American goddess at the rape of Nanking : the courage of Minnie Vautrin

Author / Creator

Hu, Hualing

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Summary

"The Japanese army's brutal occupation of the city of Nanking during the 1937 Sino-Japanese War is known, for good reason, as "the rape of Nanking." As they slaughtered an estimated three hundred t...

"The Japanese army's brutal occupation of the city of Nanking during the 1937 Sino-Japanese War is known, for good reason, as "the rape of Nanking." As they slaughtered an estimated three hundred thousand people, the invading soldiers raped more than twenty thousand women - some estimates run as high as eighty thousand. Hua-ling Hu presents here the amazing untold story of the American missionary Minnie Vautrin, whose unswerving defiance of the Japanese protected ten thousand Chinese women and children and made her a legend among the Chinese people she served." "Vautrin, who came to be known in China as the "Living Goddess" or the "Goddess of Mercy," joined the Foreign Christian Missionary Society and went to China during the Chinese Nationalist Revolution in 1912. As dean of studies at Ginling College in Nanking, she devoted her life to promoting Chinese women's education and to helping the poor." "At the outbreak of he war in July 1937, Vautrin defied the American embassy's order to evacuate the city." "When the Japanese soldiers ordered Vautrin to leave the campus, she replied: "This is my home. I cannot leave." Facing down the bloodstained bayonets constantly waved in her face, Vautrin shielded the desperate Chinese who sought asylum behind the gates of the college. Vautrin exhausted herself defying the Japanese army and caring for the refugees after the siege ended in March 1938." "Finally suffering a nervous breakdown in 1940, Vautrin returned to the United States for medical treatment. One year later, she ended her own life. She considered herself a failure." "Hu bases her biography on Vautrin's correspondence between 1919 and 1941 and on her diary, maintained during the entire siege, as well as on Chinese, Japanese, and American eyewitness accounts, government documents, and interviews with Vautrin's family."--BOOK JACKET.

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