Shanghai 1937: Stalingrad on the Yangtze (34 page)

This was a very real concern. The Chinese troops, who had entered the battle in an upbeat and patriotic mood, had gradually lost their fervor as they suffered huge numbers of casualties fighting a hopeless battle. Once a division was down to one third of its original strength, it was sent to the rear for reorganization and replenishment, and then returned to the frontline.
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Most soldiers saw the odds of survival heavily stacked against them. But in spite of frequent visits to the front, Chiang Kai-shek knew very little about this. Officers who were aware of the real conditions in the trenches also were familiar with the supreme commander’s stubborn character and his determination to stick to the defense of Shanghai to the bitter end. Under the circumstances, they found it inadvisable to break the truth to him. It was a charade which could not go on forever. In some units the situation was getting so desperate that it was only a matter of time before the soldiers would simply leave their positions.
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With mutiny an increasingly likely scenario, senior commanders sought to convince Chiang Kai-shek that a complete withdrawal of all Chinese troops from the Shanghai area to a fortified line from Suzhou to Jiaxing, a city about 35 miles to the south, was the only option available. In early November, Bai Chongxi told Chiang that the officers at the front could no longer control their men and that a pullback would be a face-saving measure, forestalling open rebellion in the ranks. Nothing they said made any impression on Chiang Kai-shek. Li Zongren, another general who had previously tried to make the case for retreat, knew that it was pointless to argue with the man at the top. “War plans were decided by him personally, and no one else was allowed to say anything,” Li said in his memoirs.
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Even so, at times Chiang seemed tantalizingly close to actually being swayed by the views of his lieutenants. As early as the first days of October, he appeared to have decided for a withdrawal of the front, but subsequently changed his mind. A similar situation emerged late in the month when Chiang had called a meeting with his frontline commanders in a train carriage at Songjiang Railway Station southwest of Shanghai. Before Chiang’s arrival, the generals discussed the battle and concluded that they could do nothing against the enemy’s superior firepower.

Once Chiang had arrived, Zhang Fakui, the commander of the troops in Pudong, suggested moving ten divisions to lines further in the rear, where the positions had been well prepared and defense would be easier than in Shanghai. The majority agreed. At this point, Madame Chiang Kai-shek, as belligerent as ever, made her entry dressed in an expensive-looking fur coat, fresh from a visit to the Shanghai front. “If we can hold Shanghai for ten more days,” she declared, “China will win international sympathy.” She wasn’t any more specific than that, but it appeared to those present that she was referring to the upcoming Brussels conference. That did it for Chiang. “Shanghai must be held at all cost,” he declared with firm conviction in his voice, as if that was what he had felt all along.
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By the first week of November, Shanghai’s refugee problem had become close to unmanageable, and a humanitarian catastrophe of unprecedented scale was in the making. Hundreds of thousands of homeless had crammed into the diminishing parts of the city that remained more or less untouched by war. At the same time the frontline moved closer and threatened to eventually sweep over the entire municipal area, leaving no district unscathed. If that situation were to become reality, the stage would be set for unimaginable suffering, as civilians squeezed into narrow alleys would be exposed to the modern instruments of war.

