patterned of operations began once again. All the inhabitants of the island (pop. 266,000) were ordered to present themselves to detention camps in several of the larger coastal towns. Those who did not (or those who did not make it their business to learn the existence of the order), and were found outside the detention camp perimeter, would be shot, “and no questions asked”. Few reporters covered the carnage; one who did noted: “During my stay in Samar the only prisoners that were made ... were taken by Waller’s command; and I heard this act criticized by the highest officers as a mistake…The truth is, the struggle in Samar is one of extermination”…

Luzviminda Francisco, “The first Viet-Nam: The Philippine-American war,1899-1902”

The eradication of Spanish, the revolutionaries' language.

An Uprooted Race

The first and perhaps the master stroke in the plan to use education as an instrument of colonial policy was the decision to use English as the medium of instruction. English became the wedge that separated the Filipinos from their past and later was to separate educated Filipinos from the masses of their countrymen. English introduced the Filipinos to a strange, new world. With American textbooks, Filipinos started learning not only a new language but also a new way of life, alien to their traditions and yet a caricature of their model. This was the beginning of their miseducation, for they learned no longer as Filipinos but as colonials. They had to be disoriented from their nationalistic goals because they had to become good colonials. The ideal colonial was the carbon copy of his conqueror, the conformist follower of the new dispensation. He had to forget his past and unlearn the nationalist virtues in order to live peacefully, if not comfortably, under the colonial order. The new Filipino generation learned of the lives of American heroes, sang American songs, and dreamt of snow and Santa Claus. The nationalist resistance leaders exemplified by Sakay were regarded as brigands and outlaws. The lives of Philippine heroes were taught but their nationalist teachings were glossed over. Spain was the villain, America the saviour. To this day, our histories still gloss over the atrocities committed by American occupation troops such as the water cure and reconcentration camps.

Renato Constantino , The Filipinos in the Philippines and other essays

American fury in the Philippines. XLIX / Vigán

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. VI

The command bivouacked for the night on the site of this engagement. The hope I had formed of reaching Antipolo by 1 o'clock of this day was not realized, solely because of the unanticipated condition of the trails by which the command was obliged to move and the delay thus experienced.
At 5 A. M. on the 4th instant the march was resumed. The Second Oregon regiment, with the battalion of the Ninth Infantry on its left, was deployed on the hills extending east from the rear of Taytay,to prevent advance of the enemy from the latter place, while the
remainder of the column continued on the trail. The killed and wounded and the considerable number of men otherwise disabled were transported by litters by Chinese coolies and insurgent prisoners, following the Oregon regiment over the hills, with a view of thus reaching the main road between Antipolo and Taytay, upon which the ambulances were to reach us.



Title: The official records of the Oregon volunteers in the Spanish warand Philippine insurrection

Author: Oregon. Adjutant-General's Office. Page 601

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. V

Report of Maj. Herbert W. Cardwell, U. S. V., Chief Surgeon, First Division, Eighth Army Corps, April 21 to May 30, 1899.

HEADQUARTERS FIRST DIVISION, EIGHTH ARMY CORPS, OFFICE OF THE CHIEF SURGEON, 3Manila, P. I., May 31, 1899.

SURGEON GENERAL UNITED STATES ARMY. (Through military channels.)

