US returns 3 disputed bells taken from Philippines in 1901
Source: Associated Press
By JIM GOMEZ
2 hours ago
MANILA, Philippines (AP) — For over a century, the Bells of Balangiga have not rung in the Philippines, a silence that the president last year called “painful.” Now, the revered bells will once again be heard in the country.
Hundreds of Filipino villagers in 1901, armed with bolos and disguised as women, used one of Balangiga town’s church bells to signal the start of a massive attack that wrought one of the bloodiest single-battle losses of American occupation forces in the Philippines. The U.S. Army brutally retaliated, reportedly killing thousands of villagers, as the Philippine-American War raged.
After the violence, the Americans took three church bells as spoils of war that Filipinos would demand for decades to be handed back.
On Tuesday, a giant U.S. Air Force cargo aircraft brought the Bells of Balangiga back to the Philippine capital in a poignant ceremony that saw U.S. defense officials and the American ambassador to Manila return the war relics 117 years after they were seized. A military brass band played the Philippine national anthem, followed by “The Star Spangled Banner.”
Read more: https://www.apnews.com/0313d7deaf39428ea34e7891ea1d54af
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