LUKBAN
Barnes & Co. in Calbayog, plus two rowboats, they sailed along with 50 men of the F Company, with Capt. Cooke commanding, with Lt. Stewart as Gilmore’ s adjutant, and Scott.
Gilmore wanted to reach Gandara at daylight, hoping to surprise the rebels and to prevent the burning of the town. But the wind and tide worked against them, so they reached the mouth of Gandara river by midnight. Now because of the tide, it became impossible to make headway until 3:00 in the morning.“ After that it was difficult to make more than 2 or three miles an hour, as the schooner had to be towed by a rowboat, so that at 8 o’ clock I took the two rowboats with 20 men and left the sailboat,” the frustrated Gilmore said in his report.
They reached Gandara at about 12:00 noon on January 30 and found the town in flames. The town was on a peninsula about a mile long, formed by the river branching at this point. There was only one street, the houses being built on the banks of the two river branches. At the head of the street, at the foot of a high hill, was the church. Two-thirds of the town was burned. With a high wind blowing, it was impossible to save any of the houses as these were all nipa shacks and built close together. When the flames had subsided a little, they went around the base of the hill and found the storehouse of Warner, Barnes & Co. still intact. When the residents returned, Gilmore was told that the plan to burn the town was done the night before and that the man who ordered it was said to be the father of Lukban’ s mistress.
Major Allen arrived later in the afternoon with a company of his battalion coming up the river in boats towed by a steam launch of the Helena. Hearing that the insurgents had been around, Gilmore continued up the river. At about 12 midnight, five or six rebels fired upon his group, but no one was hit. They did not return the fire.
They arrived at a place called Taiveran, upstream of the Gandara River, at around 8:00 in the morning, but found it deserted, save for two people – a Spaniard and a representative of Warner, Barnes & Co. They told Gilmore that a certain rebel Capt. Rafael with 60 men had been at a town called St. Helene. But they knew nothing of the whereabouts of Lukban. In fact, getting reliable information about the movements of the rebels was a very difficult thing, even for Mr. Scott’ s agents.“ People were so frightened one could get nothing from them. From what information I could get, I decided my best plan was to return overland to Calbayog,” said Gilmore.
So a fiercely determined Gilmore took his boats back to Calbayog, even if the progress was maddeningly slowly, with few natives as rowers. But they soon exhausted themselves, so the soldiers had to take over until they reached Calbayog. He and his group reached St. Helene at around 2:00 in the afternoon, rested for an hour, then found that indeed
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