The Fall of Nanking by JAMES E. SHULTZ

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Takoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Mar 5, 1914

The Fall of Nanking

By JAMES E. SHULTZ

(Concluded)

JAMES E. SHULTZ

Having satisfied ourselves as to the condition of our own interests, we turned our attention to viewing the effects of the siege upon the Chinese. On our way to the Red Cross Hospital, which was being used as the field hospital for the wounded of both armies, we passed through some of the principal business streets of the city, but nowhere did we see one store that had not been looted. The condition of the people was that of complete destitution. What will become of these, when winter comes, who yesterday were opulent, but today are penniless, is problematical. As we proceeded, we saw a man deliberately breaking the spring of his jinrikisha, while numerous other jinrikishas which had been broken were passing us. On inquiring the reason, we were told that their owners had been so overworked since the surrender as to be unable to find time to eat, much less to rest. Driven to desperation, they had done the one thing possible to obtain relief—broken their own jinrikishas, thus depriving themselves of their only means of sustenance.

Arriving at the hospital, the sights we witnessed were sad indeed. It was under the charge of Dr. Macklin, an American missionary, whose only assistants were Chinese. Naturally, their quarters were sadly overcrowded, and sanitation, as we have been taught to regard it at home, was impossible. Only those who have seen field hospitals during war times can have an adequate conception of the conditions we witnessed. Passing numberless unhappy victims of the recent struggle, some of whom were lying on cots, some on crude mattresses, some on strips of filthy matting, and all unprotected from swarms of flies, we entered the operating rooms. Here two Chinese doctors and several nurses were wearily working almost night and day, with meager facilities, to care for the wounded. They were so short of supplies that it was necessary to use the same bandages repeatedly, which must have occasioned not a little infection. The tables on which they worked were crude, being made of wood, the tops of which were slightly concave to facilitate drainage into large galvanized iron pails which were set at the foot of each. Water was sterilized on stoves so inconveniently near these tables as to make it oppressively warm for both patient and physician.

Into these rooms were brought the wounded, some on stretchers, some on the backs of friends, some trying to walk, and all suffering the horrors of war. The first to be treated after our arrival were two women who had been shot. Although noncombatants, one had lost a foot and the other the most of her right leg. These wounds were in a terrible condition, and as I saw them being cleansed, I longed to speak to those women of the Great Physician, to point them to One who can heal from sin, but being a recruit, I was unable to speak one word of helpfulness. A father came carrying his little ten-year-old son on his back, who had been wounded by a stray shell. He and his older brother were playing together when the shell, bursting, blew off his brother's head and wounded him. He had an ugly wound in his chest and another in his side, but was improving, to the great delight of his affectionate old father. From a man who was next treated had been taken a piece of shell three inches long. It had entered the lower left abdominal region and torn its way through into the left thigh, from which it was extracted. The wound was twenty days old, but had not been closed, and the poor fellow had eaten nothing during this time, as the intestines had been lacerated. His appeals for water were most affecting.

Another man had been stabbed by a bayonet which penetrated his pancreas, yet he was improving. The vitality of this people is such as to elicit surprise on the part of a foreigner.

One young man sat quietly while the doctor with his fingers traced the course of a ball that had shattered two inches of the bone in his arm, necessitating its removal. A case which especially interested me was that of a boy soldier, who had enlisted either for a few paltry dollars or for the honor that youth vainly imagines invests the field of battle. He had a very dangerous wound in his side, from which pus freely flowed when the bandage was removed, yet he had mounted the table unassisted, and bore with stoicism the suffering incident to the dressing of the wound. Only a mere boy, but if he recovers, he will be abandoned by the government, to go home and be a charge upon his relatives. As I stood gazing into his fine dark eyes and reflecting that if he recovers he must return to some obscure province and fill a Christless grave unless some one sacrifices home and friends to carry to him the gospel, I felt as never before to dedicate my life to the cause of foreign missions. Here was evidence of a need, constituting a more eloquent appeal than the stammering tongue of man is capable of framing.

But why should I multiply these harrowing scenes, since days spent in beholding such teach but one lesson,—even "the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel"? They only emphasize the fact that "the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now," and that men in heathen darkness are grasping in desperation for the hand wounded on Calvary.

As in weariness we turned from these sad scenes, I could but feel that now is the time to warn the millions of the East. China lies prostrate and bleeding today. Copying the government and customs of the West has not brought her that for which she sought. Today she feels her need. The nations have sought to assist her by lending her the hoarded treasures of earth, but she yet awaits the coming of those who, saying, "Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee," will extend the triumphs of the cross.

Shanghai.