Page 88 - GFA – A Different Drumbeat
P. 88
GFA – A Different Drumbeat 88
We arrived there on the afternoon of Saturday and spent the Sunday with our
missionary host and hostess who, with their children and our little party, comprised
the entire foreign population of the city. Sunday was a delightfully quiet day with no
sign of the approaching storm. Sometime before daylight on Monday we were
awakened by a burst of firing and in a short while woke to the full consciousness that
we were entirely surrounded by an army of brigands who during the darkness had
gained a foothold on the top of the city wall but who had been repulsed and were
again attacking with vigour. From Monday morning till Tuesday there was almost
incessant fighting. The besieging force was under the command of a brigand leader
who sent a letter into the city, which letter I personally read, and in which he stated
that the object of his band attacking the city was to possess themselves of food
supplies. After further experiences with this same band I was able to estimate that
75% of its ranks were composed of famine refugees, men who had taken to the rifle,
sword and spear and the open road in order to try and find a means of existence.
For some tense hours the fate of the city hung in the balance and at one such
moment as this, Dr. Rees came to me with the very disturbing news that Mr. Ruhl
had run up a temperature of 103º and he was apprehensive that it might prove to be
typhus!! Last year in the province of Kansuh, fourteen foreign missionaries, Catholic
and Protestant, died from typhus contracted from famine sufferers, whilst an equal
number who contracted the fell disease, recovered by the Grace of God. You can
imagine the anxiety of those moments. However, the first diagnosis proved wrong
and God graciously spared Mr. Ruhl and raised him from the bed of sickness. The
two medical members of our party were kept busily employed tending the wounded.
Dr. Rees, who is a man with a very considerable medical experience, stated that he
had never seen wounds of a more ghastly nature than those inflicted by the brigands
upon the tortured. Without surgical instruments, and without any supply of opiates,
those two doctors extracted bullets, sewed up wounds and carried out other minor
operations.
On Tuesday the bandits withdrew from the immediate vicinity of the city but
camped right across the road we purposed to travel. We delayed our departure until
the Friday and then felt it absolutely necessary that we proceed. The distance for
that day’s run was about sixty miles and we had accomplished something like half of
that distance before we ran into a large band of them. In a few moments they had
surrounded out truck and showed themselves to be a motley crowd made up of
Chinese and Moslems, the latter being direct descendants of the Arabs, Persians,
Turks and Mongols, and with some of the very pronounced traits of those races still
in their features and their temperaments. With the Moslems we quickly established
easy relationships and when they knew we were missionaries and relief workers
they showed us distinct deference. Our only difficulty lay with some deserters from
the Kuominchun Army who clambered up on the truck and wanted to search our
belongings. However, our Moslem friends took matters into their own hands and
forced those men off the truck so expeditiously that they had to jump for it. Just as
We arrived there on the afternoon of Saturday and spent the Sunday with our
missionary host and hostess who, with their children and our little party, comprised
the entire foreign population of the city. Sunday was a delightfully quiet day with no
sign of the approaching storm. Sometime before daylight on Monday we were
awakened by a burst of firing and in a short while woke to the full consciousness that
we were entirely surrounded by an army of brigands who during the darkness had
gained a foothold on the top of the city wall but who had been repulsed and were
again attacking with vigour. From Monday morning till Tuesday there was almost
incessant fighting. The besieging force was under the command of a brigand leader
who sent a letter into the city, which letter I personally read, and in which he stated
that the object of his band attacking the city was to possess themselves of food
supplies. After further experiences with this same band I was able to estimate that
75% of its ranks were composed of famine refugees, men who had taken to the rifle,
sword and spear and the open road in order to try and find a means of existence.
For some tense hours the fate of the city hung in the balance and at one such
moment as this, Dr. Rees came to me with the very disturbing news that Mr. Ruhl
had run up a temperature of 103º and he was apprehensive that it might prove to be
typhus!! Last year in the province of Kansuh, fourteen foreign missionaries, Catholic
and Protestant, died from typhus contracted from famine sufferers, whilst an equal
number who contracted the fell disease, recovered by the Grace of God. You can
imagine the anxiety of those moments. However, the first diagnosis proved wrong
and God graciously spared Mr. Ruhl and raised him from the bed of sickness. The
two medical members of our party were kept busily employed tending the wounded.
Dr. Rees, who is a man with a very considerable medical experience, stated that he
had never seen wounds of a more ghastly nature than those inflicted by the brigands
upon the tortured. Without surgical instruments, and without any supply of opiates,
those two doctors extracted bullets, sewed up wounds and carried out other minor
operations.
On Tuesday the bandits withdrew from the immediate vicinity of the city but
camped right across the road we purposed to travel. We delayed our departure until
the Friday and then felt it absolutely necessary that we proceed. The distance for
that day’s run was about sixty miles and we had accomplished something like half of
that distance before we ran into a large band of them. In a few moments they had
surrounded out truck and showed themselves to be a motley crowd made up of
Chinese and Moslems, the latter being direct descendants of the Arabs, Persians,
Turks and Mongols, and with some of the very pronounced traits of those races still
in their features and their temperaments. With the Moslems we quickly established
easy relationships and when they knew we were missionaries and relief workers
they showed us distinct deference. Our only difficulty lay with some deserters from
the Kuominchun Army who clambered up on the truck and wanted to search our
belongings. However, our Moslem friends took matters into their own hands and
forced those men off the truck so expeditiously that they had to jump for it. Just as
