[
    {
        "id": 213629,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-1995",
        "page_number": 225,
        "title": "RAS-1995",
        "content_text": "199\n\n# THE CHINESE LABOUR CORPS IN THE FIRST WORLD WAR LABOURERS BURIED IN FRANCE\n\nDAN WATERS\n\nThis article complements the piece by Keith Stevens (RAS Journal No. 29), about Chinese Labour Corps members buried in England during or just after the First World War (1914-18).'\n\nBy 1916 there was a shortage of manpower in Britain. Conscription was introduced into the armed services and more men were recruited from various parts of the British Empire. These included Chinese who actually mostly came from Shan Tung (Shandong), but some were recruited from Honan (Hunan) Province. Together with British missionary and sinologue officers, many labourers were shipped from Weihaiwei (now called Weihai). This was British Territory and served as a naval base from 1898 until the Union Flag was lowered in 1930.3\n\nServing under British military discipline, in the region of 100,000 Chinese were shipped to France to dig trenches and construct fortifications for the allies. About 2,000 died from illness, wounds, or injuries sustained during or just after the war. Some were blown up by mines as they cleared battlefields after hostilities had ceased. Others succumbed to the influenza epidemic that swept Europe in 1919. A handful were shot dead in a mutiny near Boulogne. Those that did not return to China lie far from their native soil, in such places as Abbeville Communal Cemetery Extension, Albert French National Cemetery, Arques-La-Bataille British Cemetery, Asco Communal Cemetery, and Ayette British Cemetery, in France. The largest and most decorative is the Noyelles-sur-Mer Cemetery, which has a portico built in Chinese style.\n\nOne September morning in 1995, my son, Barry, and I drove from Brussels to Foncquevillers, a village situated in the fertile, undulating French countryside between the Arras-Doullens and the Arras-Amiens roads. There are a total of 645 graves in this military cemetery, which is bounded by a brick wall and a hornbeam hedge. It is planted with catalpa and other trees. Many of the graves here are seldom or never visited by outsiders. In this well-cared-for tranquil spot, there are two graves of Chinese Labour Corps labourers, one of a French civilian.\n\nPage 225\nPage 226",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-1995.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/95941j25g",
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    },
    {
        "id": 214988,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 84,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "40\n\nAmongst the equipment issued to each coolie in France were boots, ankle and puttees, two pairs of socks, one towel and one piece of soap, one groundsheet and one blanket in the summer and three in the winter, and an enamelled mug instead of a tin mug.\n\nTransportation to France\n\n31\n\nThe Chinese Labour Corps was officially formed on 21 February 1917 with Lt. Col. B.C. Fairfax appointed as the officer-in-charge as early as 15th November 1916. In the meantime, the first labourers left China in January 1917 and the first to leave France to return to China left in November 1918. Some of those sent from China died en route to France on the sea voyages. These ships travelled either via South Africa or Suez to England via the Panama Canal or sailed to Canada, the labourers being transported across Canada by train and then sailing on to England. These routes were chosen so as to confuse German intelligence and to avoid the submarine menace. None was lost in this way despite a German presence still in northern China at that time. Thence both groups were shipped to France.\n\nThose travelling via Canada landed at William Head, Vancouver Island, the old quarantine station and, following authorisation, travelled by train to Halifax, Nova Scotia. They were guarded, to prevent escape, and consequently the usual poll tax of Can$500, levied by the Canadian Immigration Department, was waived. Over a thirteen-month period, over 84,000 were so transported. From Canada, they would be shipped to the UK to Liverpool or Plymouth, then from Folkestone to Noyelles-sur-Mer in France.\n\nG.E. Cormack, who acted as an escorting officer to five hundred labourers, was stationed at the collecting depot, a German silk factory near Qingdao. This town had earlier in the War been captured from the Germans by the Japanese, assisted by a small British force. On a monolith at one of the forts was a Prussian eagle with an inscription in German stating that this town had been captured by the Germans from the Chinese. Over this, there was a Japanese inscription stating that Qingdao had been captured from the Germans by the Japanese! China had declared war on Germany on 14th March 1917.\n\nAgain, to quote from G.E. Cormack's memoirs, he sailed, with",
