The daily morning journal and courier., 1900-04-30
AMONG FILIPINO SAVAGES
PERTLS AND ESCAPE OF LTEUTEN- ANT GILLMORE AND HIS PARTY.

| Captivcs Were Hurried or Over the | M0untain Country Made a Trail for 1 the Rescuors-The Lieutemnnt's story | of His Adventures.
 | Among the many adventures of the
 brave men of our army and navy dur | ing the Spanish war and the insurrec- 1 tion in the Philippines. none perhaps IS more thrilling than that which befell
 Lieutenant James c. Gilmore of the
 Yorktown and his boats crew, who fell
 into a Filipino ambush a year ago and
 is told most interestingly by Lieutenant | Gilmore himself in the current number
 of Golfers Weekly.
 l It was on the morning of April 12, 1 1899, that Lieutenant Gilmore left the
 Yorktown in the second cutter with
 crew of fourteen men and two passen-
 gers-an officer and a man--near the
 town of Baier, where they were to try 1
 and discover the position of church
 in which it was said a party of Spanish
 were besieged by insurgents. The men
 were landed safely, but Gillmores boat
 was discovered by the enemy little | later as he was going back to the mouth
 of the river which flows past Bier. To
 thow off suspicion as to the real pur-
 pose of his trip, Gilmore began making soundings across the river, and sketches | In doing this the boat was allowed to approach close to the left bank of the l river where there was a swamp cover
 ed with tall marsh grass
 l AS was about to give the order to
 return" Lieutenant Gillmore's narrative
 says, i've rounded a bend and came full
 upon an outpost who hailed us and fired
 shot. Before could answer the hail volley was fired at us at close range--
 about fifty yards.
 "The effect of this volley was terrible.
 Two men were killed instantly the
 brains of one being scattered over the
 boat and crew. Another man had the l fingers cut off his left hand. but still
 kept bravely to his post at the star 1 board stroke oar. The starboard oars
 were riddled and most of them shatter- ed. The boat was pierced by the Rem
 ington balls and made water fast. As
 soon as possible after recovering from
 the first shock we opened fire with Colt and rifles. The ambush was so com l plete that We could not see at what to | fire, not even the smoke, The second volley threw the Colt out of action by shattering the box and cutting the load | ing tape. The order was given to back oars, but as only very few could be used the tide drifted us in on sand bank.
 Three of the men bravely Juihped over to swim the boat out, but did not suc- ceed, the tide setting us in.
 "The volleys were now poured in on us from the left bank in quick success sion, mortally wounding two men and seriously wounding three others, and
 myself slightly At this time l was un- der the impression that most of the crew were either wounded or killed, as the bodies of the men who were killed and mortally wounded had fallen on the slighter men in the boat, in the bottom of which they were struggling. The boat was covered with blood, presenting fearful sight. The cries of the mor- tally wounded, asking me to shoot them and not allow them to fall into the hands of the savages, were heartrend- ing. At the same time there could be seen coming down the right bank band of savages-bolo and spear men with few Remington rifles. I then gave the order to hoist the white flag This was done by one of the men, who received a ball through the wrist and dropped the flag.
 The firing from the enemy now came faster and I thought they intended to massacre us, so continuer our fire, We were now hailed in Spanish from the left bank by an officer, saying that if we did not cease firing and surrender he would murder us all. then surrender ed to him. The savages on the right bank came up, took us out of the boat, robbed us, tied our arms behind our backs with bamboo thongs and lined us up on the beach to be shot I protested against being shot with my arms tied, and this altercation, which lasted about five minutes, probably saved our lives. They loaded their rifles and were all ready, when Tagalog officer came out of the bush and ordered otherwise. We were then sent aboard the boat, and af- ter stopping up the holes made by the balls and pulling the boat out proceeded up the river"
 Two of the crew were dead, two mor- tally wounded and three seriously wounded. The boat was run ashore a little way up the river, The dead were left in 1t, the mortally wounded put in the shade ashore and then the rast of the party were started for Baier. There orders were received from Aguinaldo to bring them to the capital, San Isidro; and, leaving the seriously wounded be- hind, they began a long and weary march into the interior over country broken with mountains and unbridged streams and over roads deep with mud. Their guards were bow-and arrow and corporal. Lieutenant Gilmore tells the story of that march, stage by stage, re- citing how at times the party camped in the open in rain storms aad cold, or were met with threats and inhosptality in towns, and how also in some towns they were well fed and well treated by order of the town presidentes.
 The party remained nine days at San Isdro and then as American forces were pushing forward they were ordered to the northWard in company with about one hundred Spanish prisoners. Gath l