The following statement occurs in a letter from General Bandholtz dated September 21, 1903:-- "No one is more anxious to terminate this business than I am, nevertheless I think it would be a mistake to offer any such inducements, and that more lasting benefits would result by hammering away as we have been doing." And General Allen said in an indorsement to the Philippine Commission:-- "...

in my opinion the judgment of Colonel Bandholtz in matters connected with the pacification of Albay should receive favourable consideration.

Halfway measures are always misinterpreted and used to the detriment of the Government among the ignorant followers of the outlaws." These views prevailed.
Blount has claimed that the death rate in the Albay jail at this time was very excessive, and cites it as an instance of the result of American maladministration.
Assuming that his tabulation [493] of the dead who died in the Albay jail between May 30 and September, 1903, amounting to 120, is correct, the following statements should be made:-- Only recently has it been demonstrated that beri-beri is due to the use of polished rice, which was up to the time of this discovery regarded as far superior to unpolished rice as an article of food, and is still much better liked by the Filipinos than is the unpolished article.

Many of these deaths were from beri-beri, and were due to a misguided effort to give the prisoners the best possible food.
Cholera was raging in the province of Albay throughout the period in question, and the people outside of the jail suffered no less than did those within it.

The same is true of malarial infection.