SIR: I have the honor to present here with a special report on the work of the medical department and Hospital Corps during the expedition under the command of Maj. Gen. H. W. Lawton, U. S. V., into the provinces of Bulacan, Nueve Ecija, and (A. M.) de la Pampanga from April 21 to May 30, 1899, inclusive.
On receipt of General Orders, No. 20, Headquarters First Division, Eighth Army Corps, dated Manila, P. I., April 19, 1899, designating the troops to take part in the expedition, I required a report from the medical officer of the designated troops as to the physical condition of the medical officers and Hospital Corps men of his command, and as to whether he was sufficiently supplied to carry out the movement contemplated, which was specified as to occupy ten days. Medical offcers.-Twenty-second U. S. Infantry, Capt. John A. Kulp, U. S. A., and Dr. Isaac W. Brewer, acting assistant surgeon, U. S. A.; Gale's squadron, Fourth U. S. Cavalry (three dismounted troops), Dr. G. W. Daywalt, acting assistant surgeon, U. S. A.; First North Dakota Volunteer Infantry, Maj. F. D. Pease-captain and assistant surgeon, Black being on sick leave; Scott's battery, Dr. E. K. Johnstone, acting assistant surgeon, U. S. A., who had not reported, but was hurried from Corregidor in time to take the field; Hawthorne's battery, no medical officer. Under verbal orders from the division commander I detailed Maj. George H. Penrose, brigade surgeon, U. S. V., as brigade surgeon on the expedition, and Lieut. F. M. Kemp, assistant surgeon, U. S. A., from the Fourteenth United States Infantry, to act as ambulance surgeon. I secured from Capt. F. R. Keefer, commanding officer of the ambulance company, four ambulances. These ambulances were in bad order, with leaky canvas and leaky water tanks, no tools, and no spare parts. Animals consisting of one team of four native ponies in bad order and two teams of two mules each, and for the ambulance I secured, through the division quartermaster, one team of four native ponies, the quality of which was not guaranteed, and which proved to be bad. Hearing semiofficially that battalions from Third U. S. Infantry, Oregon and Minnesota Volunteers, would join the column later, I investigated their condition as to medical officers and Hospital Corps men. Finding that the Third Infantry had no medical officer with them the chief surgeon borrowed, at my request, Dr. Van Wagemen from the hospital ship Relief, and secured an order from corps headquarters detailing Doctor Pitcher from the Seventeenth Infantry to the Third Infantry. I drew from the Quartermaster's Department twenty extra litters for the use of a squad of forty Chinese litter bearers furnished by the Quartermaster's Department and assigned by me pro rata to the different organizations. Maj. G. H. Penrose drew from the purveyor's storehouse sufficient medical and surgical supplies to enable him to conduct a brigade field hospital without tentage, and drew from the commissary one hundred rations in addition to liberal supply of beef extract, cocoa, and malted milk. The Quartermaster's Department was unable to furnish any transportation for these supplies, and it was necessary to load them into ambulances if they were to be carried at all. This seriously interfered with our facilities for transportation of the sick and wounded.

In this connection I desire to express the opinion that the Chinese coolie can be made to play a very important and useful part in any campaigning in these islands. If assured that he will receive his pay and rations he will do any amount of work and face any amount of rifle fire, but he requires to be under the constant supervision of some authority. In the Oregons each private of the hospital corps was charged with the oversight and made responsible for the presence at all times of two coolies with one litter, and the service rendered was excellent.

Title: The official records of the Oregon volunteers in the Spanish war and Philippine insurrection, page 581
Author: Oregon. Adjutant-General's Office.

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. IV

During the day, May 4th, the wagon train left for Malolos to bring out supplies which would arrive there the day following; it was accompanied by the sick and wounded in ambulances. Much annoyance was caused by the Chinese coolies, furnished by the quartermaster department as litter bearers and laborers, wandering from the organizations to which they were attached and committing many minor depredations, necessitating the issue of the following orders:

GENERAL FIELD ORDERS,HEADQUARTERS FIRST DIVISION, No. 7. EIGHTH ARMY CORPS,
In the Field, Baliuag, May 4, 1899.

Hereafter each Chinese coolie with his command will be required to wear upon his hat, or other conspicuous part of his clothing, a tag which will be legibly marked in English the name of the organization to which the wearer is assigned or belongs. Commencing to-morrow, the 5th instant, all such camp followers found without the identification tax above required will be arrested and turned over to the provost guard.
No coolie wearing such an identification tag will be required to perform labor for individuals or organizations than that to which he is assigned or belongs, and no unauthorized person will, in any way, interfere with any Chinaman not misconducting himself.
Commanding officers of organizations are charged with the prompt execution of the above orders, and will be held strictly accountable for the conduct of the coolies assigned or belonging to their respective commands.

