Alcatraz and the Philippine-American war

On April 25th, 1898, the United States declared war on Spain after months of rising tensions. While the escalation of the war centered first on Cuba, at the time a Spanish colony fighting for independence, the U.S. navy quickly took control of the Philippines to try to prevent any Spanish mobilization in the Pacific. More U.S. forces were sent to the archipelago. What does this have to do with Alcatraz? Well, with a war front now open in the Pacific, San Francisco and the fort on Alcatraz became a major military base of operations.

The Spanish-American War ended fairly quickly, with a peace protocol in August and the Treaty of Paris signed on December 10th, but the fighting was just beginning. Spain and the United States excluded any Filipino representation from the treaty congress, and Spain ceded the Philippines to the United States. Many Filipinos, having already started a revolution for independence from Spanish imperial rule, objected to this switch-up of imperial powers. In early 1899, the Philippine-American War began.

War meant way more soldiers being sent to prison than fit the capacity on Alcatraz. This San Francisco Call article from January 24, 1900, mentions that construction was underway for more prison space.

San Francisco Call newspaper

This change from liberating a Spanish colony to fighting to rule it demoralized many U.S. soldiers. The U.S. entered the war with the idea that it was helping spread civilization and remove Spanish oppression from the Philippines. Now, fighting the very people the soldiers had been sent to help, things changed. Along with the shocking brutality of the war, desertion became a major problem. Suddenly, hundreds of soldiers were sent back to San Francisco to serve time for desertion and other crimes.

While not an official military prison yet, Alcatraz had been housing military prisoners since the 1860s and was designated during the war as the place to incarcerate all the prisoners returning from the Philippines. The prison population at the post on Alcatraz Island soared into the hundreds, and a new prison complex was built on the parade ground.

The Upper Prison on the Alcatraz Parade ground, 1902. This complex was built in response to the Philippine-American War.

Golden Gate National Recreation Area park archives

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The San Francisco Call reported the escape of Frank Kinne and two other soldiers on November 2, 1900. Kinne, with his sentence of treason, made for an eye-catching headline.

San Francisco Call newspaper

Frank Kinne arrived on the island in 1900 for a 15-year sentence of desertion and treason. He had left his regiment and began fighting for the Filipino nationalists. He was sent to Alcatraz after he was caught leading a group of fighters. A few months after Kinne started his sentence, he and two other men escaped from the hospital building by faking sick and then sneaking out and taking a boat.

While we don’t know exactly what motivated Frank Kinne to fight for the Filipino people, many soldiers felt conflicted in the midst of a changing war. One soldier from Kansas wrote of the Filipino people, “Their independence is dearer to them than life, as ours was in years gone by, and is today... there is not a man who enlisted to fight these people, and should the United States annex these islands, none but the most bloodthirsty will claim himself a hero. This is not a lack of patriotism, but my honest belief.”

The war sealed Alcatraz’s fate: in 1907 the island officially became a military prison, and they constructed the cellhouse soon after. The rest is, as they say, history. From far away disputes to moral dilemmas to local change, how have global events impacted your daily life?

Sources:

Erwin Thompson, The Rock: A History of Alcatraz Island, 1847-1972. Historic Resource Study, Golden Gate National Recreation Area, California. May 1979.

Soldiers' Letters: Being Materials for the History of a War of Criminal Aggression. United States: Anti-Imperialist League, 1899.

Read more: Spanish-American War and the Philippine-American War, 1898-1902 - Golden Gate National Recreation Area (U.S. National Park Service)