March across Samar

Smith was receptive because he thought that the march might identify the best route for a telegraph line to connect Samar's east and west coasts.

Smith desired that the Marines make the march from Basey across the island of Samar to Hernani, just south if the destination proposed by Waller, for the purpose of selecting a route for a telegraph wire to connect the east and west coasts.

On December 8, two columns left Basey for Balangiga, one, under command of Major Waller, proceeding along the shore line, and the other, under Captain Bearss, marching about two miles inland.

On arriving at Lanang, Major Waller was urged not to make the attempt, however, he says in his report: "Remembering the general's (General Smith's) several talks on the subject and his evident desire to know the terrain and run wires across, coupled with my own desire for some further knowledge of the people and the nature of this heretofore impenetrable country, I decided to make the trial with 50 men and the necessary carriers."

Lyles, U. S. Army (Aide sent by General Smith), Second Lieutenant Frank Halford, 50 enlisted U. S. Marines, 2 native scouts and 33 native carriers.The start was made in boats but when Lagitao was reached, it was found impossible to use them further on account of the numerous rapids; the remainder of the distance was made on foot.

One of the most trying features of the march was the necessity for crossing and recrossing the swollen river many times, which kept the men's clothing wet continually.

After a conference with his officers, Major Waller decided to take Lieutenant Halford and thirteen of the men who were in the best condition and push forward as rapidly as possible and send back a relief party for the main column, which was placed under the command of Captain Porter with instructions to go slowly and follow Major Waller's trail.

A message was sent back to Captain Porter, directing him to follow the advanced column to a clearing which had been found where there was a quantity of sweet potatoes, bananas and young cocoanut palms, and to rest there until his men were in condition to continue the march.

On January 4, Major Waller's party rushed a shack and captured five natives, among whom were a man and a boy who stated that they knew the way to Basey.

Major Waller's party went aboard Captain Dunlap's cutter and started for Basey, where they arrived on January 6, 1902.

Meanwhile, Captain Porter had decided to retrace the trail to Lanang and ask for a relief party to be sent out for his men, the most of whom were unable to march.

Food was almost totally lacking, and heavy rains filled the streams making it almost impossible to follow down their banks or cross them as was so often necessary.

After an investigation, Waller ordered the summary execution, without trial, of the eleven Filipino porters for treason, theft, disobedience and general mutiny.

Ten were shot in groups of three (one had been gunned down in the water attempting to escape) The bodies were left in the square, as an example, until one evening, under cover of darkness, some townspeople carried them off for a Christian burial.

After having left ten marines to die along the trail, Lieutenant Williams was finally met by the relief party on the morning of January 18 and taken back to Lanang.

The full circumstances of his attempt to extricate these exhausted men from the midst of that wild tropical jungle is one of the most tragic yet the most heroic episode in Marine Corps history.

Waller, United States Marine Corps, being then and there detached for service with the United States Army by authority of the President of the United States, did, in time of war, willfully and feloniously and with malice aforethought, murder and kill eleven men, names unknown, natives of the Philippine Islands, by ordering and causing his subordinate officer under his command, John Horace Arthur Day, 1st Lieutenant, U.S. Marine Corps, and a firing detail of enlisted men under his said command, to take out said eleven men and shoot them to death, which said order was then and there carried into execution and said eleven natives, and each of them, were shot with rifles, from the effects of which they then and there died.

""I can have them here tomorrow morning", the prosecutor responded, and next day he submitted in evidence a series of telegrams between Admiral Rogers and General Chaffee in which the offer of three hundred Marines for service with the Sixth Brigade is made and accepted.

Besides, Major R. N. Getty had been assigned to investigate the shootings at Basey, and had so advised Waller before the Marine battalion was detached from Sixth Brigade on 19 February."

As a result of evidence introduced at the Waller trial, General Smith was then court martialed, convicted, admonished, and forced to retire.