A. causes of the Balangiga Massacre.

According to historians, relations went downhill after two American soldiers allegedly
tried to molest a Filipino woman tending a store.

When locals came to the woman's defense, the soldiers wanted revenge. Since then,
people in Balingaga were subjected to forced labor and detention with only little food
and water.

The locals also protested the move of the US garrison to cut food and other supplies in
the town.

The farmers were deprived of their own land and houses of the Filipinos were raided
and destroyed due to the confiscation from their houses of all sharp bolos, and the
confiscation and destruction of stored rice.

Balangiga police chief Valeriano Abanador, along with guerilla officers Captain Eugenio
Daza and Sergeant Pedro Duran Sr, plotted the uprising against the Americans.

According to historian Stuart Miller in his book Benevolent Assimilation, Balangiga men
disguised as women hid weapons inside small caskets which were brought to the
church under the pretext that a cholera epidemic had killed many children.

Reinforcements from neighbouring towns also entered Balangiga several days before
the attack under the guise of preparations for a fiesta.