XVI
THE REIGN OF TERROR IN PYENG-YANG
Pyeng-Yang, the famous missionary centre in Northern Korea, has been
described in previous chapters. The people here, Christians and
non-Christians alike, took a prominent part in the movement. It was
announced that three memorial services would be held on March 1st, in
memory of the late Emperor, one in the compound of the Christian Boys'
School, one in the compound of the Methodist church and the third at the
headquarters of the Chun-do Kyo.
The meeting at the boys' school was typical of all. Several of the native
pastors and elders of the Presbyterian churches of the city, including the
Moderator of the General Assembly, were present, and the compound was
crowded with fully three thousand people. After the memorial service was
finished, a prominent Korean minister asked the people to keep their seats,
as there was more to follow.
Then, with an air of great solemnity, the Moderator of the General Assembly
read two passages from the Bible, 1 Peter 3:13-17 and Romans 9:3.
"And who is he that will harm you, if ye be followers of that
which is good.
"But, if ye suffer for righteousness sake, happy are ye, and be
not afraid of their terror, neither be troubled.
"For I could wish that I were accurst from Christ for my
brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh."
It was the great appeal to all that was most heroic in their souls. Some of
them whispered the words after the Moderator.
"Sarami doorupkei hanangusul dooru wo malmyu sodong chi malgo."
"Be not afraid of their terror."
These white-robed men knew what was before them. Terror and torture and
suffering were no new things to them. Within a quarter of a century
conquering and defeated armies had passed through their city time after
time. They knew war, and they knew worse than war. Japan had during the
past few years planted her terror among them, persecuting the Church,
arresting its most prominent members on false charges, breaking them in
prison by scientific torture. Many of the men knew, in that assembly, of
the meaning of police flogging, the feel of police burning, the unspeakable
agony of being strung up by the thumbs under the police inquisition.
"Be not afraid of their terror!" Easy to say this to Western peoples, to
whom terror is known only in the form of the high explosives and dropping
bombs of honourable war. But for these men it had another meaning, an
inquisition awaiting them compared with which the tortures of Torquemada
paled.
"Be not afraid!"
There was no tremor of fear in the voice of the college graduate who rose
to his feet and came to the front. "This is the proudest and happiest day
of my life," he said. "Though I die to-morrow, I cannot help but read." He
had a paper in his hand. As the vast audience saw it, they gave a great
cheer. Then he read the Declaration of Independence of the Korean people.
When he had finished, another man took the platform. "Nothing of an
unlawful nature is to be permitted," he said. "You are all to obey orders,
and make no resistance to the authorities, nor to attack the Japanese
officials or people." A speech on Korean independence followed. Then some
men came out of the building bearing armfuls of Korean flags, which they
distributed among the people. A large Korean flag was raised on the wall
behind, and the crowd rose to its feet cheering, waving flags, calling
"Mansei."
There was to be a parade through the streets. But spies had already hurried
off to the police station, and before the people could leave, a company of
policemen arrived. "Remain quiet," the word went round. The police gathered
up the flags.
In the evening a large crowd gathered in front of the police station
shouting "Mansei." The police ordered the hose to be turned on them. The
Korean policemen refused to obey their Japanese superiors, threw off their
uniforms and joined the mob. The hose at last got to work. The mob
responded by throwing stones, breaking the windows of the police station.
This was the only violence. On the following day, Sunday, the churches were
closed. At midnight, the police had summoned Dr. Moffett to their office
and told him that no services could be allowed. Early in the morning, the
leaders of the Saturday meetings were arrested, and were now in jail. "Be
not afraid!"
At nine o'clock on Monday morning a company of Japanese soldiers was
drilling on the campus. A number of students from the college and academy
were on the top of a bank, looking on at the drill. Suddenly the soldiers,
in obedience to a word of command, rushed at the students. The latter took
to their heels and fled, save two or three who stood their ground. The
students who had escaped cheered; and one of the men who stood his ground
called "Mansei." The soldiers struck him with the butts and barrels of
their rifles. Then one poked him with his rifle in his face. He was
bleeding badly. Two soldiers led him off, a prisoner. The rest were
dispersed with kicks and blows.