By command of Major General Lawton: CLARENCE R. EDWARDS, AssistantAdjutant General

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. III

The Third United States Infantry was posted at the approaches to the ford, where the advance portion of the column had rested the night before, to protect the passage of the transportation. The remainder of the command, with the wagon train, resumed the advance toward the river. The same conditions (or worse, if possible) as on the day previous continued to impede the progress of the wagon train. Captain Gale, with his dismounted squadron of the Fourth Cavalry, furnished the advance guard and convoy of the train, and with his entire command rendered valuable aid assisting in building bridges and making roads.
Lieutenant Hawthorne, with his mountain battery detachment, Maj. GeorgePenrose and Lieutenant Kemp, of the Medical Corps, with their hospital squads and Chinese litter bearers, lent willing hands to overcome what frequently appeared insurmountable obstacles to further progress.

Title: The official records of the Oregon volunteers in the Spanish warand Philippine insurrection,Author: Oregon. Adjutant-General's Office. Page 558

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. II

Efforts to secure a water line of communication by Manila Bay and theMalolos estuary were made immediately and continued for more than two weeks. The proper mouth of the estuary was found with considerable difficulty.
A bar had formed in front of it, making the entrance very tortuous. Up this two of our gunboats worked their way, but encountered well-driven piles and other obstructions which the insurgents had placed there and around which mud and sand had collected, making the water too shoal for navigation. Near the mouth of the stream a dredge was used and the gunboats removed a good many of the pile obstructions, but satisfactory results could not be obtained and the work was abandoned.
A considerable detail of soldiers was made to put in sufficient repair for immediate use of the railway from Manila to Malolos, and Chinese labor was hired. The track had been considerably damaged by the insurgents and a number of bridges partially destroyed, but Major Devol, of the Quartermaster'sDepartment, overcame all difficulties, and, with the engines captured at Caloocan, gave Malolos daily railway train service.

Title: The official records of the Oregon volunteers in the Spanishwar and Philippine insurrection,Author: Oregon. Adjutant-General's Office. Page 489

Chinese collaboration under the American occupation. I

The military operations which have since taken place in Panay will be noted in a later portion of this report. As soon as Iloilo was occupied by our troops a government was established and has been successfully prosecuted.
The rapid changes in the spirit, demeanor,and demonstrations of the inhabitants of Manila of all classes between the 5th and 10th of February could be witnessed only in a community made up of the most heterogeneous elements. On the 6th the educated business classes, foreign and native born, were surprisingly hopeful that hostilities would soon end. The natives of the middle and working classes were sullen, though undetermined.
The large Chinese laboring population rejoiced over the punishment of their race enemies and the opportunity offered it for looting the country from which the insurgent forces had been driven. These Chinese had followed quite closely our advancing lines and secured many minor articles of property which by them were considered of value.
We had employed them, too, extensively to perform a good deal of the work connected with supplying the troops at the front, and they performed faithful service.

Title: The official records of the Oregon volunteers in the Spanish war and Philippine insurrection, pag. 484-85
Author: Oregon. Adjutant-General's Office

