Betrayed Ally. China in the Great War

225 Pages·2016·13.89 MB·English

by  Christopher Arnander and Frances Wood

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Betrayed Ally
betrayedally-prelimpageii-Press
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Betrayed Ally
China in the Great War
Frances Wood
and
Christopher Arnander
betrayedally-prelimpageiv-Press
FirstpublishedinGreatBritainin2016by
PEN & SWORD MILITARY
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Contents
Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi
ImageCredits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . viii
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ix
1. Japanseesanopportunity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
2. NewChina,the‘infantrepublic’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
3. Japan:notplayingstraight . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
4. Chinainwartime,1914–1916 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
5. TheChineseLabourCorps:Yellow’eathensare’elpingout
inFrance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
6. SpiesandSuspicions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
7. Acrucialyearofchaosanddecisions:1917 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111
8. Afterthewar,thedisappointment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
9. AnatomyofaBetrayal:theinterpreter’saccount . . . . . . . . . . . . . 135
10. China’sreaction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Appendix1:ChronologyofRecentChineseHistory . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
Appendix2:KeyPersonalitiesintheWar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 183
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 191
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Acknowledgements
Wecametowritingthisbookfromdifferentdirections.Frances,authorof12
books about Chinese matters, wrote an account of the chaotic diplomacy of
China in the Great War, Picnics Prohibited, which was published by Penguin
(Australia) in 2014. Christopher’s book about his grandfather, Private Lord
Crawford’s Great War Diaries (Pen & Sword, 2013), referred to the Japanese
and British seizure of the German enclave in Shandong in the first weeks of
the war. We had already cooperated on Pavilions in the Air (Stacey Inter-
national,2008),acollectionofChineseandEnglishproverbs,withcartoons.
ItseemedtousthattherewasroomforanaccessiblehistoryofChinaand
the Great War, with plenty of illustrations, aimed at the general reader.
Thereis,infact,awealthofpublishedmaterialaboutthesubject,butmostly
it is geared to the academic world. For example, two very fine works by Xu
Guoqi, China and the Great War (Cambridge, 2005) and Strangers on the
Western Front (Harvard, 2011) were published by university presses. Li Ma’s
LestravailleurschinoisenFrancedansla Premie`re guerremondiale(2012), about
all aspects of the Chinese labourers’ experiences, was the fruit of a scholary
colloquium in 2010. These volumes are to be recommended to any of our
readers who might want to delve more deeply into the subject.
Beforeembarkingonourbook,wesoundedoutfriendsandacquaintances,
most of whom had only the vaguest idea of China’s role in the Great War.
Virtually all of them expressed great interest and curiosity. We were also
encouraged by Julia Boyd, whose book Dance with the Dragon describes the
expatriate community in China at the time. Dominiek Dendooven of the In
Flanders Museum, Ypres, curated a marvellous exhibition in 2010 about the
Chineselabourersinthewar;wearegratefultohimforhisenthusiasticpro-
visionofinformation,imagesandadvice.NelsonOliverwasamineofinfor-
mation about the Chinese journeys across the Pacific and through Canada.
Librariesandotherinstitutionsthatwefoundparticularlyhelpfulwerethe
BritishLibrary,SOAS,TheLibraryofCongress,Bibliothe`quedel’Hoˆtelde
VilleandBibliothe`quenationaledeFrance,Paris,TheNationalWorldWar
1 Museum in Kansas City and UK National Archives at Kew.
We are grateful to.several descendants of diplomats who served in China
duringtheGreatWar;theysharedmemories,illustrationsandprivatepapers
with us. The archivists of three banks (Deutsche, HSBC and Barclays) pro-
videdusefulinformationandimages,forwhichacknowledgementismadeat
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Acknowledgements vii
the appropriate place. Weare indebted alsoto Professor RobertBickers and
Jamie Carstairs, of Historical Photographs of China/Visualising China.
Weareespeciallygratefultoourpublisher,Pen&Sword;notonlydidthey
