Trivia about General Paciano Rizal

General Paciano Rizal

Born on March 9, 1851 Paciano Mercado Rizal y Alonzo was the elder and only brother of Jose Rizal. Paciano studied under Justiniano Aquino Cruz and later at the Colegio de San Juan de Letran under the tutelage of Fr. Jose Burgos one of the Filipino priests who was garroted at Bagumbayan in 1872. Paciano took over the family business when his father became too old to manage it. ln 1882 together with his uncle, he sent his younger brother Jose to continue his studies in Europe. Paciano supported his brother’s activities including his involvement in the Propaganda Movement.

Paciano supported the Katipunan and was arrested and tortured at Fort Santiago to force him to implicate his brother in the revolutionary movement. After the execution of his brother, he joined the Philippine Revolution and became a general in the Revolutionary Army. Gen. Emilio Aguinaldo appointed him Secretary of Finance in the Departmental Government of Central Luzon. During ‘1898 he secured the surrender of Spanish forces in Lipa, Batangas. He also fought the Americans during the Filipino-American War until his capture in 1900.

Paciano Rizal was believed to be the real Filosofo Tacio in his brother’s Noli Me Tangere. It was he who told Rizal not to be ashamed of being a Filipino. After his release from captivity, Paciano refused all positions offered to him by the Americans and lived quietly as a gentleman farmer in Los Bafios until his death on April 13, 1930 at the age of 79.

Stamps featuring General Paciano Rizal

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