American torture in the Philippines. IX

To get at the truth as to the state of civilization of the Filipinos
at the time of the Spanish conquest one must carefully weigh the
evidences of an accumulation of mainly useless and unreliable
documents, and the history of the Philippines has yet to be written in
the modern spirit; but it is sufficient for this discussion to say
that there is no place for the notion that the Filipinos are savages
held in check by religious awe and superstition. Here, as throughout
the discussion, no reference is had to the Moros, the Indonesian hill
tribes of Mindanao, or the mountain wild people of Luzón and a few
other islands. The Negritos remaining are a negligible quantity. There
are cruelty and indifference to suffering, often to a shocking degree.
These are due to an ever present fatalism, which the little real
religious teaching the people have received has built upon rather than
sought to eliminate, and to the absolute lack of an appeal to, or of
an attempt to educate, higher feelings. If it is to be assumed at the
outset that these people are forever incapable of such higher
feelings, then it ought also to have been assumed that they were
incapable of Christianity. Water torture, which has in some cases been
resorted to on our side, is one of the forms of torture to which these
people are accustomed. The list of victims buried alive by order of
guerrilla chiefs, the maiming, mutilations, and secret assassinations
certainly make up an appalling and shocking chapter. War stirs up the
darkest passions among the most advanced peoples, however, and it was
in a degree to be expected that a people untrained in modern
international usages, and never in the past treated as though they
belonged to the brotherhood of man, or were responsible to humanity
for humaneness, would not exhibit an entirely refined code of slaying.
The "ethics of warfare," - after all, is that not a rather paradoxical
phrase? That instances of real brutality on the part of our troops
have been the exception has been stated to be the opinion of the
writer. On the confession of the officer who conducted it, the
campaign in the island of Samar from October to March last must be
excepted from this general statement. He has met the charge of
violating the rules of civilized warfare with the counter-charge that
the people of Samar are savages, and that it was necessary to suspend
many of these rules in order to restore peace and quiet to that part
of the archipelago. By inference, it then became a war of
extermination till one side or the other should cry quits.

Title: Race prejudice in the Philippines.
Author: LeRoy, James A. (James Alfred), 1875-1909.

American torture in the Philippines. VIII

Here is a description quoted in the Washington correspondence of the
Chicago Record-Herald, from John Loughran, who had seen it
"administered to natives in the islands during the first year of
American supremacy" (which was certainly before the natives had been
discovered to be a cruel set of people): - A light but strong rope is
passed across the throat of the man to be examined. It is crossed
behind his back and carried under the arm pits, the ends are again
brought around the neck and over to the back, turned under the armpits
and shoulders, and then the free ends are carried as a girdle around
the waist just at the end of the ribs, and tied fast and securely. A
stick is put through the ropes where they cross between the shoulders,
and then turned to suit. " Will it make a man talk?" Mr. Loughran was
asked. "A wooden Indian would make a speech if you gave him the rope
cure," he replied. Mr. Loughran says that this was far more effective
than the water cure, which is slow. The rope cure often persuaded a
native to reveal the hiding-place of his gun; and it did it quickly,
because he knew that as soon as he consented to talk the stick would
be loosened and would fly back, relieving the agony instantaneously.
Of course, if the victim should have a weak heart, he might die of
shock; but the native Filipino does not seem to be troubled with the
malady. This letter could be filled with extracts like this from
newspapers. The testimony before the Philippine committee proves
conclusively that the water torture was regularly used by our troops.
Captain Glenn, who administered it, as shown in Panay, was at the time
the judge advocate of the island, and as such bound to see that
violations of the laws of war were punished. It was he who gave the
orders to burn Igbaras, which was fired between eight and nine in the
morning and by twelve was entirely destroyed. As to the people, " they
only had time to save the clothes they wore at the time," * was the
testimony of Private Smith, who set the fire and who testified also
that Lieutenant Conger ordered torture by saying " water detail,"
showing that this was no isolated case. Corporal Gibbs testified to
knowing of the water cure at Catbalogan; t tried to peep in at the
windows of the place where it was administered; heard the moans of the
victims. He saw the sickly expression on their faces as they came out.
He heard that one died, ) * Evidence, p. t54o. t Ibid., p. 2303. Note
that this was General Smith's headquarters.


Title: Secretary Root's record. "Marked severities" in Philippine
warfare. An analysis of the law and facts bearing on the action and
utterances of President Roosevelt and Secretary Root.
Author: Storey, Moorfield, 1845-1929.
Publication Info: Boston,: G.H. Ellis co., printers, 1902.

