Monument to the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre at Hanzhongmen Gate

Monument to the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre at Hanzhongmen Gate

On the afternoon of December 15, 1937, over 2,000 civilians taking refuge in the international safety zone and unarmed military police were rounded up by Japanese troops and taken to Hanzhongmen Gate, where they were machine-gunned to death. The wounded who did not die immediately were either stabbed to death with bayonets or burned alive. Their bodies were discarded in the open fields, a scene of utter horror. It was not until February 11 and 18 of the following year that the charitable organization, the Nanjing Red Cross Society, began collecting and burying the remains. A total of 1,395 corpses were interred at Guangdong Cemetery near Hanzhongmen Gate and in the area around Erdaogengzi.