Michael Cash wrote:
> 
> The book said something to the effect that the Chinese were not at all
> amused by the idea that the two had been beheading innocent Chinese
> for the purpose of attracting wives. So it would seem that the Chinese
> court chose to believe that what they had told the reporter about
> their motives were true, but that their denial of the contest having
> been anything more than a hoax was false. The way it read to me was
> "We're going to shoot your asses for even joking about shit like that,
> whether you actually did it or not". Perhaps part of the reason I read
> it that way was at least in part due to the fact that they had already
> been acquitted of the crimes.
> 
Just out of curiosity, while reading it did you at all get the
impression that they were killed in part to shut them up? Seems to me
having a couple of guys running around saying it was all a hoax would
take away a great deal of leverage, though it'd be difficult to believe
anyone had that amount of forsight at the time.

> If it were the big deal that the newspaper account seems to hype it up
> to have been, wouldn't it seem likely that at least ONE other paper in
> Japan would have been carrying it? Maybe there was another paper
> carrying it, but the only articles I've ever seen mentioned in
> connection with the story all come from a single newspaper.
> 
Which paper? Wasn't the government more or less in control of the press
at that time?

John W.