The record-union., 1899-04-06
WRITTEN IN The TRENCHES.
LETTER FROM A SOLDIER BOY
BEFORE MALABON.
That Triumpha1 March Of Uncle
Sans BIue-Coated Fighters
Out Of Manila.

soldier In one OF the Kansas regiments
that has been fighting the FIlipinos
near Manila. 1t is full of interest. and
the more so from the circumstances
under which it was received. it hav-
ing arrived after the writer's death.
1t was mailed at the military station
in the Philippines near Manila on Feb
ruary 9th. On March 9th the writer
was wounded in the neck, and the dis
patches from Manila announce that he
died on the 31st. The letter arrived in
this city on April I'd:
Dear Friend: I received your most
kind and welcome letter of january
23d, yesterday morning, and I was
more than glad to hear from
you. You say that you have not
received a letter from me since leaving
Honolulu. Well, have answered every
one but the last two. and l am not to
blame for that. 1 had one ready to
mail, but we were called out unex-
pectedly on Saturday night, February
4th and the letter lies at the barracks
unmailed. Yours of December %, 1898,
was received by me while in the
trenches before Caloocan, and the very
next day we fought the battle Of
Caloocan.
So you see I couldn't really answer
your letters which I certainly would
if I'd had the opportunity We have
been on the field fighting insurgents
ever since Saturday night, February
4th, at II p. m. The call to arms rang
through our barracks rather unex-
pectedly that night, and inside of ten
minutes we were marching down Fer
nando streets on our way to reinforce
our outposts, which the insurgents had
attacked. 1t didn't take us long to
get out Hthere, and when there we were
ordered On the firing line Immediately.
To get on the line we had to wade a
canal and cross a rice swamp, where
the mud was knee deep. We got on
the firing line and exchanged shots
with the insurgents all night The next
morning Sunday they gave US a. few
bareback for breakfast We were all
wet and covered with mud, but we
were feeling fine and not man from
H Company had been shot M Com
pany was next to US, and they had one
killed
Sunday afternoon we charged on the
insurgents and drove them back into
the interior one and one-half miles.
They tried to make a stand against US
here and there, but they couldn't stand
the volleys from our Springfields. The
| woods were filled with dead inSur-
gents
We fell back 100 yards from the night
and dug our intrenchments and tried
to sleep, but now and then our Captain
would yell: Company! load! ready!
aiml fire.! He kept that up all night.
The next morning (Monday) we adj
vanced about 500 yards and took up
position on this side of Calcoocan.
We laid in our intrenchments all that
day, and on Tuesday afternoon Com
panies B. F and c made a sally into
the woods to drive them back a little,
because they had come back to the
edge of the woods and We're firing on US.
Right here the Twentieth lost a num-
Der of men. Lieutenant Afford of B
Company was killed here. He was our
Second Lieutenant when we left Law
renee, and his folks live there. Wednes-
day and Thursday we lay in the same
trenches, but on Thursday night we
had an outpost of twelve men from
each company. 1t was one from our
company, and we gave the insurgents
volley after volley all night One lad
from Company K was shot in the
head, but he's getting we'll
On Friday we started to take the
town of Calcoocan. We took it all right,
but it was a hard fight. We had one
man from H Company shot right above
the eye, and several from other COM
panies were killed. We burned the
whole town, with the exception of four
buildings We killed about 200 insur-
gents in this battle along our end of
the line.
We are to the right of Malabon now
and that will be the next city we will
take. There's only one road that runs
into Malabon, and we will have some
rice swamps to wade when the time
comes for us to take the city. After the
battle of Caloocan we had to bury all
the dead insurgents. 1t was a bad
job.
While lying in the trenches here we
have to fire every now and then, as the
insurgents are thick in their trenches
500 yards from US and they keep up a
pretty steady fire all the time. But it
won't last long with them. Their time
is short Night before last we had an
other Company H man shot in the arm
with a brass-coated Remington bullet.
It shattered the bone pretty badly. I've
been lucky so far. I haven't bad
scratch yet But some bullets have
been pretty close-closer than 1 cared
for them to come.
Thursday night, the 23d, lot of Fill
pinos got into town-or were in town
and started to fire on the troops there.
The Twenty-third regulars and Thir-
teenth Minnesota, who are doing police
duty in town now, soon fixed them.
They burned a tough district which we
noticed when we were in town. called
the Tondo District. and killed fifty in
surgents and captured $50 The
Twenty-third only lost one man.
There were two railroads running
from Manila. and we captured one and
painted on the cars, Kansas and Utah
Short Line" and 1.-THE only direct road
to Freddie's scrappers." The Mon
tanas captured the other and named
it 1.-THE Montana Fast Line We use
the trains for bringing the provisions
and carrying the wounded back to the
hospitals.
Last night, about 6 o'clock, an insur
gent came from his line waving a white
flag. When he came up he said he
didn't want to fight any more; he had
got enough. We took him prisoner.
We have been living high since we
came on the line We eat nothing but
chicken, beefsteak, string beans, rad
ishes. fish. and now and then we get
hog. After one gets out of Manila the
country is fine and healthy. We haven't
had any one sick since we left Manila.
Manila itself, though, is just terrible
They say the Twentieth regulars