Incidents were already accumulating showing that non-combatants could expect no mercy. As the Chinese defenders withdrew from Zhabei, the civilians who still remained north of Suzhou Creek rushed to escape with whatever possessions they could carry before their homes were overrun by the Japanese Army. They took the same route as the troops, pouring over the Zhongshan and Jessfield bridges to the safety of the international zones. Some of them were not fast enough. While they were still making their way across the partly destroyed Jessfield Railway Bridge, a Japanese vanguard caught up with them. A machine gun swept the entire bridge, cutting down men, women and children.
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To the south, Brenan Road stretched parallel with the creek and led to the British outposts guarding the entrances to the International Settlement. This, too, was turned into a killing ground by the advancing Japanese. A number of silver-colored Japanese monoplanes were bombing nearby rail
way carriages when three of them suddenly broke formation and started strafing civilians walking along the road. An eyewitness estimated that 200 were killed or injured. “I saw six ambulance loads taken away,” he said. “A large number of others, wounded to various degrees, stumbled into the Settlement or were helped along by others to safety.”
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Desperate cries could be heard as far away as the north bank of Suzhou Creek, where children and old women were unable to move any further, exhausted after a long trek and nervous about stepping onto the railway bridge, having seen what happened to the others. In the end, British soldiers watching the carnage taking place right on their doorstep decided to intervene. Rolling up their shirtsleeves, they moved out to assist them that final short distance to safety. “Once, twice, endless times they patiently helped the refugees in the same manner as they would have treated their own family members,” said a Chinese witness.
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As rumors spread that civilians were being machine-gunned at the Jess-field entrance to the International Settlement, the refugee streams soon started moving to other areas, which were already under severe stress after taking in large numbers of people from the war zones. The Catholic settlement around St Ignatius Cathedral on the edge of the French Concession was one such place. By early November, the monks and nuns were taking care of 7,000 civilians. A large number were children or elderly who had been separated from family members they depended on. “Many come to the camp in dying condition and, especially among the small children, resistance to disease is so small that they become easy victims of common ailments,” the
North China Herald
reported. “Often are the priests called to the side of a dying child whom the devoted nursing sisters cannot possibly save.”
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Much worse was in store for the future unless a more comprehensive solution was found. The Jesuit priest Jacquinot, who had been appointed one of the vice chairmen of the recently established Shanghai Red Cross, decided that the time was right to move more decisively on his vision for a safety zone for non-combatants. Three intense days of negotiations with Chinese and Japanese authorities followed. After securing Shanghai Mayor Yu Hongjun’s agreement to a zone adjacent to the French Concession, he moved on to the difficult part, dealing with the Japanese. Consul General Okamoto Suemasa was favorably disposed, in principle at least, but he
would have to consult his government back home. Everything was now up to Tokyo.
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Yang Huimin’s curiosity had been getting the better of her as the sound of the late-night fight around the Four Banks’ Warehouse was carried across Suzhou Creek into the International Settlement. Hoping to watch the battle from up close, she had followed the creek west until she had been stopped by a British soldier pointing his rifle at her. “Boy scout,” the foreigner said, half contemptuously. He had been fooled by the 22-year-old woman’s tomboy looks and by her uniform. Since her factory had been closed down due to the hostilities, she had devoted most of her time to the Girl Guides, helping refugees holed up in the International Settlement. The soldier had led her pass, however, and from a British bunker she had been able to follow the combat that raged around the warehouse across the creek until dawn.
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After sunrise, she had noticed how all of Zhabei was covered in Japanese flags, while on her side of the creek, over the bunker, the Union Jack was hoisted. “Where was the Chinese flag,” she thought to herself. The red banner with the white star on a blue background was missing in all this—and after all, this was Chinese territory. She had gone home, and after some consideration, she had decided what to do. She had wrapped a large Chinese flag around herself under her uniform and returned to the British bunker, and there, on the evening of October 28, she waited for an opportunity to make the dangerous trip across the Lese Bridge to Zhabei.

Taking advantage of a brief moment when the British sentries were not paying attention, she snuck onto the bridge and rushed across to the other side. Once there, she lifted her face to see the warehouse with its empty windows staring down at her like a many-eyed giant. The most dangerous part still remained—crossing the street without being shot by either British or Japanese sentries. While she was waiting for a chance to move, gun fire started all around her. For a few seconds, she thought she had been detected, but anxiety was overtaken by relief when she understood that the shooting was directed at the warehouse. She had ended up in the middle of yet another Japanese attempt at taking the building.