American torture in the Philippines. VII

Now Arnold has a detachment of 20 men at Calaca, 7 miles from here. Men that are under him now have told me that Arnold is having men tortured the same as before and other ways besides. This is one of his new ways: A strip of flesh is cut just above the ankle of the prisoner; it is then attached to a stick; the stick is coiled with the strip of flesh. Imagine the torture the poor man must endure! I am told that when Arnold is out looking for some criminal or suspected insurgent he will grab, or have his men grab, any native and ask for information. If the man gives no information, he is put to all kinds of torture. I saw the man that was cut at the ankle. I was over at Calaca the other day. He had his leg all bound up and was out in the road with other prisoners working. Last week a part of this troop, a part of the Calaca detachment, and some of the soldiers from Taal were out in the mountains. I was not along, but have been told by several men that Arnold had his men take an old man to a stream and keep him under water until the man was unconscious. This was because the old man did not give certain information that he was supposed to possess. " Men of H Troop have told me that they have known Arnold to have a man tied to a saddled horse. A few feet of slack was allowed. A man was then mounted on the horse and told to gallop down the road for a mile and then back. If the prisoner could run as fast as the horse it was all well, put if he could not he had to drag. Arnold had had this done several times, and more than once the prisoner was dragged. "Now, I have witnesses for all that I have written about, and should there ever be an investigation of this I will be perfectly willing to be put upon the stand. I know other men that would be willing to do the same. I believe that most of the officers and enlisted men in the army are humane, but those that practise what Arnold has should be brought to justice. It would do me no good to report this matter through army channels, as it would only be hushed up and then I would get the worst of it. Now, I am writing this letter to you; you are a close relation of mine, and for that reason I believe I can write anything. I think that you should bring this before the proper persons. "


Mr. Root must go:
Weir, Andrew K., Weir, P. W.
[Philadelphia?: s.n., 1902]