Now the Japanese started their innings. One man in plain clothes confronted
a Korean who was walking quietly, slapped his face and knocked him down. A
soldier joined in the sport, and after many blows with the rifle and kicks,
they rolled him down an embankment into a ditch. They then ran down, pulled
him out of the ditch, kicked him some more, and hauled him off to prison.
The streets were full of people now, and parties of troops were going about
everywhere dispersing them. The crowds formed, shouting "Mansei"; the
soldiers chased them, beating up all they could catch. There were rumours
that most of the Korean policemen had deserted; they had joined the crowds;
the Japanese were searching for them and arresting them; and, men
whispered, they would be executed. By midday, every one had enough trouble,
and the city quieted down for the rest of the day. It was not safe to go
abroad now. The soldiers were beating up every one they could find,
particularly women.
By Tuesday the city was full of tales of the doings of the soldiers; having
tasted blood, the troops were warming to their work, "The soldiers have
been chasing people to-day like they were hunters after wild beasts," wrote
one foreign spectator. "Outrages have been very numerous." Still, despite
the troops, the people held two or three patriotic meetings.
Let me tell the tale of Tuesday and Wednesday from two statements made by
Dr. Moffett. These statements were made at the time to the officials in
Pyeng-yang and in Seoul:
"On Tuesday, March 4th, I, in company with Mr. Yamada, Inspector of
Schools, went into the midst of the crowds of Koreans on the college
grounds, and thence went through the streets to the city.
"We saw thousands of Koreans on the streets, the shops all closed, and
Japanese soldiers here and there....
"As we came back and near a police station, soldiers made a dash at some
fifteen or more people in the middle of the street, and three of the
soldiers dashed at some five or six men standing quietly at the side, under
the eaves of the shops, hitting them with their guns. One tall young man in
a very clean white coat dodged the thrust of the gun coming about five feet
under the eaves when an officer thrust his sword into his back, just under
the shoulder blades. The man was not more than ten feet from us
in front....
"Mr. Yamada was most indignant and said, 'I shall tell Governor Kudo just
what I have seen and tell him in detail.'
"I asked him if he had noticed that the man was quietly standing at the
side of the road, and had given no occasion for attack. He said, 'Yes.'
"Just after that we saw thirty-four young girls and women marched along by
some six or eight policemen and soldiers, the girls ahead not being more
than twelve or thirteen years of age.
"Just outside the West Gate Mr. Yamada and I separated and I went towards
home. As I arrived near my own compound, I saw a number of soldiers rush
into the gate of the Theological Seminary professor's cottage, and saw them
grab out a man, beat and kick him and lead him off. Others began clubbing a
youth behind the gate and then led him out, tied him tightly and beat and
kicked him.
"Then there came out three others, two youths and one man, dragged by
soldiers, and then tied with rope, their hands tied behind them.
"Thinking one was my secretary, who lived in the gate house, where the men
had been beaten, I moved to the junction of the road to make sure, but I
recognized none of the four. When they came to the junction of the road and
some of the soldiers were within ten or twelve feet of me, they all
stopped, tied the ropes tighter, and then with four men tied and helpless,
these twenty or more soldiers, in charge of an officer, struck the men with
their fists in the face and back, hit them on the head and face with a
piece of board, kicked them on the legs and back, doing these things
repeatedly. The officer in a rage raised his sword over his head as he
stood before a boy, and both I and the boy thought that he was to be cleft
in two. The cry of terror and anguish he raised was most piercing. Then,
kicking and beating these men, they led them off.
"The above I saw myself and testify to the truthfulness of my statements.
In all my contact with the Koreans these five days, and in all my
observation of the crowds inside and outside the city, I have witnessed no
act of violence on the part of any Korean."
The Theological Seminary was due to open on March 5th. Five students from
South Korea arrived and went into their dormitory on the afternoon of the
4th. They had taken no part in the demonstrations. Later in the afternoon
the soldiers, searching after some people who had run away from them, burst
into the seminary. They broke open the door of the dormitory, pulled the
five theologues out and hauled them off to the police station. There,
despite their protests, they were tied by their arms and legs to large
wooden crosses, face downwards, and beaten on the naked buttocks,
twenty-nine tremendous blows from a hard cane, each. Then they were
dismissed.
That same night firemen were let loose on the village where many of the
students lived and boarded. They dragged out the young men and beat them.
The opening of the seminary had to be postponed.
