Independence patriot · Righteous army (의병) · Independence Medal (독립장, 1962)
| Life | 1852 ~ 1930 |
| Era | 근현대 |
| Clan | 전주 이씨 |
Yi So-eung raised a righteous army in Chuncheon in 1896 and executed the pro-Japanese provincial governor Jo In-seung. A Confucian scholar of the Jeonju Yi clan and ninth-generation descendant of King Seonjo, he was elected commander of a righteous army by some 1,000 local scholars and farmers who gathered in Chuncheon in January 1896 in protest of the Eulmi Incident and the top-knot cutting decree.
Invoking the doctrine of 'upholding orthodoxy and rejecting heterodoxy,' he branded Japan as a barbarian aggressor to give his resistance clear moral justification, and when the government dispatched the reformist official Jo In-seung as a pacification envoy, he condemned him as a Japanese collaborator and had him executed. He later attempted, unsuccessfully, to join forces with the Gyeonggi righteous army at Namhansanseong to attack Seoul, then joined Yu In-seok's righteous army in Jecheon before fleeing to Manchuria.
He died in 1930 at the age of 79 and was posthumously awarded the Order of Merit for National Foundation, Independence Medal, in 1962.