The Evil Deed
Toi carefully planned his killing spree to guarantee maximum carnage. He secretly prepared his weapons which consisted of a shotgun, ax, and sword and waited until night time to begin. On the evening of May 20, 1938, Toi cut the electricity line to Kamo, so the entire village was in darkness; then he waited.
The first life would soon be claimed. At approximately 1:30 am on May 21, Toi started his rampage by cutting off his grandmother’s head with an ax. Next, he strapped two electric torches to his head and began creeping through the village like a young man who was participating in Yobai. While most modern day massacres are over in a matter of minutes, Toi was able to wander through his village indiscriminately killing his neighbors with his sword and shotgun for what must have seemed like an eternity.
Overall, the Tsuyama Massacre lasted a total of 90 minutes. In that relatively short time, Toi killed 29 neighbors, bringing the death toll to 30. While 27 people died instantly, two of them suffered severe injuries and died from their wounds later on. To put the slaughter into grim perspective, Toi murdered approximately half the population of the village. It seems as if Toi specifically targeted the people he believed had insulted him. Otherwise, he may have killed every single occupant.
Aftermath
Like a significant proportion of spree killers, Toi didn’t wait to receive punishment. At dawn, he shot himself in the chest with his shotgun. While the Tsuyama Massacre was finally over, it utterly destroyed a small community. Toi left nothing but carnage and devastation in his wake and memory. Despite the intervention of the police just a few days before the slaughter, Toi was still able to get his hands on weaponry. His determination to obtain revenge led to the second-largest massacre in modern history at that time.
In fact, there wouldn’t be a more devastating killing spree until 1982 when a South Korean policeman named Woo Bum-kon killed 56 people and wounded 35 more in Uiryeong County. On that day, Woo argued with his live-in girlfriend and reported for duty at the police station. A few hours later, he returned home, beat his girlfriend and went to a reservist’s armory where he gathered guns and hand grenades.
Woo began killing people indiscriminately and covered several kilometers during his spree. When the dust settled, 56 people lay dead, and Woo committed suicide like Toi. Unlike Toi, there was seemingly no reasoning behind Woo’s deadly deed only for the fact that he suddenly ‘snapped.’ Unlike Toi, there was no planning; it was just a case of a man going berserk and taking the lives of as many people as possible.
Oddly enough, a film called Doomed Village was released the year after Woo’s killing spree. It was based on the true story of the Tsuyama Massacre, and the film’s synopsis describes Toi as an “emotionally distraught man” who goes on a killing spree because tuberculosis prevented him from serving in World War II.