Chiu Chin

Ch’iu Chin

 

Born Nov. 8, 1875, in the city of Hsiamun; died July 17, 1907, in the city of Shaosing. The first woman revolutionary in China; poet.

The daughter of a civil servant, Ch’iu studied in Japan. In 1904, she joined the revolutionary organization Kuang Fu Hui, and in 1905 she became a member of the T’ung-meng Hui. Ch’iu led a branch of the T’ung-meng Hui in Chekiang Province. In Shanghai in early 1907 she founded the newspaper Chung-kuo nü pao. In the summer of 1907, Hsü Hsi-lin, a figure in the Kuang Fu Hui who was planning an uprising in the city of Anch’ing in Anhwei Province, made an agreement with Ch’iu to support an uprising in Chekiang. In July 1907 the armed insurrection in Anch’ing was suppressed. Soon afterward the preparations for the Chekiang uprising were discovered by the authorities; as a result, Ch’iu was arrested and executed.

Ch’iu wrote civic poetry that attacked the feudal lords and colonizers.

REFERENCES

Pozdneev, D. “Iz istorii revoliutsionnogo dvizheniia v Kitae.” Novyi Vostok, 1922, no. 2.
Semanov, V. I. “Literatura perioda Sin’khaiskoi revoliutsii.” In the collection Sin’khaiskaia revoliutsiia v Kitae. Moscow, 1962.