by John Rabe
Our committee has thus far succeeded in feeding the city’s 200,000 residents packed into our Zone by setting up soup kitchens, distribution centers for rice and flour, etc. An order has now come from the Japanese to close our outlets for selling rice, since care of the refugees is to be taken over by the newly found Autonomous Government Committee. . . . As soon as order is reestablished in the city and I am granted permission by the authorities to leave Nanking, I will join you there. Up till now all such requests have been met with refusal.
I herewith request additional permission to remain here until the Zone Committee is dissolved, since the life and welfare of many people are indeed dependent on a few Europeans. In my house and garden alone, over 600 of the poorest refugees found refuge on the night of 12 December in order to avoid being molested or killed by the unchecked Japanese soldiery. Most people are housed in straw huts in the garden and live from the daily rice ration doled out to them.
With German greetings,
JOHN RABE
15 JANUARY
As is obvious from the letters that arrived for me yesterday from Shanghai via the German embassy and to which on 14 January I replied to the management of Siemens China Co. in Shanghai, people there have not the vaguest notion of current conditions here.
Memorandum of Chancellor 40 P. Schar fenberg, German Embassy, Nanking Office
Situation in Nanking as of 13 January 1938
There is no telephone, telegraph, or postal service in Nanking, nor are there any buses, taxies, or rickshas. The waterworks are not operating, electric power is to be had only in the embassy buildings, where all windows above the ground floor must be blacked out. The English embassy has no electricity as yet.
There is no traffic in the streets, since the suburbs were burned down almost in their entirety by the Chinese and the center of the city has largely been burned down by the Japanese. No one lives there now. The rest of the population—circa 200,000—is confined to the Safety Zone, formerly a residential area. People vegetate there in various buildings and their adjoining gardens, where up to 600 people live in straw huts, and no one may leave this Zone. The Zone is controlled by sentries.
The streets outside the Zone are deserted, the ruins a desolate sight. Food is dangerously short. Inside the Safety Zone people have been begun to eat horse and dog meat. Hürter managed to get through once again yesterday and was able to procure a pig and a few chickens for us via Dr. Günther at the cement factory in Hsi Sha Shan. (The English embassy was given some, as a thank-you for taking us on board their gunboats.) We cannot buy anything else.
The committee under John Rabe, and which includes several Americans, has done miraculous work. It is not an exaggeration to say that it has saved tens of thousands of lives.
The water problem is also very serious, the water mains are not functioning, and there is no way to wash clothes, since all the ponds are contaminated by the dead bodies that have been thrown into them.
The new city administration, which is supposed to take over duties that are in fact being carried out by the committee, is getting nowhere because of the actions of the Japanese. One of its new members, the well-known auctioneer Jimmy, has at least shown courage and told the Japanese: “If you are against me, then you’d better shoot me here and now!”
It’s best not to say anything about the actions of the Japanese since their arrival; it is all too reminiscent of Genghis Khan: Destroy everything! A first lieutenant on the staff told me that during the march from Shanghai to Nanking, the supply columns never once caught up with the troops, and so it is understandable why soldiers went berserk here, grabbing whatever they could. And I’m quite sure that like the Negroes in 1918 they were promised: If you hold out, you’ll each get a pretty girl in Nanking.41And things have been very, very bad for all the women who remained behind here. It is best not even to discuss the matter with those gentlemen who have witnessed it, they can only shudder at the bestiality of it all.
It is easy to say that the troops got out of hand. But I don’t believe that, because Asian warfare is in fact different from war among us. If the sides were reversed, it would probably not have gone any better, especially not with a little incitement.
The harvest in the city and out in the occupied areas of the country is rotting in the fields, because no one from the city is allowed near it and the rural population has either fled or been slain. Vegetables, potatoes, beets, etc. are going to waste, and hunger is rife here.
SCHARFFENBERG
16 JANUARY
Dinner at the Japanese embassy went off without incident. We were 13 people in all. Besides the officials of the Japanese embassy, nine representatives from our committee showed up: Miss Vautrin, Miss Bauer, Dr. Bates, Mills, Smythe, Dr. Trimmer, Kröger, and I. And after we had sat down to eat, John Magee appeared as well, who always tends to bring up the rear, but is otherwise a fine fellow.
On his arrival Kröger received the good news that he may leave for Shanghai. As glad as I am for Kröger, since he plans to get married soon, I am very worried about filling his slot. Kröger is our treasurer and it will not be easy to find a replacement. The food was excellent. Since I needed to be careful about what I said in my after-dinner speech, I brought along the following written text:
Ladies and Gentlemen,
In the name of the International Committee of the Nanking Safety Zone, I would like to express my thanks to our hosts, the officials of the Japanese embassy, for their cordial invitation to join them for dinner. We have, I can assure you, not eaten so well in a long time.
I ask our honored hosts to forgive me for saying a few words about ourselves.
Since most of the members of our committee were active here as missionaries, they felt it was their Christian duty not to desert their Chinese friends in time of war. As a businessman who has lived in this country for 30 years now, I joined them. Having enjoyed the hospitality of this land and its people for so long, I considered it fitting that I not abandon the Chinese in a time of distress.