take on a title which is somewhat outside their military speciality, but they
also coped marvellously with our detailed requirements. The task was made
themoredifficultbecause,whilewritingthebook,wereceivedmanysugges-
tionswhichjustifiedsomechanges–thebaneofanypublisher.Theirhelphas
beenunstinting,creativeandgoodnaturedthroughoutthepreparationofour
book.
Frances Wood
Christopher Arnander
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Image Credits
Plates
Taylor Archive, Barnsley, pp.17–18, 31, 33–4, 37; Wellcome Library,
London, p.12; Tank Museum, Bovington, p.38; Le Petit Journal, 6 April
1902, p.14; Vroon BV, Breskens, p.26;
W.R.Wheeler,China&theWorldWar,1918,pp.28,40–1;MarkLevitch,
Panthe´on de la Guerre, 2006, p.52; Jeremy Rowett Johns and the Historical
PhotographsofChina,UniversityofBristol,pp.29–30; TheAustralian War
Memorial, Canberra, p.39; L’Illustration, 1919, p.47;
Sophia McKenna Lloyd, p.55; Sint-Andries Abbey in Zevenkerken,
Bruges, pp.42–3; In Flanders Fields Museum, Ypres, p.20; James Brazier,
pp.35–6;TomCohen,p.45;MaberleyPhillips,AHistoryofBanks,Bankers&
Banking in Northumberland, Durham and North Yorkshire, 1894 (courtesy of
Barclays Bank Archives), p.44; John Swire & Sons Ltd Archive at School
of Oriental & African Studies (SOAS), London, p.8. Other plates from the
internet.
Textinserts
Library of Congress, Washington, Chronicling America: Historic American
Newspapers, pp.46, 50, 68 (top), p.82 (top), p.130 (top & right), p.152
(middle); Le Petit Journal, 3 March 1912, p.78; Punch, 6 November 1918,
p.90; Taylor Archive, Barnsley, p.86 (bottom), p.92 (top left and top right);
Honourable Artillery Company, London, Sylvester Alexander Album, p.92
(bottom left); Historical Institute of Deutsche Bank, Frankfurt am Main,
p.54 (top & bottom); Alan Blaikley, p.92 (bottom right), drawing by Ernest
Blaikley; In Flanders Museum, Ypres, p.92 (middle left), from The Message
from Mars, Canadian army magazine; Barclays Bank Archives, p.108 (top
right),P.W.MatthewsandA.W.Tuke,HistoryofBarclaysBankLimited,1926;
UniversityofLeeds,SpecialCollections,p.90(MajorPurdon’sphrasebook);
MunicipalArchives,Weihai,p.90(bottomright).Otherillustrationscredited
on the page or taken from the internet.
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Introduction
‘Ihadnoidea’,or‘Didn’ttheyhelpwithtanksandroads?’Thesearethesorts
ofresponsesmadebyotherwisewell-informedfriendstothequestionofhow
muchtheyknowaboutChinaintheFirstWorldWar.Thequestionprovokes
confessionsofignorance andsurpriseandfewintheEnglish-speakingworld
have any idea of China’s participation. China was so far away from the
Sommethatitseemsirrelevant.YetoneofthefirstbattlesoftheFirstWorld
War was fought on Chinese soil. How many know that China joined the
Entente Allies in 1917, in the same year as America? How many know that
almost140,000ChineseservedinFrance,aslabourers,doingessentialmain-
tenance work on roads, trenches, railways and tanks and making up for the
drastic manpower shortage by working in French factories and fields?
Atleast5,000,perhapsasmanyas10,000losttheirlives,someatsea,most
buriedthousandsofmilesfromtheirhomesandhonouredinwarcemeteries
in France and Belgium. A further 200,000 served in Russia, of whom many
werecaughtupintheRussianRevolution,andwhosefateismostlyunknown.
At the end of the war, a Chinese delegation attended the Versailles Peace
Conferencein1919butChina,nolessthanseveralothernations,feltutterly
belittledandbetrayedbyitstreatmentatVersaillesanddidnotsignthePeace
Treaty.
Theensuing bitternessandriots,theMay FourthMovementof1919, was
a turning point in Chinese history. The Great War and its aftermath led
directly, though slowly, to its current great power status. On the way, the
Chinesepeoplesufferedthehorrorsofwarlordism,Japaneseinvasion,famine,
floods,worldwar,civil waranda reunified nation’sgrowing painsafter Mao
Zedong proclaimed the foundation of the People’s Republic of China in
October 1949.
These events still form the background to China’s senseof its place in the
world. The events of 1914–1919 were of momentous significance to China
in its development as a major power. At the beginning of the war, after
thousands of years of imperial rule, China had been a republic for less than
threeyears,whenitsterritoryinShandong,formerlyleasedtoGermany,was
invaded by Japanese armed forces aided by a small British contingent.
Secondly, thousands of Chinese men travelled half way across the world to
workindangerousconditionsneartheWesternFront.Andthen,despiteher
contributions to the war, China felt humiliated and betrayed at Versailles.