Office of the Historian

493.11/2123

The Consul General at Tientsin (Caldwell) to the Secretary of State

No. 257
Tientsin, March 23, 1938.
[Received May 3.]

Sir: I have the honor to refer to the Department’s telegram No. 78 of February 18, 7:00 p.m., to the Embassy at Hankow (repeated to this office by the Embassy’s circular of February 21, 4:00 p.m.) concerning the procedure for handling claims resulting from the present Chinese-Japanese hostilities, and to the Department’s telegram No. 45 of March 11, 6:00 p.m., to this office authorizing me to furnish informally to the Japanese Consulate General a list of the losses of American property in this consular district for which indemnity has not been received.

I enclose a copy of the list which was informally transmitted to a Japanese consular officer under cover of a personal letter dated March 23, 1938, a copy of which is also enclosed,90 and which covers all unsettled losses known to this office on March 22, 1938.

[Page 298]

Claims of the several categories specified in the Department’s instruction to the Embassy at Hankow have been grouped together in the list, but this grouping has not been indicated in the copy of the list supplied to the Japanese Consulate General. The losses on pages 1 and 2 of the list, numbered 1 to 32, inclusive, totalling US$102,385.24, appear to have been due to looting by irregular troops and civilians. The losses on pages 3 and 4 of the list, numbered from 33 to 54, inclusive, and on the supplementary list, totalling US$32,516.72, seem to have been due directly to Japanese troops. The losses on page 5 of the list, numbered 55 to 59, inclusive, totalling US$9,595.19, were caused by the regular Chinese military and authorities. The responsibility for the losses on pages 6 and 7 of the list, numbered 60 to 84, inclusive, totalling US$38,980.69, has not been determined; it is probable that in at least some of the cases in this fourth category the losses were due to the actions of more than one of the groups responsible for the losses in the first three categories.

Copies of this despatch are being sent to the American Embassies at Hankow and Tokyo.

Respectfully yours,

J. K. Caldwell
  1. Enclosures not printed.↩