Ganghwa Dondae — A History of the Frontier Carved in Stone

A forgotten site that was once a battleground for great powers surrounding modern-era Joseon. We retrace the turbulent historical landscape at the 54 dondae (coastal defense forts) built on Ganghwa Island.

Words & Photos Lee Sangyeop

Uidu Dondae, seen from Cheolbuk Dondae. The two are completely linked by barbed wire fencing. It’s unclear whether the front face of Cheolbuk Dondae was rebuilt when the military installed its structures, but today it forms a curved surface. This place still represents a war that has never truly ended.

The dondae of Ganghwa Island have always been there, yet facing them properly feels strange. From the moment they were first built, their purpose was ambiguous, and when they finally entered the public eye, it was through tragedy — the Byeongin Yangyo, the Sinmi Yangyo, the Unyo Incident of the late Joseon period. These events form a dark chapter of Joseon’s history. That they rarely appear even in popular dramas or films is precisely because they were episodes in which Joseon was thoroughly violated. That’s why a journey through the dondae is a form of ‘dark tourism’ — travel centered on human death and sorrow. In the process of Ganghwa’s forced modern opening, war and massacre were carried out by France, the United States, and Japan, and history has largely failed to reveal this properly, leaving it concealed instead.
Fifty-two dondae were built on Ganghwa during the reign of King Sukjong of Joseon. They took the form of small stone forts — round or rectangular walls of piled stone with gun emplacements set throughout and a low parapet on top. Think of them simply as small stone fortresses. By 1679, dondae had been built all along Ganghwa’s coastline, fortifying the entire island and completing a system of five garrisons, seven forts, and 52 dondae. At the time these were built, East Asia was experiencing an unprecedented peace lasting roughly 200 years, from the mid-17th century to the mid-19th century.
In 1681, after Emperor Kangxi toppled the remnants of the Ming dynasty and suppressed the Revolt of the Three Feudatories led by Wu Sangui, the Qing dynasty achieved complete control over the Chinese heartland. Joseon, having settled the chaotic international affairs that followed the Manchu invasions during the reign of King Hyojong, entered a period of stability under King Sukjong, who took the throne in 1674. In Japan, peace at home and abroad arrived as the bakuhan system was completed under Tokugawa Ietsuna, the fifth shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate, who took power in 1651. Yet this era of peace was deeply contradictory, a time when opposing ideas and behaviors coexisted uneasily.
Ruling powers desired conservative stability, while the common people longed for new rights and new ways of life. In Qing China, once the expansionist policies pursued under Kangxi bore fruit, the dynasty adopted a Han Chinese bureaucratic system and gave up the vigor of the Manchu Eight Banners. In Joseon, the king and the scholar-officials elevated Neo-Confucianism as the supreme ideology and sought to turn the social order back toward the past. In Japan, the Genroku era (1688–1704) brought a boom driven by an explosion of domestic markets, even as the country maintained its policy of national isolation. Meanwhile, on the opposite end of the world, Europe was inventing the very concept of modernity, becoming an empire that had seized wealth through the seas and beginning its eastward advance. East Asia quietly collided with the foreign ideas and curiosities pressing in from outside.

Cannonball marks at Choji Dondae. During the Sinmi Yangyo, the military facilities within the fort — the arms depot, the gunpowder magazine, the command post — were destroyed by American forces. The roughly 40 cannons that remained in the battery were either destroyed or rolled down into the Ganghwa Strait. During the Unyo Incident, bombardment from 110mm and 40mm naval guns instantly destroyed the Choji battery. Afterward, Choji Fort was completely demolished, leaving only the site and the foundations of the fortress wall. The dondae seen today is a restoration of that ruin, meaning even the cannonball marks visible now are, in truth, nothing more than a fabrication.

(Left) The forested grove of hackberry trees at Donggeombuk Dondae. Among all 54 dondae, Donggeombuk is the largest in scale, rectangular in plan with a perimeter of 261 meters. The surrounding hackberry trees create a mysterious, desolate atmosphere. This is where villagers hold their communal rites. All of its stone walls have collapsed, but its existence is confirmed by the earthen embankment and facing stones. Two building sites were discovered at the lower southwest section, from which Yeongjong Island can be seen far to the southwest.

