faction ,
Bulacan wearing the
Rayadillo uniform and in horseback, with the Aguirre sword, a trophy of the
Battle of Imus. Circa 1898. On January 1, 1895, Aguinaldo became a
Freemason, joining Pilar Lodge No. 203, Imus, Cavite by the codename "Colon". On March 7, 1895, Santiago Alvarez, whose father was a
Capitan Municipal (Mayor) of
Noveleta, encouraged Aguinaldo to join the "
Katipunan", a secret organization led by
Andrés Bonifacio that was dedicated to the expulsion of the Spanish and the independence of the Philippines through armed force. Aguinaldo joined the organization and used the
nom de guerre Magdalo in honor of
Mary Magdalene. The local chapter of Katipunan in Cavite was established and named
Sangguniang Magdalo, and Aguinaldo's cousin
Baldomero Aguinaldo was appointed leader. The Katipunan-led
Philippine Revolution against the Spanish began in the last week of August 1896 in
San Juan del Monte (now part of
Metro Manila). However, Aguinaldo and other Cavite rebels initially refused to join in the offensive for lack of arms. Bonifacio and other rebels were forced to resort to
guerrilla warfare, but Aguinaldo and the Cavite rebels won major victories in carefully planned and well-timed
set-piece battles and temporarily drove the Spanish out of their area. On August 31, 1896, Aguinaldo started the assault by beginning as a skirmish to the full-blown revolt
Kawit Revolt. He marched with his army of bolomen to the town center of Kawit. Prior to the battle, Aguinaldo had strictly ordered his men not to kill anyone in his hometown. Upon his men's arrival at the town center, the guards, armed with Remingtons and unaware of the preceding events, were caught completely by surprise and surrendered immediately. The guns there were captured by the Katipuneros, and the revolt was a major success for Aguinaldo and his men. Later that afternoon, they raised the
Magdalo flag at the town hall to a large crowd of people from Kawit that had assembled after it heard of the city's liberation. The Magdalo faction of the Katipunan, which also operated in Cavite under Gen. Aguinaldo, used
flags similar to those used by the Magdiwang faction and featuring a white sun with a red
baybayin symbol for
Ka. The symbol has recently been revived by a breakaway group of army officers to show the end of war with Spain after the peace agreement. The flag became the first official banner of the revolutionary forces and was blessed in a crowd celebrating at Imus. Aguinaldo referred to this flag in his proclamation of October 31, 1896: "Filipino people!! The hour has arrived to shed blood for the conquest of our liberty. Assemble and follow the flag of the Revolution – it stands for Liberty, Equality and Fraternity."
Battle of Imus In August 1896, as coordinated attacks broke out and sparked the revolution beginning in Manila. Aguinaldo marched from Kawit with 600 men and launched a series of skirmishes at Imus that eventually ended in open hostilities against Spanish troops stationed there. On September 1, with the aid of Captain
Jose Tagle of Imus, they laid siege against Imus to draw the Spanish out. A Spanish relief column commanded by Brigadier-General Ernesto de Aguirre had been dispatched from Manila to aid the beleaguered Spanish defenders of Imus. Supported only by 100 troops and by cavalry, Aguirre gave the impression that he had been sent out to suppress a minor disturbance. Aguinaldo and his men counterattacked but suffered heavy losses that almost cost his own life. Despite the success, Aguirre did not press the attack, felt the inadequacy of his troops, and hastened back to Manila to get reinforcements. During the lull in the fighting, Aguinaldo's troops reorganized and prepared for another Spanish attack. On September 3, Aguirre came back with a much larger force of 3,000 men. When Spanish troops arrived at the
Isabel II Bridge, they were fired upon by the concealed rebels. The Spanish force was routed, withdrawing in disorder with substantial casualties. Among the abandoned Spanish weapons was Aguirre's sword, which was carried by Aguinaldo in future battles.
Battles of Binakayan–Dalahican Alarmed by a previous siege, led by General Aguinaldo in Imus, in September 1896, Governor-General
Ramón Blanco y Erenas ordered the 4th Battalion of Cazadores from Spain to aid him in quelling the rebellion in Cavite. On November 3, 1896, the battalion arrived carrying a squadron of 1,328 men and some 55 officers.
