Chinese soldiers, billetted some distance from the Soochow Creek, attempted in vain to stop the flames advancing toward their camp, which lay nestled in Chinese huts, but as they were about to be When Chinese soldiery were routed out of Kuhn Road houses by fire yesterday Royal Welch Fusiliers holding an outpost on the opposite side of the road were interested speculators of the next move, for the Settlement seemed to be the natural avenue to safety. Seconds later 2 row of shop shutters came down with a clatter exposing a nest of machine-guns, Unmanned, they pointed at the British sector and their presence had been completely unknown. Interest turned to surprised apprehension, Combatants and noncombatants had a short parley and then the Chinese retreated by way of alley-ways in to their own territory. According to them they had been smoked out by "bad Chinese," meaning traitors, This happened shortly after one o'clock. The fire burnt about ten houses in Chinese territory on the north side of Kuhn Road and then spread towards the Settlement. The blaze jumped the Settlement boundsry and destroyed about three more houses before being extinguished by the Central Station firemen.
It was reported from the French Concession boundary that the Chinese in Nantao and the Chinese City had been preparing trenches which faced the Concession defences. This was due, apparently, to the mistaken idea that Japanese troops would be allowed to make their way through the foreign areas,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.