348

Douglas MacArthur.

Proclamation No. 1, to the People of Korea, establishing the 38th Parallel border in Korea.

Yokohama, Japan, 7 September 1945
Letterpress broadside, 21 x 14¾ inches; folds, dampstaining, minor wear; signed by 7 regimental officers with their home towns. 

Three weeks after Japan's surrender ended their decades of colonial rule over Korea, this proclamation announced a new arrangement under MacArthur's rule: "Having in mind the long enslavement of the people of Korea and the determination that in due course Korea shall become free and independent, the Korean people are assured  that the purpose of the occupation is to enforce the Instrument of Surrender. . . . All powers of Government over the territory of Korea south of 38 degrees north latitude and the people thereof will be for the present exercised under my authority." The text is then repeated in Korean and Japanese. Although not explained here, the area north of the 38th Parallel was placed under Soviet control, in effect creating the nations of North and South Korea. The Korean War was fought over this border just a few years later, and the resulting Military Demarcation Line still runs near it.

The senior officer among the signatures here is Lieutenant Colonel Hugh H. Bledsoe of the Army Air Force, who served as secretary of the civilian personnel section of the military government in Korea in November 1945 and remained there through early 1948. The other signers were lieutenants and sergeants. They apparently signed this as a souvenir, rather than in any official capacity.

One traced in OCLC (in the MacArthur papers at the Library of Congress), and none traced at auction. 

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