Yun Bong-gil bought a pocket watch at a store in the French Concession of Shanghai one day in April 1932. The 24-year-old Korean exile spent nearly all his money for the purchase, keeping only a couple of Chinese banknotes in his wallet.

The following morning on April 29, he had breakfast with “Baekbeom” Kim Gu, head of the Korean provisional government in Shanghai, at the house of another Korean expatriate. After eating, Yun asked Kim to exchange their watches. “Sir, my watch is a rather expensive one, which cost six yuan. But I will not need this after an hour. Your old watch looks worth only two yuan. So, take this and give yours to me, please!”

The leader understood what this young man had in mind. He wanted to keep something from Kim on his last journey. With Kim’s watch in his pocket, Yun went directly to Hongkow Park where the Japanese military and residents were holding a ceremony celebrating Emperor Hirohito’s birthday and victory in the invasion of Shanghai. Yun threw a bomb in the shape of a water canteen to the stage. Gen. Shirakawa, commander of all Japanese forces in China, was fatally wounded, and several other military and civilian officials were killed or maimed in what was recorded as one of the most spectacular anti-Japanese actions in Korea’s modern history.

The two watches have been preserved separately. Kim Gu carried Yun’s watch until his death in 1949 and it is now on display at the Baekbeom Memorial Hall in Seoul. Baekbeom’s watch in Yun’s possession was seized by the Japanese and was delivered to his family in Yesan after his execution. It is being kept at Chungeuisa Shrine in Yun’s hometown of Yesan. Caretakers of the two watches, which both were officially designated as “treasures,” occasionally display them together as if to symbolize the two patriots meeting in heaven.

On the 80th anniversary of Yun’s bombing, commemorative events were held at three places ― Maeheon Hall in Seoul, Chungeuisa in Yesan, and Lushin Park in Shanghai, the former Hongkow Park. President Lee Myung-bak and Saenuri Party Emergency Committee head Park Geun-hye sent wreaths to the memorial hall in Seoul, but flowers from no other politicians were seen.

On a visit to Maeheon Hall, I was moved by Yun’s letters to his family and calligraphic works revealing his love of the nation. One piece in Chinese letters written upon his departure for China said: “Man leaving home for a mission never returns home alive.” Faint blown-up pictures show how the hero died.

As a Christian, I was particularly shocked by the pictures of his execution on Dec. 19, 1932 at a military compound in Kanazawa, Japan. The executioners tied him to a cross like Jesus Christ. In the last of the sequence of pictures, a round spot is seen in the center of the patriot’s forehead above the blindfold. One wonders whether it was a mark for the firing squad or the fatal wound from the shooting.

Yun was buried in a corner of the compound. After the war, the burial site was confirmed and his remains were moved home ― along with the staff of the cross ― in spring 1946. After a national funeral, he was laid to rest at the Three Patriots’ Graveyard in Hyochang Park in Seoul alongside the tombs of independence fighters Baek Jeong-ky and Lee Bong-chang.

Three years ago, the government and civic groups commemorated the centenary of Ahn Jung-geun’s assassination of Ito Hirobumi, the mastermind of Japan’s colonization of Korea, at Harbin station in 1909. These anniversary events help the posterity remember the acts of the patriots. However, ceremonies have turned perfunctory as the passage of time obscured the meaning of their sacrifice in today’s life.

The media usually carried articles on how much people knew about Yun Bong-gil or Ahn Jung-geun when the anniversaries of their feats came. Busy with the aftermath of the April 11 general elections and corruption cases involving presidential aides these days, they skipped such surveys this year. But, any questionnaire should have revealed a fast declining knowledge and interest not only among young students but adults.

Korea earned liberation from 35 years of Japanese colonial rule as a result of Japan’s surrender in World War II. Korean independence movements started late in the 19th century when Japan and other foreign powers were competing to gain control of the Korean Peninsula, yet the passive nature of liberation in 1945 diluted the effect of Koreans’ own independence efforts such as those of Yun, Ahn and numerous other fighters at home and abroad.

Yun’s bombing came 13 years after the “Samil” (March 1, 1919) nationwide uprising. Koreans were losing hope as the Japanese imperial power continued to surge in Asia. Yun’s action rekindled the Korean independence spirit and inflamed Chinese animosity against the Japanese encroachment. Chiang Kai-shek praised Yun for “doing what the 400 million Chinese and their 1 million armed forces could not do.”

Yun was no simple resistance fighter or a revolutionary but a man of great ideals. The young Bong-gil quit going to school when Japanese teachers came for colonial education and he studied by himself with books. He taught peasants’ children how to become productive farmers. He then changed his course of serving the nation to take on the Japanese in the broader world.

His writings say: “Why people live? It is to achieve their ideals. Water blooms flowers and trees produce fruits. I have decided to bloom the flower of my ideals and produce my own fruits. The youth finds love that is bigger and stronger than the love to the parents, to brothers and to wife and children. I have chosen this mission as I decided to follow this great love, away from the hills and streams here and my loving parents.”

Leaving home in 1930 at the age of 22, he wrote a note to his infant children who he called little soldiers of Joseon: “If you have blood and bones, you must devote yourself to the Joseon nation as courageous fighters under the Taegeuk flag. Then you sprinkle a cup of liquor on the empty tomb of mine and never feel sorrow for having no father around.”

A stone monument has been erected at “Maewon,” or Plum Garden, established in Lushin Park in memory of Yun. An English sign says that it was built to record the historical event that happened there, “as both a reminder of the past and a prayer for peace.” Yun Bong-gil, Ahn Jung-geun and Kim Gu are thanked for teaching their posterity pure love of nation and driving them toward a strong quest for peace for the future.

By Kim Myong-sik

Kim Myong-sik, a career journalist, was an editorial writer for The Korea Herald until recently. This article was contributed on the 80th anniversary of Yun Bong-gil’s Shanghai bombing. ― Ed.