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        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    },
    {
        "id": 214993,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 89,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "45\n\nwas selected and marked with the so-called Chinese eyes like those on a sea-going junk. It served with the 6th Battalion first as Fly-paper though subsequently it was re-named Fan-tan. The 6th Battalion later adopted the eyes as a regimental symbol. Mr David Fletcher of the Tank Museum at Bovington, in correspondence with the author, was not aware that this symbol was not generally adopted in the Great War. The 6th ultimately converted to Whippets, on which Mr Fletcher had never seen the Eyes symbol. When the 6th Battalion was disbanded after the Great War its various honours and customs were passed to the 4th Battalion which then adopted the Eyes as a Battalion symbol. The 4th Battalion used it on their vehicles from the 1920s and, when they amalgamated with the 1st Battalion RTR in 1993, it was adopted by them. In the 1930s the 6th Battalion was reconstituted and was still around to take part in the 1956 Suez action and never got back their Eyes symbol!\n\nIn the main exhibition hall of the Imperial War Museum in London there is a Mark V tank with \"European\" eyes. These tanks were introduced in the Spring of 1918 and first saw action at Le Hamel in France in July 1918. This tank, Devil [T9171] was believed to have served with B Company of the 4th Battalion of the Tank Corps and was still in service in 1925. This tank, belonging to the 4th Battalion, would have been entitled to the Eyes symbol.\n\nCamps and Recreation\n\nCamps were maintained behind the Front lines, some of the larger being at Boulogne, Calais, Dunkirk with the Head Quarters at Noyelles-sur-Mer. Hospitals were at Noyelles-sur-Mer, Arques, Moulle and Calais, with the Shorncliffe Military Hospital at Folkestone also being used for sick and injured Chinese. There was a prison for Chinese at Noyelles.\n\nLabourers died as a result of disease, bombings, gassing and, after the war, when clearing the battlefields and when digging graves, by the many unexploded bombs and grenades. Many also died as a result of the post-war influenza epidemic known as the Spanish Flu. I have seen two photographs, taken of the funeral procession of the German flying ace, Baron Manfred von Richthofen [the Red Baron] at Bertangles cemetery on 22nd April 1918 and amongst the crowd looking over the",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215007,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 103,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "59\n\nChinese, were one of four forms. ‘A Noble Duty Bravely Done', 'Faithful unto Death', 'A Good Reputation endures Forever' and 'Though Dead He still Liveth'. As with all CWGC cemeteries, this one was well maintained.\n\nWe (Friends) then visited the Tincourt British Military Cemetery which has 57 graves of the CLC.\n\nThe base depôt, prison and hospital of the CLC was at Noyelles-sur-Mer and the cemetery there contains the graves of 838 men of the CLC, with a memorial bearing the names of 41 men whose graves are unknown12. The site of this cemetery was selected by the Chinese themselves so that the fengshui was correct. Whilst many of the CLC in this cemetery had home addresses in Shandong and Zhili provinces [about 98%] there were also about 25 from other provinces all north of the Yangzi River; two were from Fengtian in Manchuria [the old name for Mukden and now Shenyang], seven from Henan, seven from Jiangsu, five specifically from Hebei [the modern name for Zhili], one from Anhui, two from Shenjing [the archaic name for Jilin province in the north-east] and one from Gansu. The latter is unusual, it being a province to the north-west of China. One grave is noteworthy being that of an early recruit whose serial number was 53. Wang Yufong came from Rongcheng in Shandong, a mere 35 miles from Weihai Wei, and he died on the 10th June 1918. Many of those buried here had died of flu from the post-war epidemic.