Mr. Dun to Mr. Gresham.

No. 88.]

Sir: You have doubtless seen a telegram from Mr. James Creelman, dated Yokohama, December 11, to the New York World, giving an account of what occurred at Port Arthur after the capture of that place by General Oyama’s forces on the 21st of November last. That telegram was retransmitted from New York to Viscount Mutsu, His Imperial Japanese Majesty’s minister for foreign affairs, who has sent a; copy of it to me. I have also heard from Mr. Creelman’s lips his account of the capture of Port Arthur and of what took place immediately after the capture.

Viscount Mutsu returned to Tokyo from Hiroshima on the 15th instant. On that day I sought and obtained an interview with him and related to him the terrible story of the massacre at Port Arthur as I heard it from Mr. Greelman, and asked him if he desired to make any statement in regard to it. Viscount Mutsu replied that a searching investigation had been ordered by his Government to ascertain just what had occurred at Port Arthur; that until the result of that investigation was made known to him, he could not make an exact statement of what occurred; but he said to me frankly that the Japanese Government and people recognized and deplored the fact that a much greater number of Chinese soldiers had been killed at Port Arthur than was necessary; that the Japanese officers and men were maddened by the atrocities committed upon their comrades who had fallen into the hands of the Chinese, and that when Port Arthur was entered by the Japanese troops but little mercy was shown. But, he said, there were but few noncombatants in Port Arthur when it was taken, the peaceful inhabitants of the plate having fled days before, and if others than Chinese soldiers were killed by the Japanese, it was by accident, and owing to the impossibility of distinguishing peaceful citizens from the soldiers, who had discarded their uniforms and donned the garb of citizens after the fortifications were taken.

Viscount Mutsu characterized Mr. Creelman’s telegram to The World as a gross exaggeration of the truth, sensational in the extreme, and tending to work great injury and injustice to Japan in the eyes of the civilized world.

I have the honor to inclose herewith a copy of a written statement of the affair at Port Arthur, sent to me by Viscount Mutsu on the 19th instant.

I have received no official report from Lieutenant O’Brien, military attaché of this legation, who was also present at the taking of Port Arthur. In a personal letter dated Kin-chou, China, December 3, 1894, received by me from that gentleman, the only reference that he makes to the subject of this dispatch is that “A great many more Chinese have been killed than there was any real need for.”

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Such are the facts relating to this deplorable incident of war that I am able to submit for your information. It appears to me it is clear that the slaughter of Chinese soldiers at Port Arthur can not be justified by any rules governing the usages of modern civilized warfare (if the term “civilized” can be properly applied to war), but that the account sent to The World by Mr. Creelman is sensational in the extreme and a gross exaggeration of what occurred.

Since writing the above I have received the Japan Mail of to-day’s date, from the columns of which I have clipped the editorial inclosed herewith, entitled “The Port Arthur affair.”

I have, etc.,

Edwin Dun.
[Inclosure 1 in No. 88.]

There is no question as to the fact that there was more blood shed at Port Arthur than at any other place, and perhaps more than was absolutely necessary; but reports sent abroad by foreign correspondents, especially by the reporter of The World, are greatly exaggerated and highly colored, so as to give sensational effect. At the fall of Port Arthur Chinese soldiers, seeing that open resistance was futile, discarded their military uniforms, and, putting on citizens dress, disguised themselves as peaceful inhabitants of the place, and betook themselves to the vacant houses of the town which the real peaceful inhabitants had quitted some days previous to the attack thereon by the Japanese army. This is the more evident, since the real inhabitants returned to Port Arthur and their homes after peace and order were restored. The Chinese soldiers, while thus disguising themselves, secretly carried arms, and, as they were not accustomed to giving quarter to their enemies and were afraid of being killed in case they surrendered, hid themselves in all sorts of disguise, and when at last they were discovered by the Japanese offered resistance and fought to the last. Some of the peaceful inhabitants who had not left the place before the battle were said to have been ordered to fire and resist, which they did; but most of those found killed at Port Arthur proved to be soldiers in disguise. This is shown from the fact that almost ah the corpses found had on them some articles of Chinese military dress inside the outer garments.

