Proceedings of the first Independence congress : held in the city of Manila, Philippine islands, February 22-26, 1930 / Published under the direction of Dean maximo M. Kalaw, executive secretary, University of the Philippines.

FIRST PLENARY SESSION

15

whose names now lie in oblivion because of the negligence of
the men who wrote the history of our revolution. I say this
because personally I saw with my own eyes courageous women
working side by side with their husbands on battlefields where
about the middle of February of 1899 we served as member of
the first Filipino Red Cross, organized by the wife of General
Aguinaldo, to bring aid to and encourage the soldiers of the
Lolomboy Division, which was quartered a few kilometers
from Polo, where the Americans had advanced, driving our
troops back to take possession of the towns then held by the
Revolutionary Government.
The Filipino woman has been always conscious of her duties
toward her country. Those who because of the weakness of
their sex were unable to fight on the field, sent donation or
rendered personal services as nurses attending the sick and
wounded or enlisting as army cooks, preparing the meals of the
soldiers and furnishing foodstuffs to our valiant combatants,
just as we personally did with other companions in Bulacan
during the twenty-eight days of the siege of that capital by the
troops of General Gregorio del Pilar, from May 30 to June 27,
1898. General del Pilar's troops were in trenches they dug a few
kilometers from the enemy's place. Many other women did the
same thing with other troops in the war zone for, as is well
known, the Revolutionary Government had no time to organize supply stations nor hospitals behind the front so that
these needs had to be filled often by private initiative aided
on many occasions by Filipino women who spontaneously
offered their services to the mother country.
The Filipino woman since the beginning of our struggles
for freedom, in her role as mother, as well as daughter or wife
or sister, has learned to assume the responsibilities of the family
and instill courage in the man to sally forth in the field of
action to defend the rights of the people. Such instances were
furnished by the generous and self-sacrificing mother of Dr.
Jose Rizal, by the heroic wife of Marcelo H. del Pilar, by the
courageous mother of General Natividad and the no less valiant
mother of General Luna, the patient wife of Andres Bonifacio,
the daring wife of General Malvar and others who might be