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Caldwell, Erskine

(Moreland, Georgia 1903-1987 Paradise Valley, Arizona) : Schriftsteller, Reporter

Name Alternative(s)

Caldwell, Erskine Preston

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Index of Names : Occident / Literature : Occident : United States of America

Chronology Entries (3)

# Year Text Linked Data
1 1939 Letter from Erskine Caldwell to Timofei Rokotov ; July 25 (1939).
By a good combination of circumstances I may be crossing the Trans-Siberian railroad into the Soviet Union during the early part of 1940. I am planning to go to China the middle of September, staying through the winter, then meeting the Trans-Siberian railroad at some convenient point and crossing the country to Moscow.
2 1941 Trip by Erskine Caldwell as reporter for "Life" and Margaret Bourke-White as Photoreporter in China (March-April).
The trip from Hong Kong to Chongqing was dangerous because China and Japan were at war and the airspace was infested with Japanese aircraft.
3 1941 Caldwell, Erskine. Transit China [ID D32813].
During these times when the greater part of the world is involved in war or the threat of war, the trip by air from New York to Moscow via the Pacific should not be classified as a pleasure jaunt. It is a job of hard work that I would recommend only to a person with the physical stamina of a hod-carrier, the mental agility of a card-sharp, and the rashness of a hitch-hiker. Otherwise, he would more than likely go down in defeat somewhere in wartime China before the combined forces of unbridled elements, Oriental blandness, and the quixotic behavior of ten-year-old airplanes.
It was during the middle stage of the journey, in China, that I learned the wisdom of taking seriously the universal footnote on airline schedules which states: "Arrivals and departures of planes are not guaranteed, and the schedule is subject to change without notice." Hereafter, when I see such footnotes, I will add: "And how!"
Margaret Bourke-White and I arrived in Hong Kong on Pan American Airways' China Clipper during the second week in April. Getting passage on a plane to Chungking, provisional capital of the Central Government is not easy, because my wife was firm in her determination not to leave behind a single ounce of her five hundred pounds of photographic equipment. And besides, planes to Chungking were booked with passengers and freight for three months in advance.
However, after spending the greater part of five days in the office of the China National Aviation Corporation we were able to secure two tickets and space for our excess baggage.
When we left with our tickets, we were advised to take along one sandwich each in case the plane had to make an emergency landing to escape Japanese raiding planes. Japanese occupied territory was only a few minutes' flying time from Hong Kong.
At four a.m. we took off from the dark airfield. There were three other passengers on the plane, all Chinese, and the remainder of the space was taken up by bales of newly-printed banknotes for the Central Government, the main cargo of every flight to Chungking, and by cases of medical supplies. Before boarding the plane the pilots, all of whom are Americans, told us it was an ideal night for flying in that part of the world because it was foggy and cloudy, and that after we had climbed above the clouds to an altitude of ten or twelve thousand feet it would be difficult for the Japanese to find us. The pilots had laughed and joked with us on the field, but once in the plane they were grim-faced and silent. One of the planes had been shot down and machined-gunned [sic] on the ground several months before by the Japanese, and no one had forgotten it.
The trip of six hours was as uneventful as a routine flight between New York and Chicago. At mid-morning we were over the mountainous city of Chungking, looking down into a fog so thick it was impossible to see anything farther than a few hundred feet away. But the pilots were accustomed to Chungking fog, and soon they got down between the mountain ranges and located the Yangtze River. After five or ten minutes the large white-painted circles on the postage stamp of an airfield were sighted, and soon the landing wheels were bumping over the cobbly ground.
As we stepped out of the plane, several English-speaking young Chinese came up and said an air raid alarm was in effect. We soon found out no alarm had been given; it apparently was merely the wartime capital’s way of greeting a newcomer.
Now that we were in Chungking, we began at once trying to get out of the city. The airline to the Northwest is operated by Eurasia Aviation Corporation, and it is owned jointly by the Central Government and German Lufthansa. It operates German-made Junkers with Chinese crews. C.N.A.C. is owned jointly by the Central Government and Pan American Airways. Its planes are U.S.-made Douglasses. The third established airline, Hami-Ata, operates between Hami, Sinkiang Province, and Alma-Ata, USSR. It is owned jointly by the Chinese and the USSR; it uses U.S.-made Douglass planes operated by Russian crews. All three lines existed primarily for the use of the military and government officials, and civilian travel is difficult. We were told that few foreigners and no Americans had entered the USSR by this route, although Anna Louise Strong had made the eastbound flight three months earlier.
When we first applied for passage on Eurasia to Hami, we were told there were no seats available, but that reservations would be accepted pending the close of hostilities. We took a short ricksha ride and came back and said that it would be impossible for us to wait in Chungking for the war to end. That settled the matter for all concerned, and we were promised passage on the plane scheduled for the first week in May. We held out firmly for the plane scheduled for the last week in April.
