Moro Massacre
- "'Slaughter' is a good word. Certainly there is not a better one in the Unabridged Dictionary for this occasion."
- Mark Twain on the Moro Massacre, 1906
Mark Twain had an unsurprisingly negative reaction to the Moro Massacre. But what was the Moro Massacre?
The Moro Massacre happened when over 600 natives, or Moros, were in the process of rebelling against the United States. The two were at war, and the Moros would run into conflict when soldiers found out where they were. The troops went in and were given the order to "kill those savages." They went in and shot all the Moros, even those that had nothing to do with the rebelling.
This depressing picture above shows the dead Moros lining the ground, while the Americans posed for a photo. The soldiers treated these unarmed Moros like nothing more than animals.
The Moro Massacre happened when over 600 natives, or Moros, were in the process of rebelling against the United States. The two were at war, and the Moros would run into conflict when soldiers found out where they were. The troops went in and were given the order to "kill those savages." They went in and shot all the Moros, even those that had nothing to do with the rebelling.
This depressing picture above shows the dead Moros lining the ground, while the Americans posed for a photo. The soldiers treated these unarmed Moros like nothing more than animals.
This map shows around where the Moro Massacre took place. |
Mark Twain felt that these American soldiers had really done wrong, and had killed a lot of completely innocent people in the process. He felt they had disrespected the country as a whole. When president Teddy Roosevelt, signed off his congratulations Twain basically said "B.S."
He was mad, and he had reason behind it. His wife and daughter had died a few years before, so Twain's views became more and more emotional. More and more critical. He certainly felt very passionate about the Moro Massacre, and would not let people believe what the soldiers did was right. |
Anyone interested in reading Twain's full comment on the Moro Massacre can do so here.