[36] Campaign Spanish for “look for.” Generals Lawton and Young had cut loose from their base of supplies and their command was trusting for subsistence to living upon the country.
[37] See translation of diary of Major Simeon Villa, Senate Document 331, pt. 3, 57th Cong., 1st Sess. (1902), p. 1988. It was in this Aringay fight that one of the narrowest escapes from death in battle ever officially authenticated occurred. Lieutenant Dennis P. Quinlan, now a captain of the 5th U. S. Cavalry, was struck just over the heart by an insurgent bullet (probably more or less spent) while crossing the river in the face of a hot fire, the bullet being deflected by a plug of tobacco carried in the breast pocket of the regulation campaign blue shirt he was wearing, which pocket, any one acquainted with that shirt will remember, is at the left breast just over the heart (War Department Report, 1900, vol. i., pt. 6, pp. 166, 279). He was knocked over, but soon recovered and went on. The flesh of the left breast over the heart was bruised black and blue. He was recommended for a medal of honor on account of the incident (War Department Report, 1900, vol. i., pt. 7, p. 136).
[38] If these figures are not exact, they are approximately correct. We always called it three hundred miles from Manila to the northern end of Luzon via Vigan and the lighthouse at Cape Bojeador.
[39] For instance, there was what used to be known to the 8th Corps as “Col. Jim Parker’s night attack at Vigan,” which occurred early in December, 1899, soon after that place was occupied, the insurgents coming into the town in large numbers, at night under command of General Tiñio, through a tunnel so it was said, and being driven out only after desperate close quarters’ fighting from about two o’clock in the morning until after broad daylight, leaving the streets and plaza of Vigan much cumbered with their dead. Again, later on, there was the sudden order, swiftly executed, in obedience to which Lieutenant Grayson V. Heidt with a part of a troop of the 3d Cavalry, rode from Laoag to Batac to the rescue of a besieged garrison at the latter place, arriving in time to prevent a small Custer massacre, the garrison having gotten short of ammunition, and having just managed to telegraph for reinforcements a few moments before the enemy cut the telegraph wire. Then, there was Lieutenant Hannay, of the 22d Infantry, who being at the front, received an order from General Lawton to come back to build a bridge. The order made him sick, the surgeon reported him sick, the messenger returned with that message, and then Hannay promptly got well, and stayed at the front. And so on, ad infinitum.
[40] The Visayan Islands—the half-dozen islands between Luzon and Mindanao already mentioned, as the only ones worth mentioning for our purposes, together with the various smaller islands, islets, and rocks “visible at high water.”
[41] “During April, in the First District, comprising the provinces of Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, Union, Abra, Lepanto, Benguet, and Bontoc, Brigadier General S. B. M. Young, commanding, the insurgents manifested considerable activity and endeavored to take the offensive against the scattered detachments in the district. The insurgents were in every instance defeated, and lost more than 500 men killed.” War Dept. Report 1900, vol. i., pt. 5, p. 196.
[42] The language quoted is that employed by Robert Collins, Associated Press Correspondent, in connection with the Round Robin incident of nine months previous, described in the concluding part of the chapter preceding this.
[43] Hereinafter more fully set forth.
[44] For the Table of Areas, see Philippine Census, vol. i., p. 58.
[45] For the Table of Populations, see Philippine Census, vol. ii., p. 123.