Philippine War Letter Home a Treasure Discovered

I was going through my mother's writing files, and was floored when I found a portion of a letter my grandfather Harry Ozro Whitson wrote home to his mother, sister, brother, and friends in Oklahoma from the Philippines during the war. There is only the first page and a fourth page, but the first has a drawing he made of his surroundings at the top.  It is priceless.  I asked my mother about it and if she had the other pages or knew who did. She (she suffers from dementia) said I didn't have it, you must have.  I knew it wasn't me, as I would never have laminated it.
This find was exciting.  I have already had one journey in finding my grandfather's experience during the Philippines War and wrote it here on my blog.

Harry O Whitson 

Company B picture location was not written on the back, just Spanish American War

This letter gave me first hand experience from him where he was and some of what he did, albeit it is only part of the story. These are the two pages of the letter.  I believe that he wrote on the back of the paper, but it is hard to tell since it is laminated together.

Letter from Harry O Whitson to his family in Oklahoma from the Philippines 1900 in possession of Fran Ellsworth 

Page 4 or flip side of above of Harry O Whitson's letter in possession of Fran Ellsworth

The hand drawn illustration on the first page.

I had downloaded GenScriber before for transcribing some wills and documents, so I dusted it off and began my hand at transcribing what my grandfather had written.  It was not easy and obviously as I worked I saw he didn't know how to spell many of the place names, I was able to figure it out, but I did not change anything as I was transcribing.  NOW, I have another reason for posting, hoping some of my eagle-eyed genfriends will see what I have missed and let me know. Crowd sourcing. (smiling) Those of you just starting, this is an awesome FamilySearch Wiki page that helps tremendously Transcribing Historical Documents (National Institute)

This is my attempt at transcribing the above letter.

Marinduquie, Santa Cruz, Oct the 28^th  9100

The 38^th, , U. S. V. Inf. Co. B

Dear friends Mother Sister Brother and friends one and all I will Try and let you know what we are dewing and have been for the last 30 days, We left the Luzon the 25^th of last month for this place for the purpose of recapturing the 29^th the 58 men and th?ec (their?) captors it was T. Co. who were captured they were about 12 miles from there quarters and they were very for st?f ok they would of never ben captured   We went through the country a cupel of times and they thought they had better turn them in so they turned them over to us they looked very hard for they they  had no shoes and but very little clothing of any kind

[page 2 and 3 are missing]

Page (4)And the seconday on water there were some sick boys  I enjoyed the trip very well myself the 27^th of Dec ? disembarked at Minalea and this 1th day of January 1900 We left Minalea and landed at [Supor… Brxny] there […one word…]first on the firing line  The 1^st of Jan  We started in the advance to the south line with 20,000 trops in the skurmish line through the rice fields We landed at Balangas Jan the 16^th  and stayed there until Sept the 25^th and then We left for Marinduque Island Santa cruz and there we are know but I do not think We shall stay here long  I will have to get ready for drill so long I will write some more to night good by

Using his letter, I searched on some of the old newspapers and found the press coverage of the same events and online I found, a wonderful webpage about the Philippine War from their perspective (always good to have). 

My grandfather's company was under Captain Anderson who was the first to go search for the captured men. From the accounts of the press it appears that it was not an easy task. This war was captioned later as the first Viet Nam.  

One of several newspaper articles I found.

The Inter Ocean
(Chicago, Illinois)17 Oct 1900, Wed • Page 3

  When searching the Newspapers on GenealogyBank.com, Newspapers.com, and ChroniclingAmerica.com, I first put  Marinduque insurgents and the date 1900.  The articles came right up.  My grandfather's account was as accurate as he accounted it. My quest for information was satisfied.
On a side note I discovered a short article about their clothing on GenealogyBank which really made sense. This is just a snippet.  Those guys must have been miserable when they first arrived.

This War was not covered greatly in my American History class. It was lumped in the Spanish American war that featured Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders, so this has been a learning experience for me as well as a journey that has helped me know my grandfather a little better, probably better than my mother who was only 2 months old when he died.  See you all next month ~FranE

Journeying Back to Your Ancestor's Time; My Person Journey

The process of journeying back to your ancestor's time has been the discussion in many videos lately, which brought me post this.

First I started at home.  I was wanting to know about the pictures I saw in my mother's picture box of men on horses that were obviously military, but I did not know who or where. I started by asking my mom about this. She said they were her father's, he served in the Spanish American War and her mother received a pension from that. She emphasized that he died when she was 2 months old, and so he did, which was why she didn't have any stories.

Picture owned by Fran Ellsworth 

My second step was looking for his military pension. I did not find it in the Spanish American War files.  I found their pension indexes mixed in with the Civil War indexes from the NARA T289. Pension applications for service in the US Army between 1861 and 1900, grouped according to the units in which the veterans served.   This discovery was on Fold3. I now knew that he was in Company B of the 38th Infantry Battalion.  I also had his muster in and muster out dates, as well as his death date. He enlisted September 11 1897 in the U.S. Army Volunteer Infantry and fought in the Philippine American War,
If you are wondering about your ancestor and the Spanish or Philippine Wars this site Spanish American War Vs Philippine American War is a great one to read.

