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Antonio Narciso Luna de San Pedro y Novicio Ancheta (; October 29, 1866 – June 5, 1899) was a Filipinos army general and a pharmacist who fought in the Philippine–American War before his assassination on June 5, 1899, at the age of 32.
Regarded as one of the fiercest generals of his time, he succeeded Artemio Ricarte as the Commanding General of the Philippine Army. He sought to apply his background in military science to the fledgling army. A sharpshooter himself, he organized professional guerrilla soldiers later named the "Luna Sharpshooters," and the "Black Guard" with Michael Joaquin. His three-tier defense, now known as the Luna Defense Line, gave the American troops a difficult endeavor during their campaign in the provinces north of Manila. This defense line culminated in the creation of a military stronghold in the Cordillera.
Despite his commitment to discipline the army and serve the Republic which attracted the admiration of the people, his temper and fiery outlashes caused some to abhor him, including people from Aguinaldo's cabinet. Nevertheless, Luna's efforts were recognized during his time, and he was awarded the Philippine Republic Medal in 1899. He was also a member of the Malolos Congress. Besides his military studies, Luna also studied pharmacology, literature, and chemistry.
After his education under Maestro Intong, he studied at the Ateneo Municipal de Manila, where he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1881. He went on to study literature and chemistry at the University of Santo Tomas, where he won first prize for a paper in chemistry titled Two Fundamental Bodies of Chemistry ( Dos Cuerpos fundamentales de la Quimica). He also studied Pharmacy. Meanwhile, his background in swordsmanship, fencing, and military tactics came from his studies under Don Martin Cartagena, a major in the Spanish Army. In addition, he acquired the skill to become a sharpshooter. Upon the invitation of his elder brother Juan Luna in 1890, Antonio was sent by his parents to Spain. There he acquired a licentiate (at Universidad de Barcelona) and doctorate (at Universidad Central de Madrid).
While in Spain, Luna not only focused on his studies but also joined the Propaganda Movement, alongside prominent figures like José Rizal and Marcelo H. del Pilar. He actively contributed to La Solidaridad, promoting reforms in the Philippines under Spanish rule.
He and his brother Juan also opened the Sala de Armas, a fencing club, in Manila. When he learned of the underground societies that were planning a revolution and was asked to join, he scoffed at the idea and turned down the offer. Like other Filipino émigrés involved in the Reform Movement, he was in favor of reform rather than revolution as the way toward independence. Besides affecting their property, the proponents of the Reform Movement saw that no revolution would succeed without the necessary preparations. This was further proven when Pío Valenzuela, Andres Bonifacio's emissary, visited Dr. Jose Rizal in Dapitan in June 1896 to inform him of the plan of the Katipunan to launch a revolution. While Rizal outright objected due to it being premature, he advised that Luna be approached with a request that he become a liaison officer between the Katipunan and the rich and influential people of Manila to strengthen their cause through more money to obtain arms and create an officer cadre. However, when approached by Jose Alejandrino at the request of the Katipunan, Luna also turned down the offer with the same reason as Rizal: that a revolt at that time was premature and would fail.
Nevertheless, after the /> His statement concerning the revolution was one of the many statements used to abet the laying down of the death sentence for José Rizal. Months later, José and Juan were freed but Antonio was exiled to Spain in 1897, where he was imprisoned in Madrid's Cárcel Modelo.
His more famous and controversial brother, Juan, who had been pardoned by the Spanish Queen Regent Maria Christina of Austria herself, left for Spain to use his influence to intercede for Antonio in August 1897. Antonio's case was dismissed by the Military Supreme Court and he was released. Upon his release in December 1897, Luna went to Ghent to study field fortifications, guerrilla warfare, organization, and other aspects of military science under the Belgian General Gerard Leman, who would later be the commanding general of the fortress at Liège in World War 1. He also read extensively about the discipline when he was at the Ateneo de Madrid. The second phase of the revolution began with the return of Emilio Aguinaldo by the US Navy to Cavite in 1898 his establishment of the Dictatorial Government of the Philippines. Upon arriving in Hong Kong, Luna was given a letter of recommendation to Aguinaldo and a revolver by Felipe Agoncillo. Receiving his military commission, he returned to the Philippines in July 1898.
To silence Luna, Aguinaldo appointed him as Chief of War Operations on September 26, 1898, and assigned the rank of brigadier general. In quick succession, he was made the Director or Assistant Secretary of War and Supreme Chief of the Republican Army on September 28, arousing the envy of the other generals who were fighting since the first phase of the Revolution. Meanwhile, Luna felt that bureaucratic placebos were being thrown his way when all he wanted was to organize and discipline the enthusiastic but ill-fed and ill-trained troops into a real army.
On September 15, 1898, the Malolos Congress, the constituent assembly of the First Philippine Republic, was convened in Barasoain Church. Luna would be one of the elected representatives and was narrowly defeated by Pedro Paterno as President of the Congress with a vote of 24–23.
Seeing the need for a military school, in October 1898, Luna established a military academy at Malolos, known as the Academia Militar which would become the basis of the modern-day Philippine Military Academy based in Baguio. He appointed Colonel Manuel Bernal Sityar, a mestizo who was formerly a lieutenant serving the Civil Guard, as superintendent. He recruited other mestizos and Spaniards who had fought in the Spanish Army during the 1896 Revolution for training. However, the academy had to be suspended indefinitely by March 1899 due to the outbreak of the Philippine–American War.
A score of veteran officers became teachers at his military school. Luna devised two courses of instruction, planned the reorganization, with a battalion of tiradores and a cavalry squadron, set up an inventory of guns and ammunition, arsenals, using convents and town halls, , and communication systems. He built trenches with the help of his chief engineer, General Jose Alejandrino, and had his brother Juan Luna design the school's uniforms (the Filipino rayadillo). He also insisted on strict discipline over and above clan armies and regional loyalties, which prevented coordination between various military units. Envisioning one united army for the Republic, clan armies and regional loyalties presented a lack of national consciousness.
Convinced that the fate of the infant Republic should be a contest for the minds of Filipinos, Luna turned to journalism to strengthen Filipino minds with the ideas of nationhood and the need to fight the Americans. He decided to publish a newspaper, La Independencia. This four-page daily was filled with articles, short stories, patriotic songs and poems. The staff was installed in one of the coaches of the train that ran from Manila to Pangasinan. The paper came out in September 1898 and was an instant success. A movable feast of information, humor, and good writing, 4,000 copies were printed, which was more than all the other newspapers in circulation put together.
When the Treaty of Paris, under which Spain was to cede the Philippines to the United States, was made public in December 1898, Luna quickly decided to take military action. He proposed a strategy that was designed to trap the Americans in Manila before more of their troops could land by executing surprise attacks (guerrilla warfare) while building up strength in the north. If the American forces penetrated his lines, Luna determined that he would wage a series of delaying battles and prepare a fortress in northern Luzon, the Cordillera. This, however, was turned down by high command, which still believed that the Americans would grant full independence.
Luna, after receiving orders from Aguinaldo, rushed to the front lines from his headquarters at Polo (present-day Valenzuela City) and led three companies to La Loma to engage General Arthur MacArthur's forces. Fighting took place at Marikina, Caloocan, Santa Ana, and Paco. The Filipinos were subjected to a carefully planned attack with naval artillery, with Admiral George Dewey's US fleet firing from Manila Bay. Filipino casualties were high, amounting to around 2,000 killed and wounded. Luna personally had to carry wounded officers and men to safety; of these, the most dramatic rescue was that of Commander José Torres Bugallón. After being hit by an American bullet, Bugallón had managed to advance another fifty meters before he was seen by Luna collapsing by the side of the road. As the Americans continued their fire on the road, Luna gathered an escort of around 25 men to save Bugallón, who Luna stated was equivalent to 500 men. Surviving the encounter, Luna encouraged Bugallón to live by giving him an instant promotion to lieutenant colonel. However, Bugallón succumbed to his wounds.
On February 7, Luna issued a detailed order to the field officers of the territorial militia. Containing five specific objects, it began with "Under the barbarous attack upon our army on February 4", and ended with "...war without quarter to false Americans who wish to enslave us. Independence or death!" The order labeled the US forces "an army of drunkards and thieves" in response to the continued bombardment of the towns around Manila, the burning and looting of whole districts, and the raping of Filipino women by US troops.
When Luna saw that the American advance had halted, mainly to stabilize their lines, he again mobilized his troops to attack La Loma on February 10. Fierce fighting ensued but the Filipinos were forced to withdraw thereafter. Caloocan has left with American forces in control of the southern terminus of the Manila to Dagupan railway, along with five engines, fifty , and a hundred . After consolidating control of Caloocan, the obvious next objective for American forces would be the Republic capital at Malolos. However, General Elwell Otis delayed for almost a month in hopes that Filipino forces would be deployed in its defense.
With their superior firepower and newly arrived reinforcements, the Americans had not expected such resistance. They were so surprised that an urgent cable was sent to General Henry Lawton who was in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), with his troops. The telegram stated, "Situation critical in Manila. Your early arrival great importance."
Luna also formed other units similar to the sharpshooters. One was the unit commanded by Rosendo Simón de Pajarillo, which would later be named after Bugallón. The unit emerged from a group of ten men wanting to volunteer in the regular Filipino army. Luna, still thinking of the defeat at the Battle of Caloocan, sent the men away at first. However, he soon changed his mind and decided to give the men an initiation. After taking breakfast, he ordered a subordinate, Colonel Queri, to prepare arms and ammunition for the ten men. Then, the men boarded a train destined towards Malinta, which was American-held territory. After giving orders to the men, he let them go and watched them with his telescope. The men succeeded in their mission and eventually returned unharmed. Admiring their bravery, he organized them into a guerrilla unit of around 50 members. This unit would see action in the Second Battle of Caloocan.
Another elite unit was the Black Guard, a 25-man guerrilla unit under a certain Lieutenant García. García, one of Luna's favorites, was a modest but brave soldier. His unit was tasked to approach the enemy by surprise and quickly return to camp. Luna had admired García's unit so much that he wanted to increase their size. However, García declined the offer, believing that a larger force might undermine the efficiency of their work. Jose Alejandrino, the chief army engineer and one of Luna's aides, stated that he never heard of García and his unit again after Luna's resignation on February 28.
Luna, however, proved to be a strict disciplinarian and his temper alienated many in the ranks of the common soldiers. An example of this occurred during the Battle of Calumpit, wherein Luna ordered General Tomás Mascardo to send troops from Guagua to strengthen the former's defenses. However, Mascardo ignored orders by Luna insisting that he was going to Arayat to undertake an "inspection of troops". Another version of Mascardo's reasoning emerged and claimed that Mascardo had left to visit his girlfriend, which was probably the version which reached Luna. Luna, infuriated by Mascardo's actions, decided to detain him. Major Hernando, one of Luna's aides, tried to placate the general's anger and convinced Luna to push the case to President Aguinaldo. Aguinaldo complied and detained Mascardo for 24 hours. Upon returning to the field, however, the Americans had broken through his defenses at the Bagbag River, forcing Luna to withdraw despite his heroic efforts to defend the remaining sectors.
Luna resigned on March 1, mainly resenting the rearmament of the Kawit Battalion as the Presidential Guard. Aguinaldo hesitantly accepted the resignation. As a result, Luna was absent from the field for three weeks, during which the Filipino forces suffered several defeats and setbacks. One such defeat would be at the Battle of Marilao River on March 27. Receiving the depressing reports from the field through his La Independencia correspondents, Luna went to Aguinaldo and asked to be reinstated with more powers over all the military heads, and Aguinaldo promoted him to Lieutenant General and agreed to make him Commander-in-Chief of all the Filipino forces in Central Luzon (Bulacan, Tarlac, Pampanga, Nueva Ecija, Bataan, and Zambales).
The Luna Defense Line was planned to create a series of delaying battles from Caloocan to Angeles, Pampanga, as the Republic was constructing a guerrilla base in the Mountain Province. The base was planned to be the last stand headquarters of the Republic in case the Americans broke through the Defense Line. American military observers were astonished by the Defense Line, which they described as consisting of numerous bamboo trenches stretching from town to town. The series of trenches allowed the Filipinos to withdraw gradually, firing from cover at the advancing Americans. As the American troops occupied each new position, they were subjected to a series of traps that had been set in the trenches, including bamboo spikes and poisonous reptiles.
Earlier in May 1899, Luna almost fell in the field at the Battle of Santo Tomas. Mounted on his horse, Luna charged into the battlefield leading his main force in a counterattack. As they advanced, the American forces began firing upon them. Luna's horse was hit and he fell to the ground. As he recovered, Luna realized that he had been shot in the stomach, and he attempted to kill himself with his revolver to avoid capture. He was saved, though, by the actions of a Filipino colonel named Alejandro Avecilla who, seeing Luna fall, rode towards the general to save him. Despite being heavily wounded in one of his legs and an arm, with his remaining strength Avecilla carried Luna away from the battle to the Filipino rear. Upon reaching safety, Luna realized that his wound was not very deep as most of the bullet's impact had been taken by a silk belt full of gold coins that his parents had given him. As he left the field to have his wounds tended, Luna turned over the command to General Venacio Concepción, the Filipino commander of the nearby town of Angeles. In recognition of his work, Luna was awarded the Philippine Republic Medal. By the end of May 1899, Colonel Joaquín Luna, one of Antonio's brothers, warned him that a plot had been concocted by "old elements" or the autonomists of the Republic (who were bent on accepting American sovereignty over the country) and a clique of army officers whom Luna had disarmed, arrested, and/or insulted. Luna shrugged off all these threats, reiterating his trust for Aguinaldo, and continued building defenses at Pangasinan where the Americans were planning a landing.
Both exchanged heated words as he was about to depart. At Plaza Lucero, fronting the church of Cabanatuan, a rifle shot rang out. Still outraged and furious, Luna rushed down the stairs and met Janolino, accompanied by some elements of the Kawit Battalion. Janolino swung his Bolo knife at Luna, wounding him in the head. Janolino's men fired at Luna, while others started stabbing him, even as he tried to fire his revolver at one of his attackers. He staggered out into the plaza where Román and Rusca were rushing to his aid, but as he lay dying, they too were set upon and shot, with Román being killed and Rusca being severely wounded. Luna received more than 30 wounds, and uttered "Cowards! Assassins!" He was hurriedly buried in the churchyard, after which Aguinaldo relieved Luna's officers and men from the field, including General Venacio Concepción, whose headquarters in Angeles, Pampanga was besieged by Aguinaldo on the same day Luna was assassinated.
Immediately after Luna's death, confusion reigned on both sides. The Americans even thought Luna had taken over to replace Aguinaldo. Luna's death was publicly declared only by June 8, and a circular providing details of the event released by June 13. While investigations were supposedly made concerning Luna's death, not one person was convicted. Later, General Pantaleon García said that it was he who was verbally ordered by Aguinaldo to conduct the assassination of Luna at Cabanatuan. His sickness at the time prevented his participation in the assassination. Aguinaldo would be firm in his stand that he had nothing to do with the assassination of Luna.
The death of Luna, acknowledged to be the most brilliant and capable of the Filipino generals at the time, was a decisive factor in the fight against the American forces. Despite mixed reactions on both the Filipino and American sides on the death of Luna, there are people from both sides who nevertheless developed an admiration for him. General Frederick Funston, who captured Aguinaldo at Palanan, Isabela, stated that Luna was the "ablest and most aggressive leader of the Filipino Republic." For General James Franklin Bell, Luna "was the only general the Filipino army had." General Robert Hughes remarked that "with the death of General Luna, the Filipino army lost the only General it had." Meanwhile, Apolinario Mabini, former Prime Minister and Secretary of Foreign Affairs, had this to say: "If he was sometimes hasty and even cruel in his resolution, it was because the army had been brought to a desperate situation by the demoralization of the soldiers and the lack of ammunitions: nothing but action of rash courage and extraordinary energy could hinder its dissolution." Of the Filipino armed forces organized during Luna's service in the army, Major General Henry Ware Lawton commented, "Filipinos are a very fine set of soldiers, far better than the Indians... Inferior in every particular equipment and supplies, they are the bravest men I have ever seen... I'm very well impressed with the Filipinos!" Lawton later recanted this statement.
Subsequently, Aguinaldo suffered successive, disastrous losses in the field, as he retreated northwards. On November 13, 1899, Aguinaldo decided to disperse his army and begin conducting a guerrilla war. General José Alejandrino, one of Luna's remaining aides, stated in his memoirs that if Luna had been able to finish the planned military camp in the Mountain Province and had shifted to guerrilla warfare earlier as Luna had suggested, Aguinaldo might have avoided having to run for his life in the Cordillera Mountains. For historian Teodoro Agoncillo, however, Luna's death did not directly contribute to the resulting fall of the Republic. In his book, Malolos: The Crisis of the Republic, Agoncillo stated that the loss of Luna showed the existence of a lack of discipline among the regular Filipino soldiers and it was a major weakness that was never remedied during the course of the war. Also, soldiers connected with Luna were demoralized and as a result eventually surrendered to the Americans. Despite Aguinaldo denying the allegation multiple times that he was involved in Luna's death, an original copy of the telegram that was sent to Luna was discovered in 2018 showing the order for Luna to visit Cabanatuan, yet studies by Ambeth R. Ocampo tackles that the telegram was not ordering Luna to Cabanatuan but was asking a query on why Buencamino was arrested.
In 2024, with some quarters however dismissing as weak evidence woven together
/ref>, local historian Ambeth R. Ocampo revealed at the GSIS Historians' Fair that there is a matter of possibility that it was actually Aguinaldo's mother (Trinidad Famy de Aguinaldo) who ordered the assassination of Antonio Luna.
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Categories: 1866 Births, 1899 Deaths, 19th-century Murders In The Philippines, Aguinaldo Administration Personnel, Assassinated Filipino People, Assassinated Military Personnel, Ateneo De Manila University Alumni, Chiefs Of Staff Of The Armed Forces Of The Philippines, Complutense University Of Madrid Alumni, Filipino Freemasons, Filipino Generals, Filipino Pharmacists, Filipino Propagandists, Filipino Chemists, Filipino Nationalists, Ilocano People, Filipino Paramilitary Personnel, People From Ilocos Norte, People From San Nicolas, Manila, People From The Spanish East Indies, People Murdered In The Philippines, Military Personnel Of The Philippine–american War, People Of The Philippine Revolution, Philippine Army, Spanish-language Writers Of The Philippines, University Of Barcelona Alumni, University Of Santo Tomas Alumni
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