Those are the reasons that led us who are strangers to this land to remain behind and make some attempt to stand beside those of the poorest Chinese, who in their need lacked the means to leave the city and did not know where to turn.
I do not wish to speak of the work and hardship that we took upon ourselves. They are known to you all.
We appeal to the noble sentiments of the Japanese, to the spirit of the samurai, about whom we foreigners have heard and read so much and who fought so bravely for their land in countless battles, yet never denied clemency to a foe who could not defend himself.
You, the gentlemen of the Japanese embassy, have patiently heard our requests and complaints, and there were many, and have always lent us a willing ear. You have also, to the extent that you could, done your best to help us. And for this much-appreciated help, I would like, in the name of the International Committee, to hereby express my thanks.
I don’t know what the Americans thought of my speech. I am aware that I spoke a little against my own conscience, but I thought it useful for our cause and followed the Jesuit principle: “The ends justify the means.”
There is no denying that it was the officials of the Japanese embassy who helped us to some extent—were the only ones who could help us by passing on our reports to the Japanese military and interceding for us a bit. That they did not have the success we wished surely lies in the fact that diplomats in Japan must defer to the military, who have the first and last word in the Japanese government. The embassy personnel, Fukui, Tanaka, and Fukuda, could therefore rightly be praised a little if one was to praise at all, which after our bitter experiences was indeed hard enough to do.
Shortly before we left for home, Fukuda also let it be known that the Japanese embassy was very distressed by the “Dr. Rosen affair.” It would please him if I would act as a go-between and bring Dr. Rosen to make some sort of conciliatory gesture. Perhaps a visit to the Japanese embassy and a few friendly words—there was no m
ention of an apology. I shall cautiously feel Dr. Rosen out on this, although I fear that my attempts will meet with no success whatever.
17 JANUARY
As I learned from a conference with Dr. Rosen, Okazaki, the Japanese consul general, has already tried to put the recent altercation to rest. If Berlin and Tokyo demand no other settlement, the file on this dispute can be closed, which I would prefer, since we have to get along peaceably with the Japanese here somehow.
Yesterday I drove through the city on a longer tour with Dr. Rosen, and returned home very depressed. The devastation the Japanese have wreaked here is almost beyond description. To my mind there is no possibility that the city can be brought back to life anytime soon. Taiping Lu, the pride of Nanking, which was the main business street before and whose lights at night were equal to those on Nanking Road in Shanghai, is totally ruined, everything burned down. There is not one building left intact, just fields of rubble left and right. Fu Tze-Miao, the former amusement district, with its tea houses and big market, is likewise totally destroyed. As far as the eye can see—nothing but rubble! Who’s going to rebuild it all? On the way back we visited what fire had left behind of the State Theater and the great bazaar. There, too, everything burned down. I’m afraid I grossly miscalculated when I wrote that a third of the city had been put to the torch by the Japanese. If the East City, which I’ve not visited to any extent, was dealt with in the same fashion, then more than half the city lies in ruins.
The city of Nanking was almost totally destroyed—by both fire and bombardment—by the Japanese army.
I also have the impression that instead of emptying out as the Japanese have demanded, our Zone is still filling up. You risk your life in the press of people on Shanghai Lu, particularly now that both sides of the street are filled with market booths built of poles and planks, where all sorts of food and clothes and even some stolen curios are peddled. Estimates of the total population of the Zone are now around 250,000. The increase of about 50,000 comes from the ruined parts of the city. People simply don’t know where to stay.
18 JANUARY
You can see columns of smoke in several directions. Fires are still merrily being set. At 9 a.m., a meeting of the managers of various refugee camps is to be held at our headquarters. We would not be surprised if the Japanese disrupt the meeting or even forbid it. I’ve placed sentries outside the walls, who are to inform the German embassy at once if our building is surrounded by the Japanese military police, as happened last time. To my delight, Dr. Rosen, Kröger, and Sperling show up. We are all anxiously waiting to see if the Japanese are going to permit some sort of incursion. But the meeting proceeds normally and calmly.
This afternoon Dr. Smythe and Fitch arrive with news that we may not move rice or any other foodstuff into the city, or fetch it from stores within the city, or import it from Shanghai. It appears the Japanese intend to let the refugees starve. This must be prevented. We therefore send the following telegram to Shanghai:
Boyton, National Christian Council, Shanghai (Excerpt)
Food question more serious because no regular supply available civilian population. . . .
We are feeding fifty thousand daily free rice. Request to truck in rice wheat purchased here and request for necessary passes to ship six hundred tons foodstuffs from Shanghai turned down. Please try negotiations Shanghai. If you can buy Chinese green beans Shanghai get permission to ship one hundred tons as soon as possible. Go ahead raising funds. We will find way to use them.
18 January 1938 FITCH
LATER
The American embassy was able to cable another “incident” to the State Department in Washington. The local American school was looted again today, and in fact they broke a large hole in the outer wall in order to take away the piano. Unfortunately the American officials arrived a little too late to catch the Japanese soldiers at their thievery. You would think it impossible for the Japanese military to compromise itself like that, now that there is an American embassy in the city again.
