Kawai Yoshitora

Yoshitora Kawai (1902–1923) was a Japanese communist activist involved with many Tokyo-based political groups.

Yoshitora Kawai
Born18 July 1902
Japan
Died4 September 1923

He attended Honzan hospital's nurse training school, but moved to Tokyo's Kameido district in September 1920 after being exposed to socialism from a professor, Oka Sensei. He was a member of Gyōminkai (Enlightened People's Society), a communist study group, and joined the Nankatsu Labor Union alongside Tanno Setsu. In March 1923, Kawai created the Tokyo Communist Youth League, the first instance of a group openly labeling themselves as Communists.[1] During the 1923 Great Kantō earthquake, Kawai was reported as having rescued three children who had been trapped under a collapsed house.[2] Amidst the chaos of the earthquake's aftermath, he was captured on 2 September 1923, and a few days later, was killed by police in prison during the Kameido Incident.[1][3]

References
  1. Hane, Mikiso (1988). Reflections on the Way to the Gallows. Pantheon Books. ISBN 978-0520084216.
  2. "Hidden history behind 1923 quake: communists killed by power". Japan Press Weekly. Retrieved 16 February 2019.
  3. Andrew Gordon (21 January 1991). Labor and Imperial Democracy in Prewar Japan. University of California Press.
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