On this date in 1841, Apolinario de la Cruz was shot at Tayabas for leading a revolt against Spanish occupation of the Philippines.

Known to history as Hermano Pule, the young de la Cruz had dreamt of entering the priesthood — but finding that most barred native Filipinos, he founded the Cofradia de San José (Confraternity of St. Joseph).

Organizing secretly and outside of the approved channels, it gained the enmity of both civilian and religious authorities, though it doesn’t on the surface look like a seditious entity; rather, it attracted Filipinos (and Filipinas) excluded from the official organs. Suddenly, that looked like trouble to Spain.

Condemnation helped the Confradia’s numbers burgeon, and forced its programme towards radicalism: where freedom of religion was forbidden, worship was a revolutionary act.

Matters came to a head when a government raid precipitated armed resistance by Pule and his followers, with the inevitable closing act postponed by an inspiring but short-lived rebel victory at arms. Pule and his followers were overrun on Nov. 1, rounded up as fugitives by the next day, and put to death outside the Tayabas courthouse — with Pule’s head, hands and feet cut off for salutary public display in his adjacent hometown of Lucban (or Lukban).

On this day..

• 1912: Alexander Kompovic, "nurderer"
• 1913: Frederick Seekings, the last hanged in Cambridgeshire
• 1807: Henry Niles
• Corpses Strewn: The Virginius Affair
• 1873: Four Cuban rebel generals
• 1895: Emma Williams, Frank Tinyana, and Jackey
• 1949: Arthur Bruce Perkins, "I knew I could never face her again"
• 1881: A day in the death penalty around the U.S.
• 2005: Hastings Arthur Wise, workplace shooter
• 2005: Brian Steckel, the Driftwood Killer
• 1818: Matthew Clydesdale, galvanic subject
• 1778: Abraham Carlisle and John Roberts, triggering Benedict Arnold's betrayal?
• 1793: The smitten Adam Lux
• 1936: Edgar André