U.S. RETURNS CHURCH BELLS TO PHILIPPINES
Troops took bronze objects as trophies a century ago
ASLEEPY Philippine town erupted in joy yesterday as bells looted from its church more than a century ago by vengeful United States troops were to be turned over to the community.
Children waving bell-shaped signs and tearful residents gathered here to welcome home the three bells that are a deep source of pride, and which the US flew to Manila this week after decades of urging by the Philippines.
US troops took the bronze objects as trophies, after razing the town and killing potentially thousands of Filipinos, in reprisal for a surprise 1901 attack that left 48 of their comrades dead.
For Balangiga folk, the bells are a symbol of the Philippines’ long struggle for independence, and a dark chapter that is the subject of an annual re-enactment and remembrance event locally.
“It’s not just me, but the whole town is walking in the clouds because the bells are finally with us,” said Nemesio Duran, 81.
“We are the happiest people on Earth now,” he said, noting that he was descended from the boy who rang one of the bells, long said to have signalled the attack on the Americans.
The bells arrived here on Friday, ahead of an official handover ceremony yesterday. The town’s streets were crowded with people and vendors selling T-shirts saying “Balangiga bells finally home”.
The ceremony was not far from the town plaza that holds a monument with statues of US soldiers having breakfast as Filipino revolutionaries raise their machetes at the start of the onslaught.
Manila has been pushing for the bells’ return since at least the 1990s, with backing from Philippine presidents, its influential Catholic Church and supporters in the United States.
The repatriation was long held back by some US lawmakers and veterans who saw the bells, two of which were in Wyoming state and the third at a base in South Korea, as tributes to fallen soldiers.