\n\nChinese visiting France today appear to be intrigued by signs saying Cimetiere Chinois [Chinese Cemetery] and, having visited them, have been surprised to see compatriots buried there. An entry, from a Chinese visitor from Qingdao, in the Memorial Book at Noyelles-sur-Mer, commented that he was a man from Shandong province himself and had not realized so many of his fellow provincials had died and had been buried in France. The CWGC, in response to our comment that we were surprised that there were no signs in French explaining the background to the fallen Chinese, wrote:\n\nA certain amount of historical information can be gleaned from the introduction to the registers made available at the cemeteries and some of the more significant sites have permanent historical notices. However, it should be",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215014,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 110,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "66\n\nits British base at Weihai Wei and the other Allied base at Qingdao. The neighbouring province of Zhili, with its cities of Beijing and Tianjin, was a good second with a total recorded from its region of about a quarter of that from Shandong. The total from the two provinces provided nearly 98% of all the Chinese manpower recruited by the British (though not including any naval personnel recruited in Hong Kong or Weihai Wei).\n\nSome of the romanised names on graves have been transliterated by either Chinese or Westerners inaccurately and this has led to confusion when checking details on the CWGC internet for individual graves. Practically all romanisation on the graves and records was in Wade-Giles whereas here in this article I have used the comparatively new native romanisation, pinyin, thus Peking has become Beijing and Shantung, Shandong.\n\nIn a letter from the CWGC to the author concerning the reasons as to why many gravestones do not have carved names of the person nor details of the district from which they originated, in Chinese characters, or if carved in Chinese characters and not in romanisation, they replied that the details inscribed on headstones were originally supplied by the surviving comrades of the casualties of the CLC. At that time it was believed to be the best option available to the CWGC and was thought to be sufficient to meet the required criteria.\n\nDr. E. J. Stuckey and the Chinese Hospital at Noyelles-sur-Mer\n\nEdward Joseph Stuckey was born at Adelaide, Australia on 29th September 1875 and died in 1952. He was the eldest, of nine, children of Joseph Stuckey and Alice Mann, she being the daughter of Charles Mann, the first Advocate General of South Australia.\n\nHe was educated at St. Peter's Collegiate School, winning, in his final year, the 'Young Exhibition for the Best Scholar of the Year.' In 1893, at the recently opened University of Adelaide, he began his BSc, graduating in November 1895 with Honours in both Physics and Mathematics. In 1896 he signed accountancy articles for three years with the Australian Mutual Provident Society (AMPS) in Adelaide.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215016,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 112,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "68\n\nEmpress of Russia, arriving at Vancouver Island, Canada. During the voyage he discovered two cases of mumps amongst the 2006 Chinese which finally increased to eleven.\n\nDuring their stay in quarantine the Chinese were trained into disciplined coherent bodies. During this time, even though being well treated, food riots nearly broke out. A white cook was sacked for exorbitant charges on bread sold to the coolies, a gold dollar for an 8lb loaf, making a profit of 400%. He also excessively charged for apples and oranges. Two coolies were caught stealing and were publicly caned. On 8th April, his dressers [medical assistants] reported that trouble was brewing over an insult from coolies from Shandong and Tianjin; fighting broke out, being quelled by Stuckey. The leader of the Shandong men was caned publicly, to set an example.\n\nFootwear, issued in China, was proving unsuitable, so British Army boots were issued, which for some became a tradable item.\n\nThey left the quarantine station on 8th April, travelling by train, those with mumps being segregated, to St. Johns and Halifax from where they sailed on the Corsican, in convoy, to Liverpool, where they entrained for Shorncliffe, Kent and then across the channel by ferry to Boulogne and another train journey to the CLC HQ at Noyelle-sur-Mer. The officers returned to the UK to order their kit and uniforms, which cost Stuckey £45 at the Army and Navy Store. He returned to France as Eye Specialist in charge of the Ophthalmic Department of the Chinese General Hospital at Noyelles.