The April Revolution of South Korea - An Archive Footage (1960)

(* Note: I uploaded this video to pay a respect to the April revolution. I tried to upload this thing since April 19th,
but since there were some difficulties on YouTube and Korean government, I couldn't upload this thing until now. Koreans finally got their freedom and democracy after 30 years of struggle, but there are still lots of things to handle.)


The April Revolution, sometimes called the April 19 Revolution or April 19 Movement, was a popular uprising in April 1960, led by labor and student groups, which overthrew the autocratic First Republic of South Korea under Syngman Rhee (Korean; 이승만). It led to the peaceful resignation of Rhee and the transition to the Second Republic. The events were touched off by the discovery of a body in Masan Harbor, that of a student killed by a tear-gas shell in demonstrations against the elections of March.

During the elections of 1960, Syngman Rhee was determined to see Gibung Lee (Korean; 이기붕) elected as the independent Vice President. He ran against Chang Myon (Korean; 장면) , former ambassador to the United States during the Korean War. On March 15 Gibung Lee won the elections with an abnormally wide margin. It became clear that the vote was fraudulent and this prompted unrest among students.

On March 15, 1960, a protest against electoral corruption took place in Masan. The protest, sparked by Democratic Party members' exposure of electoral corruption, led to about a thousand residents of Masan city gathering in front of the Democratic Party Headquarters in Masan around 7:30 in the evening. As the citizens faced off against the police, the city was blacked out. The police started shooting at the people and the people responded by throwing rocks at the police.

On April 11, Ju-yul Kim(Korean; 김주열) body was found on the beach at Masan. Kim had been a student at Masan Commercial High School who had disappeared during the Masan rioting. Authorities announced that an autopsy confirmed that the cause of his death was drowning, but many rejected this explanation. Some protesters forced their way into the hospital. They found that Kim's skull had been split by a tear gas grenade which had penetrated from Kim's eyes to the back of his head. This incident became the basis of a national movement against electoral corruption on April 19th.

Later a National Assembly investigating committee found that the firing into the crowd by the police had not been intended to disperse the crowds, but rather to kill protesters. President Rhee claimed that the Communist Party had been behind the Masan protests trying to shift the focus. Then on April 28, Minister of Interior and the Chief of Security resigned taking responsibility for the Masan incident.

Citizens and students marched from Korea University to the Blue House, located about three miles away. As they marched past other universities, their numbers grew. Finally, arriving at the Presidential Mansion, the number of the students was larger than the soldiers. Rather than be overwhelmed, soldiers fired on the demonstrators who were calling for Rhees resignation. The soldiers killed 125 students before laying down their weapons. April 19 Movement refers to the demonstrations that brought down the South Korean President Syngman Rhee. At its aftermath, President Rhee stepped down from power and escaped to Hawaii, where he died five years later. The Prime Minister Gibung Lee committed suicide along with his family.

********************************************************
The Video was edited from a Korean Documentary series, "History on Moving Pictures(Korean; 영상실록)", produced by KBS in 2005.

********************************************************
The video is uploaded for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.

Category:

People & Blogs

Tags:

• The
• April
• Revolution
• South
• Korea
• 1960
• Archive
• Footage
• 사월
• 혁명
• 4.19
• 학생운동
• 의거
• Korean
• History
• Modern
• 19th
• Syngmann
• Rhee
• 이승만

[JinSuka]

you are only showing what DID happen....Passion for freedom and democracy is not a bad thing!

[cultofmao]

What about the Jeju uprising?, i only just heard about it and only because i downloaded a north Korean movie with English subtitles. Western Propaganda is far worse than what is in any communist country i feel, they hide everything that does not fit in with the way people in the west are brain washed to believe. " Workers of the world unite" red flag for all the world!

[lacris202]

@cultofmao Actually those students and citizens were quite confident about anti-communism(they wrote about it in their declerations). Only 10 years had passed after Northern Commnist Regime invaded and destroyed the homeland... This revolution was about regaining democracy, not a class war.

[mmatei0]

The beginning of Military Dictatorship in Korea?!

[AnglesM888]

It is amasing that how people are manipulated again and again!! Remember over 90% of the past revolutions have been highjacked by the so called elite or people in power. People are mostly the biggest losers because they refuse to use their brains insted of their hands and legs...SAD very sad...:-(

[gabsylv]

@marxian00 The same is true in the United States. But I'm saying that the availability of Marxist scholarship itself in teh South is an important differentiating factor.

[gabsylv]

@tonilourdes In terms of the socialist movement during the colonial period, perhaps the North is more "accurate", But by and large it's history serving the state in both Koreas, I guess what I'm saying is that there are more diverse options in the South, that is, among nationalisms. And the important contributions of early Japanese scholars and present day global scholarships are not *entirely* ignored in the South.

[gabsylv]

@TheMightySoo  Unfortunately, your ancestors, like all of our anceators. were themselves autocratic, and just substituted another autocracy for the old one. Fuck all ancestors, this type of thinking keeps KoreaN SOCIETY backwards,