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Jaisohn, Philip (1864–1951)
Also known as Jae-pil Suh, Jaisohn was born in
North Jul-la Province of Korea. The youngest
person ever to pass the Korean civil service exam
with top honors at the age of 18, he soon served
as Minister of Defense. After a failed coup at-
tempt, however, he became a political refugee in
1885 on his way to San Francisco. Once in the
United States, he adopted the name Philip Jaisohn
by rearranging the letters from his Korean name.
In 1890 he became the first Korean to become a
naturalized U.S. citizen. Two years later, he be-
came the first Korean and one of the first Asians
to receive a medical degree from George Washing-
ton University’s Medical School. In 1894 he mar-
ried Muriel Armstrong, whose father was the U.S.
Postmaster General and a relative of President
James Buchanan.
March 1896 saw the return of Jaisohn with his
wife to Korea where he became one of the found-
ing members of the Independence Club, an orga-
nization responsible for introducing the Western
concepts of equal justice under the law, freedom of
speech, and women’s rights. Jaisohn published The
Independent, the first modern newspaper in Korea,
through which he actively promoted modern sci-
ence and Western ideology.
Upon returning to America, he continued to
publish The Independent and devote himself to the
cause of Korean independence from Japan, orga-

nizing in 1919 the first Korean Congress in Phila-

delphia. After studying medicine further at the

University of Pennsylvania, he practiced pathology

and dermatology in Media, Pennsylvania, in the

1930s. During World War II, he served in the U.S.

military as a medical doctor, a position that earned

him the Distinguished Service Medal. In 1947 he

became senior adviser to the U.S. Military Gover-

nor of Korea, General John Hodge. Visiting Korea

one last time, he helped pave the way for Korea’s

transition to a democratic government.

Hansu’s Journey (1921), a novella published by

Jaisohn under a pseudonym, “N. H. Osia,” is the

first known work of literary fiction in English by

a Korean American. The protagonist is Hansu, a

teenager from North Korea, who is unfairly im-

prisoned by Japanese police. Upon release from

prison, Hansu attends a school run by American

missionaries and later witnesses the Samil Inde-

pendence Movement against Japan on March 1,

1919. He is inspired and touched by the coura-
      geous, nonviolent march of Koreans to protest the
      brutality of Japan. After observing the inhuman
      treatment of protesters by the Japanese police,
      Hansu moves to China and then to America to
      educate himself and become more valuable to his
      country’s independence. Written to inform Ameri-
      cans of the sufferings of Koreans under Japanese
      colonial occupation, Hansu’s Journey is the only
      known literary work by Jaisohn.