\n\nThe Depot at Noyelles was already established as the central examination centre for all Chinese on arrival in France, before their allocation to various Labour Companies.\n\nThe first shipments of Chinese were routed via the Cape, but due to the long journey time and also the shortage of vegetables, leading to scurvy and beriberi, thus making the coolies of little use, the shipment routes were changed via Canada. On arrival in France, the coolies were again medically examined, especially for eye diseases, trachoma and conjunctivitis, usually in the open. Once passed fit they were drafted into various Labour units, consisting of five British officers, 19 British other-ranks and 476 Chinese, and kitted out. Those with eye diseases...",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215017,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 113,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "69\n\nwere isolated for intensive treatment, and light work. Some worked in the Crecy forest, at Blanches Hetres, cutting timber for trenches and fascines for the roads, etc.; others worked nearer the camp.\n\nOriginally the Hospital compound surrounded by a barbed wire fence, consisted of eight triple marquees, each with 50 beds. Stuckey examined up to 500 coolies each day. In mid-June, Dr. Earnest Peill, also of the LMS China, was appointed Registrar and Surgeon and O.C. Chinese Personnel, the latter post to deal with all the troubles of the Chinese, rosters and employing staff. In December 1917, there were almost 200 Chinese on the Hospital staff.\n\nUnder the C.O., Major Gray [formerly of the Peking Legation], the staff functioned efficiently, necessitating expansion of the Hospital from 300 beds to 1,040 beds within six months, capable of inspecting up to 1500 coolies per day.\n\nFrom bringing water from a pool it now had a well and pump, and shortly electricity would be installed. Stuckey was appointed Treasurer for any money the staff wished to deposit with him for safekeeping, of which he was the President, Cashier, ledger keeper, etc. Such money was utilised to buy bonds earning 5% over six months.\n\nThe Hospital received many visitors including Col. Lister and Maj. Cunningham, the British Army's ophthalmic specialists, General Tang of the Chinese HQ Staff and doctors from surrounding hospitals.\n\nIt appeared that the death rate was high for a unit whose contract specified that they should not work on any kind of military operation. After China declared war on Germany on 14th March 1917, this clause was not so strictly observed. The British military authorities ordered that the Chinese must be buried in their own plot and not near a Hindu or a Christian plot, in a box or coffin. The cemetery at Noyelles-sur-Mer was selected by the Chinese for its fengshui [on a slope facing a small stream]. It was the Orderly Officer's duty to conduct the burial service, seeing that a party of patients attended and that they returned safely to the Hospital. One returning party raided a carrot field and another raided a turnip field, pulled up and cut off and replaced the heads of the turnips.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215019,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 115,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "71\n\nMaj. Gray was sympathetic towards the Chinese and believed in fairness towards them. He said that they were strangers in a strange land and homesick. He suggested the Chinese carpenters build a small pagoda, about 15 feet high, near the entrance to the Hospital. They painted it in bright colours. When Gray was promoted Lieut-Col. he was inundated with presentations - the dressers [medical assistants] presented him with a scroll, the cooks, an honorific umbrella and two flags, the Sanitary Gang, scrolls, etc.\n\nStuckey's time in France ended on 16th March 1919, when he left Noyelle-sur-Mer for Liverpool to join an Australian Ambulance Transport ship, working his way as Medical Officer, arriving in Melbourne on 15 May.\n\nSir Douglas Haig awarded Stuckey a Mention-in-Despatches for his work at the Hospital and, on the recommendation of Sir William Lister, Captain Stuckey was awarded the Order of the British Empire, Military Division. He said that this decoration really also belonged to the three doctors of the Ophthalmic staff at the Hospital, namely Captain H. Tomlin, MD and Captain C. A. Hughes, MD, D Ch O. and himself.\n\nIn 1920, Stuckey and his family returned to China, with periods of leave in Australia, leaving in 1938, after 33 years in China, returning via Korea to the UK and then, in 1939, returning to Australia.