From Takow to Kaohsiung

Lieyu (烈嶼) Township, Kinmen, Fujian Province, ROC; the "Lieyu Massacre" and the lifting of four decades of Martial Law

Lieyu (烈嶼; "Strong Islet(s)") Township is a group of three main islands and many small islets in Kinmen County, Fujian Province, of the ROC, albeit lying just a few kilometers off Xiamen in the PRC, and technically within the boundaries of Xiamen Port. Also known as Lesser Kinmen (小金門), it is located just to the west of the county's main island, Greater Kinmen.

Although inhabited by Han-Chinese from the Central Plains since the Tang dynasty (7th-10th centuries), the reason behind its current name is not known.

According to local folklore, however, Lieyu was originally connected with Greater Kinmen by a land bridge meaning it wasn't necessary to cross the sea between them. Subsequently, an immortal being, seeing how troublesome it was for navy boats having to turn back and forth before being able to enter port, announced that it would be easier for shipping if the peninsula with the port road could be opened up to create an island. No sooner had the immortal spoken, than the islet (嶼; Mdn. yu) slowly split (裂; Mdn. lie) apart, gradually taking it further from Greater Kinmen. Over time, this character was changed for today's simiarly pronounced 烈 (Mdn. lie; "strong / intense / violent). [source: Lieyu Township Village Administration]

If such a character-switch might seem unlikely, one needs look no further than the ROC's other outlying islands in Fujian, that is, Matsu (馬祖), where 馬 (Mdn. ma in the 3rd tone; "horse") has replaced 媽 (Mdn. ma in the 1st tone; "mother").

In 1950, ROC forces on Lieyu's Dadan Island (大膽島), repulsed an attack by a larger number of PRC soldiers who had landed on the island.

In 1987, Lieyu itself was the site of a massacre (三七事件; lit. "March 7th Incident") of Vietnamese boat people. Apparently this was in line with the ROC's policy under martial law of executing on the spot anyone attempting to land on the islands (Chinese fishermen and would-be refugees were regularly shot as they approached).
Despite initial denials by military and civilian officials and even by then-President Chiang Ching-kuo, pressure from politicians of Taiwan's newly established opposition Democratic Progressive Party, as well as from foreign governments and NGO human rights activists, perhaps meant that this event was one of the final straws that led to the lifting of martial law in July of the same year.

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