793.94/16088
Memorandum by the Adviser on Political Relations (Hornbeck)87
In a letter from Nelson Johnson dated Chungking, June 18, I find a paragraph as follows:
“This thing that we are compelled to witness here in Chungking is beyond all description in its brutality. These daily visits of a hundred or more bombers swinging back and forth over a city of helpless people who cower for hours in dug outs where many are overcome just by the bad air, accompanied by the general migration into the country up over the hills, old and young, mothers carrying babies under the hot sun, up, up, the hills, resting by the way side. Last night the ferries worked till nearly midnight carrying them back across the river.”
Mr. Johnson concludes his letter with the statement:
“Of course I do not intend to go away from Chungking while this particular crisis is on.”88