\n\nNoyelles-sur-Mer\n\nThe HQ of the CLC was at Noyelles-sur-Mer. Being interested in the CLC and also curious as to whether there were any remains of the CLC camp there, my wife and I decided to visit this small village close to the River Somme and about one and a half miles inland from the sea.\n\nWe were very fortunate that, on our first day of arrival, we contacted Mr. C. Gallemant, the butcher and Mr. M. C. Landos, the baker [third generation], but we failed to locate any candlestick maker! They were very helpful, especially Mr. Landos, who, after enquiry, told us the locations of some buildings still standing used by members of the CLC. Unfortunately, there do not appear to be any remains of the CLC camp site nor their hospital, prison or detention centre and other buildings, all having reverted to farmland.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215020,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 116,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "72\n\nThe Mairie is only open part-time and we again gained some useful advice and knowledge.\n\nThe Chateau de Fransu, the billet of Col. Fairfax, GHQ Adviser, CLC, is now a logis, mainly for families. During the Second World War it was the local German HQ. [see photograph]\n\nThe Chateau de Thesy in extensive grounds was the officers quarters and mess for the HQ, CLC. It is now being extensively renovated. It is privately owned. [see photograph]\n\nThe Hotel des Voyages, near the railway station, was the main café of the village and was patronised by British Labour Corps NCOs. It is now the Hotel Restaurant Bernard. [see photograph]\n\nWhen visiting, we stayed at the 16th century Auberge du Chateau de Nolette, about a mile from Noyelles-sur-Mer and within easy walking distance.\n\nOutside the church at Noyelles-sur-Mer there is a memorial to those from the village who were killed. We saw some young children playing around it and I was moved to think that those named on the memorial did not die in vain so that future generations may live in peace and freedom.\n\nOn a later visit, a few weeks later, this time accompanied by Keith Stevens, we managed to visit the grounds of both the Chateau de Fransu and the Chateau de Thesy and spoke with the owner of the former and the caretaker of the latter. We also visited the site where possibly the Chinese hospital, with subordinate and ancillary buildings and detention centre had been established. French residents of a lone newish house almost opposite pointed out where they understood the hospital and detention centre had been.\n\nAn unexpected, and to date unexplained, observation was the pair of small white stone Chinese lions concreted on to plinths at a main cross-roads within Nolette, very close to Noyelles-sur-Mer. The inscriptions, in Chinese and French, explain that they were donated to commemorate the twinning, in 1994, of the small village of Noyelles-sur-Mer with the fishing town of Tungkang [Donggang] some forty",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215021,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 117,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "73\n\nmiles south of Kaohsiung in southern Taiwan. It was assumed that the twinning was linked in some way with the CLC cemetery but why a small town of Hokkien-speaking Chinese, ethnic Min Nan from Fujian province who during the era of the CLC were under Japanese colonial rule, would have any links with the deceased northern Chinese of the CLC, is hard to see. Perhaps the fishermen of Tungkang fled Shandong province ahead of the Communist advance in 1948 and settled there and have family memories of the labourers. Possibly some members of the CLC returned to China and they, or their off-spring, emigrated to Taiwan. Another possibility could be that they wished to remember and commemorate their fellow countrymen, now resting in a foreign country\n\nit is a subject for further investigation. Two characters are carved into the side of the plinth of one, Yidou which simply\n\n益都 means of Benefit to All.\n\nMy wife and I hope to return, to explore the area more fully as we have enjoyed our brief visits.\n\nMemorial\n\nIt is very surprising that after all the assistance the Chinese, together with their British officers and NCOs, rendered to the Allies, especially the British, there is still no specific memorial to them, whether they survived or died, other than the various cemeteries, mainly in Belgium and France, in which they lie buried. It is never too late to consider erecting a memorial at one of their major base camps, such as Noyelles-sur-Mer, but I suppose the Governments of the main countries concerned would not be interested in such a project.