American torture in the Philippines. VI

BALAYAN, BATANGAS PROVINCE, LUZON, P. I., April 0o, I90o. "MY DEAR
UNCLE: You are a free American citizen, and as such you are entitled
to know how our government is carried on. I have something to inform
you about. It is the terrible cruelty practised upon Filipino
prisoners by American soldiers in these islands. First, I want to know
if the Constitution of the United States e and international law does
not prohibit torture. "We soldiers are representatives of a civilized
nation sent out to these islands to 'civilize' a so-called lot of
savages. These people, are not nearly so uncivilized as is supposed.
You probably have read about some of our men being put to death by
horrible torture, but what can you expect when we do equally as bad to
our prisoners? *Has any court the right to force any prisoner to
confess, no matter how many crimes the prisoner is supposed to have
committed? When I say force I mean to force by torture. The arms of
the United States in the Philippines is representing the law of the
United States. But whether or not it is proper to torture a man-, itis
done anyway, and under the orders of commissioned officers. I have
heard men of other regiments make their boasts of how they have made
captured insurgents tell where their arms were, but never witnessed
the torture but once. "The instance that I have reference to occurred
about two months ago. I told the officer that he had to stop it or I
would report him to higher authority. He said he would not practise it
anymore, so I never informed on him; but now I have information
about him doing the same, and even worse, nearly every day. "While I
was one of a detachment of 24 men doing garrison duty in the town of
Pasay, 3 miles from Manila, a native man about 2I years ot age was
arrested and accused of being a murderer, highway robber, and accused
of rape. Now, whether the man was guilty or not I do not know, but
anyway Lieutenant F. T. Arnold, for he was the officer in command,
gave orders to Sergeant Edwards, both of Troop H, Fourth Cavalry, to
take the man to the basement of our quarters and get what information
he could out- of the man. So Edwards took the man and asked him if he
had any information to give. The man had none. Edwards said to the
rest of the soldiers who had congregated to witness the 'fun' that he
would have to commence operations. The prisoner was stripped naked and
laid on his back on the bare floor. He was then given the 'water
cure.' A rough stick about 8 inches long and a half inch in diameter
was put between the man's jaws. A soldier held the man's head down by
pressing on the ends of the stick. Another sat on the man's stomach,
and still another sat on the man's legs. Edwards had a bucket of water
at hand. Water was poured down the man until it was vomited up. It was
then repeated. This water cure must be a terrible torture alone. The
man heaved and begged for mercy, but to no avail. While down he was
whipped and beaten unmercifully. He was then stood up and asked to
confess. He did not. He was then beaten and clubbed again. I do not
think that a square inch of the man's body was left untouched. He was
kicked. A rope was then thrown across a beam. The man was strung up by
the thumbs. Another rope was tied to his ankles and his feet jerked
from under him. While up he was beaten. "All this time I was a
looker-on. I hoped that the punishment would stop. I dared not
interfere. But when the man was strung up by the neck I could stand it
no longer, so I went to the lieutenant. Before I went to him -I did
not know that he had given orders to Edwards to torture the man if he
did not confess. I told Arnold that I was an- American and that there
was something going on at the quarters that I could not stand. He
jumped all over me and asked if I was not making myself very busy. I
said I was not; that such carryings on were against all law. He said,
in a very sarcastic manner, that I knew such a lot about law. He said
that a lot of men in the army, especially volunteers, think that they
know how to run an army, but they do not. He said: 'Now, when I give a
man to Sergeant Edwards, I want information. I do not know how he gets
it, but he gets the information anyhow.' He said that these people
have no feelings other than physical and should not be treated as
human beings. I told Arnold that I did not come to,get any one in
trouble, but merely to have the torture stopped, that if it were not
stopped I would report the matter to higher authority. I was then
threatened with court-martial for insubordination. About this time
Edwards came in and said that he had succeeded in making the man tell
where the money was. Arnold told Edwards to take the man with him and
get the money. I told Arnold that as the torture was finished I would
not report the matter if it were not repeated. He promised not to do
it again. I then left him. "The prisoner did not show where the money
was. He had only said that -he would show the hiding-place to have the
torture stopped. Three weeks later the prisoner was released. Now,
that was criminal of Arnold.If the man was guilty he should not be
released. If guilty he should not be tortured anyway. - The rest of
the time that I was with the detachment under Arnold no torture was
committed that I know of. " Now Arnold has a detachment of 20 men at
Calaca, 7 miles from here. Men that are under him now have told me
that Arnold is having men tortured the same as before and other ways
besides. This is one of his new ways: A strip of flesh is cut just
above the ankle of the prisoner; it is then attached to a stick; the
stick is coiled with the strip of flesh. Imagine the torture the poor
man must endure! I am told that when Arnold is out looking for some
criminal or suspected insurgent he will grab, or have his men grab,
any native and ask for information. If the man gives no information,
he is put to all kinds of torture. I saw the man that was cut at the
ankle. I was over at Calaca the other day. He had his leg all bound up
and was out in the road with other prisoners working. Last week a part
of this troop, a part of the Calaca detachment, and some of the
soldiers from Taal were out in the mountains. I was not along, but
have been told by several men that Arnold had his men take an old man
to a stream and keep him under water until the man was unconscious.
This was because the old man did not give certain information that he
was supposed to possess. " Men of H Troop have told me that they have
known Arnold to have a man tied to a saddled horse. A few feet of
slack was allowed. A man was then mounted on the horse and told to
gallop down the road for a mile and then back. If the prisoner could
run as fast as the horse it was all well, put if he could not he had
to drag. Arnold had had this done several times, and more than once
the prisoner was dragged. "Now, I have witnesses for all that I have
written about, and should there ever be an investigation of this I
will be perfectly willing to be put upon the stand. I know other men
that would be willing to do the same. I believe that most of the
officers and enlisted men in the army are humane, but those that
practise what Arnold has should be brought to justice. It would do me
no good to report this matter through army channels, as it would only
be hushed up and then I would get the worst of it. Now, I am writing
this letter to you; you are a close relation of mine, and for that
reason I believe I can write anything. I think that you should bring
this before the proper persons. "Lieutenant Frederick T. Arnold was
appointed to West Point from Iowa in I893. He graduated from West
Point in 1897 and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Sixth
Cavalry. He is-now second lieutenant of Troop H, Fourth Cavalry. I
hope that the proper people of the United States will take hold of
this case and have all torture in these islands stopped. "Well, my
dear uncle, as I have already written so much on this subject, I will
not write about other subjects. I am in fine health, and hope that you
are the same. Give my love to all. "I remain, your loving nephew,
"ANDREW K. WEIR, JR., "Troop C, Fourth United States Cavalry, Balayan,


