Battle for Batangas: A Philippine Province at War

Battle for Batangas: A Philippine Province at War by May, Glenn Anthony. hardcover edition. ISBN: 9780300048506.

This study of the Battle for Batangas province during the Philippine-American War of 1899-1902 is both an account of what life was like for the soldiers and civilians who participated in the war, and a revision of established scholarship that has viewed the masses as the backbone of the conflict. May demonstrates that the lions share of Philippine resistance came in fact from the political and economic elites rather than the peasantry. Discussing the American side as well as the Philippine, May prefaces his study with a socio-historical probe of the decades immediately preceding the war and considers important aspects of Philippine life such as old-boy networks, family connections, patron-client bonds, municipal politics and political beliefs. He also reevaluates the behaviour of the Americans in the war, arguing that it was neither as unpleasant nor as praiseworthy as it has thus far been portrayed.