Academia Historica on Saturday released a collection of historical records on the military crackdown against civilian protests in Keelung to mark the 76th anniversary of the 228 Incident.
The latest volume was mainly sourced from the archives originally held by the Keelung government, and is the 30th addition to the collected files of the 228 Incident the institution has published since 2002, Academia Historica president Chen Yi-shen (陳儀深) said at the book launch event.
The 228 Incident, also known as the 228 Massacre, refers to a crackdown launched by the then-Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) regime against civilian demonstrators following an incident in Taipei on Feb. 27, 1947.
Photo: Fang Pin-chao, Taipei Times
The estimated number of people killed during the subsequent government crackdown ranges from 18,000 to 28,000, many of them members of the intellectual elite, according to a government report published in 1992.
The crackdown, which lasted into early May 1947, also marked the beginning of the White Terror era that saw thousands of people arrested, imprisoned or executed.
The archives cover the Keelung protest, which began on March 8, 1947, when the regime’s Nationalist forces landed in the city to quell the uprisings.
The documents show how civilians became victims during the military crackdown, corroborating some victims’ oral histories, Chen said.
Among the historians was Chang Yen-hsien (張炎憲), the president of Academia Historica from 2000 to 2008, whose interviews with survivors of the crackdown in Keelung contained stories that were nowhere to be found in official archives, he said.
Lin Mu-chi (林木杞), a survivor of the crackdown, told Chang that he was strung with wires by his hands and feet to eight other people, and that soldiers took them to the bay one by one and shot them.
Lin recounted that he managed to break free and hide for 10 days before returning home, Chen said.
Academia Historica is continuing to compile historical archives for publication, hoping to piece together a more focused historical picture of the 228 Incident and provide further research materials for 228 studies, Chen said.
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