Of the much-advertised punitive expedition undertaken by the Japanese garrison of Peiping against this band when they asserted to have killed 60 and taken 100 prisoners or so, the captives knew nothing at all. According to their account the band that they were with never, at any time, was involved in any serious or close fighting—at most a languid exchange of shots at long range—nor did they see or hear of any wounded, with the exception of one member of the band who had shot himself by accident.
During their enforced stay with these so-called bandits, the composition of the band had steadily changed for the better. AN the professional bandit element who were originally responsible for the attack on the seminary and the carrying-off of thirteen foreign missionaries, with a special view to obtaining a large ransom, had been gradually eliminated, They were given a cash payment and sent away. New "volunteers" were recruited in the villages through which they passed land many disbanded soldiers joined up, until in the end the band consisted of 400 well-armed men, all wearing some kind of uniform. The leader was an intelligent and educated man, obviously of a better class, and probably a former military officer.
He told the captives that he had changed the personnel of his band, because his only purpose was to fight the Japanese, and it was not part of their plan to rob their own countrymen. He said that there were well-armed groups amounting to over 3,000 men in the hills who were preparing themselves for guerilla warfare against the Japanese. The three captives did not see any actual cases of deliberate looting, though there was a certain amount of petty pilfering by individuals, but the mere presence of a band of such size in the provertystricken mountain villages was almost as disastrous, for they ate the poor villagers out of house and home.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.