in the Indian Campaign, August, 1865.]

MISPLACED SYMPATHY

ADDRESS TO THE
NEW YORK COMMANDERY, MILITARY ORDER OF LOYAL
LEGION, ON CRUELTIES IN THE PHILIPPINES

I desire to enter my protest and call the attention of the companions to
the position of a portion of the public press, and some people, towards
our Army in the Philippines, and what they assert are cruelties
perpetrated there.

There is a certain portion of the press, and also of the people, who are
and always have been absolutely opposed to the operations of our army in
the Philippines. They were very anxious to push us into a war which we
were all opposed to, but after getting us there they refused to accept the
results, and have persistently opposed everything done that was not in
exact accordance with their views. In order to work upon the sympathies of
the people, some of the papers are publishing pictures showing our
soldiers in the very act of committing great outrages; the pictures were
manufactured in their own offices, as were also most of the outrages
complained of. You have not, however, seen in these papers any pictures
portraying the cruelties perpetrated upon our soldiers, which have been
worse than any acts ever committed by the savages in our wars with them;
they are, in fact, too revolting to relate. I have had much to do with
Indian warfare, but have never seen any cruelties to be compared with
those inflicted upon our soldiers by the Filipinos, and these occurrences
were not rare, but general,--happening all the time. Very little has been
said on this subject, for it was not the policy of the Government to have
the stories of these atrocities printed, or brought before the people; but
now that our army is being so bitterly attacked, it is time that, the
soldiers' side of the question should be presented, and we are learning of
the soldiers who have been assassinated, their feet burned, buried alive,
killed by slow-burning fires, their bowels cut open and wound around
trees. The Filipinos indulged in every torture and indignity that was
possible, and, as a general thing, our soldiers did not retaliate. How
they managed to refrain from taking vengeance is beyond my comprehension,
but their action is greatly to their credit and honor.

The questions I wish to bring before you, however, are, What are the
rights of an officer in such matters? What are his duties and privileges
in war in an enemy's country that is under martial law