The Rape of Nanking

her diary that a man mentioned to her that “there are reported still many dead bodies on both sides of the Yangtze and many bloated ones floating down the river—soldiers and civilians. I asked him if he meant tens or hundreds and he said it seemed to him to be thousands and thousands”; diary 1937–40, p. 247.

104. “Since return (to) Shanghai a few days ago”: “Red Machine” Japanese diplomatic messages, no. 1263, translated February 1, 1938, record group 457, National Archives. Manchester Guardian correspondent H. J. Timperley originally wrote this report, which was stopped by Japanese censors in Shanghai. (See “Red Machine” Japanese diplomatic messages, no. 1257.) His estimate of 300,000 deaths was later included in the message sent by Japanese Foreign Minister Hirota Koki to Washington, DC. The significance of this message is that the Japanese government not only knew about the 300,000 figure given by Timperley but tried to suppress the information at the time.

CHAPTER 5: THE NANKING SAFETY ZONE

106. In November 1937, Father Jacquinot de Bessage: Tien-wei Wu, “Let the Whole World Know the Nanking Massacre,” p. 16.

106. When the Presbyterian missionary W. Plumer Mills: Angie Mills to the author, February 16, 1997. In her family archives, Mills found a copy of a speech given by John Rabe on February 28, 1938, at the Foreign YMCA in Shanghai to a group of Westerners. In it he said, “I must tell you Mr. Mills is the man who originally had the idea of creating the Safety Zone. I can say that the brains of our organization were to be found in the Ping Tsang Hsiang No. 3 [the address, according to Angie Mills, of Lossing Buck’s house, where nine or ten of the Americans were living during this period, near Nanking University]. Thanks to the cleverness of my American friends: Mr. Mills, Mr. Bates, Dr. Smythe, Mr. Fitch, Mr. Sone, Mr. Magee, Mr. Forster and Mr. Riggs, the Committee was put on its feet and thanks to their hard work it ran as smoothly as could be expected under the dreadful circumstances we lived in.”

107. Interestingly enough, the Panay would later be bombed: “Sinking of the U.S.S. Panay,” ch. 11 of Some Phases of the Sino-Japanese Conflict (July–December 1937), compiled from the records of the Commander in Chief, Asiatic Fleet, by Captain W. A. Angwin (MC), USN, December 1938, Shanghai, Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Division of Naval Intelligence, general correspondence, 1929–42, folder P9–2/EF16#23, box 284, entry 81, record group 38, National Archives; “The Panay Incident,” Records of the Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Records of the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, 1882–1954, Intelligence Division— Naval Attache Reports, 1886–1939, box 438, entry 98, record group 38, National Archives; “The Bombing of the U.S.S. Panay,” drawn by Mr. E. Larsen after consultation with Mr. Norman Alley, December 31, 1937, box 438, entry 98, record group 38, National Archives; Weldon James, “Terror Hours on Panay Told by Passenger,” Chicago Daily News, December 13, 1937; A. T. Steele, “Chinese War Horror Pictured by Reporter: Panay Victims Under Japanese Fire for Full Half Hour; Butchery and Looting Reign in Nanking,” Chicago Daily News, December 17, 1937; Bergamini, pp. 24–28.

108. “We were not rich”: Marjorie Wilson, telephone interview with the author.

108. “Would they kill us?”: Alice Tisdale Hobart, Within the Walls of Nanking (New York: Macmillan, 1928), pp. 207–8.

108. “We were more prepared for excesses from the fleeing Chinese”: “Deutsche Botschaft China,” German diplomatic reports, document dated January 15, 1938, starting on page 214, National History Archives, Republic of China.

109. The son of a sea captain: Details of John Rabe’s early life come from correspondence between the author and Rabe’s granddaughter, Ursula Reinhardt, and from the archives of the Siemens Company, Berlin Germany.

