The March 1st Movement was a watershed event in modern Korean history and is still an influential item in today’s Korean society.

It is also an item that gets bandied about in the expat K-blogsphere from time to time — with different camps arguing its importance and meaning — especially whether it is part of a strong resistance to Japanese rule or more of an unusual note in a long line of basically weak/non-resistance.

For myself, I don’t really care about that discussion: how much or little Korean society at the time fought back against colonial rule. Really, it doesn’t interest me much at all…

I like the news archives — looking at primary source material from historical events — getting a window into what people thought and knew or thought they knew at the time at hand. The March 1st Movement was a big event in Korean history, and that is why I’m looking at it:

11 April: American Missionary is Arrested in Korea

The State Department has been advised of the arrest of the Rev. Eli Miller Mowry, a Presbyterian missionary at Pyeng Yang, Korea, on a charge preferred by the Japanese authorities that he was aiding and abetting the Korean independence propagandists.

13 April: Fighting Spreads All Over Korea

Most of these articles are datelined Tokyo…

The uprisings in Korea are spreading and threaten to engulf the whole peninsula, says an official statement from the Japanese Government today. There have been serious riots in the last three days in hundreds of places. A number of policemen have been killed and several police stations and Post Offices destroyed.

“The fact that the situation has grown worse may be attributed chiefly to the activities of Koreans abroad, especially in Vladivostok, who seek to propagate Bolshevism in Korea and then in Japan.

This article has a 2nd entry – datelined San Francisco:

Japanese began what was described as a “massacre” in Korea at Seoul, the capital during a demonstration on March 28 according to a cablegram received here today by the Korean National Association from a native Christian pastor.

The cablegram is from Shanghai based on reporting from the group’s member in Seoul.

“Japan began massacring in Korea. Over thousand unarmed people killed in Seoul during three hours’ demonstration the 28th.

…Churches, schools, homes of leaders destroyed, women made naked and beaten before crowds, especially leader’s family, the imprisoned being severely tortured.”

“The present trouble in Korea,” said Mr. Ohta, “originated with a group of religious associations, some of which are Christian, and with certain students who, unfortunately, bewildered by political ambition, misunderstand the term “League of Nations” and misconstrued it as meaning – self ‘determination.’”

14 April: Japanese Arrest Americans in Korea

The article gives some few details about three missionaries in Pyongyang who were questioned – including the one held from the earlier article.

Later, it describes a conference on Korea held in Philadelphia including Syngman Rhee and other leaders of the Koreans in exile:

“The revolution on the part of the Koreans since the Provisional government was set up March 1 is orderly, and there is no reason for the kind of suppression the Japanese have begun,” said Mr. Chung. “It has been a passive revolution. Koreans have no weapons…. The charge that Korea is swept by Bolshevism is absolutely false.”

20 April: Prosecutor Demands Imprisonment of Missionary in Korea

The proofs of their guilt were alleged to be three copying presses, one personal letter and one copy of a newspaper: The Independent News. The missionaries arrested total eight, three being British and five American. All have been released except Mowrey.

23 April: Uncensored Account of Korea’s Revolt

This is a very long article that is worth reading in full.

An American version of the present troubles in Korea was received by The Times yesterday in the form of a memorandum written by the Rev. A. E. Armstrong, M. A., of Toronto, Assistant Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presbyterian Church in Canada, who is now in the Far East.

“(1) Missionaries and other foreigners in Korea were as ignorant about the plans of the Koreans as the Japanese themselves.

This is the same as I’ve read in several places on the March 1st Movement.

It is hard to believe a movement that sprung up all across the nation could have been organized so quietly, but it is obvious that the Japanese authorities in Korea weren’t aware of it, so I guess it could have been carried out right under the noses of the foreign Christian leaders as well, even though their Korean church members were the leaders and main body of resistance members.

“(3) Foreigners marvel at the ability and thoroughness with with which the Koreans organized and are carrying on the campaign. Even the oldest British and American citizens had no idea that the Koreans were capable of planning and conducting such a widespread rebellion.

“(4) Their methods are those of passive resistance, that no violence be used nor resistance offered to arrest.

“(5) The police are baffled in their efforts to find the leaders. Though they arrested the 33 signers of the original manifesto, yet the program continues, and the committee is unknown.

This might not seem so surprising. I can vaguely remember reading in Korean history that it had a habit of maintaining secret societies due to the nature of Confucian, East Asian kingship, much like went on in China, but you don’t get the sense in reading Korean history that they were as strong and influential as they were in China – at least from what is written in the English language history books, I can’t speak for the Korean ones.

(For our contemporary times, if I were some big shot in the US government with influence in the intelligence agencies, I’d be trying to work with/using the underground missionary (and black market) circles in North Korea to both gain information and try to prep the society for the inevitable collapse – and probably try to help speed that even up…)

The 6th point is about the system of heavy handed rule by the Japanese authorities being the same as carried out in Germany but was abolished in Europe.

(7) The tortures which the Koreans suffer at the hands of the police and gendarmes are identical with those employed in the famous conspiracy trials. I read affidavits, now on their way to the US and UK governments which made one’s blood boil…

Point 8 again brings up how the foreign community and missionaries were in the dark but adds that they might be compelled by the behavior of the Japanese authorities to take a stand:

A meeting of all the foreigners in Seoul was called for March 19, to consider what they should do. The civil authorities (who should be differentiated from the military) called a few missionaries into conference on March 9, and were told plainly how Japan had all along been alienating the Koreans and what reforms should be introduced. Mr. Usami stated that the Government intended to institute certain improvements.

Next, the author tries to predict likely outcomes:

The probable outcome will not be independence, though the Koreans have succeeded in getting the question raised in the Peace Conference. There should be the granting of long-overdue and reasonable reform measures. The Koreans should have freedom of speech, press, assembly, petition, and travel, all of which liberties – the common rights of all peoples – are denied them. They should also have a share in the administration of their country. At present even a village headman must be a Japanese. Justice should be guaranteed. A Korean cannot get justice in a Japanese court if his opponent is a Japanese.

It goes on to mention the attempts to Japanese-ize Koreans in the society.

The last bit is interesting:

It is common knowledge that Japan is extremely sensitive to international opinion. She covets the world’s good-will. She is proud of and very much wants to retain her ‘place in the sun.’ She will probably act very quickly when she knows the world’s mind about Korea.

The next article is an editorial by the NY Times that is worth a read:

[the news out of Korea]…indicates that there is a conflict between an irresistible principle and immovable facts. The facts, not seriously disputed, are that the Koreans are better off materially and intellectually under the Japanese rule than they were while independent, and most probably better off than they would be even today if they ruled themselves. The principle is the passionate desire of the Korean people for freedom, and the events of the last few weeks have shown that this is a fact quite as stubborn as any of the others.

Amazingly widespread, remarkably organized, it began as a movement of passive resistance and peaceful demonstrations, and seems to have remained so despite the harshness of repressive measures.

This is a curious item to me at the moment. When was Gandhi first actively preaching nonviolent resistance?

Gandhi first employed non-violent civil disobedience as an expatriate lawyer in South Africa, in the resident Indian community’s struggle for civil rights. After his return to India in 1915, he set about organising peasants, farmers, and urban labourers in protesting excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921… (Wikipedia)

Clicking on the link to “civil disobedience” led to:

One of its earliest massive implementations was brought about by Egyptians against the British occupation in the nonviolent 1919 Revolution^…

What I’m interested in is how or why this idea seems to have gotten so widespread a hearing back at this time of low level technology. I know Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience was published some 70 years prior, but I don’t know much about how theories related to it spread and were used before Gandhi made it so world famous, and I don’t know how early Gandhi used it and was well known for it…

I know Woodrow Wilson’s advocacy of self-determination lit a fire in the minds of many Koreans who went on to lead the anti-colonial movement, but I don’t know where or when the idea of Civil Disobedience also caught their avid attention….???…

Anyway…

Undoubtedly the greatest misfortune in recent Korean history was the assassination of the able and just Prince Ito, the first Japanese Governor, by a Korean fanatic. Ito’s system contemplated a considerable training of the Koreans in self-government and a moderate rule by the Japanese.

Here is a link to An Jung-Geun – the man who killed Ito.

The whole of the article is well worth reading. From what little I know, it seems to state the thinking that was in the majority in the American public concerning the Japanese occupation of Korea at the time. I don’t think, however you could say it was the majority opinion among Americans (and perhaps Western) expats in Korea or who had lived there for significant lengths of time — many of whom were Christian missionaries – either working to promote the religion or working in medical and higher education institutions they founded and supported.