“I have heard some Igorot say that
beyond the great mountain called “Tonglo” which overlooks Santo Tomas and Agoo,
and is one of the noteworthy mountains of Luzon, there was a very large town
situated in a broad and fertile valley the inhabitants of which were very rich
and brave people and made war upon the pagans of the foothills.” (Espedicion al
Valle de Benguet en Enero del año de 1829)
The
expedition diary of Lt. Col. Guilermo de Galvey in 1829 is a fourteen-day
account of his voyage to “Valle de Benguet” (present day ‘La Trinidad Valley’).
Galvey is without a doubt, “the greatest despoiler of the Igorots Spain ever
sent to the Cordilleras”.
Seventy
years after the punitive expedition of Tonglo by Pangasinan Governor Arza,
Galvey marched to the mountains with his Igorot friend, Pingue, about a dozen
officers and a troop of fifty, and some 200 ‘Polistas’ (Filipinos forced
into labor). They crossed wild rivers and climbed steep rocks. For days they
shielded themselves from the traps of ‘pagans’ and heavy rains, until the eight
day where they finally ‘came upon the pine trees’.
At
4 am that day, they finally arrived at the valley where Galvey wrote: “…we discovered from the heights the
beautiful valley of Benguet, the lovely sight of which surprised us all, so
that even the soldiers gave vent to their admiration by joyous shouts”.
Galvey’s
troops were advancing when two drunk Igorots with spears planted themselves and
confronted them furiously. They were later bound after a brief scuffle and
another group of Igorots were brought to Galvey for interrogation. He set them
free and told them to go back and tell the headmen to see him the following day
and assured them that no harm would be done to them, but that if they attacked,
he would burn their village.
That
afternoon he described Valle de Benguet as: “…a
valley of a league and a half or more in circumference; it is surrounded with
springs and forms a basin. The soil was very well cultivated, with immense
fields of sweet potatoes, gabe and sugar cane, but no paddy in this tract of
land. All was irrigated and fenced in by dividing lines of earth after the
manner of Spain, and provided with wells. The houses which had numbered some
500, were of broad pine boards and very dirty. He finally decided that it
is in the valley that he will establish the capital of the district.
At
8 pm however, their camp was attacked by Igorots, and Galvey, in response, killed
a number of natives and captured twelve Igorots – all of whom were drunk and
were shouting savagely.
On
the next day, Galvey found himself surrounded by more natives who were angrier
than the night before. It is at this tipping point that Galvey decided to “give
them a lesson”. He and his troops stormed the village firing at the natives and
burning down some 180 houses.
After
that unforgettable violence, Galvey and his troops went southwest with
twenty-eight Igorot prisoners. They continually descended towards the west for
days until they arrived at Aringay in the fourteenth day.
As
a final reflection, Galvey wrote: “…the
expedition, though short , served well for those I made later, as the Igorot of
Benguet shortly afterwards asked me for peace and have since been my friends.
On different expeditions I have passed eight or ten times through their valley,
and far from attacking me, they have treated me with kindness, providing me
with rice, cows, and other food. Still, as a consequence of this expedition and
of smallpox, this town has been reduced to about a hundred houses. I am,
however, doing everything to make it flourish again, and my highroad reaches
there”.
Ten
years later after the expedition, Don Guillermo de Galvey died in 1839. Despite
popular tradition that La Trinidad was named after his supposed wife Dona
Trinidad de Galvey, his military records in Madrid revealed that he is in fact
unmarried (soltero).
In
1875, one of Galvey’s successors, Commandante Manuel Scheidnagel renamed “Valle
de Benguet” to La Trinidad.
***
In
my ridiculous moments, I wonder why our Igorot ancestors had to get drunk
before they took any action against the foreigners (or just about anything). Maybe
it has something to do with the “shy mangu” and “agbainbain, ngem nu nabartek
ket mang-ibabain” stereotype. Just maybe. But then, we have a history of even
defending our “right to get drunk”, just read the case of People vs. Cayat.