109. “I believe not only in the correctness of our political system”: Rabe’s account of the Rape of Nanking can be found in his report to Adolf Hitler, entitled “Enemy Planes over Nanking,” copies of which are now at Yale Divinity School Library, the Memorial Hall of the Victims of the Nanking Massacre by Japanese Invaders, and the Budesarchiv of the Federal Republic of Germany. Information and quotes in this section not otherwise attributed come from this report.

112. “the mayor of Nanking.” Letter from John Rabe of the International Committee for Nanking Safety Zone to the Imperial Japanese Embassy, December 27, 1937, enclosure to report entitled “Conditions in Nanking,” January 25, 1938, Intelligence Division, Naval Attache Reports, 1886–1939, Records of the Office of the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, 1882–1954, Office of Naval Intelligence, box 996, entry 98, record group 38, National Archives.

113. lost an eye: Fitch, My Eighty Years in China, p. 101.

113. only a fraction of the total food: Hsu, p. 56.

116. Han Chung Road: Hsu, p. 2.

116. mingled with civilians: Letter from John Rabe to Fukuda Tokuyasa, December 15, 1937, box 996, entry 98, record group 38, National Archives.

116. “We knew that there were a number of ex-soldiers”: George Fitch, diary entry for December 14, 1937, reprinted in My Eighty Years in China, p. 106. One of the original copies can be found in Commanding Officer C. F. Jeffs to the Commander in Chief, U.S. Asiatic Fleet (letterhead marked the U.S.S. Oahu), February 14, 1938, intelligence summary filed for the week ending February 13, 1938, Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Division of Naval Intelligence, general correspondence, 1929–42, p. 5, folder A8–21/FS#3, box 195, entry 81, record group 38, National Archives. In the diary, Fitch wrote: “Not a whimper came from the entire throng. Our own hearts were lead…. How foolish I had been to tell them the Japanese would spare their lives !”

118. “All 27 Westerners in the city”: Letter from John Rabe to the Imperial Japanese Embassy, December 17, 1937, enclosure no. 8 to report entitled “Conditions in Nanking,” January 25, 1938, box 996, entry 98, record group 38, National Archives. This letter can also be found in Hsu Shuhsi, ed., Documents of the Nanking Safety Zone: Prepared under the Auspices of the Council of International Affairs, Chungking (Shanghai, Hong Kong, Singapore: Kelly & Walsh, 1939).

118. “We did not find a single Japanese patrol”: Rabe to Imperial Japanese Embassy, December 17, 1937; Hsu Shuhsi, Documents of the Nanking Safety Zone, p. 12.

118. “Yesterday, in broad daylight”: Rabe to Imperial Japanese Embassy, December 17, 1937; Hsu Shuhsi, Documents of the Nanking Safety Zone, p. 20.

118. “If this process of terrorism continues”: Rabe to Imperial Japanese Embassy, December 17, 1937; Shuhsi Hsu, Documents of the Nanking Safety Zone, p. 17.

118. During the great Rape some Japanese embassy officials: IMTFE judgment, National Archives. See “Verdict of the International /Military Tribunal for the Far East on the Rape of Nanking,” Journal of Studies of Japanese Agression Against China, November 1990, p. 75.

118. “if you tell the newspaper reporters anything bad”: Fu Kuishan’s warning to Rabe, recorded in John Rabe diary, February 10, 1938, p. 723.

119. Once there, he would chase Japanese soldiers away: Robert Wilson, letter to family, January 31, 1938, p. 61.

120. failed to take the matter seriously: Even the Japanese embassy staff seemed secretly gleeful of the excesses of the Japanese army. When Hsu Chuang-ying caught a Japanese soldier raping a woman in a bath house and informed Fukuda, vice-consul of the Japanese embassy, of the situation, he saw that Fukuda had “a little smile on his face.” Transcript of the International Military Tribunal of the Far East. Testimony of Hsu Chuang-ying, witness. RG 311, Entry 319, page 2570-2571. Records from the Allied Operational/Occupation Headquarters, National Archives, Washington, D.C.