Lewis Strong Casey Smythe (1901)

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Biography

From Jean (Corey) Holroyd-Sills, Dec. 2011:

This appears to be the same Lewis Smyth who was present during the. Nanking massacre in 1937 - 1938. He is mentioned several times in the book "The Rape of Nanking" by Iris Chang.

Lewis Strong Casey Smythe received his BA from Drake College in 1923 and his Ph.D. in Missions and Christian Theology from the Chicago Divinity School in 1928. He married Margaret Lillian Garrett in 1924. In 1928, the Smythes went to Nanking, sponsored by the United Christian Mission Society. Smythe served as Professor of Sociology at Nanking University until 1951.[1].

Smythe was in Nanking during the Battle of Nanking and its aftermath, the Nanking Massacre. He served as Secretary of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone from December 14, 1937 to February 10, 1938.[2] In that role, he and the Committee's chairman, John Rabe, recorded the atrocities committed by Japanese troops and made daily reports complaining to the Japanese embassy. Smythe reported that the Japanese embassy continually promised to do something about the atrocities but it was February 1938 before anything effective was done to restore order to the city.[3].

After the end of World War II, Smythe was among members of the International Committee for the Nanking Safety Zone who testified about the Nanking Massacre to the International Military Tribunal of the Far East.

He subsequently worked as an advisor to several organizations and wrote several articles and books relating to social change in China.[1]. In the documentary film Nanking, Smythe was portrayed by actor Stephen Dorff.

In The Rape of Nanking (Iris Chang, 1997) it was reported that:

“Under the direction of the sociologist Lewis Smythe, the International Safety Zone Committee conducted a systematic survey of damage to the Nanking area. Investigators visited every fiftieth inhabited house in the city and also went to every tenth family in every third village in the countryside. In a sixty-page report released in June 1938, Smythe concluded that the 120 air raids that Nanking experienced and the four-day siege of the city did only 1 percent of the damage inflicted by the Japanese army after it entered Nanking.

“Arson caused most of the destruction. Fires in Nanking began with the fall of the city and lasted more than six weeks. Soldiers torched buildings under the guidance of officers and even used special chemical strips to set the fires. They burned down churches, embassies, department stores, shops, mansions, and huts---even areas within the Safety Zone. The zone leaders could not put out these fires because their pumps and fire equipment had been stolen by the Japanese. By the end of the first few weeks of the Rape of Nanking, the military had incinerated one-third of the entire city and three-fourths of all the stores” (p. 160).

Sources

^ a b "Oral History Catalogue: Claremont Graduate University". ^ Timothy Brook, ed (1999). Documents on the rape of Nanking. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-472-08662-7.

^ Timothy Brook, ed. Documents on the rape of Nanking. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-472-08662-7.

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Lewis S.C. Smythe

See also War Damage in the Nanking area Dec.1937 to Mar.1938 Minnie Vautrin John Rabe

COPIED FROM WIKIPEDIA ENTRY ON LEWIS SMYTHE, ON 12-26-2011 TID 0

Name: Footnote References

^ a b "Oral History Catalogue: Claremont Graduate University". ^ Timothy Brook, ed (1999).

Documents on the rape of Nanking. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-472-08662-7. ^ Timothy Brook, ed.

Documents on the rape of Nanking. University of Michigan Press: Ann Arbor Paperbacks. ISBN 978-0-472-08662-7.

Wikisource has original works written by or about: Lewis S.C. Smythe

See also War Damage in the Nanking area Dec.1937 to Mar.1938 Minnie Vautrin John Rabe

COPIED FROM WIKIPEDIA ENTRY ON LEWIS SMYTHE, ON 12-26-2011

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