WALA LANG
I used to thrive (at age 13) on the electrifying adventures of the 12-year-old twins Nan and Bert Bobbsey and the teenaged Hardy Boys Frank and Joe who solved mysteries that adults could not.
These were novels written for young people, the early 1900s equivalent of today’s computer games. Some of those adventures were set in the Philippines, about young boys with Admiral Dewey in the Battle of Manila Bay or fighting the “moros” of Sulu, and one that I spent a COVID home quarantine day last week reading, about an American teenager among insurrectos.
Our hero is the 17-year-old orphan Dick Carson, a patriotic, honest, hardworking, good-looking, physically fit, and fearless young man from Ohio, clearly intended as role model for the book’s target readers,
Dick spoiled a profitable deal being engineered by an unscrupulous German (Germans were then also interested in the Philippines). The latter got his revenge by seeing to it that Dick was captured by Aguinaldo’s soldiers.
His breathtaking adventures follow one after the other—imprisonment in Malolos, torture and rescue in Bigaá, attending to battle-wounded Filipino soldiers, retreating with insurrectos from advancing Americans, escape attempts and close shaves, culminating in a letter from US President William McKinley.
AGUINALDO’S HOSTAGE – The teenage captive Dick Carson in Bigaa, eavesdropping from atop a super strong banana tree.
The author must have done a good deal of research. The geography and circumstances of Dick’s adventures are remarkably convincing and describe overlooked viewpoints. Historical accounts and memoirs covering the period from the Battle of Manila Bay to Aguinaldo’s capture are by political and military leaders. Carson’s fictional adventures cover the same territory but from the eyes of the 80,000 to 100,000 bolo-bearing Filipino foot soldiers and 200,000 to one million civilians swept into the maelstrom.
Dick’s adventures begin on Jan. 30, 1899, four days before shots were fired near San Juan Bridge. Manila was tense, overflowing with refugees fearing insurrecto takeover, looting, rape, and massacre. The Spanish had surrendered to the Americans and American troops had begun to arrive. Checkpoints were manned by the Guardia Civil and American soldiers. Unarmed Filipino soldiers were allowed to enter Manila and some did their best to provoke American soldiers who were under strict orders from General Elwell Otis not to respond to any provocation.
It was business as usual for profit-focused foreign trading houses, busily accumulating hemp (abaca) and other local products against possible supply chain disruption.
Dick Carson worked with an American trading house in Binondo and lodged in an Intramuros mansion that had seen better days. He had occasional dinners at the Restaurant de Paris on the Escolta overlooking the Bridge of Spain and was often at the Hotel de Oriente on Plaza Calderon de la Barca where his employer stayed.
He loyally refused a bribe from German trader Schwarz to betray his employer who was about to close shop. Schwarz got his revenge by surreptitiously arranging to send the unsuspecting Dick on a wild goose chase to Malolos. The trip was unpleasant, the train from Tutuban being loaded with hostile soldiers gearing for war. Getting off at Barasoain station, Dick was immediately arrested and jailed. With fellow prisoners (all Chinese), he was forced to chop bamboo trunks into water canteens for the Aguinaldo army, lucky to have occasional water and a handful of rice.
Dick was convicted by a kangaroo court as a spy (again courtesy of Schwarz) and sentenced to death. Word spread and crowds gathered at the Malolos Plaza for the spectacle. Kneeling tied hand and foot, the firing squad had raised their guns when President Emilio Aguinaldo happened by on the way to the Presidential Palace (the Malolos church), saved our hero whom he handed to Colonel Pluma as servant.
Loaded with heavy baggage, Dick followed Pluma on a train packed with hostile soldiers on the way to the front. They got off in Bigaá where Pluma was strengthening defenses to protect Malolos. Trenches were being dug by Chinese conscripts, half a mile in length along the river.
Pluma treated the proud American boy as a slave and rebelling, Dick was severely flogged, tied to a tree for three days running, and given water only by kindly passersby. Both American and Filipino sides committed unspeakable atrocities.
Already at death’s door, Dick was released by the compassionate army surgeon Musebo. Blasted by American cannon and rifle fire, wounded, horribly mangled, and dying soldiers were being taken to the rear, to the church of Bigaá that was made a military hospital. The place was hell. Dick, whose father was a doctor, made himself useful.
Word from the Aguinaldo government was that Americans suffered defeat after defeat (which was untrue) and that while Americans numbered 12,000, Filipino forces numbered 25,000 rifle bearers and an inexhaustible number of bolo men ready to replace the fallen.
At the battle of Tuliahan River in Polo (now Valenzuela), Musebo and Dick supervised stretcher bearers and gave first aid. Dick tried to run toward American troops already across the river, but was caught and almost beheaded by a bolo-wielding Tagalog insurrecto before returning to a furious Musebo.
While in Bigaá, Dick saw his enemy again and eavesdropping, overheard a Schwarz-arranged incoming armaments shipment for the Aguinaldo forces about to land in Paombóng. Dick managed to send word to General Otis and the shipment was captured by American forces, ruining its financier Schwarz.
Americans captured Polo and Meycauayan and the Bigaá hospital was abandoned for Malolos, before which Filipino soldiers looted the church (santos, silver fittings, books, records) and private homes abandoned by fleeing civilians that were also set afire.
It was chaos in Malolos as the Aguinaldo government retreated to San Fernando. Gen. Antonio Luna saw Dick and ordered his execution. Another deus ex machina event saved our boy and he continued with Musebo to Quinguá (now Pláridel) whose church was again a hospital where a stream of badly injured soldiers were taken.
Having learned of Dick, General Otis arranged rescue by an American spy disguised as a Filipino soldier. The road south from Quinguá to Guiguintô, Bigaá, and American-held territory was peppered with armed Filipino checkpoints that Dick and his rescuer managed to pass or elude almost unscathed.
The tale ends with Dick’s assignment as civilian orderly to General Arthur MacArthur and a telegram from President William McKinley offering him a post as second lieutenant, which our teenage hero joyfully accepted.
Whew!
Notes: (a) This article is based on H. Irving Hancock, Aguinaldo’s Hostage (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1900); and (b) The Filipino-American War began on Feb. 4, 1899 when the first shot was fired near San Juan Bridge. American troops advanced toward Malolos, Aguinaldo’s capital, using the railroad and engaging Filipinos in one town after another. Aguinaldo retreated to San Fernando, Pampanga as American forces neared Malolos.The capital was in American hands by April 1, 1899. Resistance proved fruitless. Aguinaldo was captured in Palanan on March 23, 1901 and the war officially ended on July 2, 1902.
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