\n\nOn my\n\nvisits to World War I battlefields in Belgium and France, and if the opportunity arises for me to visit a cemetery in which members of the CLC, whether officers, NCOs or Labourers are interred, then I pay my respects, considering that, even though there may be few graves or many, I am honouring all who gave up their lives.\n\nFinale\n\nVarious articles, books and unpublished reminiscences have been used in the preparation of this article. It is not my intention, and never has been, for me to view the various files held at the Public Records",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215022,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 118,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "74\n\nOffice, Kew, London, to ascertain details from their records. This I leave to more qualified people. I thank the staff of the Reading Room at the Imperial War Museum for their help and assistance in locating and providing material in their archives from which I obtained some details for this article and the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Maidenhead, for information supplied by them. To David Mahoney thanks are due for the various tit-bits sent to me. I also thank Mr. D. Fletcher, of the Tank Museum, Bovington, Dorset, and the Imperial War Museum, London, and also others listed for their permission to reproduce photographs from their archives. All other photographs were taken by myself. I would especially like to thank Keith Stevens for being my mentor and for all his assistance in deciphering the Chinese characters on the gravestones, translating the notebooks held at the Imperial War Museum in London, together with his invaluable comments and suggestions for this article. Without his encouragement and pressure this article would not have been written! Finally, I thank my wife, Claudine, for her patience, companionship and for acting as interpreter on our many visits and also for translating various articles written in her native French.\n\nAny errors or omissions are my responsibility.\n\n\"What, indeed, were the Chinese doing in France during the First World War?\n\nNoyelles and Tungkang\n\nAs far as we were concerned the story began when we were touring the British military cemeteries in northern France where Chinese Labour Corps members had been buried during or immediately after the First World War. In one small village, Noyelles-sur-Mer, we were surprised to see a pair of Chinese white stone lions mounted on small plinths within the small village square - albeit it was close to what is known as the Chinese Cemetery in which the largest number of Chinese had been buried - and so we sought an explanation.\n\nThe immediate response was, as far as we could make out, that in 1994 the pair of Lions had arrived unannounced, borne by four Chinese who proclaimed that they were bringing them from the town of Tungkang in recognition of their twinning with the village of Noyelles on the Somme. Again, as far as we could understand, once the lions",
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    },
    {
        "id": 215024,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 120,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "76\n\nindistinct. It reads:\n\n\"The Twinning Pledge between the Town Halls of Noyelles-sur-Mer and Tungkang, in response to the deep aspirations and genuine needs of our nations, is based on an affinity since the beginning of the century between Noyelles and the Chinese, and that the Chinese cemetery has become the symbol of freedom and fraternity, representing the common goal pursued by the French and Chinese nations.'\n\n'Considering that closer co-operation between our two nations is useful and necessary for human progress TODAY WE UNDERTAKE THE SOLEMN PLEDGE to maintain permanent links between our two Town Councils; to encourage exchanges in all forms between their inhabitants to develop a living fraternity; and to combine our efforts to encourage, to the full, a better mutual understanding of our two nations.\"\n\nPage 120\n\nPage 121",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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    {
