Jasper County Democrat, Volume 15, Number 40, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 August 1912 — DR. SUN YAT SEN SLAIN BY TROOPS? [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

DR. SUN YAT SEN SLAIN BY TROOPS?

San Francisco Chinatown Stirred by Report. HIS CHILDREN GET RUMOR China’s First President Said to Have Been Assassinated While on Journew to Peking to Prevent Hostilities. San Francisco, Cal., Aug. 20. —Dr. Sun Yat Sen, first provisional president of China and head of the revolutionary party, was assassinated by imperial troops acting under orders supposed to have been given by President Yuan Shi Kai, according to a report that has reached Dr. Sun’s sons and daughters, who are op the Pacific coast. Grave fears were expressed for the safety of Dr. Sun when he left Shanghai Sunday in defiance of warnings of friends. He started for Peking to undertake to save the republic from a threatened renewal of hostilities following the execution of several generals, among whom were Generals Chang Chen-Wu and Aeng Wet Report Causes Wild Excitement.

No details of the reported assassination of Dr. Sun have reached here and Chinatown is a state of wild excitement. Bulletins are posted on the Chinese newspaper bulletin boards and the streets are thronged with anxious Celestials.

Despite the fact that the report reached Dr. Sun’s family, the Chinese consulate refuses to give credence to it and at the consulate the report was dismissed as entirely improbable. ' Sets Out Alone for Peking. General Huang-Sing, who commanded the southern republican army and who was to have accompanied Dr. Sun to Peking, abandoned the trip

at the last moment and Dr. Sun set out alone. The southern generals recently put to death were members of Dr. Sun’s party and were seized at the capital by orders of President Yuan Shi Kai and summarily put to death. Two of the officers were charged with conspiracy against the government and after trial by drumhead court-martial were shot at the capital, while the others were returned to Hankow in chains and there executed.

According to Chinese newspapers, the execution of General Chang was carried out in a fiendish manner. The Bannerman general. Yuan Chi Kuei, who was entrusted with the execution, actually dined with his victim in a European hotel and toasted him repeatedly. When the dinner was over he followed his victim in another carriage to his lodging. Executed in Fiendish Manner. On alighting from the vehicle General Yuan Chi Kuei blew a whistle as a signal, whereupon a forest of sabers and bayonets sprung like magic about Chang Chen Wu, wnb was seized and bound, flung into a mule cart and carried to the military court. No evidence was given at the trial, and the accused officer was condemned to immediate execution. The first volley not killing the prisoner, repeated volleys were fired until the general’s body was completely disemboweled;. It being necessary to dress the corpse, a message was sent to the victim’s wife for more clothes, as her husband “felt cold in the night air.”

Dr. Sun Yat Sen.