Page 292 - Three Score Years & Ten
P. 292
“THREE SCORE YEARS AND TEN” MISSIONARY WORK IN CHINA
Amy Moore
END OF JAPANESE WAR - WAITING!
August 6 was the day when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima in Japan. After the long five
years since we had seen Raymond it seemed impossible that Japan had surrendered, the war was
over and our children in concentration camp would be released. Every day we looked for news of how
or when we could expect to see our little oldest son again. Mails were so slow, not only letters, but it
took eight days for an urgent telegram from Chongqing to reach us. How much longer from
Shanghai? We did not even know if they would be taken to Shanghai so we could not even write, and
so we waited (not very patiently) and we were still waiting at the end of August and into September.
The Air Force GIs were gradually being given orders to return home and when one of them was going
to Beijing, we gave him letters for Raymond and the school staff, hoping that by posting on that side
they would get to their destination more quickly. By the time he got there the move had already been
made and the school children were scattered. But where was Raymond?
One of our English Friends Ambulance friends stayed each time he passed through to Xi’an, and we
asked him to make enquiries there. When he returned, he said he heard that some people from Wei
Xian camp had passed through, but when he went to ask at the Baptist Mission there, they told him it
(Right) Percy as US Air Force Chaplain and (above) some of the Air Force “boys”.
was the old and the sick who had been flown out to Kunming and India to get shipping to their home
countries. Among them was old Herbert Taylor, son of Hudson Taylor. The children were still at Wei
Xian till it was decided where they should go.
So we waited, not very patiently I am afraid. Then we got a letter from Chongqing saying a circular
was enclosed to tell us what was happening to the children. At the end a PS said the circular had
been sent to us ‘yesterday’. We had not received it and never did, but the letter went on to say that
our child and most of the children of missionaries in Free China were being sent home to us.
Still we waited. Then a letter from a friend in Xi’an said, “I am sorry I missed seeing your Raymond
when he passed through here. Some of our folks went out to the airport to see them, but I could not
go.” That was the first indication we had that he was on this side of China. But if he had passed
through Xi’an, why was he not already home with us?
292
Amy Moore
END OF JAPANESE WAR - WAITING!
August 6 was the day when the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima in Japan. After the long five
years since we had seen Raymond it seemed impossible that Japan had surrendered, the war was
over and our children in concentration camp would be released. Every day we looked for news of how
or when we could expect to see our little oldest son again. Mails were so slow, not only letters, but it
took eight days for an urgent telegram from Chongqing to reach us. How much longer from
Shanghai? We did not even know if they would be taken to Shanghai so we could not even write, and
so we waited (not very patiently) and we were still waiting at the end of August and into September.
The Air Force GIs were gradually being given orders to return home and when one of them was going
to Beijing, we gave him letters for Raymond and the school staff, hoping that by posting on that side
they would get to their destination more quickly. By the time he got there the move had already been
made and the school children were scattered. But where was Raymond?
One of our English Friends Ambulance friends stayed each time he passed through to Xi’an, and we
asked him to make enquiries there. When he returned, he said he heard that some people from Wei
Xian camp had passed through, but when he went to ask at the Baptist Mission there, they told him it
(Right) Percy as US Air Force Chaplain and (above) some of the Air Force “boys”.
was the old and the sick who had been flown out to Kunming and India to get shipping to their home
countries. Among them was old Herbert Taylor, son of Hudson Taylor. The children were still at Wei
Xian till it was decided where they should go.
So we waited, not very patiently I am afraid. Then we got a letter from Chongqing saying a circular
was enclosed to tell us what was happening to the children. At the end a PS said the circular had
been sent to us ‘yesterday’. We had not received it and never did, but the letter went on to say that
our child and most of the children of missionaries in Free China were being sent home to us.
Still we waited. Then a letter from a friend in Xi’an said, “I am sorry I missed seeing your Raymond
when he passed through here. Some of our folks went out to the airport to see them, but I could not
go.” That was the first indication we had that he was on this side of China. But if he had passed
through Xi’an, why was he not already home with us?
292
