Student awaits US response on Balangiga Bells’ return plea

BALANGIGA, Eastern Samar, Sept. 30  -- A senior high school student from this town is hopeful that US President Donald Trump would grant her plea to return the Balangiga Bells that were taken as a war trophy by American soldiers 116 years ago.

Hannah Ruth B. Padit of the Southern Samar National Comprehensive High School wrote a letter to the White House two months ago, seeking the return of the Balangiga Bells to the belfry of Saint Lawrence the Martyr Church.

"I am bravely writing this message in hopes that it touches your heart and finally hear a plea that the town and its people have been begging to be heard for the past 116 years... It’s time the bells come back home. Balangiga is its home and its people are its family and no one deserves to be separated from their family that long," read Padit’s letter.

In an interview Friday, the 17-year-old said it is the youth’s turn to retrieve the bells since their elders have already done their part.

"The bells are very important to us people of Balangiga because they represent the sanctity of our church. It is also a remembrance of our ancestors who sacrificed to have those bells for our church," she said.

The Balangiga Bells, Padit said, had been serving the Church by reminding the people of their faith and religion until they were taken by American soldiers after their bloody encounter with the natives.

With President Rodrigo Duterte calling for the bells’ return, her hope grows.

"I am hopeful, just like the other people of Balangiga. I am happy that the President has been publicly demanding for the bells’ return, unlike former presidents," Padit added.

Milagros Abanador-Calabos, granddaughter of Valeriano Abanador, the town’s chief of police who led the attack against the American soldiers, said the bells mean so much to them.

"The bells are very important to us because it belongs to the Filipinos of Balangiga, an instrument of the Church, and it was used as a signal of the natives to attack foreign invaders," Calabos said.

The Balangiga Encounter occurred on Sept. 28, 1901, when town residents led by Abanador initiated an attack against US soldiers as the latter were having breakfast.

About 2,500 Filipinos were killed in the US’ retaliatory attack, after which the Americans took the bells as a war trophy.

The three bells are in the custody of the US government, two of them with the FE Warren Air Force Base in Cheyenne, Wyoming, and one with the 9th US Infantry Regiment in Camp Red Cloud in South Korea.

Attempts by past presidents, and even by the Catholic Church, to recover the bells proved to be unsuccessful.

During the 116th commemoration of the Balangiga Encounter last Thursday, Duterte said the Philippines is giving the US government enough time to return the Balangiga bells.

The President first urged for the return of the bells during his State of the Nation Address last July 24. (SQM/With reports from Pearl Marie L. Ecaldre, OJT/PNA)