The Story of Ni Cui Ping
In 1937 11 year-old Ni Cui Ping lived in Nanking with her parents,
grandparents, aunt and uncle. Her father worked in a charcoal store,
her mother sold vegetables. On December 13, 1937 Japanese soldiers
arrived. They shot Ni’s
father as he was washing vegetables at the
riverbank. When her mother rushed outside, she too was shot and
killed, before turning on the rest of the family. Ni, who was shot in
the arm and slashed in the shoulder with a bayonet, was the only one
to survive. Ni, who was permanently disabled from her injuries, went
to live with an aunt and uncle. In a separate incident her pregnant
aunt was brutally raped by a Japanese soldier and she bled to death.
Three years later, at the age of 14, Ni was living on her own, begging
in order to survive. At the age of 19 she got married to a peasant
farmer. They had one daughter. Ni, now a widower, lives with her
daughter and her three grandchildren in Nanking. Her statue is
displayed at the Nanjing Memorial Hall.
“I saw my mother in my father’s arms and a pool of blood on the
ground..” – Ni Cui Ping
