The relationships extended beyond politics. Three Filipino exiles decided to stay on Guam including Leon Flores, Pancrasio Palting, and Maximo Tolentino.9 The men found employment with the US Naval government as lawyers and as a servant, respectively. But the jobs were not the only reason they stayed. They all married local women and became part of their families. Leon Flores married Felicita Dungca and Pancrasio Palting married Soledad Dungca, both daughters of Justo Dungca.10 Their descendants became prominent members of Guam society. For instance, the first Chamorro Archbishop of Guam, Felixberto Flores, was the son of Leon Flores and Ana Camacho. Tolentino married Tomasa Crisostomo Lizama of Hagåtña.11 The Filipino exiles created kinship relations and became integrated in Guam society. The relationships formed between Filipino revolutionaries and Chamorro families at the turn of the 20th century challenge our understanding of the Philippine revolution and the long history of Chamorro self-governance. They are not separate sequences of events in history, but connect to each other on the island of Guam. We could surmise they discussed political philosophies and the political trajectories of each of their peoples. We can also speculate if Filipino revolutionaries and the signers of the petition discussed American colonialism in the Philippines and Guam, if they made plans to aid each other’s anti-colonial struggles, or if they were silenced by the guards standing outside the prison. The fact that they did meet disrupts notions of the completeness of imperial power and shows how even in spaces of dominance and exile, there can be, too, places of 9
In 1961, historian Tony Palomo published a weekly series in the Guam Daily News chronicling the lives of the Filipino Revolutionaries exiled to Guam in both the Spanish and American eras. They include: “Among the Exiles a Sublime Paralytic,” May 7, 2941; “Governor Called Mabini ‘Most Influential’ Exile,” May 14, 1961; “Former PI Political Prisoner Recalls Massacre in Agaña,” May 21, 1961; “52 Filipinos Exiled Here Included an Elite Group of Intellectuals,” May 22, 1961; “Mabini Marker at Asan Pt. Dedicated in ‘4th’ Ceremony,” July 5, 1961; “Last of the PI Insurgents Exiled to Guam Dies,” May 14, 1964.
10
Letter from Justo Dungca to Lt. Governor William Safford, 1904, William Safford Papers MSS 980 Folder 1, Micronesian Area Research Center, University of Guam.
11
Mary Ellen Cook, A Survey of Exiles in the Mariana Islands (University of Guam, 1980).
116・4th Marianas History Conference 2019