        "id": 215028,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 124,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "80\n\nAppendix B to CLC in France\n\nI am indebted to Claudine, my wife, for translating a booklet I received from Noyelles-sur-Mer, in which there are some personal reminiscences and a few facts, these from a French point of view, concerning life at that time and the CLC.\n\nI quote:\n\nWork conditions were sometimes extremely dangerous. Deaths also occurred from epidemics such as \"Spanish flu\" at the end of the war and poor hygienic living conditions, with many dying at Camp No. 3 at Noyelles-sur-Mer.\n\nUniform of the CLC appeared [to the French] bizarre in being blue padded jacket, with funny hats, but not as funny as the kepi.\n\nThe Chinese adored to eat apples and so the French locals, as usual, exploited this in charging high prices.\n\nThe hospital in the Camp appeared to resemble a park for madmen. On the night of 23 May 1918, when the munitions dump at Saigneville was bombed, this unsettled some members of the CLC who destroyed the barbed wire surrounding their camp and escaped, being found after a few days.\n\nMme Nataly Salle [born 1900] remembers the Chinese and said that, due to bad treatment meted out to them, no one wished to speak.\n\nThe grandparents of Mme Félicienne Bruvy, stated that they were savages, mad and dangerous. They were lazy, greasy, stupid and ugly. They also apparently murdered her grandparents.\n\nMme Salle said that many Chinese died from bad treatment. 'The Gestapo never invented anything like this 25 years later'. But Mme Salle, whose husband, Valery, worked in the cemetery for 15 years said “It was the war”. 'They would be beaten like dogs by the guards and the English police. They removed their shoes, undressed them and told them to lie on tables where they were whipped until they bled. And then they would be scrubbed with a brush and hot water to cover...",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215030,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 126,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "82\n\nwas rather naïve, like the tall Chinese who constantly laughed aloud for no reason.' Mme Réveillon, only 12 years old, did prefer the Indian cavalry, they being far more elegant.\n\nThe Camp was dismantled after the Armistice in 1919 and the only witness to this extraordinary story is the Noyelles-sur-Mer cemetery and its 838 graves.",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215034,
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        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 130,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "86\n\nAppendix D\n\nSome Officers appointed to serve at various times with the Chinese Labour Corps\n\nat Noyelles-sur-Mer\n\nGHQ Adviser Chinese Labour\n\nAsst GHQ Adviser Chinese Labour\n\nCol Bryan Charles Fairfax CMG\n\nLt Col Richard Ireland Purdon\n\nat HQ CLC\n\nAdjutant HQ CLC\n\nOC The Depot CLC\n\n2i/c The Dépôt CLC\n\nIntelligence Officer The Dépôt CLC\n\nQM The Dépôt CLC\n\nAdjutant The Depot CLC\n\nRecords Office CLC\n\nOC Dépôt Hospital CLC\n\n2/Lt [temp. Capt] Howard Norman Cole\n\nMajor Harold Nicolson Brinson DSO, MC\n\nMajor Edward Charles Fry\n\nCapt Cecil Folder Lees\n\nLt (QM) James Henry Elliott MBE\n\nLt David Monro Peattie OBE\n\nLt James Sinclair Hay\n\nLt [acting Major] Henry Stuart Weigall\n\nMajor [temp.] (acting Lt Col) William Henry Graham Aspland MD, FRCS, RAMC",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215038,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 134,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "86\n\n3\n\nİ\n\n90\n\nLonguenesse (St Omer) Souvenir, Pas de Calais\n\nMaroeuil British, Pas de Calais\n\nMaroilles Communal, Nord\n\nMazargues War, Marseilles, Bouches-du-Rhone\n\n8 Metz-en-Couture Communal\n\nBritish Extension, Pas de Calais\n\nMondicourt Communal, Pas de Calais\n\nNoyelles-sur-Mer Chinese Cemetery, Somme 838\n\nNoyelles-sur-Mer Chinese Memorial, Somme 41\n\nOrival Wood, Flesquieres,Nord\n\n1\n\nOuttersteene Communal Extension, Bailleul, Nord 1\n\nPernes British, Pas de Calais\n\nPerreuse Chateau Franco British National,\n\nSeine-et-Marne\n\n2\n\nPommereuil British, Nord\n\nQueant Communal British\n\nExtension, Pas de Calais\n\nQuirrieu British, Somme\n\nRamillies British, Nord\n\nRosieres Communal Extension, Somme\n\n1\n\nRuminghem Chinese, Pas de Calais\n\n75\n\nSolesmes British, Nord\n\n1\n\nSt Andre Communal, Nord\n\n3\n\nSt Etienne-au-Mont Communal, Pas de Calais 147\n\nSt Pierre, Amiens, Somme\n\nSt Sever Extension, Rouen, Seine-Maritime\n\nSt Marie, Le Havre, Seine-Maritime\n\nTerlincthun British, Wimelle, Pas de Calais\n\nTincourt New British, Somme\n\nTourcoing (Pont-Neuville) Communal, Nord\n\nVadencourt British, Maissemy, Aisne\n\nVillers-Carbonnel Communal, Somme\n\nHONG KONG\n\nHong Kong Cemetery\n\nSai Wan (China) Memorial\n\nITALY\n\nTaranto Town Cemetery Extension\n\n1\n\n44\n\n4\n\n1\n\n5\n\n3\n\n57\n\n1\n\n3\n\n4\n\n3",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
