1899-1901 Shocking, Remarkably Detailed Frontline Account of the Philippine-American War from the Perspective of a US Soldier

On offer is an unbelievable handwritten account of 19 months of action on the frontlines of the Philippine Insurrection (the Philippine-American War) between November 1899 and June 1901. An unknown American soldier writes of his experiences in a level of detail that cannot be overstated. This diary places the reader in the Philippines with shocking realism, making this diary exceedingly rare. The 139 pages of this journalled account of events have been removed from a larger document and someone has pinned these loose pages together. This writing begins at the end of a sentence penned on (presumably) November 17, 1899 and concludes half way through a sentence written on June 23, 1901. There seem to be very few missing pages from within the journal, and it reads very smoothly. The content is outstanding. The diary opens with our soldier diarist sailing from New York to the Philippines, via the British Naval base at Gibraltar and the Suez Canal. He describes his experiences sailing, sharing about a stop ashore in Malta, a Thanksgiving spent at sea, a concert enjoyed aboard the gunboat Nashville on the way to Manila and more. He arrives with his regiment in Manila on Dec 22, 1899. The troops explore Manila and meet Filipino locals. In early January of 1900, they receive orders to head to southern Luzuon on the "Kobbe Expedition", which refers to General William Kobbe’s Expedition to Bicolandia. This expedition was in response to an urgent order from Washington to open up hemp ports of Southern Luzon due to an American hemp shortage. The problem was, the port towns were largely controlled by Filipino Insurgents. Our diarist provides absolutely remarkable detail about America’s role in defeating the Insurgents, and the tragedy of the Filipino people’s experience. Context indicates that our diarist was possibly a member of the 43rd Volunteer Infantry Regiments USV, Company A. An excerpt that provides a sense of how our soldier explains the circumstances in the Philippines follows: "Jan 16th we got the order to pack up and get ready to leave [Mikata] and to proceed to the Southern part of Luzon…we were put aboard the transport Hancock which was at anchor in the Bay of Manila…All combined we were named the Kobbe Expedition to the Southern Luzon to open up the Hemp ports and protect the natives from the Insurgents down there…On the 21st of Jan 1900 our boats dropped anchor in a bay named the bay of Sorsogon in the Province of Albay…All over this province there are large gangs of Insurgents holding the towns, so at many towns our boys had a hard fight with the Insurgents before they could take the towns and the gun boat had to shell many of the towns. Our Regt. Occupied nine towns. Our detachment of A and D. Co. Were taken to a town named Donsol, the gunboat Helena took us ashore from the Hancock…On their arrival ashore they were met by a crowd of Philippinos. They had an order from the officers of the Insurgents it read saying that they would not haul down their colors nor surrender for three days. So our Major returned to the gunboat and a short conversation was held with the officers of the gun-boat and it was decided to prepare the gun boat for action and land all of us. If the Insurgents fired one shot at us the gun-boat would shell the town…The hills were full of fleeing people. A detail of men were sent out on the hills at once then the Insurgents fired their first shot at us. Our boys had a warm fight for 15 minutes. They found the hills well entrenched and also found one big cannon. Lots of spears, Bolas and wooden guns. They returned to town bringing in a few prisoners. A scouting party was seent and they saw a lot of Philippinos fleeing to the mountains. This town had a population of 10,000 and three hundred were Insurrectors. The next thing we done was to find ourselves some good houses to live in. Outposts were put out all around the town. A few natives came across our post for a few nights and on the 22th Jan the Insurgents. …