Traveling to China in 1939

Helen Pierpont was a second cousin, once removed, of mine. She was born in Waterbury, CT, in 1905 and was a teacher in NJ. She didn’t marry until she was 40, but spent many years traveling the world in the 1930s. Her trips included: France in 1930, Cuba in 1933, Bermuda in 1935, Japan in 1937 and France in 1938.

On the cruise to Japan in 1937 she met another single lady, Ella Miller, a teacher from Syracuse, NY. Ella was 20 years older than Helen, but was a similar world traveler, having gone to England in 1925 and 1927, Turkey in 1930, Mexico in 1931, Germany in 1933 and 1934, Gibraltar in 1935, Japan in 1937, and France (with Helen) in 1938.

In 1939, they decided to take another trip together. They left New York City in July by train across the US to San Francisco, then by boat to Japan and thence to China. Being in China in the fall, and knowing that Christmas was approaching, they each wrote a letter to their friends back in the US. It appears from this letter that they may have been intending on continuing around the world together, although I have not been able to verify their itinerary. However, by the following April Helen was back home in New Jersey and Ella was back in Syracuse.

I recently came into possession of their letters written for that Christmas of 1939. Helen’s letter is in the form of a poem of her impressions, where Ella’s is a more thorough itinerary of what they had been doing.

XXXXXXXXXX Letter from Helen Pierpont XXXXXXXXXX

College of Chinese Studies

Peking, China

Christmas, 1939

Merry Christmas, Everybody!

            I’d like to see the hustle and bustle of Christmas at home, the gorgeous decorations, shops, Christmas trees, heaps of gifts, and everybody busier than at any other season. But here at the Antipodes filled with wonder at this great, strange, beautiful world. I’m very glad that the wars in 1939 have allowed us to come thus far, and hope that they won’t prevent our coming back home in 1940.

            Here is a thought about Peking that I have cudgelled from my brain:

CAMBULAC CORNUCOPIA TO FRIENDS AT HOME

We’re here in Cambulac (as Marco called Peking).

And we’re dazzled by the facets of its art and life.

Temple of Heaven, august and white, with blue sky canopy;

Hutung, pai lou, orange-robed lama priests;

Pomegranates, persimmons, Peking dates and ducks;

Lily feet, an occasional queue, babies swathed in Chinese red;

City gates securely locked at eight; walls to foil

Chinese guerrillas raiding from their mountain hideouts;

Jade Street, Lantern Street, Little Embroidery Street,

Treasures of emperors in finest craftsmanship,

Aladdin’s wondrous hoard of radiant jewels;

Rickshaw coolies running their lives away,

Peking carts, long-eared burrows, straining human horses,

Camels somber, aloof, treading in misanthropic dignity;

Flaming sunset sky above rich golden tiles

Of six hundred imperial roofs in the Forbidden City;

Street cries, musical and strange; tantalizing

Odors of roasting pork, hot chestnuts, sesame cakes; stalls

Spilling out chrysanthemums white, red, and gold;

Stories of evangelists, doctors, soil chemists,

Epidemiologists, refugees, and sinologues;

Turbaned Moslems, temples of chanting Buddhists,

Gregorian music sung in Chinese words,

Marco Polo’s Cambulac, gateway to Cathay.

                                    Helen Pierpont

XXXXXXXXXX Letter from Ella Miller XXXXXXXXXX

College of Chinese Studies

Peking, China

Christmas, 1939

Dear Friends everywhere,

            Blessings on the ancient Chinese who first invented printing! There’s so much to see and hear and do in Peking that we begrudge every minute devoted to correspondence. Hence this Round Robin in lieu of person messages, a stream-lined account of our wanderings to date.

            On July 13, 1939, Helen Pierpont and I started westward round the world, leaving New York City on the All-American sleeper bus for San Francisco. We enjoyed every mile of the ride, realizing anew how vast and rich and beautiful our country is. The desert especially fascinated us with its every-changing, light-effects on cactus, yuccas and sage brush. One afternoon we even beheld a delectable mirage.

            The six-hour stop-over in Dallas passed all too quickly at the house of Helen’s friends, the Banks Upshaws. Our one day in Los Angeles was hectic. First we had dinner with “Cousin Carrie” at San Fernando; in the afternoon, thanks to the kindness of Lenore Llewellyn, we saw the high spots of Hollywood: Grau’s Chinese Theater, the Brown Derby, the Inn, the Bowl. After a visit to Aimee’s Four, Square Temple we “did” Mexican Olvera Street, mingling with the crowds, eating tamales, tacos, enchiladas, and at 10.45 P.M., attending the Puppet Show “For adults, Only.” Helen slept through the Strip Tease act.

            July 18-27. In San Francisco. Fortunately we got rooms in the steam-heated Sutter Street Y.W.C.A. San Francisco is incredibly cold, even in summer. But we put on all our woolies, sweaters, coats, and ferried to the Fair. Aside from the cold, we liked everything on Treasure Island, its location in that magnificent harbor; the architecture, ramparts, towers, castles right out of fairy land; the gorgeous flowers everywhere. Pacific House with the Covarrubias maps, the Palace of Fine Arts with Old Masters lent from all over the world, etc. etc.

            Reluctantly, we tore ourselves away from it all when our ship sailed at noon on the twenty-seventh. Nathalie Sacket and Helen’s friends, the Kwiciens, saw us off.

