The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, April 20, 1902, Page 11

NDAY' CALL T was the fight of a minute! But that was a terrific one and crowd- the bloody stress of war. three of us marching along the row hillside trail in single filé— ers on the triggers. As always tant and watchful. old Filipino stalked in advance—a scout looking for the Spear traps. Suddenly he grunted and fell in his tracks. A bolo had pierced him! The cor- poral yelled ‘Goo-goos!’ “A second, and the ambush of the tall cougan grass was alive with the glint of bolos wielded by 140 Filipinos. “The guns cracked wildly and the knives slashed and hewed. “No one feit them then, but at the end of that hot minute, aided by the eleven men who had hurried up to us from the rear; we had killed thirty-seven of the wild-eyed crew. “When we counted our own, four lay @dead in the grass and four more fatally wounded. Wounds also fell to the lot of the few of us left to tell the tale.” So spoke Captain F. H. Schoeffel of the CAPT F H [SlenoerreL is a modest man, this gallant six-footer, San Francisco from the Philippines. #fe ipinos with a band of fiftsen courageous a rair fignt 1n an open field, this tragic It is not extravagant to call him fight of a minute in the island of Samar, Tresult of it. More than that, it is possi- ble that he may be crippled for life. His left foot and limb are entirely paralyzed from the severing of the sciatic nerve by a bolo thrust. Two operations at Manila did not result favorably and the handsome young officer is here on waiting orders at the Presidio hospital. He hopes soon to be ordered to Washington for treatment, and then to Johns Hopkins in Baltimore for another operation, which will consist” of bringing the nerve together and sewing it. 'This may restore to him the use of his foot and limb. He is anxicus to get East for other reasons also, for at his home in Rochester, N. Y., are wife and children, eager for the sight of their brave soldier. Though Captain Schoeffel tries to re- count the story of the fight in the most impersonal way possible, the fact remains that bravery and courage were the most eminent qualities in the makeup of the band of sixteen men who fought for life and America in the island of Samar on the morning of December 24, 1901. “To begin with,” sald Captain Schoeffel, “I was staticned about a year, ago at Taragnan, on the west coast of Samar, near the Gandare River section. Last fall 1 had been for some time trying to cap- ture an influential Filipine, one of Luk- ban’s most active agents. I had sent out several parties of soldiers to hunt for him in the tidal swamps. I had sent with them native scouts who know well these swamps with their houses on stilts. They were not successful, further than getting into several brushes with the Filipinos that did not result in much damage. Fi nally, I laid a little scheme to corral the man and his followers th.at I wanted, with rifles. K “Early on the morning of December 24 I sent Lieutenant Lang with eighteen men, many of them native scouts, by boats to a place called Dap-Dap, while I, with eighteen men of Company E, Ninth In- fantry, and one or two native scouts, went by boats also to a place called Talinga, at the head of a bay some miles in the rear of the first named place. My idea in sending out the first party was to act as a gort of a blind to attract the attention of the Goo-goos I was after. Lang with his men had orders to remain in Dap-Dap un- til I came up. It did not fail, for when we divided and parted we could hear the bamboo horns, which the natives * blow from hill to hill wPen they think they have signs of an enemy. But my party left those sounds behind and got over the hills and into the country where I thought my préy was without starting up any horns in our vicinity. We advanced till about ope and a half or two miles from the plake where Lang was waiting, and then from the crest of a hill we saw smoke from the fires he had lighted to at- tract attention. We knew he was ail right, for he was near the boats—right on the shore. We knew if the Filipinos had rifles, which they do not know the ex- pert use of in that section, and are very much afraid of losing, that they would s not attack him there, but would wait un- ‘til they got him in the jungle and then swoop down upon him with bolo men. T left three men in charge of the boats when. we left them, and had in going through the hills fifteen men and a few friendly natives to act as bearers. I di- vided the party up, with three men and myself as advance guard. “It was nearly 8 a. m. when we reached the crest of a hill, whence we couid see Dap-Dap and the stretch of country lying between. Some distance below the crest of this hitl was a narrow ridge con- Ninth Infantry, who has just arrived in who routed overpowering numbers of Fil- both a hero and a lucky man. It was not and the captain is wearing crutches as a necting with another narrow rldge be- NUTE Fl6HT ON RECORD INTHE CHILIPPINES yond, making what ‘we call in California a sort of hogback. This ridge and the slopes that we descended toward it were covered with tall grass. This is called cougan grass by the natives, and is so thick that you can’t see into it as far as two feet from you. Stretches of this dense grass are called by the Filipinos icou- ganalles.” On this. slope the trail nar- rowed to about a foot in width, making it impossible for the men to move other than in single file. “The first man on the trail in our little advance guard was our faithful old Fili- pino scout, who knew the country, every inch of it, well. He was on the lookout at évery tree for a bamboo -spear trap. These people have an unpleasant way of