The remains of the late Korean independence fighter Hwang Ki-hwan arrive at Incheon International Airport, west of Seoul, on April 10, 2023, returning home 100 years after he died in New York in 1923. (Pool photo) (Yonhap)
SEOUL, April 10 (Korea Bizwire) — The remains of a Korean independence fighter, who campaigned in Europe and the United States against Japan’s 1910-45 colonization, returned home from New York on Monday, a century after his death.
A ceremony for the repatriation and burial of Hwang Ki-hwan’s remains took place at the Daejeon National Cemetery in Daejeon, 140 kilometers south of Seoul, after they arrived earlier in the day, just one week before the centennial anniversary of his death.
“(Hwang) proudly voiced our nation’s strong will for independence and made efforts to win support from the international community,” Veterans Minister Park Min-shik said at the ceremony.
“The government will repatriate the remains of heroes buried alone in faraway lands … to our now independent country until the very last one.”
The independence fighter’s life came into the spotlight in recent years as he became known as the real-life model of a protagonist in the hit 2018 TV series “Mr. Sunshine.”
Born in Sunchon, South Pyongan Province, now in North Korea, in 1886, Hwang moved to Hawaii in 1904 and volunteered to fight for the United States during the First World War, being stationed in France.
After the war, he remained in Europe and took part in Korea’s independence movement by supporting Korean representatives at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919.
In 1921, Hwang served as a member of the Korean provisional government’s diplomatic mission in London and worked at its American committee before dying of heart disease in New York on April 17, 1923.
His body was buried at Mount Olivet Cemetery in New York.
In 2008, a pastor at a Korean American church rediscovered his grave, leading Seoul’s veterans ministry to start making efforts to repatriate his remains in 2013.
Although the New York cemetery had sought a local court’s approval for the relocation due to the absence of Hwang’s family members, it finally reached an agreement in January this year after much persuasion from the ministry.
(Yonhap)
