Timber poaching on Ulleong Island

Korean junks on Ulleong Island circa 1906.

By Robert Neff

Ulleong Island had a reputation as being a lush and fertile paradise where the "bamboo grew to twice the size it grew on the mainland, while the peaches were so large that the pits were divided and wine cups made from the two parts." At least that is what an 1895 article in the Korean Repository claimed, but over the next couple of years, Ulleong was looking less of a paradise and more like a poacher's dream.

In early 1896, the senior official on Ulleong reported to the Korean government the pitiful conditions of the 1,134 Koreans living on the island. He claimed the island was infested with rats and destructive birds that devastated their meager crops.

Adding to their woes was the heavy-handedness of a man named Bae, who levied illegal taxes upon the people and harvested timber and sold it to foreigners. His excesses were so severe that the islanders lynched him ― hanging him in front of the government building.

In February 1898, the senior official reported that two sword-wielding Japanese men (possibly Wakida Shotaro and Amano Genzo) and their handful of workers were terrorizing the island. They illegally harvested valuable timber and trampled the islanders' crops as they transported the logs to their junks (ships). The official appealed to the central government for help.

A small port on Ulleong Island circa 1906.

The Japanese population on the island was considerable compared to the Korean population. There were more than 250 people (men and women) living in two or three small settlements ― when the junks arrived for the timber, the population would increase temporarily to more than 300. Most of them were from the Japanese island of Oki who had arrived on Ulleong in 1894 and made their living as lumberjacks, but a few tried farming, fishing and trade.

In April 1899, two Japanese men allegedly assaulted a Korean woman. The infuriated Korean islanders banded together and marched on the Japanese settlement, but were met with guns and swords. One Korean islander was wounded. The official, afraid for his life, gave the Japanese a document granting them permission to harvest the trees.

Laporte, A French employee of the Korean Customs Department, visited the island in June 1899 and described how the Japanese harvested the timber.

"To kill the trees they remove the bark, allowing them to stand until they become 'seasoned,' after six months or so the trees are cut, sawn, and ready for sale."

The leaders of the Japanese lumberjacks were Wakida Shotaro and Amano Genzo ― both claimed they had permission to harvest the timber. Laporte, however, speculated that "all of the Japanese on the island help themselves more or less freely to the richness placed undefended within their reach."

Foreign visitors on Ulleong Island circa 1906.

Protests were made, but with little effect.

In 1903, the Japanese community on the island even had its own police force. When a complaint of timber poaching was made to the senior Japanese policeman by a Korean official, he was told that an agreement between the two governments (Korea and Japan) allowed Japanese to settle on the island and to harvest what they needed. The only way the Japanese police would prevent the trees from being cut down is if they received orders from the Japanese legation in Seoul. Apparently they did not.

By the end of the decade, Korea was no longer a sovereign nation and the complaints of illegal lumbering ceased.

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