Episode 005: Islands of Canned Goods

## Introduction

Commodore Dewey sent back a cutter to Hong Kong to report the victory to the rest of the world. A week after the battle American journalist Edin Harden sent what may have been the world's most expensive telegram across Asia, Africa, and the Atlantic ocean to the telegraph office of the New York Herald with the news of American victory.

President McKinley would later say of Dewey that if he had just sailed away from Manila he would have saved the US a whole lot of trouble.

## Summary of the Episode

Aguinaldo returned to Manila on the ship that carried the journalist after he sent the telegram to the New York Herald. He immidiately got about to organizing a Filipino army, and declared independence for the nation of the Philippines. With this army he took control of every Spanish fort on the island chain save Manila.

Meanwhile the US was organizing its own forces, some 15,000 men to remove the Spanish garrison from Manila. En route to the Philippines, these forces captured Guam, a the Spanish garrisoned there didn't even know they were at war with the US. The United States also officially annexed Hawaii, who had been asking to become an American territory since the coup of 1893. The matter of annexation was opposed by the Democrats, but the war with Spain gave more credence to the idea of using Hawaii as a naval base in the Pacific, and provided enough support in Congress to pass a joint resolution for its annexation. The US had also defeated Spain's fleet in the Caribbean, and was moving troops onto Cuba, one of whom was Theodore Roosevelt, who had resigned from his position as Assistant Secretary of the Navy.

Out of a national and racial pride, the Spanish garrison in Manila refused to surrender to the besieging Filipinos. The Americans negotiated the surrender of Manila, and Spain in order to save face wanted some token fighting before officially surrendering. The Americans took over a part of the siege line, lobbed a couple of shells in the direction of Manila, and walked into the city. All of this happened after an armistice with Spain was agreed to, but because the telegraph cable between Manila and Hong Kong had been cut the forces in the Philippines had no way of knowing.

All that remained was terms of peace. And the matter of the Philippines was tricky. The islands contained something like 12% the population of the United States at the time. And then there's the matter of what the Filipino people themselves want.

## One more thing

In a syndicated column about a fictional Irish pub, humorist Finley Peter Dunn imagined his fictional bar owner speaking with a patron who opined that the US should annex the Philippines and "take in the whole lot of them". The bar owner replied sardonically, "And yet, it's not more than two months since you learned whether they were islands or canned goods!"

## Mentioned in the episode

### People

* Admiral George Dewey
* Edwin Harden, journalist
* President William McKinley
* President Emilio Aguinaldo
* Spencer Pratt
* Rounsenvill Wildman
* Ambassador John Hay
* Major General Wesley Merritt
* Brigadier General Thomas Anderson
* Captain Henry Glass
* Presidents Grover Cleveland, and Benjamin Harrison
* Speaker Thomas Reed
* Theodore Roosevelt
* Finley Peter Dunn

### Works of Art

* Lupang Hinirang ("Chosen Land")
* There'll be a Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight