Clyde Toland, a life-long student of local history, took exception to last Saturday’s report of Gen. Fred Funston’s alleged dark side activities in the Philippines in the early 1900s.
Toland wrote:
“I was not previously familiar with the author William Loren Katz whose 2007 article ‘Water Boarding in American History’ you rely on for repeating allegations of certain actions and statements by General Fred Funston … the article states in the author bio it draws ‘heavily’ on Stuart Creighton Miller’s 1982 book, ‘Benevolent Assimilation.’
“… Miller relies in ‘Benevolent Assimilation’ primarily on the accounts in anti-war, and hence anti-Funston, newspapers of the time, and makes no effort to assess their accuracy. In today’s terms, that would be like relying solely and unquestioningly on the cable television channel MSNBC for one’s facts.
“There is much dispute about what Funston may or may not have done and said in the war in the Philippines. You do him, and his reputation, a great disservice by not delving into that critical aspect and disclosing it to your readers. Instead, you have left your readers with the bald statement that he did use torture and favored civilian massacres.”
KATZ’S REPORT was a follow-up read to “Honor in the Dust,” which contained reports of executions and torture by U.S. forces in the Philippines. Written by Greg Jones, an investigative reporter, foreign correspondent and Pulitzer Prize finalist, the book is documented by an extensive bibliography.
Jones wrote: “Others, like Fred Funston and Lloyd Wheaton, suffered few moral qualms, and they summarily executed guerillas, burned villages and tortured as a matter of course …”
While episodes in the Philippines may have cast a shadow on Funston’s career, he was revered for many of his actions during hostilities in Cuba and the Philippines, and won a Congressional Medal of Honor for bravery. He was credited with saving San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake and led U.S. forces in the Mexican border campaign. President Woodrow Wilson favored Funston to lead the American Expeditionary Force to France in World War I, precluded by his death at age 51 in 1917.
Adding to his resume, previous to his military career Funston worked as a journalist, and performed prolonged scientific explorations in Death Valley and Alaska.
No one can deny Funston was a diverse and interesting contributor to U.S. history.
