Thursday, July 4, 2013

Death

Emilio Aguinaldo died of a heart attack at Veterans Memorial Hospital in Quezon City, Philippines, on February 6, 1964. His private land and mansion, which he had donated the prior year, continue to serve as a shrine to both the revolution for Philippine independence and the revolutionary himself.

Philippine American War

The United States, however, was not eager to accept the Philippines' new government. While the United States and Spain had been fighting the Spanish-American War, the Philippines had been ceded by Spain to the United States in the Treaty of Paris in December 1898.

Just two weeks after Aguinaldo's inauguration, an American sentry killed a Philippine soldier stationed at the San Juan Bridge, in a gesture of resistance against the newfound Philippine independence. On February 4, 1899,  the Philippine-American War exploded into action. Aguinaldo's revolutionaries quickly resorted to guerilla tactics, resulting in one of the bloodiest wars in American history, but in little direct progress for Aguinaldo and his cause. Concerning the apparent futility of his efforts in war, Aguinaldo said, "I saw my own soldiers die without affecting future events."

After three years at war, Aguinaldo was captured by American General Frederick Funston on March 23, 1901. After swearing an oath of allegiance to the United States, on April 19, 1901, Aguinaldo officially declared peace with the United States. By this time, the United States was ready support Philippine independence. Friendly relations, along with an American civil government, were established. Aguinaldo retreated to a private life as a farmer but never forgot the men who fought alongside him. In their honor, he would later establish the Veterans of the Revolution, an organization that arranged their pensions, as well as affordable payment plans for land purchases.

Aguinaldo took another stab at politics when he ran for presidency in 1935 against Manuel Quezon but lost. In 1950 he became a presidential advisor on the Council of State.

Independence from Spain

Eager to fight for the cause of Philippine independence, in 1895 Aguinaldo took up with a secret society of revolutionaries headed by fellow lodge member Andres Bonifacio. When a rival faction executed Bonifacio in 1897, Aguinaldo assumed total leadership of the revolution against Spain.
By December 1897, Aguinaldo had managed to reach the Truce of Biak-na-Bato with Spain. He and his rebels agreed to a surrendering of arms and accepted exile to Hong Kong in exchange for amnesty, indemnity and liberal reform. However, neither side kept up their end of the bargain. The Spanish government did not deliver in full all that was promised, and the rebels did not truly surrender arms. In fact, Aguinaldo's revolutionaries used some of Spain's financial compensation to purchase additional arms for the resistance. From Hong Kong, Aguinaldo also made arrangements to assist Americans fighting against Spain in the Spanish-American War. As neither peace nor independence had been achieved, in 1898 Aguinaldo returned to the Philippines to resume his rebellion against Spanish rule.

Back in Cavite, Aguinaldo forcibly set up a provisional dictatorship. After meeting with the Malolos Congress and drafting a constitution for a new republic, on June 12, 1898, Aguinaldo at last declared Philippine independence. Announced from his home town of Kawit, Aguinaldo's proclamation put an end to four centuries of Philippine oppression under Spanish Colonial rule. In January of the following year, dressed in a white suit at Barasoain Church in Malolos City, Aguinaldo was sworn in as the first president of the new, self-governed Philippine republic.

Emilio Aguinaldo

Revolutionary leader Emilio Aguinaldo 
was born on March 22, 1869, in Kawit, Cavite, Philippines. In 1898, he achieved independence of the Philippines from Spain and was elected the first president of the new republic under the Malolos Congress. He also led the Philippine-American War against U.S. resistance to Philippine independence. Aguinaldo died of a heart attack on February 6, 1964, in Quezon City, Philippines.

Emilio Aguinaldo was born on March 22, 1869, in Kawit, Cavite, Philippines. Nicknamed Miong, Aguinaldo was the seventh of eight children. His parents were of Chinese and Tagalog descent. His father, Carlos, died when Aguinaldo was just nine years old. Widowed, his mother, Trinidad, sent him to attend public school in Manila.