P. I." Title: Mr. Root must go:
Publication Info: [Philadelphia? : s.n., 1902]

American torture in the Philippines. V

I have another letter. All that I know about it is that it appeared in
the Portland Oregonian of January 29, 1902, and is as follows:


SEATTLE, January 28.
Clarence Clowe, of Seattle, who recently arrived home from the
Philippines, where he served as a private in Company H, Twenty-fifth
Infantry, United States Volunteers, has authorized the publication of
a letter written by him to Senator HOAR from the islands June 10,
1900. Clowe asks in the letter honorable discharge from a service that
is outraging his conscience. In alleging inhuman treatment by American
soldiers toward Filipinos he says in part: "At any time I am liable to
be called upon to go out and bind and gag helpless prisoners, to
strike them in the face, to knock them down when so bound, to bear
them away from wife and children, at their very door, who are
shrieking pitifully the while or kneeling and kissing the hands of our
officers, imploring mercy from those who seem not to know what it is,
and then, with a crowd of soldiers, hold our helpless victim head
downward in a tub of water in his own yard, or bind him hand and foot.
attaching ropes to head and feet, and then lowering him into the
depths of a well of water till life is well-nigh choked out and the
bitterness of death has been tasted, and our poor gasping victims ask
us for the poor boon of being finished off, in mercy to themselves.
"All these things have been done at one time or another by our men,
generally in cases of trying to obtain information as to the location
of arms and ammunition. "Nor can it be said that there is any general
repulsion on the part of the enlisted men to taking part in these
doings. I regret to have to say that, on the contrary, the majority of
soldiers take a keen delight in them and rush with joy to the making
of this latest development of a Roman holiday."


Title: The problem in the Philippines. Speech of Hon. Henry M. Teller,
of Colorado, in the Senate of the United States ... February 11, 12,
and 13, 1902.
Author: Teller, Henry Moore, 1830-1914.

American torture in the Philippines. IV

That is where General Chaffee, in the letter read by the Senator from
Vermont [Mr. PROCTOR], said the rebellion would be stamped out in a
short tile.
"But no Americans over here blame the army for such measures, as these
natives have no respect for anything short of torture. They are
exceedingly cruel themselves, and they consider leniency a sign of
weakness and fear. The "water cure" is the favorite torture of the
Americans to force the natives to give information concerning the
insurrectos. The native is bound and gagged, and one soldier pours
water and sand down his throat while another beats him on the stomach,
which soon swells out like a drum. This torture is said to be
horrible, and it generally makes the Filipino betray everything, but
many of them are game to the last and carry their secret to the grave.
A soldier who was with General Funston told me that he helped
administer the " water cure" to 160 natives, all but 26 of whome died."

Title: The problem in the Philippines. Speech of Hon. Henry M. Teller,
of Colorado, in the Senate of the United States ... February 11, 12,
and 13, 1902.
Author: Teller, Henry Moore, 1830-1914.