LUKBAN
A locally-made cannon crafted from bamboo called ‘ lantaka ’.
sewing machines contributed by private citizens . Because of the difficulties of getting all the necessary ingredients for the manufacture of bullets , their chemist Vito Borromeo learned how to increase the output of nitrate of potash , without the usual ingredients . The chemist had discovered a way to mix various substances using local resources . 23
Powder was made from salt peter , sulphur and charcoal , or from salt peter , charcoal and alcohol . The salt peter was obtained from niter beds whose establishment was ordered in all towns . The charcoal was made from the native wood , while sulfur was found in the country . Since the natives consumed large quantities of distilled liquors for drinking , some of these were diverted to the manufacture of gunpowder . When their own cartridge shells were hopelessly worn out , they made substitutes from galvanized iron roofs . Even the copper bands were stripped from shells thrown into the seacoast towns by the US Navy and laboriously beaten out into sheet copper and then used for the manufacture of cartridge shells , while the melted silver ornaments were used for soldering . When shells thrown by the navy had not exploded , they were opened and the powder withdrawn . A fulminate for the cartridges was obtained from the heads of the matches . 24
In the later months , when the shooting war erupted , people in the neighbourhood always saved the cartridge shells with great care . Those thrown away by the Americans were collected by the people and sent to the guerrillas . They were too hard pressed to consider any question
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