Biak-na-Bato and exile The
Spanish Army launched an attack that forced the revolutionary forces under Aguinaldo into a retreat. On June 24, 1897, Aguinaldo arrived at Biak-na-Bato,
San Miguel, Bulacan, and established a headquarters there in what is now called "Aguinaldo Cave" in
Biak-na-Bato National Park. In late October 1897, Aguinaldo convened an assembly of generals at Biak-na-Bato that decided to establish a constitutional republic. A constitution, patterned closely after the Cuban Constitution, was drawn up by Isabelo Artacho and Felix Ferrer and provided for the creation of a Supreme Council composed of a president, a vice president, a Secretary of War, and a Secretary of the Treasury. Aguinaldo was named president. In March 1897,
Fernando Primo de Rivera, 1st Marquis of Estella, the Spanish
Governor-General of the Philippines, had been encouraging prominent Filipinos to contact Aguinaldo for a peaceful settlement of the conflict. On August 9, the Manila lawyer
Pedro Paterno met with Aguinaldo at Biak-na-Bato with a proposal for peace based on reforms and amnesty. In the succeeding months, Paterno conducted
shuttle diplomacy, acting as an intermediary between de Rivera and Aguinaldo. On December 14–15, 1897, Aguinaldo signed the
Pact of Biak-na-Bato under which Aguinaldo effectively agreed to end hostilities and to dissolve his government in exchange for amnesty and "₱800,000 (Mexican)" (Aguinaldo's description of the $MXN800,000 amount) as an indemnity. On May 28, 1898, Aguinaldo gathered a force of about 18,000 troops and fought against a small garrison of Spanish troops
in Alapan, Imus, Cavite. The battle lasted from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. After the victory at Alapan, Aguinaldo unfurled the
Philippine flag for the first time and hoisted it at the Teatro Caviteño in Cavite Nuevo (present-day Cavite City) in front of Filipino revolutionaries and more than 300 captured Spanish troops. A group of American sailors of the US Asiatic Squadron also witnessed the unfurling.
Flag Day is celebrated every May 28 to honor the battle.
Declaration of independence and revolutionary government On June 12, Aguinaldo promulgated the
Philippine Declaration of Independence from Spain in his own
mansion house in Cavite El Viejo, believing that declaration would inspire the Filipino people to eagerly rise against the Spaniards. On June 18, he issued a decree formally establishing his dictatorial government in which he also provided for the organization of the local government and the establishment and the composition of the Revolutionary Congress. On June 23, Aguinaldo issued a decree replacing his dictatorial government with a revolutionary government with himself as president upon the recommendation of his adviser
Apolinario Mabini. The decree defined the organization of the central government and the establishment and the election of delegates to the Revolutionary Congress and to prepare for the shift from a revolutionary government to a republic.
Arrival of American troops By May 1898, Filipino troops had cleared Cavite of Spanish forces. In late June 1898, Aguinaldo, with the help of American allies, who were now landing in Cavite, was now preparing to drive the Spaniards out of Manila. The first contingent of American troops arrived in Cavite on June 30, the second under General
Francis V. Greene on July 17, and the third under General
Arthur MacArthur Jr on July 30. By then, 12,000 US troops had landed in the Philippines. Aguinaldo had presented surrender terms to Spanish
Governor-General of the Philippines Basilio Augustín, who refused them initially since he believed that more Spanish troops would be sent to lift the siege. As the combined forces of Filipinos and Americans were closing in, Augustín realized that his position was hopeless, secretly continued to negotiate with Aguinaldo, and even offered ₱1 million, but Aguinaldo refused. When the Spanish
Cortes learned of Augustín's attempt to negotiate the surrender of his army to Filipinos under Aguinaldo, it was furious and relieved Augustín of his duties effective July 24. He was replaced by
Fermin Jáudenes. On June 16, warships departed Spain to lift the siege, but they altered course for Cuba where a Spanish fleet was imperiled by the US Navy. In August 1898, life in
Intramuros, the walled center of Manila, had become unbearable, and the normal population of about 10,000 was now 70,000. Realizing that it was only a matter of time before the city fell and fearing vengeance and looting if the city fell to Filipino revolutionaries, Jáudenes, suggested to Dewey, through the Belgian consul,
Édouard André, for the city to be surrendered to the Americans after a short, "mock" battle. Dewey had initially rejected the suggestion because he lacked the troops to block Filipino revolutionary forces, which numbered 40 000, but when Merritt's troops became available, he sent a message to Jáudenes, agreeing to the mock battle. A bloodless mock battle had been planned, but Spanish troops opened fire in a skirmish that left six Americans and forty-nine Spaniards dead after Filipino revolutionaries, thinking that the attack was genuine, joined advancing US troops. Besides the unplanned casualties, the battle went according to plan. The Spanish surrendered the city to the Americans, and it did not fall to the Filipino revolutionaries, who felt betrayed. By the end of September, Aguinaldo's forces had captured over 9,000 Spanish prisoners, who were relieved of their weapons. They were generally free to move around but remained within the control of Aguinaldo. Aguinaldo did not know that on December 10, 1898, the
Treaty of Paris had been signed; it transferred the Philippines from Spain to the United States for the sum of $20 million. ==First Philippine Republic==