United States or Mali ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
This man's record is not known to me. Apparently he was an officer in the Spanish army, for he is later reported as surrendering to the Insurgents at Santa Ana on August 13, 1898. See footnote 4, p. 104. Taylor, 33 AJ. Artemio Ricarte was one of the ranking Insurgent generals directing operations against Manila. Taylor, 30 AJ. Taylor, 30 AJ. On August 2, 1899, Agoncillo wrote Mabini:
There exists a significant circular signed "J.M.B." believed to have been an outright forgery, both from its tenor and from the fact that the signature "J.M.B." is not in the handwriting of Basa's letter hereinbefore quoted. It contains the following statements: "The true patriots have organized a committee to which I belong, naming Aguinaldo as President and Agoncillo as Vice-President.
I inquired of Senor Agoncillo, the Philippine commissioner to Paris, whether those bloody stories were true. He scoffed at the notion that they might be so, and laughed and shouted "No, no!" as if he was having much fun. But Agoncillo is a lawyer and a diplomat, and I had heard so much, of this horrid society I did not feel positive it was certain that its alleged blood rites were fictitious.
On January 25, 1899, Agoncillo cabled from Washington to Apacible in Hongkong: "Recommend you await beginning American aggression, justifying our conduct nations." Apacible apparently did not take this view of the matter, for on January 31 he wrote to Aguinaldo that the Senate in Washington would take final vote upon the treaty of peace between the United States and Spain on February 6, and said:
We were on the Union Pacific Railroad at the time, and I called the attention of Don Felipe Agoncillo to this remarkable intelligence and asked him what he thought of it. He said emphatically that it was "Nothing," "No true," "Nothing at all," and he laughed at the comic idea.
In case Senor Agoncillo's dispatch should fall into the hands of an unfriendly power and find its way into the newspapers, I have thought it wise to apprise the State Department of the nature of the high commissioner's proposals. Senor Agoncillo informs me by late mail that he will proceed at once to Washington to conclude the proposed treaty, if I advise.
The climax was finally reached in an official protest against the Paris Treaty written by Agoncillo in Paris on the 12th of December, 1898, in which occurs the following: "The United States of America, on their part, cannot allege a better right to constitute themselves as arbitrators as to the future of the Philippines.
But the Filipinos had fought Spain before and were by no means sanguine. Their more intelligent and reasonable men clearly foresaw that they could not win unaided. Señor Antonio Regidor was at the time residing in London. He was a Filipino of unusual intelligence and exceptionally good education. He took a keen interest in the situation, and on July 28, 1898, telegraphed Agoncillo as follows:
Part of them surrendered, giving him more arms, and the others retreated to Manila. Soon afterwards two ships, which were the private property of Senor Agoncillo and other insurgent sympathizers, were converted into cruisers and sent with insurgent troops to Subig Bay and other places, to capture provinces outside of Manila.
Obviously, Agoncillo was somewhat impressed by this cablegram, for on August 1 in a letter to Aguinaldo he made the following statements and inquiries: "If the American troops leave us alone there, the questions which will arise are these: Have we sufficient arms to maintain the war against Spain in order to secure our independence?
Word Of The Day