Savior of 10000 lives during Rape of Nanking (#204, Topic J)

This noon, I attended a lecture, a progress report on the proposed Asian Pacific WWII Atrocity Museum. Initially, it was to be patterned after the Holocaust Museum and the U. S. Slaves Museum, which took 14 years to complete in the former and is projected to complete over a 20-year period in the latter. The proposed APWAM would probably cost $70+ million and need 30 years, clearly too costly and too time-consuming. Thus, the board decided to scale it down, to a park with a 48' World Peace statue at the center, surrounded by 50 monitors linked to a database. The statue will be a duplicate of the winning entry at the Normandy Peace Museum, completed in 2004 during the 60th anniversary of Normandy landing. (The winning entry was entered by a well-known artist in China, who, lucky for the APWAM, kept the copyright on the statue, and, thus, was able to donate one to this project.) The site will have various tablets honoring those who had suffered from Japanese atrocity. As to the Rape of Nanking, an important component of the project, in addition to a link in the database, several persons cited in Iris Chang's best-selling book, The Rape of Nanking, will be honored, including Chang herself. Among other honorees, one will be Minnie Vautrin, dean of studies at Ginling Women's Arts and Science College. Well covered in Chang's book (at pp 129-139, 186-7), Vautrin declined to be repatriated shortly before the Japanese invaded Nanking (now Nanjing). As a result, the American consulate gave her a U.S. flag to be placed on the campus to signify that it was U.S. property. Vautrin put the flag to good use, and allowed some 10,000 Chinese residents to occupy the camps and, thus, saved their lives. Still, she was abused by the Japanese soldiers, which "took a deeper psychic toll on her." She kept a diary (valuable to Chang's research), the last one was dated April 14, 1940, saying that "I'm about at the end of my energy." (pp 186-7) Two weeks later, she suffered a nervous breakdown, necessitating her to be repatriated to U.S. for medical attention. During the trans-Pacific voyage, she attempted several times to jump over the ship. She succeeded in taking her life on May 14, 1941. According to today's lecturer, the president of APWAM, she was upset that her God would allow such atrocity be committed -- one of her diary entries said: "Oh, God, control the cruel beastliness of the soldiers of Nanking tonight." (p 137) A sad end to a true friend of China. In particular, I appreciated her soothing words to those fortunate enough to be on her campus: "Don't you people worry. Japan will fail. China will not perish." (p 137) How prescient! We look forward to the day that your name is honored in the APWAM.