The image of the “Nanjing Massacre” has been shaped largely by the testimony of American missionary John Gillespie Magee at the Tokyo Trials. This article examines the actual content of Magee’s testimony, the results of cross-examination, his own diary entries, and later scholarly evaluations, revealing how the narrative of mass slaughter was constructed on extremely limited eyewitness accounts.

The Japanese people were branded as having carried out the mass slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Chinese because of the irresponsible falsehoods of a single foreigner.
2016-11-25.
An article published yesterday in the Sankei Shimbun explained that the 16mm film recorded by the American missionary John Magee, which was registered as a Memory of the World, was described as having “recorded evidence of Japanese war crimes at great personal risk,” and short related footage was also broadcast.
However, almost no Japanese citizens know who John Magee was.
The following is an excerpt from Wikipedia concerning him.
John Gillespie Magee (1884–1956) was an American Episcopal priest.
He testified at the Tokyo Trials regarding the Nanjing Incident (Nanjing Massacre) allegedly committed by the Japanese Army.
The film footage he recorded, known as the Magee Film, was submitted by the Chinese government to the Memory of the World program and registered in 2015.
Omitted.
He was born in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States.
After studying at Yale University, he transferred to a theological seminary in Massachusetts.
From 1912 to 1940, he worked in the Republic of China as a missionary of the Episcopal Church, operating a church in the Xiaguan district of Nanjing while engaging in Christian missionary and medical activities.
During the Japanese occupation of Nanjing, he served as chairman of the Nanjing International Red Cross Committee and as a member of the International Committee for the Nanjing Safety Zone, housing refugees in large residences borrowed from foreigners.
While recording and testifying about the Nanjing Incident, he also documented and evaluated the conscientious conduct of Japanese soldiers.
Omitted.
Magee’s testimony at the Tokyo Trials.
Eyewitness testimony.
Regarding eyewitness testimony excluding hearsay, defense attorney Brooks conducted a cross-examination, asking, “How many instances of unlawful acts or killings in progress did you personally witness?”
Magee replied, “As I believe I have clearly stated in my testimony, I personally witnessed only one such incident.”
According to this account, on December 17, 1937, Magee witnessed from his home balcony the killing of a single Chinese man.
When a Japanese soldier questioned the man, he fled, and the soldier pursued and shot him.
On the other hand, Magee’s diary states, “We did not actually witness any killing sites.”
Eyewitness testimony.
Brooks further asked, “Did you witness any acts of rape in progress, and if so, how many?”
Magee replied, “What I saw was one man actually committing rape.
As for two other men, they were lying on a bed with a girl, but according to her father, the rape had already occurred before I arrived.”
Controversy over the evaluation of Magee’s testimony.
Mori Ōtaku, who served as battalion commander of the Fukuchiyama Regiment (20th Infantry Regiment) and was responsible for security in and around Nanjing during the campaign, stated that “Magee testified in detail for two days as a prosecution witness, but when pressed by a lawyer named Brooks during cross-examination, it became clear that all of his two days of testimony were false, and in the end only one case each of theft and assault on women could be confirmed, making him a laughingstock in the courtroom.”
Tanaka Masaaki argues that Magee directly witnessed only three incidents — the killing of a suspicious individual, rape, and theft — and that all other claims were based on hearsay, rumors, and speculation.
According to Watanabe Shōichi, the killing Magee claimed to have witnessed involved a Japanese soldier on patrol in Nanjing who questioned a Chinese man, who then fled and was shot, and he asks, “Where, in this, is a massacre?”
Watanabe further states that Brooks, the defense attorney for General Matsui Iwane, relentlessly cross-examined Magee, the American missionary whose testimony became the foundation of the massacre myth, and forced him to admit that he had actually seen only one Chinese person killed by Japanese soldiers.
He adds that although the Tokyo Trials were essentially an international political tribunal and Matsui was sentenced to death, thanks to Brooks’s cross-examination, we are still able today to glimpse the true nature of the massacre myth.
Watanabe also argues that all rumors and documents concerning this so-called massacre converge at a single point.
That point is the falsehoods of one American missionary, Magee.
Even when those falsehoods are traced back and investigated, nothing resembling factual evidence can be found anywhere.
In short, the Japanese people were branded as perpetrators of the mass slaughter of hundreds of thousands of Chinese solely because of the irresponsible falsehoods of a single foreigner.
Fujioka Nobukatsu likewise maintains that Magee’s testimony was based almost entirely on hearsay.
Omitted.