The Houston daily post. [volume] (Houston, Tex.) 1886-1903, 1902-07-20
ONE OF SMITHS OWN MEN
Ex-SoIdier Tells Of Operations in The
Philippines.
KILLED BABIES, CHILDREN AND OLD FOLKS
"The Burners" Orders Were Carried Out
to the Letter--How Those Orders
Were Promulgated.

Brennan. Texas, July 19.-J. %. Dwyer,
who has been recently mustered oat Of the
United States army. is In the city. lie was
member Of company l. Ninth infantry, I'M
der Colonel McCurdy. one OF the three regi-
ments in Jake" Smiths famous brigade.
His narrative throws some sideights on the
situation which tend to extenuate the ac.
tion Of General Smith.
II enlisted from Palestine" be began
we were sent TO Cuba and participated In
the battle of san Juan Hin. 1t wasn't
much Of a battle. All that bsyonettirg In
the trenches that sou heard about is all
gun ! was there and never saw much OF
IT, Roosevelt wasn't the whole works as
some Of the papers said. We never heard
OF him until the papers came out. We lost
bat about geventy.ive men either In battle
or on account OF sickness. After the war
was over in cuba we got orders in October,
1895. to move to the Philippines. We went
by the way Of sun Francisco and embarked
on the transport Grant. The voyage WAS
uueventful aud we landed at Manila on No.
Fem0er T. We then marched to Cavite
province thence to the Isle OF Mindanao and
skirmshed and fought all over the island
The natives are as treacherous as the
.NPANlt lNu4auS. IuGt Nre Known as MOrOS,
are large struppiBg fellows six feet tall and
KNOW nothing Of civilization They attack.
60 our mule trains as we moved through
the lungles; the paths were very narrow
ana they would line up ia rows OF Il hul-
dred Oh either side concealed by the 3ense
uhdefgrowth and pounce down upon the
mule troirs with large Dolos aud capture
! ana XII the entire OUTFIT. When we were
| thus deprived Of our rGtlons We would
! forage on their chickens and rice We
never were without food.
sENTRIEs KILLED BY NATIVES.
The first two weeks we we're there we
! lost eight sentries. We would mud them
| the next morning with their bodies horribly
mutilated and their heads invariably miss.
Ing from trunks. The iriars told our
officers-they would not talk with enlisted
men-that in the tribal wars they wonld
decapitate their enemies and take their
! nends into the interior ana hold war
dance around them, after which they were
uolied ana eaten No doubt a number OF
4 me American soldiers were treated IN a
similar manner: at least we survivors we're
hrmly convinced Of IT, A number of times
our boys we're sent for water and their
hcadless trunks were found around tho
springs, mutilated in a sickenng manner.
We got SO we did the same thing. 1t be-
came personal matter with us; when we
ARM hd7e On gong ne spring WE "e sHoT
THEM LIKE DOGS for we knew they
would do the same to us.
The killing Of our sentries by these mid.
night assaselns began to grow with intol-
cradle rapidity. We began to make eXcur.
sions into the country under sergeants IN
punches OF from twenty TO twenty 1--WE. We
would report seeing a batch Of from about
nifty 10 100 natives whom we dispersed
This was not generally the case, We shot
81 we could aud they did the same to us
We burned their villages and shot every
! thing In sight We didn't kill the old peopl,
ana leave lot OF children under 10 year