Nanjing Massacre Museum

12. Plaque on Memorial Stone

The Japanese soldiers raped an estimated 20,000 women during the six weeks of the Nanjing Massacre and most were brutally killed afterwards. The Japanese soldiers even raped girls less than ten years old, women over seventy years old, pregnant women, and nuns. Rampant raping took place in the streets or at religious worshiping places during the day. Many women were gang raped. Some Japanese even forced fathers to rape their daughters, sons to rape their mothers, etc. Those who resisted were killed immediately.

When the Japanese were approaching Nanjing in mid-November, a group of concerned foreigners formed an international rescue committee to establish a safety zone in an attempt to protect the refugees. The safety zone was located inside the city and consisted of more than twenty refugee camps, each of which accommodated from 200 to 12,000 people. During the six weeks of the Nanjing Massacre, the Japanese frequently entered the safety zone to arrest young men. Every time, several hundred young men were arrested and executed on the site.