I’m wracking my brains about how I should go about “winding up business” here as they put it in their telegram. There are no crates to be had at the moment, no craftsmen, and no porters. How I am supposed to pack things? You can’t just leave everything lying here—that would be tantamount to losing it all. What would become of my compound here, if I were to just cut and run, meaning go to Shanghai? The Japanese will probably give me a pass to leave at some point; I even have the feeling they would be happy to be rid of me. But what would become of the 650 refugees on the grounds? What a bitter ending to all our labors!
19 JANUARY
The radio reports that a Berlin newspaper has warned Japan to refrain from advancing any farther into the interior of China. At the same time the newspaper is said to have recommended that China be offered an honor-able peace. That would be “too good to be true.” No one here believes that Japan will follow such good advice.
The telegram sent to Rabe via the American naval station: “Following for German Embassy begins Siemens for RABE wind up business yourself and Han return Shanghai soonest Fischer ends Phillips.”
There will soon be major battles along the Lunghai Railway. The Chinese army has about 40,000 drawn up there and appears to have regrouped, or so at least the radio report claims. All incompetent officers are said to have been eliminated. We haven’t the least hope, sad to say, that China will emerge victorious from those battles.
Meanwhile Tsingtao has been taken by the Japanese, the same goes for Tsinanfu. Word is that the police have revolted and are looting in Cheefoo—according to Japanese reports.
On orders of Chiang Kai-shek, Han Fuchün, the governor of Shandong, and two other generals have been court-martialed for not offering adequate resistance to the enemy. Word is that Han Fuchün put all his cash into Japanese banks. There’s little doubt of it, since it’s probably the Japanese who are making this claim.
There was also news today that Chang Hsueliang, son of Chang Tsolin and leader of the Sian rebellion, has been shot, the same man who arrested and imprisoned Chiang Kai-shek in Sian about a year ago.42
As photographs make clear, the Japanese took pleasure in the killing of their victims. They often posed for snapshots, which were saved as mementos.
These purges on Hankow’s part have all come much too late; people doubt if they will be of any use.
I gave written notice to our Siemens employees today, telling them that on orders from the central office in Shanghai, I am to close our office here; for I see no other possible interpretation of Shanghai’s message to “wind up business.” I’ll pay people their January salaries in full, but no New Year’s bonus. That’s damned hard, I know, because the Chinese New Year, which begins on 1 February, is at hand and there’s been an extraordinary rise in the price of food, that is if you can find any. But hundreds of thousands of people here are just as badly off. The employees all have a roof over their heads as long as I’m still here. And when I run out of money for food, then they’ll have to take advantage of the International Committee’s soup kitchen, which is already feeding most of the 650 refugees in my house. Two sacks of rice a day.
My landlord’s agents have fled, along with the landlord. All the same, I’ll write a letter giving him notice, since by contract I can abandon the house if the firm recalls me.
Letter from John Rabe to the Siemens Central Office
19 January 1938
Re: Closing the Nanking Office
This is to inform you that, as per your telegram of 10 January, in which you order me to close the local office, I am giving the local Chinese employees written notice that due to the state of war, they should regard their positions with our firm was terminated as of the end of this month. Could you please inform me if, in addition to their January salary, I can pay them a New Year’s bonus or provide some other monetary gratification. Since food prices here have risen considerably and none of our Chinese employees has any savings from which a family could live
for any length of time, I would most heartily recommend a positive answer in this matter. In hope of a reply telegraphed to me as quickly as possible, I remain
Very truly yours,
JOHN RABE
John Rabe’s Letter of Termination to Han Hsianglin, His Chinese Assistant of Some Years
Nanking, 19 January 1938
Dear Sir,
Since all business has come to a standstill on account of the war, we regret to inform you that following instruction from our head office, the Nanking office of Siemens China Co. has to be closed.
Please note that this will—much to our regret—also terminate your engagement with our firm. We shall be pleased to reengage you after the war, if conditions permit, and ask you to kindly let us know your future address to enable us to keep you informed.
We take this opportunity to express to you our gratitude and appreciation for your faithful service rendered to our firm during the last six years, and beg to remain very truly yours,
JOHN RABE
Representative Nanking, Siemens China Co.
This sequence of photographs records Chinese being beheaded. When the Japanese soldier took the film to be developed, a Chinese boy working in the shop secretly made copies, at the risk of his life, and glued them into a scrapbook documenting the atrocities. He decorated its cover himself and kept it hidden until the end of the war.
20 JANUARY
Snow storm! The refugees are in an extraordinarily wretched state. You really don’t have to be softhearted to feel pity for these poor people here. The camp in my garden has become one huge puddle of mud. Little channels have been dug around the tents and straw huts to let some of the snow water run off. More than once I’ve just closed my eyes when I’ve spotted open fires under those low straw roofs. In the driving wind and snow, fires are impossible outside. So if people are to have any warmth at all, we simply have to run the risk. When I look at the misery out in my garden, I’m reminded of two books by Dwinger,43Army behind Barbed Wire and Between Red and White.