No. 2
In the Proclamation which His Majesty graciously issued to-day (11th moon, 15th day) are words, “We, in cutting Our hair, are setting an example to Our subjects. Do you, the multitude, identify yourselves with Our design, and cause to be accomplished the great work of establishing equality with the nations of the earth.”
At a time of reform such as this, when we humbly peruse so spirited a proclamation, among all of us subjects of Great Korea who does not weep for gratitude, and strive his utmost? Earnestly united in heart and mind, we earnestly expect a humble conformity with His Majesty’s purposes of reformation.
(Signed) Yu-kil Chun,
Acting Home minister.
504th year since the founding of the Dynasty,
11th moon, 15th day.
Among the reasons which rendered the Top Knot decree detestable to the people were, that priests and monks, who, instead of being held in esteem, are regarded generally as a nuisance to be tolerated, wear their hair closely cropped, and the Edict was believed to be an attempt instigated by Japan to compel Koreans to look like Japanese, and adopt Japanese customs. So strong was the popular belief that it was to Japan that Korea owed the denationalizing order, that in the many places where there were Top Knot Riots it was evidenced by overt acts of hostility to the Japanese, frequently resulting in murder.
The rural districts were convulsed. Officials even of the highest rank found themselves on the horns of a dilemma. If they cut their hair, they were driven from their lucrative posts by an infuriated populace, and in several instances lost their lives, while if they retained the Top Knot they were dismissed by the Cabinet. In one province, on the arrival from Seoul of a newly-appointed mandarin with cropped hair, he was met by a great concourse of people ready for the worst, who informed him that they had hitherto been ruled by a Korean man, and would not endure a “Monk Magistrate,” on which he prudently retired to the capital.
All through the land there were Top Knot complexities and difficulties. Countrymen, merchants, Christian catechists, and others, who had come to Seoul on business, and had been shorn, dared not risk their lives by returning to their homes. Wood and country produce did not come in, and the price of the necessaries of life rose seriously. Many men who prized the honor of entering the Palace gates at the New Year feigned illness, but were sent for and denuded of their hair. The click of the shears was heard at every gate in Seoul, at the Palace, and at the official residences; even servants were not exempted, and some of the Foreign Representatives were unable to present themselves at the Palace on New Year’s Day, because their chairmen were unwilling to meet the shears. A father poisoned himself from grief and humiliation because his two sons had submitted to the decree. The foundations of social order were threatened when the Top Knot fell!
People who had had their hair cropped did not dare to venture far from Seoul lest they should be exposed to the violence of the rural population. At Chun-chön, 50 miles from the capital, when the Governor tried to enforce the ordinance, the people rose en masse and murdered him and his whole establishment, afterwards taking possession of the town and surrounding country. As policemen with their shears were at the Seoul gates to enforce the decree on incomers, and peasants who had been cropped on arriving did not dare to return to their homes, prices rose so seriously by the middle of January, 1896, that “trouble” in the capital was expected, and another order was issued that “country folk were to be let alone at that time.”
Things went from bad to worse, till on the 11th of February, 1896, the whole Far East was electrified by a sensational telegram—“The King of Korea has escaped from his Palace, and is at the Russian Legation.”
On that morning the King and Crown Prince in the dim daybreak left the Kyeng-pok Palace in closed box chairs, such as are used by the Palace waiting-women, passed through the gates without being suspected by the sentries, and reached the Russian Legation, the King pale and trembling as he entered the spacious suite of apartments which for more than a year afterwards offered him a secure asylum. The Palace ladies who arranged the escape had kept their counsel well, and had caused a number of chairs to go in and out of the gates early and late during the previous week, so that the flight failed to attract any attention. As the King does much of his work at night and retires to rest in the early morning, the ever vigilant Cabinet, his jailers, supposed him to be asleep, and it was not until several hours later that his whereabouts became known, when the organization of a new Cabinet was progressing, and Korean dignitaries began to be summoned into the Royal presence.