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Tirona, his officers and his soldiers, promptly pillaged the convento. The officers left the Bishop of Vigan ten pesos, but the soldiers subsequently took them away from him. Wardrobes and trunks were broken open; clocks, shoes, money, everything was carried off.

We have also learned that Señor Buencamino, and Tirona, and Concepcion are prisoners of the American authorities in Manila. With reference to the wife and sister of the honourable president and the two Leyba sisters, it is said that they went to Vigan and from there went by steamer to Manila." The mother and son, accompanied by Buencamino, had allowed themselves to be captured at an earlier date.

On August 10, 1898, Colonel Daniel Tirona, a native of Cavite Province and one of the intimates of Aguinaldo, was ordered to proceed to Aparri in the Insurgent steamer Filipinas and establish the revolutionary government in northern Luzon.

So at about 2 o'clock in the morning, Aguinaldo and Tirona went directly to the court-house. Arriving there, these two determined insurgent chiefs intimated to the guards that they should surrender their equipments. These replied that it was impossible, and said they would die first. Instantly a struggle ensued between the four men, which lasted nearly an hour.

"But Aguinaldo, in company with his godfather, the lamented Candido Tirona, insisted on convincing them with their strong arguments. They made them understand that Spanish cruelty would annihilate them without fail, and for no other reason than that they were members of the Katipúnan. "As it happened, at that very time there were two 'Guardia Civil' soldiers in the court-house.

"I have learned lately, that some foreigners, residents in that province, among them some employees of the Tobacco Factory, 'El Oriente' and of the firm of Baer Senior & Co., who have Spanish employees in various pueblos of that province, have some very serious complaints to make of assaults committed against them prejudicial to their interests; however, I hope that now with the arrival of General Tirona he will regulate matters, although I believe that this gentleman is not sufficiently energetic in proceeding against the officers and soldiers, as I have seen when I reprimanded and punished them for faults committed he has pardoned them, and it appears that he censures energetic acts which we must use in order to subject them to rigorous discipline.

In doing this he was to hold elections for office-holders under Aguinaldo's government and was authorized to approve or disapprove the results, his action being subject to subsequent revision by Aguinaldo. His forces were composed of four companies armed with rifles. Tirona reached Aparri on August 25 and promptly secured the surrender of the Spaniards there.

It was in consequence of the atrocities committed by the Tagálog soldiers in the Cagayan valley that Captain Batchelder was able a little later to march practically unopposed through the provinces of Nueva Vizcaya, Isabela and Cagayan with one battalion of American negro troops, for whom he had neither food nor extra ammunition, and that Tirona surrendered the Insurgent forces in the valley without attempting resistance!