            July 27-August 10. On board the Tatuta Maru. Delightful southern crossing. Every morning we looked out of our port-hole and repeated, “Lo, here hath been dawning another blue day!” There were so few passengers that food and service in second class were deluxe. We had the run of the ship at all hours, the decks for promenading and games, the tiled swimming pool, the gymnasium, movies, dances, a show by the stewards, pottery painting. The suki-yaki dinner on deck was unusually jolly because of the spontaneous entertainment by passengers: Japanese folk dances, a Siamese love song, Aloha in Hawaiian, rollicking singing by a Mexican, recitation of the “One-Legged Duck” by our own Professor Cochran.

            The Cochrans, our table-companions, were planning to celebrate their wedding anniversary on the fifth, but they reckoned without the calendar – just then we crossed the International Date Line and lost that day. We went to sleep on the fourth and woke next morning on the sixth.

            We were disappointed because the United States Shipping Laws forbade passengers on foreign vessels to stop over in Hawaii. But we made the most of our few hours shore leave, shopping in the Kress Five-and-Ten, feasting on luscious pineapple, papayas and avocado and sipping cocktails on Waikiki Beach at the Royal Hawaiian. To insure our return to the balmy isles we threw overboard, on sailing, our fresh fragrant gardenia leis.

            August 10. We landed in Yokohama, minus our copy of “Inside Asia”, Bon Voyage gift from Libbis and Mary. The censor insisted that it was “no good for Japan”. Having suspected this we had Transferred to our heads most of its “dangerous thoughts” on shipboard. What did come as a shock, however, was the refusal of a landing-card to Mr. Lee, a United States citizen, from Hawaii. “You are an enemy. We don’t want you on shore.” His parents were Chinese. Asia makes short work of the American illusion that the state is anything but Naked power.

            August 11-27. In Tokyo, at the Imperial, the favorite meeting-place of Westerners in Japan. We chose this hotel because of its historical associations. Wright had designed it to be earthquake-and fire-proof. It stood through the holocaust of 23.

            With Dr. Austoni, Dr. Rojanavongse, and Mrs. Keck, friends from the boat, we had a round of theater and dinner parties, sampling Kabuki plays, Takarazuka opera, Osaka Puppets, tempura, sukiyaki, and grilled eels. Miss Ando and Miss Nakamichi, genial nurses just back from a year in America, generously served as our guides and interpreters.

            Meanwhile, there was difficulty getting passage to Peking. “Impossible,” said N.Y.K. officials, “there is a flood in Tientsin”. Nothing daunted we set sail for Kobe on the Hakozaki Maru, favored on the way with magnificent sunset and moonlight views of Mt. Fuji.

            At Kobe after much argument, we finally obtained reservations for the fourth, and went off to Koyasan to spend the intervening time. Our three days at Shojo-Shinn-in (Pure-hearted Temple) were an interlude in Never-Never-Land. The Buddhist monks served us vegetarian meals in our exquisitely-painted room which opened on a Japanese dream garden. We attended the sunrise service in the gold-and red-lacquered chapel, had Ceremonial Tea with our Japanese neighbors, and took long walks under the ancient cryptomerias. We’ve seen Nara and Nikko and Kyoto: Koyasan surpasses them all.

            On returning to Kobe we learned that Britain had declared war, and that “The military prohibits people from going to Peking by rail or water or air.” None the less, we sailed, on the fourth, on the Oryoku, for Dairen. Our Special Suite was so grand, and the voyage through the Inland Sea so delightful that even Helen, who’s none too fond of boats, was hoping something would happen to prolong the trip. But we docked at Dairen on schedule on September 7, visited Port Arthur by bus, and at 5 P.M. took the express for Peking, via Mukden.

            Towards noon on the eighth, we approached the flood area. Ours was the first train that went over the new bridges and the restored road bed, reinforced by millions of sandbags. For three hours we cautiously inched along through the waste of waters. Whole villages of mud houses had dissolved in the floods; countless coffins, washed out of the burial mounds in the fields, were bobbing up and down in the water; thousands of wretched refugees were clinging to existence on the few feet of land along the tracks. A never-to-be forgotten experience.

            At five we reached Peking, rickshawed with our baggage to the College of Chinese Studies, and snatched up the last available rooms! Dumb luck! For Peking is full of refugees these days – some from the flood, other driven from their missions by the Anti-British Campaign. And all of them, refugees, vacationists, students, vastly interesting, with stories of their experiences and observations.

            We are seeing Peking at an interesting time, the capital of a vast empire under the heel of the conqueror. Already a hundred thousand Japanese are in the city, soldiers with bared bayonets, officers in speeding limousines, camouflaged armored tanks rumbling down crowded thoroughfares, bombers roaring overhead. And the Chinese are going about their endless toil in seeming indifference. At first, Helen protested, “Something is wrong! In Japan we saw a nation of soldiers; here a city of ricksha coolies!” Just dumb cattle? Or are they wiser than the rest of us following sound instincts of survival? Time will tell.

            Meanwhile, the Chinese strike us as anything but decadent, and we like them, their frankness, their democratic spirit, their good nature, their never-failing humor.

            Thanks to the favorable exchange, 10 to 14 Chinese dollars for one of Uncle Sam’s, we afford all sorts of luxuries; stalls at the Chinese Opera, donkey rides over the Western Hills, Feasts of Peking Duck and Mongolian Mutton Grills, and best of all, day long ricksha rides through the kaleidoscopic city with its rhythmic medley of street cries.

            We like Peking and suggest that you all come to “look see” for yourselves. Meanwhile, Happy Holidays.

                                                Ella Miller