On the morning of our sixth day in Chungking we were notified by Eurasia to go to the airfield on the following morning promptly at seven o’clock, and to bring only 15 kilograms of baggage each. A few hours later we were notified that the flight had been cancelled because of an air raid on Kunming. Late in the afternoon we were again called to the phone and told that motor trouble at Kweilin had been the cause of the reported cancellation, not an air raid on Kunming, but that the motor had been repaired and the plane would arrive the next morning in Chungking after all.
In a confused state of mind we retired to one of the recesses in Chialing House, a Chinese version of a pigeon coop, which is an eating and sleeping establishment for foreigners. We already had a satchel full of Central Government currency, but in the sultry Chungking spring we decided we would need an additional $4,000 mex, so we exchanged another $100 U.S. at the hotel and sent a like amount to the bank. Then we sat down and attempted to cool off with alternate swigs of hot tea and Chungking's version of un-iced lemon pop. Hot, humid, and sweaty, Chungking is no summer resort from April to October.
Late in the evening we were told that we would need about $10,000 mex for our tickets and excess baggage to Hami, and a like amount to get us from Hami to Alma-Ata. We had barely accomplished the new financial transactions when we were told that the only legal tender in Sinkiang Province, aside from its own currency, were notes issued by the Central Bank of China. We emptied the satchel of currency on the floor and fingered through the stacks of $1, $10, and $100 notes. Only one out of every five was an issue of the Central Bank, the remainder being issues of the Farmer’s Bank, the Bank of Communications, and other institutions. Towards morning we succeeded in swapping all but a few hundred dollars for Central Bank notes.
We left the hotel that morning at five-thirty, and, with some six hundred pounds of baggage, including the satchel stuffed with banknotes, arrived at the airfield at seven by means of ricksha, sedan chair, and foot. At nine o'clock we were told that the plane would not arrive, because there had been an air raid at Kunming. We tried to find out why a raid on Kunming would prevent a plane from leaving Kweilin, which was several hundred miles west of the former city, but nobody knew why. As we were leaving we were called back and told that the plane was coming after all. At ten o'clock a plane did arrive, but it was going in the wrong direction for us; it had come from Hami en route to Kweilin. Back we went to Chialing House to swig hot tea and lukewarm lemon pop for another day.
The next morning we reached the airport at seven. At half past eight the plane dropped suddenly out of a foggy sky and rumbled over the cobbly field in a shower of dust and pulverized stone. It was a matter of only a few minutes until the inevitable conflict over excess baggage arose. We told the air line people it was impossible to leave the baggage behind, and they told us it was impossible to take it along. We seesawed back and forth over the problem for an hour and a half, neither side conceding as much as a single kilogram. Finally, tea was brought out and we all drank. The tea brought good humor and handshaking all around, and we boarded the plane with our six hundred pounds. A few minutes later we were off to Hami via Chengtu and Suchow. Ordinarily a flight of about eleven hours, we were to arrive there exactly twelve days later.
The flight to Chengtu lasted an hour and a half. The other passengers aboard were three government officials, two army officers, all Chinese; and two Russian pilots, both with side-arms, but in civilian clothes. We came down on the broad Chengtu air field under the first clear sky we had seen since leaving Hong Kong. Just before we touched ground, one of the Chinese pilots came into the cabin and, following the letter of the law, drew the curtains tightly over the windows. The Russians raised their curtains and looked out, but none of the rest of us dared. Everything we were prevented from seeing as we came down the runway was more plainly visible when we stepped out of the plane a moment later.
After a few minutes the two Chinese pilots and the radio operator got into an automobile and disappeared behind a knoll in the distance. We were told that they were going to a teahouse for tiffin, so together with the three Chinese government officials we started across the air field behind them. When we got to the teahouse fifteen minutes later, we were told we would not have time for tiffin, because the pilots had just then decided to leave immediately in order to reach Suchow before dark. There was not even time enough to get tea, so we all got into the Eurasia bus and went back to the plane.
Before taking off, one of the pilots came in to make certain that the curtains were still drawn over the windows. The two Russians lifted their curtains and looked out just as if they had never heard of the law.
We flew over rice paddies and small angular fields for half an hour before going up above the clouds. The roads through the rolling country were dense with every kind of traffic. We could see coolies carrying loads on their back which weighed, I discovered later by lifting one, up to three hundred pounds. There were carts being pulled and pushed by coolies. There were sedan chairs on coolie shoulders which bore wealthier countrymen. There were men, women, and children as thick as ants over the countryside; some carried water for miles and miles to irrigate the fields, some carried refuse with which to fertilize the soil, others spaded earth that in thousands of years had not been touched by an animal-drawn plow.
We flew for three hours above the clouds at an altitude that averaged 9,000 feet above sea level or 6,000 above ground level, except when crossing mountain ranges, when we went to 12.000 feet.
