Virginia citizen. (Irvington, Va.) 1891-1921, 1904-08-26
SUICIDE THAT THRILLS.
Hara-Kari by Japs on Sinking
Transport Inspires Army
and Navy.

Hara-karf by Japs on Sinking
Transport Inspires Army
ana Navy
So infinitesimal is the number OF
prisoners taken by the Russians
since the outbreak of the present
conflict that people here and in Eu-
rope, ignorant of the Jappanese
character, have assumed that the
Muscovite troops were granting no
quarter, but this is net so. If the
Russians have so few prisoners-and
these all of them men badly wounded
1T is not that the Cars soldiers
refrain from giving quarter, but be-
cause the Japanese refuse to accept
it, preferring death by their own
hands to the disgrace of surrender
For surrender save in certain excep-
tional cases, such as that of be-
sieged town or when wounded, is, ac-
cording to their military ethics, dis
honorable.
Napoleon, when he assumed COM
mand Of the army of Italy in 1895,
issued a memorable order forbidding
any one to lay down his arms under
pain of death. Generals, officers,
and soldiers" he writes, "who in
battle save their lives by capitulation
should be shot. Both he who orders
surrender and those who obey the
commands are traitors alike and de-
serve capital punishment" These
doctrines are embodied 10y most mill.
tary nations, civilized as we'll as bar
barous, in their articles of war,
which calls for court-martisls in
every instance of the laying down of
arins, s,and, while among the W bite races
u greater degree of laxity prevails
nowadays in these matters than fifty
aud hundred years ago, yet among
the japanese the old time principles
are held in as high regard as ever, and
they prefer to take their own lives
rather than to allow themselves to
be captured by the enemy.
Prince Jaime relates in letter re-
Gently received that when, after an
attempt to bottle up Port Arthur, he
steamed out in a launch to rescue
several Japanese who were clinging
to the rigging of the fireships sunk
in the roadstead, the men, one after
another, blew out their brains with
their reyolyers or ripped open their
stomachs with their knives, throwing
themselves into the sea rather than
permit themselves to be taken pris-
oners. .f.t
Moreover, in the graphic accounts
of the sinking of the Japanese trans
port Kinshu Maru off the Corean
coast by the Vladivostok squadron,
it is related how the troops on board,
several hundred in number, having
refused to surrender, and resisted
with rifle Gre an attempt to board the
ship, committed suicide while the
vessel was being torpedoed. The
officers and a number of the men
who belonged TO the Samurai class
destroyed themselves by means of
hara-kari, that is by cutting their
stomachs open with their swords or
knives, while the others, presumably
of lower order in the social scale
either blew ont their brains with
their rifles or shot one another
This took place on deck in full view
of the Russian fleet, and it was not
until third torpedo had been fired
that the sinking of the Kinshu Mara
put an end to the extraordinary
scene.
Several of the soldiers who had
baen plunged into tine sea by the
fonndering of the vessel before hav-
ing had time to kill themselves were
dragged on board boat on which
the English officers of the transport
had sought refuge and as no attempt
was made by the Russians to molesl
them they reached land in safety
AS soon as possible they notified the
military authorities at Gensan OF
the fate of the transport and ask ed
permission now that they had accom-.
plished the duty imposed upon them
of supplying information, to follow
the example of their comrades and to
destroy themselves, declaring that
all the troops on board when they
found their ship surrounded by the
Russian fleet had taken solemn
pledge to kill themselves.
The story Of the death of the
troops and of their officers on board
the Kinshu Maru sent thrill of
admiration throughout the entire
Japanese nation. served to give a
timely inspiration to the army in
the field, and was constructed as u
silent but eloquent assurance that
Japan could trust her honor TO the
the keeping of her'soldiers. 1t was felt
that they had rendered service to
their country by the national spirit
shown in the manner of their death.
that death by Hara-kari, which
the princes, great mobiles, and Sam
urai of Japan have for 500 years
and more preferred to dishonor.
Some years ago project was
brought forward in the Legislature at
Toxic advocating the abolition of
the practice of hara kari. or seppuku,
as it Is more commonly called in
Japan. During the debate IL was