WASHINGTON POST, APRIL 24, 1902
TORTURE OF PRIEST
[Extract from the Washington Post, Thursday, April 24, 1902.]
TORTURE OF PRIEST — ALLEGED MURDER BY AMERICAN SOLDIERS AT BOLO1 — A WATER-CURE ATROCITY — SENATOR LODGE PUT IN POSSESSION OF FACTS BY FORMER PRIVATES — WATCH AND CHAIN OF THE VICTIM SAID TO HAVE BEEN TURNED OVER TO A COMMISSIONED OFFICER — OTHER INSTANCES OF SAVAGE WARFARE IN THE PHILLIPINES GIVEN A STATEMENT BY WILLIAM LABELLE AND ALBERT W. BERTRAND, OF LYNN, MASS.
LYNN, MASS, April 23.
Two Lynn men, William Labelle and Albert W. Bertrand, formerly privates in Company D, Twenty-sixth Regiment, U. S. Volunteers, have sent to Senator Lodge a statement of instances of applications of the " water cure " in the Philippines that came under their observation. Bertrand was clerk of Company D and regimental clerk at headquarters while the regiment was stationed at Panay. Labelle says that while at Anilao three natives were taken by Company D into a Catholic church and given the water cure. One of the natives refused to tell where insurgent guns were secreted, and after he had been given the water cure he was blindfolded, and one of the soldiers fired his gun near the man's head. The instant the gun was fired, another member of the squad hit the native with a stone, and he was told that he had been shot. The native then told the United States soldiers where they could find the guns. Labelle gives the names of the officers and privates who participated in administering the punishment.
Labelle further says that in the summer of 1900, while the United States forces were about 3 miles from Estancia, Company D captured three natives and gave them the water cure. After the men had been filled with water, blood came from their eyes and ears.
FATE OF FATHER AUGUSTINE.
Bertrand has furnished Senator Lodge with particulars of the alleged disappearance and killing of Father Augustine, a Catholic priest at Bolo1. He says it was reported that Father Augustine knew where insurgent gold was buried. Men from Company D captured him in December, 1900, and dressed him in a uniform of the United States
artillery. He was then taken to Banate and kept in a well. He refused to tell where the gold was buried, and on the night of December 9 he was taken to a house formerly occupied by the presidente of the village. Upon his arrival there, Bertrand says, the water cure was given him by the "water-cure squad." The men succeeded in getting nearly all the water out of him, but he did not revive. The men became frightened and a surgeon was sent for. His services proved unsuccessful, and Bertrand says that the priest died.
GIVES NAMES OF MEN AND OFFICERS.
Some of the men were sworn to secrecy, and the body was buried in a plat of land used by the troops as a baseball ground. Bertrand says that a noncommissioned officer was seen with the priest's watch and chain, and when a commissioned officer learned this they were turned over to him. Bertrand gives the names of the men and officers taking part, and also refers to several officers.
According to Labelle, when Company D was on a hike, while stationed at Dungas2, in July, 1900, the men were ordered to burn everything, and see that no grown person escaped.
This, Labelle says, the men proceeded to do. Labelle and Bertrand say that while at Dungas2 the soldiers came to a hut where a native woman had just given birth to a child. The husband was made a prisoner, and the woman and child were dragged from the house and left on the ground. The native shack was then burned, but Labelle and Bertrand do not know what became of the woman and child.
1 must be Molo, Iloilo.
2 must be Dumangas, Iloilo
