393.1115/511: Telegram
The Commander in Chief of the United States Asiatic Fleet (Yarnell) to the Chief of Naval Operations (Leahy)96
[Received September 3—11:22 a.m.]
0003. Totals of Americans indicating desire leave China are Peiping–Tientsin area 71, Chefoo–Tsingtao area 270, Shanghai 100, river and interior 310, South China 40. Above numbers vary almost daily with changes in military situation and are only an estimate (see my 0028 1815 August). Commercial transportation is available to residents in Peiping–Tientsin area. Residents in Yangtze Valley can still leave via Hankow–Canton Railway. Asiatic Fleet distributed as follows: Peitaiho one destroyer, Chefoo Blackhawk, three destroyers, Heron, Bittern; Tsingtao Canopus, four destroyers, two submarines, Pigeon; Shanghai Augusta, Isabel, Sacramento, four destroyers, Finch; Pagoda anchorage one destroyer; Amoy Tulsa; Swatow Asheville; Canton Mindanao.
These dispositions governed by numbers of Americans in different areas and based upon the requirement that sufficient ships remain in ports where sudden developments may require taking of nationals at short notice to save them from actual violence.
Vessels which can at present be used for evacuating Americans to distant ports are a few destroyers and Gold Star. Destroyers are unsuitable for women and children except for short distances. River gunboats confined indefinitely in Yangtze by Chinese barrier. Gold Star now employed evacuate to Kobe but is unfitted for more than about 50 unless standee bunks in hold are used which is now being done by naval women and children. Chaumont and Marblehead will be used on arrival. A limited amount of transportation is available in small coastwise steamers and will take care of present situation [Page 304] at South China ports. There are a few sailings of larger vessels for Japan and the Philippines. About 25 of the passengers booked for the Hoover and McKinley have since left Shanghai on other vessels. The great bulk of our nationals will not leave China until the necessity becomes immediate and pressing and they realize that their lives are endangered and their business or occupation are permanently lost.
- Copy transmitted to the Department by the Navy Department.↩