(Right) A view through the gun port of Sangam Dondae. Sangam Dondae has a steep slope on its front side and a gentle slope at the rear, set against the mountain behind it. The four gun emplacements facing the sea are relatively well preserved. The stonework at Sangam Dondae was built by fitting roughly hewn rectangular stones together with meticulous grinding and joining. The horizontal joints are generally aligned, but the vertical joints deliberately are not, giving the structure remarkable stability. Small ‘filler stones’ were also wedged between the larger stones to make the wall solid and secure.

A full view of Bunori Dondae. About 30 percent of its outer wall has been restored, and because it was built using the natural rock face of the eastern cliff, it creates a breathtaking scene. Among all 54 dondae, Bunori Dondae has an especially unusual form that never fails to draw gasps of admiration from visitors.

Modern history defines East Asia’s entry into modernity as occurring in the mid-19th century. The issue is that this shift, in every case, resulted from violent treaties imposed by Western powers. China signed the Treaty of Nanjing with Britain in 1842, and Japan concluded the Treaty of Amity and Commerce with the United States in 1858. Both were unequal treaties. Joseon, likewise, was forced under Japanese coercion to sign the Treaty of Ganghwa in 1876. We generally define this as East Asia’s entry into the modern era. In this turbulent modern age, Ganghwa Island — Joseon’s remote frontier — became a battlefield of contradictions. Surrounded by its dondae, Ganghwa was subjected to demands for forced opening by France, the United States, and Japan, and eventually became a battleground for Qing China, Russia, and Japan. In this way, Joseon suffered almost unbearable hardship. And at the very site of that suffering stood the dondae.
After liberation, through the Korean War and military coups, the dondae came to be given an entirely different value. They faced a new reality in which they were regarded not as military installations but as historical and cultural heritage sites. Ironically, it was during the Park Chung-hee administration that the long-dormant, ruined dondae reopened their eyes. Park, who clashed with the United States over his pursuit of self-reliant national defense and nuclear weapons development, chose Ganghwa Island as a sacred site of anti-American national salvation, and under the pretext of consoling the spirits of the people who died in the Sinmi Yangyo, the government carried out large-scale restorations of sites connected to that conflict, including Sondolmok Dondae. As a result, roughly ten dondae, from Gapgot Dondae to Choji Dondae, were presented to the public through restorations of uncertain historical accuracy. Having thus been spotlighted as security-themed tourist attractions, the dondae suffered yet another ordeal when local governments, riding the wave of booming domestic tourism, turned them into sightseeing attractions. Today, of the 54 dondae, 10 have been completely lost, roughly 20 are under military ownership, and the rest have either been abandoned or restored without proper historical verification. Only a handful still retain anything close to their original form.
And now, the dondae face yet another trial: inscription as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. This means passing through numerous gates in order to meet the criteria of ‘universal and outstanding value’ required of world heritage. Can these stone structures — long ignored, forced at some point to bear witness to the nation’s most painful era, then abandoned and exploited once again — truly be preserved as one of humanity’s purest historical monuments?

(Left) A military bunker discovered near the site of Jeokbuk Dondae. At a glance, it’s clear the bunker was built using the facing stones of the dondae. Jeokbuk Dondae originally stood at the tip of a landmass jutting out into the sea, atop a low hill. Today it has been so severely damaged that its original form can no longer be determined. Many dondae have been lost in this way, through military occupation and destruction.

(Right) Hyuam Dondae, viewed from Wolgot Dondae. Hidden behind trees, the shape of its fortress wall is not visible. Hyuam Dondae is located at the edge of the coast, on the hill behind Goseong Village in Wolgot-ri, Ganghwa-eup. Visiting the site, only a stone wall section of about three to four meters remains, and military installations make it impossible to determine its original form. The barbed wire fencing here often gives visitors the mistaken impression that this is the DMZ, but the waters off Ganghwa are in fact designated a peace zone — meaning anyone is free to walk down to the shore and sail out to sea by boat. Of course, no one actually does.