That afternoon we landed at Lanchow in the arid country of the Province of Kansu on the west bank of the Yellow River. We were then five hours by air, 740 kilometers by highway, from Chungking. The mountains north and west of the city of 50,000 inhabitants were as bare as the palm of the hand. The only vegetation in sight grew in the irrigated fields along the banks of the river. The earth-colored mountains, the blazing sun, and the pale blue haze all around us was a close replica of Southern California. The people who came across the field to meet the plane looked strangely out of place for the moment. The civilians were wearing the black shoe-length coats that are still the major item in the national costume of China, and the soldiers were wearing every conceivable shade of khaki and carrying a curious-looking fire-arm that was about a foot and a half in length. None of the soldiers wore leather shoes or boots; fibre soles were strapped over bare feet. Their officers, however, wore serge uniforms, glossy leather boots, and spotless white gloves.
After going through military inspection we were told that the pilots had decided to remain overnight in Lanchow, and that we would leave promptly the next morning at six for Suchow and Hami.
We were awakened at 4 a.m. The plane took off at 5:55. After twenty minutes in the air, we suddenly turned around and headed for Lanchow. Just before we landed I asked one of the pilots what the trouble was, and he said they wanted to test one of the motors. We are on the ground a scant two minutes before taking off a second time.
Half an hour later, while we were at a high altitude climbing over the 5,000-foot mountains, the cabin began filling with smoke and the sharp odor of scorching paint. A thin stream of black smoke drifted up from the floor. We started for the control room, but just then one of the pilots opened the door and discovered something was wrong. A moment later we were swinging around at a precarious angle, the plane banking sharply, and the three motors roaring on a full gun. If the plane were capable of making more than one hundred miles per hour, it probably made the best time in its ten-year-existence on the way back to Lanchow. When we sighted the air field, the motors were cut off, and we glided down to a bumpy landing. Nobody thought of drawing the curtains over the windows that time, even though the field was lined with row after row of military planes, both real and deceptive.
All of us tumbled out of the ship at top speed. The sheeting under the nose, or center, motor was ripped off, mechanics sprinted across the field with fire extinguishers, and a cloud of black smoke floated out. The exhaust pipe and manifold had been completely shattered by backfire, presumably having occurred when the plane was being warmed up that morning, and flame from the motor had scorched the flooring of the control cabin.
After a long inspection the airport manager said the plane would have to be repaired before we could continue to Suchow, and that we would leave the following morning at six. I asked him how it could be repaired without replacement parts, and he said they would take a manifold and exhaust pipe from another plane. I looked around the field but I could not see a ship that looked capable of supplying what was needed.
The Eurasia bus took us back to the hotel where we had spent the previous night, and the tragi-comedy that was to last for ten days began. The hotel had formerly been named China Travel Service, in English, but the lettering had been removed from the building when Britain temporarily closed the Burma Road, and it had not been put back. I gathered that there was no intention of replacing the sign for some time to come.
At dusk that evening the airport manager came to our room and said the parts taken from a smaller plane had failed to fit the Junkers, and that they had not yet decided what to do about it. Naturally, we would not be able to leave the next day.
After he had gone we sat down and tried to visualize all the ships at sea, all the airplanes in the world, and all the other methods people use in getting from one place to the next. The only ships on the Yellow River were rafts of inflated pig hides that made about six miles an hour going downstream in the direction of Japanese-occupied territory. The only airplanes in Lanchow were two-place pursuit ships and an unrepaired Junkers. The closest railroad was a thousand miles away in Japanese control. And the bus had left Lanchow for Chengtu a month before but had not returned because it was bottom-side-up in a ditch somewhere along the highway.
By mid-afternoon of the next day the airport manager had failed to call us, so we went to the Eurasia office. He assured us that we would be off in no time. A repair plane had left Hong Kong for Lanchow that morning with the necessary parts, and it was expected within the next few hours. The damaged plane would be repaired the next day, and we would be on our way to Hami. We all drank tea, shook hands, beamed with good humor. Then we went back to the hotel.
The hotel was a series of rooms connected together much in the style of an auto court or tourist camp. There was no electricity in Lanchow that week, or the next, because the electric plant had been closed down for repairs. The oil lamps supplied guests were small pots with a wick, and they consumed their allotment of oil each evening by nine o'clock. There was no sanitation to speak of; the system in use was a sort of every-man-for-himself idea. From one point of view, no progress in that direction had been made since the time of Confucius, or earlier. After seeing the water that was carried into the hotel by coolies from one of the places where they get water, and not being able to identify some of the visible foreign matter, we decided not only to use tea for drinking purposes, but also to utilize tea wherever else possible. We washed hands and face in tea, we brushed teeth in tea, and we use tea to sprinkle the floor to settle the dust.
