John Rabe

John Heinrich Detlef Rabe (23 November 1882 – 5 January 1950) was a German businessman and Nazi Party member best known for his efforts to stop war crimes during the Japanese Nanjing Massacre (also romanized as Nanking) and his work to protect and help Chinese civilians during the massacre that ensued. The Nanking Safety Zone, which he helped to establish, sheltered approximately 250,000 Chinese people from being killed. He officially represented Germany and acted as senior chief of the European-U.S. establishment that remained in Nanjing, the Chinese capital at the time, when the city fell to the Japanese troops. Early life & career Rabe was born in Hamburg on 23 November 1882. He pursued a career in business and worked in Africa for several years. In 1908, he left for China, and between 1910 and 1938 worked for the Siemens AG China Corporation in Shenyang, Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai and later Nanjing. Rabe suffered from diabetes by the time he worked in Nanjing, requiring him to take regular doses of insulin. At the time of the Japanese attack on Nanjing, Rabe was a staunch Nazi and the party's local head, serving as a Deputy Group Leader in the Nazi Party.