John Rabe (FILE)

John Rabe (1882-1950) was born in Hamburg, Germany and moved to China in 1908. He worked in Beijing, Tianjin and other cities before moving to Nanjing in 1931 where he worked as a business representative for Siemens and lived in the three-story house at No.1 Xiaofenqiao in downtown Nanjing.

The house, one of 25 Nanjing Safety Zones, served as a refugee shelter during World War II. In December 1937, he, together with other foreign friends, set up the Nanjing International Safety Zone Committee, which saved hundreds of thousands of local residents in one month during the Nanjing Massacre, when Japanese soldiers ravaged the city and killed more than 300,000 people.

He recorded the atrocities committed by the Japanese troops he witnessed on a daily basis in the "Rabe's Diary" from September 1937 to the following February.

(Source: China Daily)