        "rank": 0
    },
    {
        "id": 215040,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 136,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "Fisher, W M : Dr E J Stuckey and the Chinese Hospital at Noyelles-sur-Mer. A biographical fragment of World War I : unpublished: BA Hons. Thesis at Monash University: 1984\n\nGriffin, NJ: The Use of Chinese Labour by the British Army : PhD thesis, University of Oklahoma : 1973 - held by the Imperial War Museum, London\n\n: Britain's Chinese Labour Corps in World War 1: Military Affairs : vol.XXXX No. 3 [Oct 1976]\n\nJones, A. Philip: Britain's Search for Chinese Co-operation in the First World War : Garland Publishing Inc.: New York and London: 1986\n\nKlein, Daryl\n\nLoisel, M : : La Chine de l'Empire Celeste [Chine des Han] en Terre Française - Picardie: 1995\n\n: With the Chinks: Bodley Head: ca. 1918\n\nLucas, C : The Empire at War\n\nMaxwell, J : The Chinese Labour Corps: A précis of their participation in World War: Unpublished\n\nMellor, Norman: With the Chinese Labour Corps - France 1918\n\nPaton, Alec : Occasional Gunfire, Private War Diary of a Siege Gunner: Bishop-Laggett Publishing: London: 1998\n\nPutkowski, J: British Army Mutineers 1914-1922 : Francis Boutle Publishers: 1998\n\nStevens, Keith : British Chinese Labour Corps Labourers Buried in England Journal of the Hong Kong Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society: Vol. 29: 1989\n\nSummerskill, M: China on the Western Front: pub by Michael Summerskill",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215045,
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        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 141,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "Chinese New Year celebrations in a Labour Camp, Noyelles-Sur-Mer, France 11/2/1918 (by courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, London, Q8485)\n\n97",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215046,
        "series_id": 26,
        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 142,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "98\n\n办\n\nCelebration of Chinese New Year's day at the Chinese Labour Corps Camp at Noyelles Sur Mer France 11/2/1918\n\n(by courtesy of the Imperial War Museum London, Q9848)",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215047,
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        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 143,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "Men of the Chinese Labour Corps interested in the official cinematographer who is taking a record of the New Year celebrations at the Labour Corps Camp at Noyelles-Sur-Mer 11/2/1918\n\n(by courtesy of the Imperial War Museum, London, Q10260)\n\n99",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215052,
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        "series_slug": "histsyn-rashkb-journal-engine",
        "series_title": "RASHKB Journal 皇家亞洲學會香港分會學刊",
        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 148,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "104\n\nரா\n\nДадат\n\nRa\n\nLe Chateau De Fransu, Noyelles-Sur-Mer, France. The former billet and Hq of Lt Col BC Fairfax, Ghq Adviser, CLC.\n\nMay 2001",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
        "external_url": "https://digitalrepository.lib.hku.hk/catalog/nk328168n",
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    {
        "id": 215053,
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        "series_use_hku_proxy": false,
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        "page_number": 149,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "Le Chateau De Thesy, Noyelles-Sur-Mer, France. The former Officers Quarters and Mess of the Hq, CLC,\n\nMay 2001\n\n105",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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    {
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        "document_key": "RAS-2000",
        "page_number": 150,
        "title": "RAS-2000",
        "content_text": "106\n\nHotel restaurant Bernard, formly Le Hotel Des Voyages, Noyelles-Sur-Mer and the main cafe of the village, patronised by the British NCOs of the CLC\n\nMay 2001\n\nPage 150\n\nPage 151",
        "txt_file_path": "txt/dfo323lmgvd/RAS-2000.txt",
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]