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Show is said to have committed suicide. The Anti-Graft, Waste and Beaurocracy Movement, which sounded at first take a laudable attempt to clean up government and business, has become a terror to the rank and file of most Chinese. Every one is assumed guilty and compelled to confess for their own misdeeds, whether or not committed, and accuse others, whether or not guilty. For example, the head of the girls school in which Miss Huggins taught is held incommunicado and accused of serious charges. The Business Manager, a Mr. Kung, one of our good Christians from Lintsing, cut his throat in attempted suicide. Another teacher (Tang Pao-shan, a Christian) is also under student arrest, and in danger. The head of the business departments of the boys school (formerly Jefferson Academy; is our next-door neighbor and a fine Christian. He was so accused and grilled that he attempted suicide with a nail through the temple which put out one eye and paralyzed half of his body. Students with loaded rifles are. guarding all school grounds lest someone escape. The sup't. of our Tunghsien Hospital is locked up pending investigations. He is Wang Hrush ju of Taiku, one of our old and prominent workers. At Yenching the President (C. W. Cruh), supposedly very progressive and anti American, is being tried for pro-American sympathies, about the worst crime possible now. The. dean of the School of Religion, Dr. T. C. Chao, who has been a staunch advocate of the Peoples Government in the pages of the Christian Century etc. is also on trial for his thinking. Our former accountant in the Kung Lie Hue and American Board Treasurer's Office, Peking, is in considerable danger because of so-called "black market" exchange of American money by that office before the Communists took Peking. All those through whom such exchange was made - friendly business men, are in similar danger. Our leading business layman, Mr. Sun Yu Chi, is under attack, his son under arrest, and he is trying to save his son's life by turning all his considerable business and property over to the government. Mass executions are common thru all the extent of China, and fill the^papers. There are few in responsible positions free from fear of accusation. The medical superintendent of the Methodist Hospital was compelled by the police to accuse the head nurse of that hospital, both of them old Christians. He has nearly lost his mind over it, knowing that it was all a lie. So it goes. Next cabin to us on the boat is occupied by a French Catholic sister who has given her life - 29 years - to a Chinese orphanage. She was accused of killing off Chinese children, sentenced to 15 years, put in jail for 4 months and now expelled from China with only the clothes on her back. The propaganda against America is unbelievably terrific. It was about the limit before, but the last 2 months have been full of U.S. (always "U.S.", never U.N.) bacterial warfare in Korea and Manchuria. Every newspaper is full of it, radio loudspeakers blare it all day. Posters in all public places. All groups have to discuss it and protest, especially doctors, bacteriologists, nurses, scientific bodies, etc., etc. Reports of the so-called investigation commission headed by the Minister of Education, Lu Te-ch'uan (originally a Boxer Christian orphan, from Tunghsien, and later Feng Yu-huiang's wife) claim all kinds of "proof" that American planes are dropping plague and other germs over Korea and the Manchurian mainland. The last 10 days before we left the paper carried reports that the Americans had atom bpmbs in Korea and were about to use them. No Chinese can afford to appear friendly to any American in public. No Chinese friends dared to say goodbye or see us off at Tunghsien or Peking station, or Tientsin wnarr, tnougn many did in private when they could. Every American is under suspicion as a potential if not probable spy. The deciding question put to me in the matter of my radio and my stamps was "Are you an American?" Do the Chinese people believe all this? No. But a strong minority, especially of students and youngsters, swallow it all and lead the procession. Any one who raises questions or doubts or even fails to appear enthusiastically convinced is branded as "reactionary" or, worse still, "pro-American", and the dice are all loaded against him. The most trivial pretext is seized upon or manufactured to accuse such a person. There is no such thing as trial before impartial juries. No lawyers to plead, no witnesses permitted on behalf of the accused. - 2 - |