At a commemoration ceremony held on Thursday, Shulin District (樹林) officials in New Taipei City honored the memory of 13 Taiwanese who died in Shulin fighting the Japanese colonial government in 1895.
Shulin District Office Director Lin Yao-chang (林耀長) presided over the ceremony, at which officials and local residents burned incense and gave offerings in remembrance of the revolutionaries’ sacrifice, Lin said.
China ceded Taiwan to Japan in 1895 after losing the First Sino-Japanese War, and groups of Taiwanese fighters took up arms against the incoming Japanese imperialists, Lin said.
In 1895, on the 21st day of the fifth month on the lunar calendar, a group of armed Taiwanese raided a Japanese military supply train in Shulin and destroyed the railway to sabotage the Japanese supply line running from Taipei to Hsinchu, Lin said.
The Japanese army mounted a counterattack on the first day of the sixth month of the lunar calendar, killing 13 people and setting fire to local villages in retaliation, Lin said.
Villagers rebuilt the graveyard where the 13 fighters were buried and in 1948 erected a memorial column to honor their sacrifice, with the site designated a municipal historic site in 2008, Lin said.
Shulin District Office division head Lee Tien-min (李天民) said that the office holds a memorial service each year, with the ceremony on Thursday marking the 121st anniversary of the death of the 13.
Graveyard manager Hsu Ching-wan (許進旺) said the graves of the fighters have seen a steady stream of people paying their respects, and although four of the 13 people killed in the engagement have remained unidentified, the descendents of the other nine often visit the site and pay tribute to their ancestors.
The graveyard has a tombstone dedicated to the fighters which is inscribed with the words: “The spirit will never die,” alongside a tall monument and an introductory plaque, Hsu said.
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