Portrait of Kim Chwajin

Birthday profile

Kim Chwajin

Kim Chwa-chin, South Korean guerrilla leader (died 1930)

Born
December 16, 1889
Died
January 24, 1930
Zodiac sign
Sagittarius
Birth year
1889

About Kim Chwajin

Kim Chwajin (Korean: 김좌진; Hanja: 金佐鎭; 24 November 1889 – 24 January 1930), also known by his art name Paegya, was a Korean military officer, independence activist, and anarchist. Born into a noble family in the kingdom of Joseon, Kim was educated at the military academy of the newly-founded Korean Empire shortly before the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910. After spending three years in prison for freeing his family's slaves, he joined the Korean independence movement and went to Manchuria to fight against the Empire of Japan. While in Manchuria, Kim established the Northern Military Administration Office in 1919 and trained Korean soldiers in guerrilla warfare before going on to lead the Korean Independence Army to victory in the Battle of Cheongsanri. In 1920, Kim co-founded the Korean Independence Corps and went to Siberia, but was forced back to Manchuria following the Free City Incident. He was subsequently influenced by anarchism and in 1925 established the New People's Administration, which Kim intended to follow egalitarian and libertarian principles. Following a split in the Administration, in 1929 he joined with young socialists and anarchists to establish the Korean People's Association in Manchuria, a self-governing federation of agricultural cooperatives. In 1930, he was assassinated by a young member of the Communist Party of Korea. Kim is considered a national hero in modern-day South Korea and has been compared to the Ukrainian anarchist Nestor Makhno.

Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.

Kim Chwajin timeline

  1. Born into a noble family in the kingdom of Joseon, Kim was educated at the military academy of the newly-founded Korean Empire shortly before the Japanese annexation of Korea in 1910.
  2. In 1920, Kim co-founded the Korean Independence Corps and went to Siberia, but was forced back to Manchuria following the Free City Incident.

The world when Kim Chwajin was born

Kim Chwajin was born in 1889. The year snapshot below places that birthday in its cultural and historical setting: the music and films people were following, the headlines shaping public life, and the everyday prices families encountered.

Headlines and milestones

  • Top headlineEiffel Tower opens for Paris World's Fair
  • Technology milestoneEiffel Tower — world's tallest structure
  • World population~1.49B

United States snapshot

  • U.S. leaderBenjamin Harrison
  • U.S. population58.6M

1889 versus 2026

These figures put everyday life in Kim Chwajin's birth year beside the site's latest United States snapshot.

Measure18892026
Population58.6M341 million

Sources and editorial standards

This profile combines a biographical source with structured birthday and historical context. Sources recorded for this profile: Wikipedia, Library of Congress, Wikidata. See our editorial policy for sourcing, corrections, and review standards.

Read the source biography on Wikipedia. Wikipedia text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License.