THE CAPTURE OF AGUINALDO

By Brigadier-General Frederick Funston.

Funston, whose account of the capture of the Filipino insurrection leader is given here by permission on of "Scribner's Magazine," in which it originally appeared, went to the Philippines in 1898 as colonel of the Twentieth Kansas Volunteers, and in the following year was made a brigadier-general for bravery at Calumpit. In March, 1901, he commanded the expedition which surprised and captured Aguinaldo in the manner described, at Palanan, Island of Luzon.

On April 2, 1901, Aguinaldo formally took the oath of allegiance to the United States. For two years he had braved the military power of this country, leading an unsuccessful attack on Manila on February 4-5, 1899, and thereafter conducting a guerilla warfare in behalf of Filipino independence.

After performing this exploit, Funston was in command of the department of California, and during the San Francisco earthquake of April, 1906, placed the city under martial Ian, and brought order out of chaos.

IT was the 8th day of February, 1901, and in the room that served as an office in the headquarters building at San Isidro, I was going over the morning's work with the adjutant-general of the district, Captain E. V. Smith, when there arrived a telegram that for the moment disturbed our equanimity a brief message that was to have no small part in the making of the history of the Philippine insurrection. It was signed by Lieutenant J. D. Taylor, Twenty-fourth Infantry, commanding the company of that regiment that constituted the garrison of the town of Pantabangan, about sixty miles to the north-east, at the foot of the western slope of the massive mountain range that separates the great central plain of Luzon from the Pacific coast of the island, and was to the effect that a small band of insurgent soldiers had voluntarily presented themselves to him, and that the man in command had stated that he was the bearer of dispatches from Emilio Aguinaldo to certain subordinates in central and southern Luzon. The letters addressed to Baldomero, Aguinaldo, Alejandrino, Urbano Lacuna, Pablo Tecson, Simon Tecson, Teodoro Sandico, and other insurgent leaders, were in cipher and so could not be read, and evidently signed fictitiously, though in a handwriting that seemed to resemble that of Aguinaldo.

For more than a year the exact whereabouts of the elusive chieftain of the insurgent Filipinos had been a mystery. Rumor located him in all sorts of impossible places, but those best qualified to judge thought that he was somewhere in the great valley of the Cagayan, in the northern part of the island, or in one of the extensive mountain ranges on either side of it. Probably few if any of those in high command among the insurgent forces knew where he was, as he was taking every precaution against treachery, or the disclosure of his hiding-place by the capture of correspondence, having gone so far as to forbid that the name of his temporary capital should be put on paper in any of the letters sent out by himself or staff. A few trusted men saw that letters to him reached their destination.

The period of guerilla warfare that had succeeded the heavier fighting of the earlier days of the insurrection-had now lasted more than a year and a half, and it must be confessed that from our stand-point the results had not been satisfactory. Scattered all over the Philippines we had more than seventy thousand troops, counting native auxiliaries, and these in detachments varying in size from a regiment to less than a company garrisoned every town of importance and many places that were mere villages. Through the country everywhere were the enemy's guerilla bands, made up not only of the survivors of the forces that had fought us earlier in the war, but of men who had been recruited or conscripted since. We had almost worn ourselves out chasing these marauders, and it was only occasionally by effecting a surprise or through some streak of good fortune that we were able to inflict any punishment on them, and such successes were only local and had little effect on general conditions. These guerillas persistently violated all the rules that are supposed to govern the conduct of civilized people engaged in war, while the fact that they passed rapidly from the status of peaceful non-combatants living in our garrisoned towns to that of men in arms against us made it especially difficult for us to deal with them. It was realized that Aguinaldo from his hiding-place, wherever it might be, exercised through their local chiefs a sort of general control over these guerilla bands, and as he was insistent that the Filipinos should not accept American rule, and as he was still recognized as the head and front of the insurrection, many of us had long felt that the thing could not end until he was either out of the way, or a prisoner in our hands.