The Japanese were eager to find grounds for convicting the missionaries of
participation in the movement. One question was pressed on every prisoner,
usually by beating and burning, "Who instigated you? Was it the
foreigners?"
Dr. Moffett was a special object of Japanese hatred. The Osaka _Asahi_
printed a bitter attack on him on March 17th. This is the more notable
because the _Asahi_ is a noted organ of Japanese Liberalism.
THE EVIL VILLAGE OUTSIDE THE WEST GATE IN PYENG-YANG
_A Clever Crowd_
"Outside the West Gate in Pyeng-yang there are some brick houses
and some built after the Korean style, some high and some low.
These are the homes of the foreigners. There are about a hundred
of them in all, and they are Christian missionaries. In the balmy
spring, strains of music can be heard from there. Outwardly they
manifest love and mercy, but if their minds are fully
investigated, they will be found to be filled with intrigue and
greed. They pretend to be here for preaching, but they are
secretly stirring up political disturbances, and foolishly keep
passing on the vain talk of the Koreans, and thereby help to
foster trouble. These are really the homes of devils.
"The head of the crowd is Moffett. The Christians of the place
obey him as they would Jesus Himself. In the 29th year of Meiji
freedom was given to any one to believe in any religion he
wished, and at that time Moffett came to teach the Christian
religion. He has been in Pyeng-yang for thirty years, and has
brought up a great deal of land. He is really the founder of the
foreign community. In this community, because of his efforts
there have been established schools from the primary grade to a
college and a hospital. While they are educating the Korean
children and healing their diseases on the one hand, on the other
there is concealed a clever shadow, and even the Koreans
themselves talk of this.
"This is the centre of the present uprising. It is not in Seoul
but in Pyeng-yang.
"It is impossible to know whether these statements are true or
false, but we feel certain that it is in Pyeng-yang, in the
Church schools,--in a certain college and a certain girls'
school--in the compound of these foreigners. Really this foreign
community is very vile."[1]
[Footnote 1: Osaka _Asahi_, quoted in the Peking and Tientsin
_Times_, March 38,1919.]
A veritable reign of terror was instituted. There were wholesale arrests
and the treatment of many of the people in prison was in keeping with the
methods employed by the Japanese on the Conspiracy Trial victims. The case
of a little shoe boy aroused special indignation. The Japanese thought that
he knew something about the organization of the demonstration--why they
thought so, only those who can fathom the Japanese mind would venture to
say--so they beat and burned him almost to death to make him confess. A
lady missionary examined his body afterwards. There were four scars, five
inches long, where the flesh had been seared with a red-hot iron. His hands
had swollen to twice their normal size from beating, and the dead skin lay
on the welts. He had been kicked and beaten until he fainted. Then they
threw water over him and gave him water to drink until he recovered when he
was again piled with questions and beaten with a bamboo rod until he
collapsed.
Some of those released from prison after they had satisfied the Japanese of
their innocence had dreadful tales to tell. Sixty people were confined in a
room fourteen by eight feet, where they had to stand up all the time, not
being allowed to sit or lie down. Eating and sleeping they stood leaning
against one another. The wants of nature had to be attended to by them as
they stood. The secretary of one of the mission schools was kept for seven
days in this room, as part of sixteen days' confinement, before he was
released.
A student, arrested at his house, was kept at the police station for twenty
days. Then they let him go, having found nothing against him. His bruised
body when he came out showed what he had suffered. He had been bound and a
cord around his shoulders and arms pulled tight until the breastbone was
forced forward and breathing almost stopped. Then he was beaten with a
bamboo stick on the shoulders and arms until he lost consciousness. The
bamboo stick was wrapped in paper so as to prevent the skin breaking and
bleeding. He saw another man beaten ten times into unconsciousness, and ten
times brought round; and a boy thrown down hard on the floor and stamped on
repeatedly until he lost consciousness. Those who came out were few; what
happened to those who remained within the prison must be left to the
imagination.
Despite everything, the demonstrations of the people still continued. On
March 7th the people of the villages of Po Paik and Kan, twenty miles north
of Pyeng-yang, came out practically en masse to shout for independence.
