Office of the Historian

793.94/8129: Telegram

The Second Secretary of Embassy in China (Atcheson) to the Secretary of State

Nanking, September 9, 1936—2 p.m.
[Received September 9—1:52 p.m.]

262. Penultimate paragraph of Canton’s September 8, 11 a.m.94

1.
Japanese Embassy states that it has no details other than that a Japanese merchant, the only Japanese resident of Pakhoi who has lived there many years and has a Chinese wife, was killed several days ago at Pakhoi by a Chinese mob. (Reuter’s at Canton quoting the Japanese Consulate General there gives the date of the alleged murder as September 3.) Suma intimated this morning to a foreign news correspondent that the affair involved members of the former 19th Foreign [Route] Army part of which is reported to have been in occupation of Pakhoi on behalf of the Kwangsi rebels. He said that this was one more instance of anti-Japanism and is equivalent to the [Page 282] Chengtu incident in importance and he mentioned the Shanghai murders as previous instances concerning which Japan had shown great patience. He said that Japanese patience was now exhausted and it would be “immediately necessary” for the Chinese Government to take adequate steps to suppress the vicious anti-Japanese feeling which the Government had allowed to grow throughout the country.
2.
He said that he opened yesterday preliminary negotiations with the Minister for Foreign Affairs over the Chengtu incident but the conversation was general, he had offered no demands or proposals for settlement and the Japanese Government had not yet formulated its demands. He said he told Chang Chun that the suppression of anti-Japanese feeling in China was essential to a settlement of the Chengtu murder and to the adjustment of Sino-Japanese relations. He said the date of Kawagoe’s arrival in Nanking had not yet been set.
3.
I am informed by responsible official of the Foreign Office that the Chinese Government has not yet received any official information of the Pakhoi incident.
4.
To Department and Peiping. Repeated to Canton, by mail to Shanghai, Tokyo.
Atcheson
  1. Not printed.↩