The Death of

Jose Rizal
1. The death of Jose Rizal on December
30, 1896 came right after a kangaroo
trial convicted him on all three charges
of rebellion, sedition and conspiracy.
December 30th is the death anniversary
of Dr. Jose Rizal. The death of Jose
Rizal came right after a kangaroo trial
convicted him on all three charges of
rebellion, sedition and conspiracy. He
was guided to his cell in Fort Santiago
where he spent his last 24 hours right
after the conviction.
At 6:00 AM of December
29, 1896, Captain Rafael
Dominguez read Jose
Rizal’s death sentence
and declared that he will
be shot at 7:00 AM of the
next day in Bagumbayan.

At 8:00 PM of the same day, Jose Rizal
had his last supper and informed Captain
Dominguez that he had forgiven his
enemies including the military judges that
condemned him to die. Rizal heard mass
at 3:00 in the morning of December 30,
1896, had confession before taking the
Holy Communion.
He took his last breakfast
at 5:30 AM of December
30, 1896 and even had the
time to write two letters
one for his family while
the other letter was for
his brother Paciano. This
was also the time when
his wife, Josephine
Bracken and his sister
Josefa arrived and bade
farewell to Rizal.
Rizal was told to stand on a grassy lawn between two
lam posts in the Bagumbayan field, looking towards the
Manila Bay. He requested the firing squad commander
to shoot him facing the firing squad but was ordered to
turn his back against the squad of Filipino soldiers of
the Spanish army. A backup force of regular Spanish
Army troops were on standby to shoot the executioners
should they fail to obey the orders of the commander.
Jose Rizal’s execution was carried out when the
command “Fuego” was heard and Rizal made an effort
to face the firing squad but his bullet riddled body
turned to the right and his face directed to the morning
sun. Rizal exactly died at 7:03 AM and his last words
before he died were those said by Jesus Christ:
“consummatum est,” which means, “It is finished.”
Jose Rizal was secretly buried in Paco Cemetery in
Manila but no identification was placed in his grave. His
sister Narcisa tried to look in every grave site and found
freshly turned soil at the Paco cemetery, assuming the
burial site as the area where Rizal was buried. She gave
a gift to the site caretaker so as to mark the grave with
RPJ — the initials of Rizal in reverse.
Thank you for
listening!