THE FIRST FILIPINO RECIPIENT OF THE U.S.CONGRESSIONAL MEDAL OF HONOR

BY PETER LA. JULIAN

(last of two parts)

SAN FERNANDO CITY, LA UNION--Records show that Jose Balinton Nisperos, a private of the then 34th Company, Philippine Scouts, U.S. Army, received the U.S. Congress Medal of Honor in a military ceremony at the Luneta on February 3, 1913. Maj. Gen. Franklin Bell, the commanding General of the Philippine Division, U.S. Army presented him the medal.
   
Raul R. Ingles wrote about the even in an issue of the Manila Times the following day, February 4. Citing sources, Ingles recounted the battle with Yakan outlaws at Lapurap Island in Basilan, in which Nisperos participated and for which the Ilokano soldier was cited for gallantry in action. His account:

"After having his left arm shot above the elbow, Nisperos had dug the stump of his (left) arm into the ground and continued firing his rifle with one arm (right), saving his small party from complete annihilation and preventing the mutilation of the bodies of his fallen comrades."

Primitivo C. Milan, writing in the Sunday Times magazine that came off the press sometime in 1958, said that Nisperos was listed along with American winners of the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor in the "Medal of Honor", a publication of the U.S. Army. He claimed in the article that a copy of the publication was then available on file in the office of the Army Attache in the American Embassy in Manila.

Undoubtedly, Milan, a captain of the Philippines' armed forces, based his article on the "Medal of Honor" magazine--supposedly published in South America--and interviews with Nisperos's surviving relatives in San Fernando.

In the first part of this article, we raised the question: Was Nisperos the first Filipino to receive, as he did, the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor?

In an article that appeared in the defunct Ilocos Times dated Nov. 25, 1977, the late San Fernando Mayor Antonio T. Ferraren was quoted as contradicting a news item in one of the Manila dailies that a certain Capt. Jose Calugas of Cebu, a veteran of World War 11, was the first Filipino to win the U. S. Congressional Medal of Honor.

Dr. Gilbert Perez, chief of the vocation education division of the bureau of public schools also disputed the claims of the national daily. He had met with Nisperos' widow Potenciana in the eaarly part of 1952, and promised to look into the case regarding the latter's survivor's pension.

Romeo J. Arceo, also of the Manila Times, said that Dr. Perez lamented the fact that the United States Veterans Administration did not inform him (Perez) what action Washington had taken almost six years after he presented USVA the case of the Nisperos widow.

At any rate, Calugas, who was a special guest of the Philippine government during cermonies marking the 10th anniversary of the Fall of Bataan in March 1952, acknowledged to the press at that time that there were two other Filipino recipients of the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor.

Milan, writing in the Philippine Free Press issue of Oct. 17, 1957, mentioned the names of the Filipino recipients--Nisperos, as the first recipient of the award, followed by a certain Telesforo Trinidad who was with the U.S. Navy (1915) and Calugas, then a sergeant with the U.S. who fought in Bataan in 1942.

Will justice be given to Nisperos as the first Filipino to win the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor? Will justice be given to his widow Potenciana, who died penniless years ago, with respect to her survivor's pension claims? (We met the widow sometime in the late 1990's in their house in San Fernando when we interviewed her in the late 1990's for an article in the Philippine Daily Inquirer. Vic Alhambra, Jr. , then PDI photographer, took a photo of Potenciana, which was published in the Inquirer accompanying said article.)