After graduating from the University of Santo Thomas in Manila, Aguinaldo returned home to Kawit, where he developed a growing awareness of Filipino frustration with Spanish colonial rule.
While serving as the head of barter in Manila, he joined the Pilar Lodge chapter of the Freemasonry in 1895. The Freemasonry was a government- and church-banned resistance group. It was through his role as municipal captain of this fraternity that Aguinaldo met Andres Bonifacio, a key figure in the fight to overthrow Spanish rule.

Monday, July 1, 2013

Bonifacio Katipunan

Bonifacio was the son of Santiago Bonifacio and Catalina de Castro in Tondo, Manila, and was the eldest of five children. His siblings were Ciriaco, Procopio, Troadio, Esperidiona and Maxima. His father was a tailor who served as a tenyente mayor of Tondo, Manila, while his mother was a mestiza born of a Spanish father and a Filipino-Chinese mother who worked at a cigarette factory. As was custom, upon baptism he was named for the saint on whose feast he was born, Andrew the Apostle.

Bonifacio's normal schooling was cut short when he dropped out to support his siblings after both their parents died of illness. He sold canes and paper fans he made himself and made posters for business firms. In his late teens, he worked as a mandatory for the British trading firm Fleming and Company, where he rose to become a corregidor of tar, rattan and other goods. He later transferred to Fressell and Company, a German trading firm, where he worked as a bodeguero (storehouse worker). Bonifacio was also a part-time actor who performed in moro-moro plays.

Not finishing his normal education, Bonifacio was self-educated. He read books about the French Revolution, biographies of the Presidents of the United States, books about contemporary Philippine penal and civil codes, and novels such as Victor Hugo's Les Misérables, Eugène Sue's Le Juif errant and José Rizal's Noli Me Tángere and El Filibusterismo. Aside from Tagalog and Spanish, he could speak a little English, which he learned while working at J.M. Fleming and Co.

Bonifacio was married twice: first to a certain Monica who died of leprosy; then he married Gregoria de Jesús of Caloocan in 1893. They had one son named Andrés who died of smallpox in infancy.

In 1892 he joined Rizal's La Liga Filipina, an organization which called for political reforms in Spain`s colonial government of the Philippines. However, La Liga disbanded after only one meeting as Rizal was arrested and deported to Dapitan in Mindanao. Bonifacio, Apolinario Mabini and others revived La Liga in Rizal's absence and Bonifacio was active at organising local chapters in Manila. La Liga Filipina contributed moral and financial support to the Propaganda Movement of Filipino reformists in Spain.

Heroes Recommended

The National Heroes Committee recommended Jose Rizal, Andres Bonifacio, Emilio Aguinaldo, Apolinario Mabini, Marcelo H. del Pilar, Sultan Dipatuan Kudarat, Juan Luna, Melchora Aquino, and Gabriela Silang to be recognized as national heroes on November 15, 1995: As of today, no action has been taken for these recommended National Heroes. In August 2009, shortly after the death of former President Corazon Aquino, widow of Benigno Aquino, legislative measures have been filed calling for her official recognition as a national hero.

Famous National Heroes History

Philippine National Heroes and Presidents
A national hero of the Philippines is a Filipino who has been recognized as a hero for his or her role in the history of the country. Loosely, the term may refer to all Filipino historical figures recognized as heroes, but the term more strictly refers to those officially designated as such. In 1995 the Philippine National Heroes Committee officially recommended several people for the designation, but this was not acted upon. Currently, no one has ever been officially recognized as a Philippine national hero.

The reformist writer Jose Rizal, today generally considered the greatest Filipino hero and often given as the Philippine national hero, has never been explicitly proclaimed as the (or even a) national hero by the Philippine government. Besides Rizal, the only other Filipinos currently given implied recognition as national heroes are revolutionary Andres Bonifacio and Senator Benigno Aquino, Jr. While other historical figures are commemorated in public municipal or provincial holidays, Rizal, Bonifacio and Aquino are commemorated in public nationwide (national) holidays and thus are implied to be national heroes.