bending over a tree branch and fastening it down witn a sharp-pointed bamboo spear in such a hidden way that whea the unwary soldier steps on it it will fly up and pierce him through. The old fel- low was facing this danger in lieu of our- selves, and we were following him very cautiously, with magazines loaded and fingers on the triggers. In the jungles of the Philippines surprises and Goo-goos are sometimes thicker than leaves. Sud- denly the scout gave a quick, deep grunt and ‘fell forward on his face. A bolo had gone through him, and when we reached him his intestines were protruding. He was carried a little to one side, and strange to say, he lived. He had not falien before the corporal yelled ‘Guo- goos!" In less than a second the cougan grass was literally alive with their brandished bolos and the air danced with waves of red sashes and caps. On their cotton shirts were cabalistic figures, which marked them as members of the fanatical religious society, which has its seat in Samar, known as the Dios-Dio: “Then they came for us. We could see nothing else in front and on either side but a sea of knives, for they had no rifles. “In fact, we could see nothing but a sea of fury, and the tall grass was a chass of slashing, shooting and stabbing. ““Our men who turned to fire on one side were stabbed in the back. It seems to me there was not a word spoken on either side. Death and the desire for life were the only forces in that silent battle. There "was no time to’aim, so we used the muagazines. When they were empty we clubbed the muskets and slashed for the red cap of a Goo-goo or his bare head. As soon as the firing began my eleven men, who were a short distance ‘n the rear, started to our assistance. They nad to fight their way through the fiends in the thick, tall grass, into which the bloed was settling, and only three of them reached us unhurt. With just the group of us I do not know how we repulsed the bolomen,. cutting and hacking at us and jumping like cats to get away, as is their habit. “When the skirmish started I was armed only with my pistol, and that wasn't drawn. A mad boloman started for me and I had nothing to meet him with. My knowledge of boxing came in play, and Just as he reached me I side-steppod him, so to speak. He sank to his knees on the trail-and I drew my revolver and shot him in the chest, as I thought, kill- ing him. ““At the same second three of them came at me on the other side, with knives raised. One of them drobped on his knees and made a dive af my chest. I parried and poured hot shot into them with the pistol and two of them fell. The other one ran away, pursued by a friendly scout, a native. “I was fighting mad, but I remember that I saw the face of the man whom 1 thought I had killed peer up at me as 1 turned. He was not dead and his bolo flashed as he sunk back and crawled or dragged himself away through’ the grass. He had stabbed me twice in the back, but I did not feel it in the fierce blcod- thirsty tension of the fight. I did not know then that I had been touched, but one thrust went in deep in the lower part of my back and the other struck me un- der the shoulder blade. “I fought on unconsciously, and when my revolver was empty I saw one of my own men, now so pitifully few, lyiog at my feet. He was conscious, but he had been stabbed near the heart, and death was not far distant. I reached for his gun and belt and took them. Then, with the’ help of the few men left, some friendly natives and our bearers, who had simply sunk into the grass from fright when the fight began, we fought like demons, and saw the remaining bolomen turn and run. Or, rather, they seemed to sink into the tall grass whence they came. In the flercest of the fight - . Corporal Russell tripped and fell on his back. As his legs_ flew up a boloman gave him a slashing wound. But he raised his arm as he lay and shot the Filipino dead. “I must speak of the devotion of the friendly natives who were with us and those who came to us. There were three or four of them armed with bolos whd panticipated in the figat. One of them. got in close quarters wih one of the op- posing bolomen, and aiffer the battle was cver they were found at the bottem of the slope, where they had rolled, clinched in each other’s arms ‘and both dead. “Seelng a clear space I went back to help my wounded. I can never forget the courage and fortitude which the little band with me displayed on that Cnrist- mas eve. The morrow brought a sad Christmas to us all. I fired signal shots for Lang to come to my assistance at cnce, and then in the Mll, fraught with dread of another attack, with the heip of some natives we collected the wounded and dead, what guns we could find and put them in the circular space we had cut in the arass. It was a «ry gather- ing. We trled o prepare for another rush, which fortunately did not come. We When the Boys n Khaki Réeelled the {mblshing Bolo Men of Samar. bound up the badly wounded men as weil as we could with our first ald packages. “Lieutenant Lang answered my signals, so I knew he would soon be with us. As he did not find us immediately I sent frieudly natives armed with bolos-taken from our dead enemies to bring him to me. It was an hour and a half, and it seemed a very long time, before he reached s. In the meantime I was speculating on the cause of the ambusn. The trail on which we were attacked was the only one leading out of Dap-Dap. Having scen the smoke of Lang’s fires, as we had expected, they had supposed he would come up that way and had hidden in the grass. prepared to massacre his band. “The arrival of Lang and his men was more than welcome, for we could not by our own efforts make a move to get out