When the fire had died down, she quickly ran over to the warehouse,
entered through a hole in the barbed wire surrounding the building, and soon stood face to face with Xie Jinyuan, commander of the “Lost Battalion.” Yang Huimin took off her scout’s coat and unwrapped the flag, now soaked in her sweat after the exertion and the danger. There was no flagpole anywhere in the building, and instead the soldiers jerry-rigged one from two bamboo poles. They climbed the stairs to the roof and hoisted the flag in a quick and low-key ceremony, performed by a dozen soldiers shortly before dawn. Yang Ruifu, the second-in-command, made a short speech. “Now that our flag is flying over the warehouse,” he said, “no one can dispute the fact that Zhabei is sovereign Chinese soil!”
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Yang Huimin had noticed a large number of injured lying on the floor of the warehouse and offered to stay in order to help look after them, but Xie Jinyuan declined. As the sun was rising on October 29, he sent her back, urging her to choose a different route for the return trip. “Jump into the creek,” he told her. She followed the advice, dashing to the bank and leaping into the foul water. Immediately, she heard Japanese bullets whizz over her head. She was a good swimmer, and did most of the trip under the surface. When she emerged on the other side, a crowd was standing along Suzhou Creek, cheering and clapping. They were not celebrating her, but the Chinese flag, flying over Zhabei again for the first time since the withdrawal.

Inside the warehouse, fatigue was now widespread. The defenders had been fighting for three days, and the nights had been spent improving their positions. Yang Ruifu had been walking from platoon to platoon after dark, kicking everyone who was slumbering. “If we don’t do everything we can to prepare the positions, the enemy will kill us,” he shouted angrily. “What do you want, to sleep or to live? Anyone caught sleeping from now on will be severely punished!” The privates quietly cursed the officer behind his back, as they got up and set to work on their positions.

Everything indicated that the Japanese wanted October 29 to be the last day in the embarrassing battle for the warehouse. The first warnings started arriving early in the afternoon from across Suzhou Creek, where sympathetic Chinese civilians were secrety spying on enemy troop movements. The battalion was informed by telephone that a major force, consisting of hundreds of soldiers, had been put together and was marching towards the warehouse. Minutes later, it got a similar warning from British
soldiers who were guarding the exits from Zhabei and who had no special love for the Japanese military after one of their numbers had been killed in an air raid in late October. Then the attack started. The Japanese had rolled up numerous artillery pieces and shelled the warehouse for more than an hour. However, the defenders crouched behind ten-foot-thick defensive walls, and escaped with only minor injuries. They also succeeded in beating back the following infantry attack. But it was obvious that they could not hold out for much longer.

By this time, the Chinese Alamo-style battle in Zhabei had been a resounding propaganda victory. The “Lost Battalion” had captured the imagination of the world, and for a few days, journalists paid intense attention to its fate. Zhang Boting, the 88th Division’s chief of staff, had been sent to Shanghai’s foreign districts to keep in touch with Xie Jinyuan and his men. He felt that after four days of fighting, the battalion had made its point and the next step for it was to disengage from the enemy and withdraw. The only escape route was across Lese Bridge to the International Settlement, and hopefully from there to the suburbs and the Chinese positions there. There was one obstacle to this move. It would require the agreement of the western powers.
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On October 30, Zhang Boting turned up at the residence of Yang Hu, the Shanghai defense commissioner, and nominally the most senior military figure in the city. Located in one of the most exclusive areas of the French Concession, it was a sumptuous villa nested in a luxurious flower garden, a home worthy of an official widely rumored to be corrupt.
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Also present were Mayor Yu Hongjun and, more importantly, Alexander Telfer-Smollett, commanding officer of the British forces in Shanghai. Yang Hu got straight down to business. “The supreme commander of the Chinese forces has ordered the Lost Battalion to withdraw from the Four Banks’ Warehouse,” he said. “But we need to confer with the British army on ways to bring this about, with a view to the possible impact on the International Settlement.”

“Do you know about this issue?” Mayor Yu asked the British general. Telfer-Smollet replied in the affirmative. “Our troops have been neighbors with your division across the creek for some time now, and we’ve become friends,” he said. “We’ll do our best to assist the withdrawal of the battalion, but how do you plan to bring it about?” Zhang Boting said the only way
out was through the International Settlement. “The Japanese have set up a machine gun position and searchlights, covering the exit at Lese Bridge. We need your protection in order to make a withdrawal possible,” he said. Telfer-Smollett rose and patted Yang Hu on the back. “Don’t worry. Yang Hu and I are friends.”
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