One of the foreign correspondents has said that, as most of the killed at Port Arthur bore sword-cut wounds, they presented a more horrible spectacle than if they had received bullet wounds. This may be one of the causes that led some foreigners to exaggerate the facts. The, Japanese soldiers were greatly excited by the sight of the fearfully mutilated bodies of their comrades who had been taken prisoners by the Chinese; some of whom had been burnt alive, while others had been crucified. In spite of this the Japanese preserved discipline, and none of those who peacefully surrendered themselves were either killed or maltreated, and about 355 Chinese prisoners who were taken at the fall of Port Arthur have been kindly treated, and are being brought to Tokyo, where they will arrive in a few days.

[Inclosure 2 in No. 88.—From The Japan Daily Mail, Yokohama, December 20, 1894.]

the port arthur affair.

Doubtless the attitude of all fair-minded persons with regard to the Port Arthur affair has been one of suspended judgment. We have not as yet had any authoritative statement of what really occurred at the capture of the fortress. Newspapers have given their own versions of what war correspondents are supposed to have said, and it has been hinted that the correspondent of the New York World is about to publish revelations calculated to startle humanity. Altogether, the impression conveyed is that the behavior of the Japanese soldiers was most cruel and bloodthirsty; that they slew combatants and noncombatants without discrimination, and that they continued this fierce slaughter throughout three days following the capture. Among the four newspaper correspondents present at Port Arthur, three were wholly novel to the work they were required to record. They had never before seen anything of war, and even its ordinary incidents must have been shocking to them. Of course we do not desire to suggest that their evidence is without virtue, but the public will certainly be inclined to pay far more attention to the testimony of the [Page 87] military attachés who accompanied the, army, since they necessarily enjoyed the best opportunities of observing the operations, and were, moreover/competent to estimate them by expert standards.

One of these attaches has now returned to Tokyo, and we learn from him that the statements hitherto published by the local foreign press must be received with the greatest reservation, and very largely discounted before the residuum of truth is reached. In the first place, this observer states that the civilians, or at any rate the noncombatants, had all left the town of Port Arthur before the assault of the forts, and that a number of the soldiers had either discarded their uniforms altogether, or thrown civilian garments over them. These men, thus disguised, continues our informant, fought even more resolutely than their comrades, and subsequently escaping into the town maintained their resistance there. The result was a good deal of house-to-house fighting, in which the Japanese used their swords freely, and when a Japanese sets out to use a sword in earnest the results are often terrible. That there was unnecessary cutting down seems pretty certain, and it is very conceivable that the cuts and slashes often assumed a character suggestive of mutilation. But our informant did not see anything from which willful mutilation could fairly be inferred, and he does not believe that genuinely peaceable citizens were killed, or that if a few were killed, the thing was intentional. The sum of his opinion is that the Japanese, employing their swords and rifles under circumstances where discrimination was difficult, and in the sequel of many Chinese barbarities sufficient to have infuriated the soberest troops in the world, were doubtless guilty of excesses, but not by any means of such excesses as have been laid to their charge. Of the death of women or children he neither saw nor heard anything, and his conviction is that there were no women or children in Port Arthur at the time. Finally, he is emphatic in his denial of the allegation that undisciplined slaughter was continued through several days. The whole affair, so far as the town of Port Arthur was concerned, began and ended during the night of the 21st of November. From the following morning nothing of the kind was to be seen.

We think, it right to lay these facts before our readers. They are not conclusive, inasmuch as some of the testimony is negative, and negative testimony can not possess much weight as against positive. But they show, at all events, that the stories hitherto circulated must be received with caution, and that the public should be careful about attaching implicit credence to the allegations of writers, some of whom are proverbially disposed to take the harshest possible view of every offense charged against the Japanese, and one seems to be deliberately resolved to work up this affair into a sensation of which he himself will be the central figure.