Office of the Historian

393.1163 American Church Mission/39: Telegram

The Secretary of State to the Consul General at Shanghai (Lockhart)

Washington, August 13, 1938—2 p.m.

487. Hankow’s July 13, 4 p.m., July 20, 9 a.m., August 11, 4 p.m., and August 12, 3 p.m., and your 990, July 14, 4 p.m., 1098, August 12, [Page 440] 4 p.m., and 1106, August 13, 3 p.m.54 Unless you have already done so, the Department desires that you make comprehensive and emphatic representations to the appropriate Japanese authorities recapitulating succinctly the essential facts and circumstances of the attacks on American mission properties at Wuchang as reported in the telegrams under reference and pointing out that notwithstanding the fact that the mission properties had been marked on maps delivered by you to Japanese authorities, the mission properties under reference have been bombed no less than seven times since July 12, and particularly emphasizing the fact that in the course of these attacks American lives have been directly imperiled. You should request that immediate and effective steps be taken to prevent a recurrence of such deplorable attacks.

Please repeat to Tokyo55 and Hankow.

Hull
  1. None printed.↩
  2. See note of August 16, from the American Ambassador in Japan to the Japanese Minister for Foreign Affairs, Foreign Relations, Japan, 1931–1941, vol. i, p. 619.↩