Note 13 — Protocol of Peace

For some time after the white flag was hoisted there was street-fighting between the rebels and the loyals. The rattle of musketry was heard all round the outskirts. The rebels had taken 300 to 400 Spanish prisoners and seized a large quantity of stores. General Basilio Augusti, who was personally averse to useless bloodshed, relinquished his command of the Colony about a week prior to the capitulation. Just before the attack on the city he went on board a German steam-launch which was waiting for him and was conveyed to the German cruiser Kaiserin Augusta, which at once steamed out of the bay northwards. General Fermin Jaúdenes remained as acting-Captain-General.13 Brig.-General of Volunteers and Insp.-General Charles A. Whittier and Lieutenant Brumby then went ashore in the Belgian Consulʼs launch, and on landing they were met by an interpreter, Cárlos Casademunt, and two officers, who accompanied them to the house of the acting-Captain-General, with whom the draft terms of capitulation were agreed upon. In his evidence before the Peace Commission at Paris, General Whittier said: “I think the Captain-General was much frightened. He reported in great trepidation that the insurgents were coming into the city, and I said that I knew that that was impossible because such precautions had been taken as rendered it so. “His fear and solicitude about the natives entering the city when I received the surrender of Manila were almost painful to witness.” Lieutenant Brumby returned to Admiral Dewey to report, and again went ashore with General Merritt. In the meantime General Jaúdenes had taken refuge in the sacristy of a church which was filled with women and children, presumably with the wise object of keeping clear of the unrestrained mobs fighting in the suburbs. For some time the Spanish officers refused to reveal his whereabouts, but eventually he and General Merritt met, and on August 14 the terms of the Capitulation were signed between General Nicolás de la Peña y Cuellas and Colonels Jose Maria Olaguer Tellin and Cárlos Rey y Rich, as Commissioners for Spain, and Generals F. V. Greene and Charles A. Whittier, Colonel Crowder, and Captain Lamberton, U.S.N., as Commissioners for the United States. The most important conditions embodied in the Capitulation are as follows, viz.: