Kawai Yoshitora
Yoshitora Kawai | |
|---|---|
 Photo of Kawai from an Asahi Shinbun article reporting the Kameido Incident, 12 October 1923 | |
| Born | 18 July 1902 |
| Died | 4 September 1923 (aged 21) Komeido-Chō, Minami Katsushika-gun, Tōkyō, Empire of Japan |
Cause of death | Assassination |
Yoshitora Kawai (Japanese: 川合 義虎; 1902–1923) was a Japanese communist activist involved with many Tokyo-based political groups.
Kawai attended Honzan hospital's nurse training school, but moved to Tokyo's Kameido district in September 1920 after being exposed to socialism by a professor, Oka-sensei. He was a member of Gyōminkai (Enlightened People's Society), a communist study group, and joined the Nankatsu Labor Union alongside Tanno Setsu. In March 1923, Kawai created the Tokyo Communist Youth League, the first instance of a Japanese group openly labeling themselves as communists.[1] During the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake, Kawai was reported as having rescued three children who had been trapped under a collapsed house.[2] Amidst the chaos of the earthquake's aftermath, he was captured on 2 September 1923, and a few days later, was killed by police in prison during the Kameido Incident.[1][3]
References
- 1 2 Hane, Mikiso (1988). Reflections on the Way to the Gallows. Pantheon Books. ISBN 978-0520084216.
- ↑ "Hidden history behind 1923 quake: communists killed by power". Japan Press Weekly. Retrieved 16 February 2019.
- ↑ Andrew Gordon (21 January 1991). Labor and Imperial Democracy in Prewar Japan. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-06783-7.