“‘Very respectfully,
“‘Manuel Xeres Burgos.
“‘General Crowder.’
“On June 30, 1901, the original of this order, signed by Luna and produced by Burgos, was shown to Aguinaldo, who, after examining it, stated that the signature was that of General Antonio Luna, with which he was well acquainted. He furthermore stated that he had no personal knowledge of such an order, and had hitherto been unaware of its existence. He was then asked whether General Luna’s authority, as Director of War, was of sufficient scope to authorize him to issue such an order without express authority from the insurgent government. He declined to answer this question.
“A photographic reproduction of the original of the order of Luna, dated February 7, 1899, a printed copy in Spanish, the translation which preceded this note, and the correspondence upon which the foregoing statement is based, is given beginning on page 1903, Senate Document No. 331, part 2, Fifty-seventh Congress, First Session, ‘Hearings before the Committee on the Philippines of the United States Senate.’
“There does not seem to me to be the slightest reason for doubting the authenticity of this order. It was an atrocious one, but that argument is not sufficient to prove that the order delivered up by Dr. Burgos was a forgery in whole or in part.
“The facts of the case seem to me to be the following: In January, 1899, Doctor Burgos was employed in Bilibid prison by the Americans, and as an officer of Sandatahan was deep in the plotting for a general massacre of the foreigners in Manila. Sometime that month he wrote to Aguinaldo that the uprising in Manila should begin in Bilibid prison, and that the Sandatahan should be posted on San Pedro street and the adjacent thoroughfares in preparation for an attack upon the Zorilla theatre, where the Pennsylvania regiment was quartered across the way from the prison (Exhibit 349). His suggestion was adopted as part of the plan for the uprising. Burgos, like the majority of the Filipinos in Manila, believed that Aguinaldo would win, and was doing what he could to aid his cause, but without giving up his position under the American government. The plan embodied in Luna’s order was to be carried out as part of the attack upon Manila; but that attack was delivered prematurely, and it was found impossible to carry out the uprising in Manila which was to have preceded the attack upon the American lines. After February 5, 1899, the majority of the Filipinos in Manila ceased to believe that Aguinaldo was going to beat the Americans, and Burgos, who was known to have taken part in the movement in Manila headed by Sandico, found it expedient to ward off any investigation of his conduct by giving information. He wanted to stay out of prison, and he wanted to remain surgeon of Bilibid prison. He was well aware that Sandico was known by the Americans to have organized bodies of sandatahan in Manila, and he therefore delivered to the provost marshal general a partial copy of Luna’s order which, if it was not then in his possession, he had seen; and he saw no reason for telling more than seemed expedient for the attainment of his immediate purpose, he said that it had been issued by Sandico, who he well knew the Americans would believe was the man most likely to have issued it. He naturally desired to avoid having to make too many explanations. In 1901, Luna being dead, and Burgos being safe from his vengeance, he found no great difficulty in delivering up the original document, which was probably, as he said, in the papers of Colonel Leyba, or Leiva, a native of Manila whose family lived there and whose house had probably been a centre of insurgent intrigue. In 1899 or 1900 Colonel Leyba, a trusted and confidential aid of Aguinaldo, had been murdered by ‘The Guards of Honour’ in Pangasinán Province, and Burgos seems to have had access to his papers. This, at least to me, seems a plausible explanation of the incomplete form in which this first order appeared, and why it appeared at all. It is true that I have found no record of it among the record-books kept at Malolos; but this order was not of a character to be written out in full in any letter-sent book; and, furthermore, the record-books of the government at Malolos show that almost no records were kept there for a week after the outbreak of hostilities. The clerks and officials were probably busy in preparing to defend the place against an advance of the Americans, whom they had hitherto looked upon with contempt.
“John R. Taylor.”[58]
In reality there was nothing novel about the issuing of such an order in the Philippines.
Alfonso Ocampo, who was to have led the attack in an attempt to massacre all Spaniards in Cavite at the outbreak of the revolt of 1896, testified as follows concerning the proposed movement:—
“It was to be carried out in conjunction with the towns of Imus and others of the province; the people were to enter by the Porta Vaga (the main gate of Cavite) and uniting into groups, were to assault, kill and rob all the Spaniards. The deponent was in charge of this affair. The jailer of the prison was to distribute daggers among the prisoners and then release them. When the plot was discovered, some of these arms had been distributed. The object of the rebellion was to assassinate all the Spaniards, then to rape the women, and cut their throats, as well as those of their children, even the smallest.”[59]