There were two styles of food available at the hotel. The cook boy, whose name was Show King, and who had cooked in the Palace Hotel, Shanghai, before the war began, was able to provide almost anything we called for. His only concern each time he took our order was whether we wanted Chinese chow or foreign chow. We generally chose foreign chow. Show King would then bring out his cook book, which he had written himself in both Chinese and English while cooking in Shanghai, and begin calling out some of his 150-odd varieties of soup, his 90-odd ways of serving chicken, and his 11 flavors of soufflé. No matter what we selected, we always got chicken soup and fried chicken. The dessert was always banana soufflé, because Show King liked it best himself.
The third day passed, but there was no report from Eurasia. However, on the morning of the fourth day we heard that not only had the repair plane taken off for Hong Kong, but that the Junkers had turned back to Hong Kong also. We rushed to Eurasia and excitedly demanded an explanation. The manager poured tea and passed around a new tin of Craven A cigarettes fresh from London. He said it was wartime, and that many changes of plans had to be made from day to day, especially when Eurasia's planes were already ten years old and when spare parts were difficult to obtain from Germany. It all led up to the fact that the damaged plane, although repaired and capable of flying eleven hours to Hong Kong, was being removed from its schedule[d] flight to Hami, only six hours away. We all drank some more tea, smoked some fresh Craven A's, and shook hands two times around. The manager said he would communicate with us without fail the following day and let us know when we could expect to leave Lanchow.
The next day we made several meals of Show King's foreign chow, including banana soufflé, and when the last drop of oil had been consumed that evening, there was still no word from the airport manager.
The next morning we were awakened by the roar of scores of USSR-made bombers and pursuit planes over the city. We decided at once to call on the governor of the province and to ask for seats on a military plane to Hami. It took us several hours to work our way through the channel of approach. First we had to be introduced to the civil chief of police, who in turn introduced us to the military chief of police, who introduced us to the secretary of the secretary of the governor. Each step consumed from one half to a full hour during which time we had to drink so much tea, I became purple in the face. At noon we finally reached the next to last office, that of the governor's secretary. He had us sit down, poured tea, and asked for our passports. He then went into another room and examined them for three-quarters of an hour. While he was gone, I went to the door and threw out all the tea. When he came back, he noticed at once that our cups were empty, and promptly called for another and larger pot. I took one swallow, and when I tried to reply to one of the secretary’s questions, all I could do was make a watery sound. He shook hands with us and told us to come back in half an hour for the appointment with the governor.
We took a short ride in rickshas and returned promptly at the time set. The secretary shook hands with us, poured tea from another and still larger pot, and informed us that the governor regretted he could not receive us, because we did not have the proper signature in our passports for the Province of Kansu. He said the necessary signature could be obtained only by going to Chungking, and we would have to return there for it. We walked back to the hotel through the dusty unpaved streets and ordered some more of Show King's foreign chow.
Two police from the civil police came in while we were eating and asked for our passports. They studied them closely for a while and then shook their heads. They said it was just as they thought. We did not have a permit to remain in Lanchow. We offered to go to the civil office and get the permit, but they said that since we did not have a certain signature - from Chungking - the chief of police would be unable to recognize our presence in Lanchow. I asked them what we should do about it, since it was impossible to return to Chungking, they said they did not know. They went away.
On the sixth day we went to the office of the commissioner of highways for the Province to inquire if it would be possible for us to ride on one of the military trucks to Hami. The commissioner listened to us with a gleeful smile, and then he said it usually took ten days for the trip, but at that time of year it would require at least two weeks. When we got up to leave, he asked if our passports were in order. I told them they were as far as I knew, because we had the proper visa for Central Government territory. He said, when coming to the Northwest Province, it was a good idea to have more than a Central Government visa. Then he said it would not be wise for us to insist on leaving Lanchow under the circumstances, and that he hoped we would secure the proper signature from Chungking.
When we got back to the hotel, the clerk informed us that the police had sent for us to come to the civil office and explain what we were doing in Lanchow; and, since we were already in the city, to explain why we were trying so desperately to find means of leaving it. We sent word to the civil office that we were too tired to go there that day, but that we would try to come as soon as we were able.
On the seventh day the airport manager told us that the regular weekly plane was due to leave Kweilin early the next morning and would arrive in Lanchow the same afternoon. He asked us to pack our bags, pay our hotel bill, obtain a permit to leave the city, and to go to the airport in case the pilots decided to continue the flight to Suchow.
We were up early the next morning. It took us no time at all to pack, and we called Show King and ordered banana soufflé for breakfast. The sun was shining brightly, children were playing in the courtyard, and we thought we heard birds singing in the eaves of the pagoda. The room boys brought an extra pot of tea, and we washed our faces, brushed our teeth, and sprinkled the floor. Before we had finished our soufflé, an air raid alarm sounded. We gathered up what things we could carry, called the room boys to lock our door, and got a pot of tea to take with us to the mountains.
