The Japanese occupied the town on the evening of Christmas Day, Preparations had been made to distribute 1,200 chin of mo-mo to the poor, and actually half this amount was got out before the gates were closed. The rest has been very useful in feeding the many refugees who have sought shelter on the Church premises. It was impossible 10 hold the usual Christmas services. treasury is.empty I] many obstacles ahead to be faced, but if a representative and unafraid-body of Chinese is got together to'cope with the present temporary state of affairs, they will have the support of the foreign community until a properly accredited administration, Chinese or Japanese, comegalong to take over.
A Japanese destroyer came quite close into the Outer Harbour this afternoon, had a look round and left again after a few minutes, that they also wauld effect a landing at Wangkiatai Bay to occupy Chu-cheng (40 miles away) and this caused Gen. Vu Hsueh-chung's troops stationed at Weihsien and Kaomi to rapidly withdraw to Chucheng. These rumoured moves never eventuated of course, but caused the present debacle
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.