Memoirs of a Conquistador Anda y Salazar and the British Invasion of Manila
\nTrinidad Hermenegildo Pardo de Tavera y Gorricho was probably (1857-1925) the Filipino with the broadest intellectual training of his time. Born on Cabildo Street in Intramuros and from two of Manila’s most illustrious families, he received a thorough education. He studied at the Ateneo Municipal de Manila, at the Colegio de San Letran and, after his family left for France, he studied medicine at the Sorbonne and linguistics at the École nationale des langues orientales vivantes, graduating in Malay. He published several research articles on medicine and linguistics in the most prestigious European academic journals — he was the first Filipino to do so — and in addition to Spanish, he spoke Tagalog, English, French, German and Italian. His intellectual milieu also led him to become interested in botany, history, bibliography, philosophy and politics. Despite his Spanish roots, he felt completely Filipino and harshly criticized the way in which Spain colonized the Philippines, with especially negative criticism of the ecclesiastical class. He founded the Federal Party in 1900 and welcomed the American occupation with open arms, believing that it could have a positive influence on the education and prosperity of the Filipinos.
\nDuring the last decade of the 19th century he devoted himself to the publication of sources of the knowledge of Philippine history, most of which came from the immense family library. Una memoria de Anda y Salazar (A Report by Anda y Salazar) is a publication in which he rescues an important manuscript written around 1768 by the enlightened and liberal governor Simón de Anda y Salazar. He served as oidor of the Audiencia of Manila since October 1761. However, as a consequence of the English invasion of Manila in October 1762 and after being the acting governor, as Archbishop Manuel Antonio Rojo was captured by the English, Anda y Salazar proclaimed himself acting governor of the Captaincy General of the Philippines in Bacolor (Pampanga). From there, he successfully led the resistance against the invader by arming ten thousand native soldiers. He also quelled several local rebellions, such as that of Diego Silang in Ilocos. He relinquished the post of governor after the arrival in March of the new governor appointed by the king, Francisco de la Torre, shortly before the expulsion of the British in April 1764, who were never able to advance beyond Manila and Cavite.
\nAnda y Salazar returned to Spain in 1767 carrying with him this impressive report destined for the king. Divided into eighteen points — called “desórdenes” — the report is written in a very simple way: it points out concrete problems followed by their solutions. Some of the problems it lists are the following: that there was no need to have two universities — the Dominican and the Jesuit — in a city with so few students, that the secular priests would see their ecclesiastical careers hindered by the religious orders, that the religious orders would charge the royal treasury a large part of their expenses, that the priests charged excessive prices for services to the parishioners, that there were indigenous villages with missionaries who did not pay tribute, that the fathers protected Chinese merchants even when they behaved dishonorably, that the priests used the ‘dalagas’ to thresh rice at home using them as servants, etc. In general, most of his criticisms were directed against the religious orders that enjoyed excessive power in the islands and against the existence of certain laws that he considered unjust and hindered social peace and prosperity in the archipelago. Anda y Salazar would later became the governor of the Philippines between 1770 and 1776.
\nPardo de Tavera thus rescued this report because he found in it evidence that the problems that still afflicted the Philippines at the end of the 19th century had existed at least since the mid-18th century. Just as important as the report itself, which occupies pages 9 to 41, are the forty notes by Pardo de Tavera himself that accompany it — on pages 42 to 102 — in which there are numerous comments on the history of the Philippines, references to other printed sources, clarifications, amplifications and also personal opinions.
\nA report by Anda y Salazar was published by the printing house of La Democracia, the newspaper that Pardo de Tavera founded after the American occupation. It is extremely rare, although there are some copies to be found in public libraries. (Jorge Mojarro)
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