Dafen Police Station Ruins

The Dafen Police Station (大分駐在所) was established by the Japanese colonial government in 1911 as part of a network of mountain outposts along the Batongguan Traversing Trail (八通關越嶺道) in eastern Taiwan. Located deep in the Central Mountain Range at approximately 1,200 meters elevation, the station served as a key control point in the colonial administration's effort to subjugate the Bunun indigenous people of the Lakulaku River valley.

On May 17, 1915, a force of 56 Bunun warriors led by the brothers Raho Arei (拉荷・阿雷, Dahu Ali) and Aliman Siken attacked the Dafen station, killing 12 Japanese police officers — including seven slain personally by Raho Arei. Five days earlier, on May 12, Bunun fighters had attacked the nearby Kashibana station. This uprising, known as the Dafen Incident (大分事件), was triggered by the Japanese Five-Year Aboriginal Subjugation Plan, which forcibly confiscated hunting rifles essential to Bunun livelihood, imposed coercive assimilation policies, and subjected indigenous people to abuse and forced relocations.

Following the attack, Raho Arei led his followers over the Central Mountain Range to establish a stronghold at Tamaho (玉穗社) on the upper Laonong River, in terrain inaccessible to Japanese police. For 18 years, this group maintained armed resistance, making the Bunun the last indigenous people in Taiwan to be brought under Japanese control. In 1921, the Japanese lured 23 Bunun warriors to supposed peace talks and executed all of them, further hardening resistance. Raho Arei finally accepted surrender terms on April 22, 1933, earning the designation as 'the last barbarian to submit' in Japanese colonial records.

Today the Dafen station ruins lie within Yushan National Park and serve as a base for the park's Taiwan Black Bear Research Center. The site is accessible only via multi-day mountain treks along the historic Batongguan Trail, requiring hiking permits from the national park. Stone foundations, terraced platforms, and Japanese-era memorial steles remain visible among the forest. The surrounding area features numerous commemorative pillars marking sites where Japanese police were killed during decades of Bunun resistance.

The Dafen site stands as one of the most significant landmarks of indigenous resistance in Taiwan's colonial history, representing the Bunun people's determined 18-year struggle to preserve their culture, livelihood, and autonomy against the full force of the Japanese colonial state.