He is the Founding Father of Korea
However, he was assassinated on the streets of Changsha
When life hangs in the balance
Chiang Kai-shek urgently sent a telegram to Changsha to rescue him with all his might
Behind the earth-shattering murder
What kind of historical situation is it?
On the south side of Xiangchun Road in Changsha's Kaifu District, there is an old alley called Xiyuan Beili, which is one of the six major mansion clusters in Changsha, in other words, decades ago, the people who lived here were some leading figures.
Nowadays, few people know that at the corner of the north side of the West Garden, it is the former site of the Korean Provisional Government, and a Korean founding father almost died there.
The former site of the Korean Provisional Government in The North Garden of Changsha West Park
The legendary assassination of Changsha
Every city has a legend, the most vivid annual ring is to witness the legendary architecture, if not recorded, left to posterity, only the legend of nothingness.
This is the north mile of the West Garden, which changsha cultural department calls "one of the six major mansion clusters in Changsha". Times have changed, and most of the old buildings here no longer exist, only vaguely revealing the rings of history.
Nanmu Hall is located not far from the north side of the West Park, a small alley. In the bustling footsteps of the city, this alley still loses its usual tranquility and serenity.
In front of the courtyard, which has been listed as a cultural relics protection unit in Changsha, the nameplate at the door quietly waits for a thrilling story, because this story is related to the fate of a country.
Several gunshots rang out late at night on May 6, 1938, and this quaint building went down in history.
On this evening, the main members of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, which had been persisting in the anti-Japanese struggle and striving for national independence, were holding a meeting on the second floor, and the topic of the meeting was the three-party alliance and the formation of a united front to better lead the Korean people to resist Japan. Just as the meeting was halfway through, an accident occurred.
A man suddenly burst in the conference room, raised his gun, and fired several shots at the people present.
Four people were shot. One was Kim Joo, and the other three were important members of the Korean Revolutionary Party, Lee Sung-sung, Hyun Yeo-chol, and Yoo Dong-yue. Xuan Yizhe died on his way to the hospital.
The four people who were spattered in the bloody scene of the assassination were all important leading members of the Korean independence movement, and the terrible consequences of this terrorist incident are self-evident.
But what makes future generations wonder is, why did this incident occur? And what are the details? The parties do not have exhaustive records.
In the autobiography of one of the bombers, Chairman of the Provisional Government, Kim Khwang, we only see the following text:
I also attended a dinner party at the Nammun Hall, the headquarters of the Korean Revolutionary Party, on May 6.
But when I regained consciousness, I found myself in the hospital.
- Bai Fan Yizhi (Memoirs of Jin Jiu)
After the shooting, the people of Changsha realized that there was such a special person living next to them, in this inconspicuous alley.
However, what people don't understand is, when did such a big person come to Changsha? Why did a South Korean "father of the nation" appear in China during a period of war?
Changsha West Park North Mile
In the face of such a major and confusing historical event, scholars of later generations can only speculate from a variety of possibilities due to the lack of research data. South Korean historians have also done a lot of research on the motives of the murderer's assassination, but they have not been able to reach a consensus.
Who is murdering the leading figures of the Korean independence movement? Is it a Japanese spy, or some other mysterious force?
Because it was the Sino-Japanese War, people first turned their suspicious eyes to the Japanese spy organization.
For a long time, Kim 9 and others have opposed Japan's colonial rule over the Korean Peninsula and advocated national independence, which has undoubtedly touched Japan's sensitive nerves. More remarkably, Kim Joo himself was the leader of the South Korean assassination group Patriotic League, whose target was the invincible Japanese occupiers.
So is the assassination of Jinjiu a retaliation by the Japanese?
Kim 9, "Father of the Nation of Korea": Carry out revolution in a foreign country, and establish a Provisional Government of Korea in China
Guo Hanmin, a professor at Xiangtan University, believes that this is a ghost committed by the Japanese, and there are two pieces of evidence.
One piece of evidence comes from Kim Wako-san, who said that Park Chang had long been in collusion with the Japanese authorities and was a Japanese agent, and that he had taken this opportunity to send Lee Yun-han to kill Kim-joo, which was a Korean traitor who had colluded with Japan.
Another piece of evidence is that in the 1980s, Jin Jiu's son, General Jin Xin, once told Hu Chenggui that Li Yunhan's motive for assassination was to be supported and directed by Japanese money. Mr. Hu Chenggui was one of the first Taiwanese scholars to study the Korean independence movement.
The providers of these two theories were Jin Ruoshan, a comrade of Jin Jiu, and Jin Xin, the son of Jin Jiu, but Jin Ruoshan was not in Changsha at the time; and Jin Xin was only a teenager at that time. How high is the credibility of what the two of them are talking about?
