A 1920 church census of Guam snapshot with “deportado” (deportee) information.
During the Spanish occupation of the Mariana Islands and early U.S. occupation of Guam, there were instances of Filipinos being deported to the Mariana Islands for criminal or political reasons.
As with the case of “Procopio N”, a Filipino gentleman, who was a deported to Guam for political reasons (related to the 1896 Philippine Revolution against Spain). It took some additional time and research to discover that his full name was Procopio Peña Novera.
After translating the church census text on Google Translate, it revealed that Procopio and Ana Ignacio Cruz, my maternal Great Grandfather Jai's sister, had one daughter, who they also named Ana (married Juan Pangelinan Santos, manggåfan Bonik).
When all the Filipino political deportees on Guam were allowed to return back to their country Procopio eventually chose repatriation and to reunite back with his wife in the Philippines. However, in De Viana (2004), he indicates that Procopio opted to stay on Guam; but never mentioned that he in fact returned back to the Philippines. Procopio was still on Guam by 1902, based on a land record court case where he made a statement to the court that he purchased a house on Pizarro Street in Hagåtña from Jose Ignacio.
Later after Procopio had left Guam, Tan Anan Jai married Juan “Iko” Pangelinan Guerrero (manggåfan Kotla yan Liberato) as reflected in this church census snapshot.
Bibliography
United States Government. 1902. Civil Case No. 245, Procopio Novera y Peña. Court of First Instance, Guam.
Father Roman Maria de Vera. 1921. Censo Oficial de 1920 (copia). Aragon-Cantabria, Burlada, Spain.
Augusto V. De Viana. 2004. In the Far Islands: the Role of Natives from the Philippines in the Conquest, Colonization and Repopulation of the Mariana Islands. University of Santo Tomas: Manila, Philippines.