When we reached the street in front of the hotel, we stopped and put our things on the ground. There was no way of knowing which direction to take, because people by the hundreds were running as fast as they could in both directions. Half were running up the street, and half were going the other way. A one-legged man was pulling himself over the ground without crutches; a blind man was tapping his way along the sides of the buildings; there were people pulling and pushing donkeys, trying to make them walk faster. There were carts going at full speed and knocking down people right and left. There were baby carriages loaded with belongings being pushed at top speed while the children came along behind crying because they could not keep up with their parents. In a few minutes the rickshas began wheeling through the street, going rapidly in both directions, while the coolies panted and the well-to-do riders urged them to faster and faster speed. Behind the rickshas came military trucks carrying anti-aircraft guns, howitzers, and field kitchens. Soldiers, coolie and officer alike, dashed towards the airfield. By the time a dozen or so military trucks had roared through the street there was so much dust in the air but it was difficult to see more than a few feet away. Only the dogs were calm. One dog, taking advantage of an opportunity he had evidently been waiting for a long time, went into the kitchen of the hotel and walked out calmly with a leg of veal. He carried it to a quiet corner of the court and lay down to eat leisurely.
Before we could make up our minds which direction to go, the all-clear signal sounded. Within a few moments there was not a person moving faster than a walk. Shop blinds were taken down, a cigarette seller unrolled his stock of goods and spread them on the sidewalk, and one of the room boys came and took the leg of veal away from the dog and carried it back into the kitchen. The Japanese, it developed, had raided a nearby city, and then had turned back.
And, of course, our plane did not fly that day.
On the eighth day, something happened to one of the motors while the ship was still on the ground at Kunming, and it did not take off. But the police of Lanchow came to our room and explained once more that we did not have a permit either to remain or to leave, and asked us how we expected to exist under the circumstances. We poured tea, shook hands with them, and reminded them that America was a friendly country. They said that it was true that America was a friendly country, but nevertheless it would be impossible for us to exist without the proper signature in our passports.
Next morning the airport manager and the civil police arrived simultaneously. All were breathless, having rushed across town to accomplish their individual missions. We shook hands with the police, but listened to the airport manager. He said we should pack our baggage and go with him at once to the airfield, because the regular weekly plane had left Kunming early that morning and would arrive at one o'clock, leaving half an hour later for a Suchow. The police interrupted to say that we would have to get that permit, or they could not allow us to leave Lanchow. I told them it would be impossible for us to go to Chungking for the signature, because it was necessary for us to go to Hami, in the opposite direction. They shook their heads, saying they could not understand how we expected to exist under the circumstances.
When we were ready to leave the hotel, we heard a violent commotion in the street. We rushed out and found the street blocked from one end to the other with a mob of shouting, shoving people. Shopkeepers were hastily putting the blinds over their windows, taking down all removable signs, and locking their doors. The scene had all the indications of a people's rebellion against the Central Government, or an outbreak of the troublesome rice-riots. When the police arrived, we ask the hotel clerk what the trouble was, and he said it was an unusual situation but not at all serious. A Chinese merchant had successfully cheated a fellow countrymen in a deal involving a pair of pants.
We arrived at the airfield at noon and shook hands with the military inspectors, the police, both military and civil, and assured the airport manager that we bore no hard feelings towards him for the delay. There was a catch in his voice as he answered us. His eyes became moist. He said he was homesick for Shanghai, where his wife and children were living, and that our enforced delay had helped him endure his exile in the hinterland. He admitted that he was glad the plane had broken down. We took back all the harsh remarks we had made in the Eurasia office from day to day, and asked him to forgive us for having lost our temper each time the plane had failed to arrive.
The plane did not arrive at 1 o'clock. At two thirty a radio report was received from Chengtu. It stated that the plane had turned back to Chengtu that morning after having come within one hundred kilometers of Lanchow, because ice had begun to form on the wings.
No one said anything. The airport manager pointed to the bus, and we got in and sat down. We drove the fifteen kilometers back to the hotel in complete silence, and it was only when we had stepped out of the bus that the possibility of the plane's eventual arrival was mentioned. The airport manager said he would communicate with us later in the day. Just then the police arrived and followed us to our room. We all looked at each other helplessly. After a while we poured tea for the police, and shook hands with them, and then they went away.
Just before dusk the police came back and looked at our passports and shook their heads sadly. We invited them to have some of Show King's banana soufflé with us, but they declined, saying they never ate foreign chow. They had been gone only a few minutes when the airport manager arrived. He did not say anything for a long time. Then suddenly he leaned forward and, speaking in a husky voice barely above a whisper, said that the plane, after turning back from Lanchow that afternoon, and remained in Chengtu only a short time, and then had gone back to Chungking. We stared at him, unable to utter a sound. Even then his Oriental calm was unruffled. He patted my arm consolingly, and explained that the plane had gone to Chungking to refuel, because there was no gasoline in Chengtu, and that it would make an early start the next morning. The explanation seemed reasonable enough, because gasoline, which was carried thousands of miles into the interior of China from Burma and the USSR by camel, donkey, and truck, was one of the scarcest of commodities. However, we did not believe a word of it.