Next day four soldiers and one Korean policeman arrived, asking for the
pastor of the church. They could not find him, so they seized the
school-teacher, slashed his head and body with their swords and thrust a
sword twice into his legs. An elder of the church stepped up to protest
against such treatment, whereupon a Japanese soldier ran a sword through
his side. As the soldiers left some young men threw stones at them. The
soldiers replied with rifle fire, wounding four men.
Soldiers and police came again and again to find the pastor and church
officers who had gone into hiding. On April 4th they seized the women and
demanded where their husbands were, beating them with clubs and guns, the
wife of one elder being beaten till great red bruises showed all over her
body.
The police evidently made up their minds that the Christians were
responsible for the demonstration, and they determined to rid the place of
them. The services of some liquor sellers were enlisted to induce people to
tear down the belfry of the church. On April 18th a Japanese came and
addressed the crowd through an interpreter.
He told them that the Christians had been deceived by the "foreign devils,"
who were an ignorant, low-down lot of people, and that they should be
driven out and go and live with the Americans who had corrupted them. There
was nothing in the Bible about independence and "Mansei." Three thousand
cavalry and three thousand infantry were coming to destroy all the
Christians, and if they did not drive them out but continued to live with
them, they would be shot and killed.
A number of half drunken men got together to drive out the Christians. This
was done. A report was taken to the gendarmes that the Christians had been
driven away, whereupon the villagers were praised. In other parts, near by,
the same chief of gendarmes was ordering the families of Christians out of
their homes, arresting the men and leaving the women and children to seek
refuge where they might.
Word came to some other villages in the Pyeng-yang area that the police
would visit them on April 27th, to inspect the house-cleaning. The
Christians received warning that they must look out for a hard time.
Everything was very carefully cleaned, ready for the inspection. The leader
of the church sent word to all the people to gather for early worship, so
as to be through before the police should come. But the police were there
before them, a Japanese in charge, two Korean policemen, two secretaries
and two dog killers.
The two leaders of the church were called up by the Japanese, who stepped
down and ran his fingers along the floor. "Look at this dust," he said.
Ordering the two men to sit down on the floor, he beat them with a flail,
over the shoulders.
"Do you beat an old man, seventy years old, this way?" called the older
man.
"What is seventy years, you rascal of a Christian?" came the reply.
The police took the names of the Christians from the church roll, and went
round the village, picking them out and beating them all, men, women and
children. They killed their dogs. The non-Christians were let alone.
On the afternoon of April 4th a cordon of police and gendarmes was suddenly
picketed all around the missionary quarter in Pyeng-yang, and officials,
police and detectives made an elaborate search of the houses. Some copies
of an Independence newspaper, a bit of paper with a statement of the
numbers killed at Anju, and a copy of the program of the memorial service
were found among the papers of Dr. Moffett's secretary, and two copies of a
mimeographed notice in Korean, thin paper rolled up into a thin ball and
thrown away, were found in an outhouse. The secretary was arrested, bound,
beaten and hauled off. Other Koreans found on the premises were treated in
similar fashion. One man was knocked down, beaten and kicked on the head
several times.
Dr. Moffett and the Rev. E.M. Mowry, another American Presbyterian
missionary from Mansfield, Ohio, were ordered to the police office that
evening, and cross-examined. Dr. Moffett convinced the authorities that he
knew nothing of the independence movement and had taken no part in it (he
felt bound, as a missionary, not to take part in political affairs), but
Mr. Mowry was detained on the charge of sheltering Korean agitators.
Mr. Mowry had allowed five Korean students wanted by the police to remain
in his house for two days early in March. Some of them were his students
and one was his former secretary; Mr. Mowry was a teacher at the Union
Christian College, and principal of both the boys' and girls' grammar
schools at Pyeng-yang. Mr. Mowry declared that Koreans often slept at his
house, and he had no knowledge that the police were trying to arrest these
lads.
The missionary was kept in jail for ten days. His friends were told that he
would probably be sent to Seoul for trial Then he was suddenly brought
before the Pyeng-yang court, no time being given for him to obtain counsel,
and was sentenced to six months' penal servitude. He was led away wearing
the prisoners' cap, a wicker basket, placed over the head and face.
An appeal was at once entered, and eventually the conviction was quashed,
and a new trial ordered.
- The text in this document is from a Korea-related work more than 50 years after the death of the authour and thus has entered the public domain. No modifications should be made to the text as this is the source of the work itself, not a page to be collaboratively worked on and improved.
