awton led his brigade to the district
of Montalban and San Mateo, a few miles north of Manila, to attack the
insurgents. The agreed plan was to make a flanking movement against
the enemy on the San Mateo River and a frontal attack immediately the
enemy was engaged. The frontal attack was being personally directed
by the general, who stood on the high bank of the river. Captain
Breckinridge, the general's aide-de-camp, had just been hit in the
groin, and General Lawton went to speak to him before he was carried
away on a litter. Whilst so engaged, the general threw up his hands
and fell without uttering a word. He had been shot through the heart,
and died instantly. His body was carried to Manila for public burial,
and the insurgents were as jubilant as the Americans were grieved
over this sad occurrence. The date was fixed for the interment with
military pomp, and immense crowds came out to witness the imposing
procession. Some Filipinos, expecting the cortege would pass through
a certain street, deposited a bomb in the house of an old woman,
unknown to her, but fortunately for her and all concerned, it was
not on the route taken. In memory of the late lamented general the
present five-peso bank notes bear his vignette.

In 1900 the war of independence began to wane. In January,
General Joseph Wheeler left Manila to assume command of the late
General Lawton's brigade, and overran the Laguna de Bay south shore
towns. Vinan was taken on January 1, but as no garrison was left there,
the insurgents re-entered the town when the Americans passed on. The
armed natives were, in reality, playing a game of hide-and-seek,
with no tangible result to themselves further than feeding at the
expense of the townspeople. Aguinaldo was still roaming about central
Luzon, but, one by one, his generals either surrendered or were
captured. Among these was General Rizal, captured in January. In
this month a plot to blow up the foreign consuls was opportunely
frustrated. The Chinese General Paua, Aguinaldo's brother-in-law,
surrendered in March and found shopkeeping in Binondo a less risky
business than generalship. In the same month the Manila-Dagupan
Railway was handed over to the company's management, after having
been used for war purposes. General Montenegro surrendered in April,
and a fortnight afterwards Don Pedro A. Paterno, late President of
the Insurgent Congress, was captured at Antomoc (Beuguet district);
Generals Garcia and Dumang