On Ancestry.com, I found him and his 2 brothers, Robert C Whitson, and Oscar Whitson on the 1900 US Federal Census at Battalion at Batangas, Philippine Islands, Military and Naval Forces in the same battalion.

Ancestry.com, Online image, Year: 1900; Census Place: Batangas, Philippine Islands, Military and Naval Forces; Roll: 1841; Enumeration District: 0191; FHL microfilm: 1241841

My next move was to go to my favorite newspaper sites, Newspapers.com ,  GenealogyBank.com , and Chronicling America to search the newspapers of that time to see what was being said.  Sad to say, the press was very negative about this war and coverage wasn't great, but the political cartoons were rampant.

Newspapers.com clipping Decatur Daily Republican
(Decatur, Illinois)25 Apr 1898, Mon • Page 1

Chronicling America, The Houston daily post., May 31, 1902, MAILABLE EDITION

The worse article to read was about a battalion being charged with atrocities. I breathed a sigh of relief that my grandfather was not in that battalion.  His service summary card said service Honest and Faithful.  A description I would not mind to have. Finally I found an article that told of the end of the volunteer army. It described when they would come home, and the transports that would be involved.

I also used Google search where I also found the book Annual Report of the Secretary of War, Volume 1, Part 3 US Gov. 1901.  In there was the chart that gave the exact ship ‘Thyna’ that his battalion came home on, the date in port and the date they were discharged on which matched his pension card.   I then searched for the names of the transports which gave me the dates and places that they arrived in.
Someone (there wasn't a name) had transcribed two Oregonian Daily articles that included the arrival of the ship.

THE MORNING OREGONIAN, THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 1901. Thyna And KINTUCK.

Two Big Transports Will Return to Portland From Manila.

“The United States transports Thyra and  Kintuck will both return to Portland
from Manila, and the former has already sailed for Portland with a company of
volunteers, which will be mustered out in San Francisco. The Thyra was turned over
to the Government in this city, and It is supposed that she Is coming back to Port,
land to be returned to her owners. Otherwise, she would probably go direct to
San Francisco with the troops. Just why the troops should not be mustered out In
Portland is a matter which is not easily explained, except that the San Francisco
pull is heavier than that of Portland. The Kintuck will probably bring a few
soldiers when she returns. She had excellent luck with her outward cargo of
horses and mules from Portland, losing but four animals on the voyage.”

THE SUNDAY OREGONIAN, PORTLAND, JUNE 30, 1901. ASTORIA:  June 29. Arrived at 8:50 A.M. and left up at 12:30 P. M.

 Norwegian steamer Thyra, from Manila. From San Francisco.

“The Norwegian steamship Thyra, which has been In the Government transport
service for several months, arrived at Astoria yesterday morning, and after a
short stay at quarantine, proceeded up the river. She brings 237 passengers,
nearly all, of them returning volunteer Infantrymen. The officers on board were
Captain D. F. Allen, Captain Ross A. Nichols, First Lieutenant A. J. Brown,
Second Lieutenant A. C. Davis, First Lieutenant S. Friedman and Captain W.
G. Fleischhauer. The present trip of the Thyra will be her last
 in the Government service, and she will probably drift back
into the merchant service.”

From this, I was able to see they had a long hard trip aboard a steamer.  They had to wait another
month before they were discharged to go home.  It was amazing to see they were transported to the upper North West of the United States to be able to get back to their homes.  The newspaper article said they still had to wait for their last 5 days of pay because of not being mustered out until 5 days after the expiration of the time the congress had set for the volunteer army.
I hope they got it. These men did not get a ticker tape parade or a pat on the back.

I know from my great uncle Ray Whitson, and from what my mother said, that my grandfather volunteered because he wanted to serve his country. During WWI, he couldn’t volunteer to go serve as a soldier, so he went and volunteered to drive a taxi at Fort Sill, Oklahoma to help the soldiers.  He apparently kept hitting his knee on the door. When his knee hurt enough, he went in to the doctors and they discovered he had cancer in his knee.  His service days were over. According to his Pension Index card, it was the 19th of June 1920 that they deemed him to be sufficiently handicapped to receive his military pension.  My grandmother, continued to receive this pension, thankfully, as a widow, It was a blessing because they had lost everything because of medical bills and she still had 6 children at home.

I close saying that I am grateful my grandfather was a man who stood for his country and desired to serve to help other’s be free.  He was a good man.  I made a scrapbook page to depict his military journey, from where he lived when he volunteered to where he returned to the United States.

Created utilizing facts found about his journey in newspapers, military records, Historical records of the time. by Fran Ellsworth

This was my journey. I love books on History such as Spanish-American war and battles in the Philippines that were written in the time period you are searching. The Internet Archive is a great source for all countries and wars. I also use Newspapers, and Military Records that give descriptions. All countries have their own newspapers that give their perspective of a war.  I even found articles written by other countries used by American newspaper companies.   By the time I was through, I felt I had had a moment to see what it was like for him, I am sure not his exact feelings but at least what the forces were that he was dealing with.