The next morning at six the airport manager woke us up and pulled us out of bed. We called the room boys for tea, and the three of us sat down and smiled at one another across the table. The airport manager looked as pleased as a kitten with a mouse. He said the plane was coming, and would arrive at nine o’clock, promptly. We all had some more tea, gulping down cup after cup and when we could drink no more, we sprinkled what was left on the floor.
When it was time to leave for the airfield, the police came along with us, inquiring over and over again how we expected to leave Lanchow when we did not have the permit; and, on the other hand, how we expected to remain there if we did not leave, since we did not have that kind of permit, either. 1 told him that Ernest Hemingway had come to China and, since he had a large vocabulary, he could undoubtedly explain it better than I could. They said they would make that report to the chief of police, and then we all shook hands and they left.
The plane did not arrive at nine, at ten, or at eleven. But at a few minutes past twelve it roared down out of the sky, and landed promptly without circling. We all rushed out to greet it. The airport manager patted its corrugated sides affectionately, and the rest of us stood under its wings and gazed upon it in awe.
Just before taking off, the airport manager handed us a paper bag containing two dozen medium-boiled eggs for our tiffin. We assured him we would think of him every time we saw a boiled egg after that.
After a three-hour flight we spent the night at Suchow on the southwest edge of the Gobi. The airport was on a plain at the foot of the northern range of the snow-capped mountains. We were still in Kansu Province, but all the signs at the station were in Russian. Posters decorated with portraits of Stalin, Lenin, and Red Army troops hung on the walls. China seemed very far away.
At six the next morning we were up and ready to leave. A stiff wind was blowing down from the north, and we had to close our eyes to keep out the dust and sand.
At seven we took off over the Gobi for the normal three-hour flight to Hami. We had been told that the connecting plane for all Alma-Ata was waiting for us there, and that we would be in the USSR by evening.
After gaining an altitude of a thousand feet, the plane began to bounce and bump. One of the pilots said a head-wind was blowing down from the Taklamakan Desert into the Gobi with a velocity of 75 kilometers per hour. We climbed up another thousand feet, but the wind was still just as strong at that level. Finally, we went to 12,000 feet. By that time we were about a hundred kilometers from Suchow and directly over the Gobi. When we looked down, we could see that the earth was blotted out by a cloud of yellow dust and sand that was swirling steadily upward. In another minute the sandstorm had enveloped everything in sight. Even the tall snow-capped mountains had become invisible. Inside the cabin we were hanging on to our seats with all our might to keep from being tossed about the plane.
With a side-slip and a suddenly executed downward plunge, the pilots succeeded in reversing the course of the plane. We went down and down until it seemed as if we would surely dive nose-first into the Gobi. Minutes passed, and there was still no visibility. The sun was lost in the sand-filled sky overhead, and I had the feeling that day was suddenly turning into night. Then the floor of the Gobi rose up out of the void to meet us. The pilots pulled the plane up sharply and before we knew what had happened we were bumping across the desert.
We landed near a military airfield, and soon soldiers who looked like Mongolians rushed towards us with drawn bayonets. The plane did not bear the Central Government insignia, a multi-pointed white star, nor did it bear the red star of the USSR, and from the actions of the soldiers it was evident that they were taking no chances with a plane whose only identifying markings were numerals on the wings. Within a few minutes another squad of soldiers arrived. They took up close-ranked positions around the plane while an officer opened the cabin door and looked inside. In the meantime half-a-dozen soldiers dressed in long sheepskin coats began rolling stones towards the plane; then some of the stones were placed around the landing wheels to prevent the plane from taking off, and others were used to weight-down the wings to prevent the wind from tipping it over. Another detail of soldiers arrived on the run and took up guard at the cabin door. Half an hour later the commanding officer, a Chinese, arrived. He had the curtains drawn tightly over the windows and took up our passports. Another officer began inspecting baggage. When that had been done, both officers and our passports disappeared into the desert.
After two hours the pilots brought out a thermos bottle of hot water and a can of condensed milk. All of us put a teaspoonful of milk into our cups of hot water and drank it down quickly because sand was filtering into the cabin. The desert heat shocked the mercury in the plane’s thermometer higher and higher. After another hour's wait, we brought out a Chinese checker board from a suitcase and introduced the game to the two pilots and the radio operator. They had never heard of Chinese checkers in China, and they played the game avidly.
