The Revered Mr. Lee Myong-Ho`s 43 Year-Life Of Searching For Fighters Of National Independence

``Although you, a reporter, know the martyr Yoo Kwan-Soon, you don’t know much about Sir Ahn Hee-Jae, do you? There was an incident called `the case of Daedong Sanghoi` during the King Euichin era. Sir Ahn Hee-Jae, the owner of the Daedong Sanghoi, secretly raised the fund for the independence movement in Youngjoo City, Kyungbuk, and continued to commit himself to the independence movement even after his release, having been brutally tortured by the Japanese police. Because our education teaches only macro histories, the life of Sir Ahn is not known as well as the life of the martyr Yoo Kwan-Soon. However, he was as great as Yoo Kwan-Soon.``

The Revered old Mr. Lee Myong-Ho (73. Kwangmyong Dong, Kwangmyong City, Kyunggi Province) has been discovering fighters, who had died namelessly for the national independence, for 43 years.

Mr. Lee started to discover nameless fighters because he felt pity for the descendents of fighters, who were scraping bare livings, not to mention having insufficient education.

Mr. Lee, who was born in Sangyoung Myun, Yeonchun Kun, Kyunggi, which now belongs to North Korea, came to South by himself in 1948. He decided to come to South because he could not bear various suppressions against him due to his wealthy family background under the communist regime. Mr. Lee, who was staying in his uncle`s house, joined the army as the 6.25 War broke out, and was discharged after having survived a life-or-death crisis.

Since then, having worked in various magazine companies, Mr. Lee began to be interested in collecting resources in relation to the national history or folk history. Especially, he has strived for searching for the unknown fighters for the national independence.

``While I was working to find resources for reporters, I coincidentally ran into books related to the independence movement. There were many fighters whom we were not aware of. However, there were no organized resources or books about the fighters. Hence, I began to work on this.``

Mr. Lee has discovered the independence movement related resources in each university library, the National Assembly library, and the national libraries, and has classified the data by year, name, date of arrest, and date of trial. At the same time, he also found out the fighters who were still living and their descendents.

He found Sir Suh Sang-Lak, who exiled to Manchuria in 1919 and organized the Euiyuldan with Sir Kim Won-Bong. After undergoing indescribable hardships, Mr. Lee found a son of Sir Kim’s daughter, and helped him to be recognized as the person of the national service merit. Finally, he was granted the order of patriotism. There are more than 500 cases found by Mr. Lee and were recognized as the person of the national service merit. Mr. Lee said, ``I will spend the rest of my life to find those who had dedicated their lives for the national independence.``

straw825@donga.com