The chairman of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, Kim Joo, was assassinated in Changsha, and the number one suspect was first targeted at the Japanese who had a feud with Kim Joo.
As early as January 9, 1932, an explosive news piece shook the whole of China.
It turned out that just the day before, Emperor Hirohito of Japan was assassinated on his way back to the Imperial Palace after participating in the Japanese Army Parade. The assassin was Lee Bong-chang, a member of the Korean Patriotic League formed by Kim Joo.
As Hirohito's black sedan drove in front of Lee Bong-chang, he suddenly jumped up and threw a grenade at Hirohito's car, but it was a carriage that blew up behind him. Li Bongchang did not hesitate and then threw a second grenade, but unfortunately, the grenade that accurately hit Hirohito's car turned out to be a dud. Lee Bong-chang was subsequently arrested and sacrificed heroically, and was respected and loved by all the Korean people.
Memoirs of Jin Jiu
The next day, the Ta Kung Pao, the Qingdao Republic of China Daily, and other newspapers invariably adopted the same headline, "Lee Bong-chang, a Korean, sniped at the Japanese Emperor for misfortune."
The Japanese became angry and either destroyed or put pressure on the Chinese Nationalist government to forcibly shut down the Chinese newspaper that published the news. But the concessions of the Chinese Nationalist government did not buy the peace it wanted.
20 days later, the "one, two eight" incidents that shocked the world broke out.
Jin Jiu wrote afterwards:
Li Fengchang's sniping at the Japanese emperor and Chinese's comments on the matter of "unfortunate mismatch" were also one of the reasons for the war.
- Bai Fan Yizhi (Memoirs of Jin Jiu)
In this local war of disparity in strength, the Japanese army gained the upper hand. But what they didn't expect was that the sword of vengeance had quietly stabbed in.
Jin Jiu and Yin Fengji take a group photo
This is a photograph taken on April 26, 1932, where the man with sorrow written between his eyebrows is The mastermind of the assassination of Emperor Hirohito, Kim Joo, and the smiling and spirited man on the right is The newly joined member of the organization, Yoon Bong-gil.
This is a heart-pounding photo, and at this time, Jin Jiu's heart must be full of contradictions: for the sake of national righteousness, he will endure the pain to send the young man around him to a road of no return; also for the sake of national righteousness, Yin Fengji, who was originally youthful and radiant, will generously go to righteousness.
Three days later, with a loud noise in Shanghai's Hongkou Park, the commander-in-chief of the Japanese Shanghai Dispatch Army and the Japanese Army general Yoshinori Shirakawa were seriously injured, and a month later, Shirakawa was ordered to return to the Western Heavens.
Kim-joo finds Yoon Bong-gi, a young South Korean living in exile in Shanghai, and goes to carry out an assassination attempt
Unexpectedly, Jin Jiu then issued a statement through the British Reuters agency, admitting to the world that he was the mastermind of the two assassinations in Tokyo and Shanghai.
Suddenly, the whole world was shocked.
Golden Nine
Since then, the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, headed by Kim Joo, has received the full support of Korean overseas Chinese all over the world, but he has since become a thorn in the eyes and a thorn in the flesh of the Japanese, and he will want to get rid of it quickly.
Under the covert protection of the Chinese Nationalist Government, Jin Jiu led the Korean Provisional Government to evacuate Shanghai safely, and successively traveled to Jiaxing, Nanjing, and Hankou, arriving in Changsha in November 1937, where he was warmly welcomed by the people of Hunan.
For Changsha, these Korean national elites are no strangers.
As early as the period of the May Fourth Movement, there were Korean volunteers active in Changsha. At that time, Comrade Mao Zedong was founding the Jiusan Society in Hunan, Hunan Self-study University, and we also cooperated with them at that time.
This is the former site of Chuanshan College near Xiaowumen in Changsha.
100 years ago, in 1921, Hwang Won-hee, Lee Eun-woo, Lee Ki-chang and others of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea established the Changsha Sino-Korean Mutual Aid Society here, and thus began the friendship between the two peoples to help each other and jointly oppose aggression.
What few people know is that the director of the communications department of this mutual aid society was None other than Mao Zedong, who was 28 years old at the time.
Sixteen years later, in 1937, Changsha, a city that also loved peppers and kimchi, once again dispelled the hardships of the Exile of Korean heroes with abundant products and fiery enthusiasm, making them feel as if they had returned to their warm hometown.
Mr. Kim Joo, then Chairman of the Provisional Government of the Republic of Korea, wrote in his autobiography:
More than 100 of our extended families moved to Changsha, where they were cared for by the Chinese central government and assisted by their compatriots in the United States. In particular, Changsha is rich in products and cheap prices, and the newly arrived chairman of Hunan Province, General Zhang Zhizhong, is very familiar with me, so it has given us a lot of convenience.
Kim 9, the father of the Korean nation
In Changsha, Jin Jiu, who has been living a sloppy life, enjoyed the most joyful time in his life.
He wrote in his autobiography:
I served my mother and began to live a happy life again, eating the food and drink made by my mother.
However, with the sound of gunfire on the night of May 6, 1938, this happy time came to an abrupt end.
The earth-shattering assassination took place.
Interestingly, the biggest suspect in the assassination, the Japanese intelligence organization, also released an investigation report on the assassination at the first time.
Japanese spies also conducted a so-called investigation into the incident. South Korea's Donations from Korean Overseas Chinese, and the Chinese Government, have also provided him with financial support, and how these funds are distributed among the more than 100 people in South Korea. The Japanese side's saying is that the distribution of the golden nine is uneven, and for some people, it is ten yuan a month and five yuan for children. For the other group of people, some people have seven dollars a month and small children three dollars and five dollars. Many people are very angry, so they have caused internal contradictions and conflicts, and some people want to kill him.
The Japanese investigation report, on the other hand, looks more like a joke about watching the fire from across the shore and schadenfreude, and its credibility is almost zero. In the eyes of his Korean compatriots, Kim Joo is a very trustworthy person.
Kim Joo is known as the founding father of Korea and has spent his life fighting for Korea's independence.
There were more than 100 people brought to Hunan by Mr. Jin Jiu, who also needed money for meals and activities, and they were very difficult at that time. Even Mr. Jinjiu's mother had to go outside to beg. So in South Korea, a sculpture in front of Mr. Kim Joo's memorial hall is Kim Joo's mother holding a crutch and a begging bowl, the image of a begging old lady, supporting the great struggle of the Korean people with her own actions. Many people were touched by Mr. Jin Jiu's mother.
Time still goes back in time. After the shooting, Jin Jiu and other wounded were rushed to the nearby Xiangya Hospital.
Xuan Yizhe died on the way to the hospital, Jin Jiu has been in a coma, and Li Qingtian and Liu Dongyue have also been seriously injured.
Chiang Kai-shek was commanding the Battle of Wuhan at that time, and his military affairs were very busy, but he also sent three telegrams in a row, instructing the Hunan Provincial Government to attach great importance to this matter and expressing his condolences to Mr. Jin Jiu. At that time, the chairman of the Hunan Provincial Government was Zhang Zhizhen, who came to the hospital to visit him and instructed him to be treated at all costs, and all the expenses were paid by the Hunan Provincial Government.
At the same time, the Changsha police launched an all-out investigation into the murder.
According to the clues, the Changsha police quickly locked the murderer and began a citywide search.
A train going north in Changsha had not yet left Changsha, but it was driving back, and the murderer on the train who was preparing to flee north was arrested and arrested.
To the astonishment of the people of Changsha, this murderer turned out to be Kim Jiu's Korean compatriot, Li Yunhan.
Jin Jiu's calligraphy works
So why did Li Yunhan assassinate Jin Jiu?
Korean historians have done a lot of research and have not come to a consensus. Some scholars believe that it was caused by some disputes and disputes within the Korean exiles at that time, and Li Yunhan only listened to gossip and was indignant.
However, the long history is like a fog, and such an analysis is only the words of one's own family. Why Li Yunhan assassinated Jin Jiu is still a topic of discussion among later scholars.
A month later, Jin Jiu recovered and was discharged from the hospital, and the first thing he did was to rush to his home to comfort his old mother.
He later recalled:
She saw me and said, "I know God will bless you, and evil doesn't suppress righteousness!" Unfortunately, Lee Yun-han is also Korean, and you are better off being shot and killed by the Japanese.
Cannibalism is the same root, and it is urgent to fry each other. The sadness and indignation on the old man's face overflowed into words.
Yet history is so merciless.
Jin Jiu was assassinated
On June 26, 1949, Kim Joo, who advocated the reunification of the Korean Peninsula and was beloved by the South Korean people, was assassinated at the age of 73 at his home in Seoul.
Exactly one year later, on June 25, 1950, the Korean War broke out...
He was the founding father of South Korea and spent 27 years in exile in China.
In 2001, a group of five members from the South Korean Government's Inspection Office, led by Liang Xiaojin, an expert in Changsha's literature and history, went to Changsha's Xiyuan Beili and Nanmu Hall to visit and investigate the assassination of Kim Jiu that year. This dusty history for many years has also been gradually understood by people during this visit. Who has ever thought that this Korean national hero who has been in exile in China for 26 years has ever imagined that in this old street in Changsha, there is such a thrilling escape from death.
Mr. Kim Joo, a Korean national hero
The story of Changsha's legendary old street begins here.