At noon a soldier entered the plane with the card of the commanding officer, and one of the pilots went across the desert to the field post. After another hour our passports were returned to us, and we were invited to go to the barracks for tea. The pilots decided it would be impossible to continue the flight that day as the wind had increased to 80 kilometers per hour, and we got ready to leave the plane. There was no way of finding out if the connecting plane at Hami would wait another day for us, so we got into the military truck provided for us, and rode across the desert to the barracks. After going several kilometers we came to a high-walled encampment built like a fortress. The wall was about twenty feet high, constructed of brick, stone, and sun-hardened adobe, and looked as ancient as the Great Wall of China. We entered through a narrow passage after opening a heavy iron door eight feet wide and fifteen feet high. Inside the encampment there were eight or ten earth-and-straw huts in which the laborers who worked the surrounding fields lived. We went through another gate into an inner court where there were quarters for soldiers. There we got out of the truck and walked about a hundred yards through several passageways to the officers' quarters. We were provided with a large room that contained fifteen or more comfortable beds. We spent the night there and got up the next morning at five o'clock and had tea. One of the pilots was late getting up and when he came into the dining room he was still wearing the hairnet in which he had slept during the night.
The wind was still blowing, but with much less force. The pilots had brought no instrument from the plane with which to gauge the velocity of the wind, so they walked to the other end of the encampment and looked at the two tall poplar trees by the pond. They decided after watching the wind in the leaves that the flight could be safely resumed. We all got into the truck and rode across the desert to the plane.
The flight to Hami lasted a little less than three hours. We flew at a low altitude all the way, sometimes barely skimming the tops of desert crags. The Gobi was parched and burned. The surface had been windswept with such force year after year that it looked in some places as if it were composed of polished marble. At other places the action of the wind and sand had made carvings in the bedrock that looked like sea waves. There were long stretches of alternating sand, rock, and a substance that looked like coal. Towards the end of the flight the desert flattened out until it was as level as a sheet of window glass.
Just before arriving over the air field at Hami, the military road that runs from Alma-Ata to Chungking came into view for the first time since we had left Lanchow. It was dotted with trucks and camels, and it looked as if it were as heavily-traveled as the Burma Road. The Hami Road follows the old Silk Route, and after many centuries it is still the only means of entering China from the West between Tibet and Mongolia.
As we came down to the Hami airfield we could see scores of military planes, but not a single civil plane. As soon as we stepped out, we were told that the plane to Alma-Ata had left at noon on the previous day, and that we would have to wait for the next weekly plane to get to the USSR.
Our living quarters in Hami seemed like a shining new castle after the squalor we had known in other provinces of China, where dirt and disease are commonplace. The airport manager who, like everyone else at the field, was Russian, showed us to our room, where the beds were made up with clean linen. At meal times we were served all the food we could eat, and the tables were repeatedly piled with fresh-baked bread. Across the air field in the distance were Sinkiang Province's snow-covered Tien Shan, or Heavenly Mountains, and the sun shone hotly from a blue sky.
We dug into the satchel to pay our fares to Alma-Ata, and after we had paid for our tickets we still had almost $4,000 mex left. During the next three days we did our best to spend it, since it would be valueless once we left China. The most expensive items we could find in the shops were embroidered skullcaps and caviar, the latter costing only $18, Chinese currency, or $ 1, U.S., for a five-pound tin.
We left Hami early in the morning of the fifth day, feeling as though we had spent a week-end at Palm Springs. The plane was an [sic] U.S.-made Douglass DC3, operated by a Russian crew. The first stop on the six-hour trip into the USSR was at Urumchi, the capital of Sinkiang. After tiffin at the airfield restaurant, we found we could not use our Central Government money to pay for our meal although technically we were still in China. Luckily we had three dollars in Sinkiang currency.
After a short flight we came down at Alma-Ata, at last within the borders of the USSR. When we landed, we were told that the Moscow plane was due to leave in two days, but would be a day late.
The next morning we were informed by Aeroflot, the USSR civil airline, that they had decided to send out the plane a day ahead of schedule. After our experiences in China, this was almost more than we could believe.
But it was true. We boarded the Aeroflot plane, a USSR-made Douglass DC3-type, complete with stewardess and all the accessories of U.S. airline travel. The first stop was at Tashkent, in Middle Asia, where we stepped out into warm spring. The airfield restaurant was surrounded by a garden of roses in full bloom. Inside there were white ruffled curtains over the windows, embroidered pillows in the deep chairs, and piles of fresh strawberries on the table.
The trip of approximately 3,000 kilometers from the Southeast border of the USSR to Moscow was made swiftly and without incident. We spent the night at Aktyubinsk, and at noon the next day, after a non-stop flight of six and a half hours, we sighted Moscow. The plane flew low over the city, circling above The Kremlin and Red Square, and landed at a plane-filled airport beside the Dynamo Stadium.