cf the tall grass. They at once went to work and cut down saplings and made stretchers on which to carry the wound- ed men down to the boats. - I was among the number, for my wounds had made me il and fant. It was an awful trail, and we all had to be tied to the stretchers. The dead were carried on the natives’ backs, and it made the most grewsome sight I ever saw. Blood flowed all over. the trail. We got back in our boats to Tanagnan, where Dr. Calhoun, the post surgeon, dressed all wounds. “Then we had time to find out about our destruction amgng the 140 of the enemy. We fifteen had killed thirty~ seven of them certainly, besides numbers of them found afterward out in the hills, where they had fallen from loss of blood. Our friendly natives found fifteen bodies on the slope of the ridge while making stretchers. But our small force had suf- ered proportionately, and the wonder is that any of us survived. Four of our gal- lznt American boys were killed in that fight, which I am almost sure was over in the space of a moment. They were Sergeant Swisher, Corporal Gaughn, Pri- vite Weippert, and a fourth whose name I cannot recall, but it belonged to a brave soldier. “Some of those who were wounded died later. Private Mar died while waiting for the arrival of Lieutenant Lang. Private Clark died on the way to the boats, and Private Bedford passed away In the hos- pital at Tanagndn, two hours after reach- ing there. The death of Private Claxton occurred on Christmas day. “The following were wounded and re- covered, or mearly so: Corporal Russell, Private Bradley, Private McPherson and Private Bonnycastle, who was a fdll- blood Indian and who was only saved from instant death through the stab of a bolo by the. thickness of his cartridge belt. Private Clark had just joined the company, after twenty-one years' service in other regiments. He was killed in his first fight with us. My wound, or one of them that disabled me, turned out to be pretty serious—a straight-in jab of about one and a half inches. , Dr. Calhoun at first theught it did not amount to much, and I thought so, too. “But, all the same, our Krag magazine guns, shots to a man, did pretty good work in as fierce a fight as ever took place on the island of Samar. The men in Cieutenant Wallace’s camp had a hard fight last October, when eighty-nine na- tives were killed, with eleven Americans killed and nine wounded. But the odds in our fight were fearfully against us. “Samar has-a fine climate on the coast, but it is the worst section of the Philip- pines for military operations. The towns are all on the coast, with the exception of a few that are up the rivers. The peo- ple of Samar and Gandar are Visayans, and of 4 lower order than those of Luzon. They are much more ignorant and super- stitious, and consequently much more dangerous as a foe. The Dios-Dios society is led usually by some renegade priest or hermit in whom the natives have confl- dence. These leaders work up the natives to the belief that they can impart to them through selling them certaln books or prayers the quality of being nvisible and impervious to the attack of their foes in battle. Imbued with this superstition, the Visayans fight an | die like Turks or other Oriental fanatics. It was a gang of that sort that we struck on the morning of December 24, 191. It made me think of life on the plains and the sudden at- tack of hidden savages. “I had gone through that same grass hundreds of times before, and I never went through but I thought if few or many of us were ever caught In that spot we were gone. But that fight of a minute scattered that thought forever. None of us that lived through that fight will ever forget it.” Big Ears That Grow. MOST discouraging fact for people O\ with big ears, or, in tact. for people g with any ears at alk has been dis- covered by the systematic exami- nation of over 40,000 pairs of ears in Eng- land and France. It has been discovered that the ear never stops growing while its owner is alive. So people with big ears in youth may expect to have regular “flappers” in old age, and the dainty miss with the seashell appendages on either side of her head may expect the ears to which her lovers now write sonnets to be- come large and prominent when she is & grandmother. But she won't care so much then, which is one consolatien; all her lovers will be dead or married, and there will be only the children to remark, ‘“What big ears granny has got!” Granny, who used to have the little pink sea- shells. The ear, it has been discovered, grows even in the later decades of life. We get old and shrivel up and decrease in stature, but the ear still grows. A woman with small ears at 20 probably will have me- dium-sized ears at 40 and large ears at 50. Again, 1t is stated, as the result of the examination of the 40,000 pairs of ears, that probably no person in the world has ears perfectly matched. In most people the two ears differ perceptibly not only in shape, but in size. Frequently they are not placed on the head at exactly the same angle or at the same height. It'is declared by those who have devoted thelr time and abilities to the study of ears that the age of a person can be judged by them with great accuracy by an expert. After youth is past 10 ears assume an increased form and gives the clew to the age of the owner of the ears, if one is able to read the signs correctly, which, fortunately, few people are. Nor- deau, Lombroso and that crowd lay great stress upon thé ear as an indication of character; yet some of the best men we meet have outrageous ears, while almost everybody can recall some bold, bad man of his acquaintance who has small, well- formed and well-placed ears.