Memorial Hall of the Victims in the Nanjing Massacre locates in Jiangdongmen area, which was one of the execution sites and mass burial places in the Nanjing Massacre. The memorial hall was built by local Municipal Government in 1985 to memorize the victims in the Nanjing Massacre and architecture was extended in 1995. With an area of 28,000 square meters, it is the National 4A Scenic Spot and listed as National Key Cultural Protection Relics.
About Nanjing Massacre
Nanjing has a key geographic position with profound historical background. The population extended up to 600,000 when the government of the Republic of China set up its capital in 1927.
During the World War II, the Japanese army occupied Nanjing on December 13, 1937. During the following six weeks, the Japanese army had the inhumane disgrace and bloody massacre exerted to this beautiful city. No less than 300,000 innocent Chinese civilians and unarmed Chinese soldiers were brutally slaughtered in mass. A third of the architectures, stores, residences together with their inside objects were looted and damaged by fire.
Nanjing Massacre is one of the most representative incidents and cruelest war crimes, which the Japanese invaders committed in China in history.
Exhibition areas of the memorial hall
The memorial hall was made of gray and white marbles in a solemn atmosphere. It consists of three sections: the square exhibition zone, osseous remains exhibition and historical material exhibition.
The square exhibition zone is divided into three outdoor exhibition sections, including the mourning square, memorial square and the graveyard square. The carved stone reliefs and small tablets surrounded by withered trees and cobblestones show the major sites and historical facts of the massacre. The names of the victims are carved on the marble wall, which forms a permanent record of the bloody tragedy.
The osseous remains exhibition area shows the remained bones, which were excavated from Jiangdongmen in 1985. They are exhibited in a coffin-shaped display hall. There were more than 208 bones unearthed from this ‘pits of tens of thousands bodies' in 1998. Another tomb-like exhibition hall, which is buried half underground, contains over 1000 items that illustrate the historic tragedy.
The historical material exhibition area shows the inhuman crimes which the Japanese troops ever committed in Nanjing during the World WarⅡ. Paintings, sculptures, display cabinets, multimedia screens and documentary films all remind the visitors of the crimes of the Japanese troops in history.