  • Document: Caldwell, Erskine. Transit China. In : Caldwell, Jay E. Erskine Caldwell, Margaret Bourke-White, and the popular front (Moscow 1941). [ID D32805]. Erskine Caldwell papers, Special Collections Research Cetner, Syracuse University Library. (Cald8, Publication)

Bibliography (19)

# Year Bibliographical Data Type / Abbreviation Linked Data
1 1941 Caldwell, Erskine. Transit China. In : Caldwell, Jay E. Erskine Caldwell, Margaret Bourke-White, and the popular front (Moscow 1941). [ID D32805]. Erskine Caldwell papers, Special Collections Research Cetner, Syracuse University Library. Publication / Cald8
2 1942 Caldwell, Erskine. All-out on the road to Smolensk. (New York, N.Y. : Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1942). [Enthält Reise in China]. Publication / Cald2
3 1946 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Yan cao lu. Kaokelande gai bian ; He Mengfu yi. (Shanghai : Qun yi chu ban she, 1946). (Qun yi fan yi ju cong ; 2). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Tobacco road. (New York, N.Y. : C. Scribner's Sons ; Grosset & Dunlap, 1932).
煙草路 		Publication / Cald15
4 1949 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Gui zai shang sheng de tai yang xia. Jiadewei'er deng zhu ; Dong Qiusi yi. (Shanghai : Sheng huo, du shu, xin zhi Shanghai lian he fa xing suo, 1949: (Xian dai Meiguo wen yi yi cong). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Kneel to the rising sun. In : Caldwell, Erskine. Kneel to the rising sun and other stories. (New York, N.Y. : Viking Press, 1935).
跪在上升的太陽下 		Publication / Cald18
5 1951 [Caldwell, Erskine ; Steinbeck, John]. Meiguo hei ren sheng huo ji shi. Jiadewei'er, Sitanbeike zhu ; Dong Qiusi yi. (Beijing : Sheng huo du shu xin zhi san lian shu dian, 1951). [African Americans].
美國黑人生活紀實 		Publication / SteJ84
6 1955 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Gao yuan lao wu. Jiang Sen yi. (Xianggang : Guang xia shu dian, 1955). (Shi jie ming zhu yi cong). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. A house in the uplands. (New York, N.Y. : Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1946).
高原老屋 		Publication / Cald5
7 1963 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Xie zuo qian tan. Kedeweier deng zhuan ; Ding Shunan yi. Vol. 1-2. (Taibei : Taiwan xue sheng, 1963). (Wen xue yi cong). [On writing].
寫作淺談 		Publication / Cald14
8 1968 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Kelaodai. Kaoteweier zhuan ; Hu Ming yi. (Taibei : Chun wen xue, 1968). (Chun wen xue cong shu ; 13). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Claudelle Inglish. (Boston : Little, Brown, 1958).
克勞黛 		Publication / Cald11
9 1969 [Caldwell, Erskine]. En ai fu qi. Kedewei deng zhu ; Lin Junde yi. (Taibei : Shui niu chu ban she, 1969). (Shui niu wen ku ; 103). [Original-Titel nicht gefunden].
恩愛夫妻 		Publication / Cald4
10 1970 Luyisi. Maomu [Somerset Maugham] deng zhu [et al.] ; Fei Huang yi. (Tainan : Hua ming, 1970). (Da da wen ku ; 8). [Enthält : 13 Short stories von Katherine Mansfield, Somerset Maugham, Ernest Hemingway, Erskine Caldwell, John Steinbeck, Sherwood Anderson, Willa Cather, Guy de Maupassant, Franz Kafka, Anton Pavlovich Chekhov].
露意絲 		Publication / Mans34
11 1973 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Yan cao lu : chi luo de ren jian qun xiang. Kedeweier zhu ; Wen Qi yi. (Taibei : Zhi wen, 1973). (Xin chao wen ku ; 88). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Tobacco road. (New York, N.Y. : C. Scribner's Sons ; Grosset & Dunlap, 1932).
菸草路 : 赤裸的人間群像 		Publication / Cald16
12 1974 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Yan cao lu. Kaideweide zhuan ; Chen Pode yi. (Taibei : Zheng wen, 1974). (Ying han dui zhao shi jie ming zhu ; 130). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Tobacco road. (New York, N.Y. : C. Scribner's Sons ; Grosset & Dunlap, 1932).
菸草路 		Publication / Cald17
13 1976 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Anni fu ren. Keweier zhuan ; Yang Guolong yi. (Zhanghua : Zhanghua yuan lin, 1976). (Da sheng shu ku, di san zhong). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Annette. (New York, N.Y. : New American Library, 1973).
安妮夫人 		Publication / Cald3
14 1977 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Gao yuan lao wu. Kedeweier zhuan ; He Xin yi. (Taibei : Zhi wen, 1977). (Xin chao wen ku ; 171). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. A house in the uplands. (New York, N.Y. : Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1946).
高原老屋 		Publication / Cald6
15 1979 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Qi yue di feng bo. Esijin Kaodewei'er zhu ; Wang Jinling yi ; Wang Wenbin jiao. (Jinan : Shandong ren min chu ban she, 1979). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Trouble in July. (New York, N.Y. : Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1940). Publication / