Interesting Japanese Token w/ Skull Shina Jihen: Any thoughts?

[markohno]

I acquired at my local flea market a WWII "keyring" assortment consisting of a US WWII navy dog tag, a .30 M1 carbine deactivated cartridge and a Japanese token or medal that I thought looked interesting. (who can resist something military looking and with a skull on it and priced like a McDonald's meal?) I had a Japanese professor at Yale Univ look at a photo of it to try to determine what it said, and it seems to be a commemorative piece for the Shina Jihen (second Sino Japanese war). There is possible reference to a "Murakami group", and Lt General Keisaku Murakami did lead one of the major Japanese forces in that war into a number of engagements around 1940, sometimes referred to as the Murakami force, and which included seven or eight regiments of the 39th Division. I am told other writing is a phrase from a poem from the Manyoshu or Ten Thousand Leaves (oldest existing collection of Japanese poems) but this one was also incorporated into a popular wartime song) with the phrase meaning "the grass will grow over a dead body (if you die in the mountains)" and presumably accounting for the skull and death iconography. I wonder if anyone is more familiar with the background of this particular piece and what it represents and the circumstances of it being made. I am assuming it probably dates from the 1940-1945 period? Any thoughts?

[GHP]

Front:

誠
Makoto
Loyalty

Reverse:

支那事件記念
Shina Jiken Kinen

[star] 八村上隊
Hachi Murakami-tai
8 Murakami Group


草むす屍
kusu musu kabane
Corpse-steaming Grass

--Guy

[Nick Komiya]

The song goes like this ( with English lyrics)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C2-vYrMd4kY

[Nick Komiya]

A huge number of War Medals for the China Incident were awarded in April 1940, which would have made this unofficial watch fob/key ring totally redundant. Therefore, it would have been made by the army unit between 1937 and 1940, at a time before they learned that an official medal would be established. The awarding of huge quantities of medals and orders that took place in April 1940, so exhausted beuarocratic resources, which had to prepare all the citations, that henceforth no official citations came with the awarding of medals. Anyway, the China medal thus remains the most common Japanese War Medal today.

[GHP]

Nick,

As ever, thank you for the great detailed background information!

Regards,
--Guy