Therefore it was but natural that the telegram from Lieutenant Taylor should have created no little excitement, though as I now recollect the circumstances I do not believe that it occurred to any one of us that we would be able to do more than transmit the information for what it might be worth to higher authority, the plan which afterward worked so successfully being evolved later. It was directed that the leader of the surrendered band, with the correspondence that he had given up, be sent to San Isidro with all possible speed. With an escort of soldiers he arrived in less than two days, and proved to be a very intelligent Ilocano, giving his name as Cecilio Segismundo. After being well fed he told me the story of his recent adventures.

According to his story, he was one of the men attached to Aguinaldo's head-quarters and had been with him many months, his principal duty being such errands as the one that he had now been sent out on, that is, carrying official mail between the insurgent chief and his subordinates. On the 14th of January, accompanied by a detachment of twelve armed men of Aguinaldo's escort, he had left with a package of letters to be delivered to Urbano Lacuna, the insurgent chief in Nueva Ecija province, who was to forward to their final destinations those that were not meant for him. After a terrible journey down the coast and through mountains he had, in the vicinity of Baler, encountered a small detachment of our troops out on a scouting expedition and had lost two of his men. After this encounter Segismundo and his little band had made their way across the pass through the mountain range to the westward, and finally, twenty-six days after leaving Palanan, had reached the outskirts of the town of Pantabangan. Here, foot-weary and hungry, he communicated with the local "presidents," or mayor, who had formerly acted in the same capacity for the insurgent government that he was now filling under American rule.

Segismundo then went on to tell of conditions at Palanan. Aguinaldo with several officers of his staff and an escort of about fifty uniformed and well-armed men had been there for several months, and had been in constant communication with his various subordinates by means of messengers. The residents of the town and most of the soldiers of his escort were not aware of his identity. He passed as "Captain Emilio," and by those who did not know him to be Aguinaldo was supposed to be merely a subordinate officer of the insurrection.

Our attention was now given to the surrendered correspondence, but those not in cipher contained little of importance.

The most important letter and the one that was the final undoing of its writer, was to his cousin, Baldomero Aguinaldo, then in command of the insurgent bands operating in Cavite province just south of Manila.

This directed the person to whom it was addressed to proceed at once to the "Centre of Luzon,' I and, using the communication as authority, to supersede in command Jose Alejandrino, who evidently was not giving satisfaction to his chieftain. As soon as he had established himself in command, Baldomero was to direct his subordinates, that is Lacuna, Mascardo, Simon and Pablo Tecson, and possibly one or two others to send him detachments of men until the aggregate should reach about four hundred.

By morning I had thought out the general features of the plan which was eventually to succeed.

It was settled beyond the possibility of a doubt that no force the nature of which was known could even get within several days' march of him. So the only recourse was to work a stratagem, that is to get to him under false colors. It would be so impossible to disguise our own troops, that they were not even considered, and dependence would have to be placed on the Macabebes, those fine little fighters, taking their name from their home town, who had always been loyal to Spain and who had now transferred their loyalty to the United States. As it would be absolutely essential to have along some American officers to direct matters and deal with such emergencies as might arise, they were to accompany the expedition as supposed prisoners who had been captured on the march, and were not to throw off that disguise until there was no longer necessity for concealment.

In order to pave the way for the bogus reinforcements, which were supposed to be those from Lacuna's command, it was considered essential to have them preceded by letters from that individual. . . . Aguinaldo himself afterward told me that it was the supposed letters from Lacuna that threw him entirely off his guard and caused him to welcome the supposed reinforcements.

On the night of March 6th the "Vicksburg" slipped out of Manila Bay, and steered south in order to pass through the straits of San Bernardino.

Fortunately for us, the weather was thick and squally, and at one o'clock on the morning of the 14th, the "Vicksburg" having very carefully approached the coast, with all her lights screened, we were landed in the ship's boats.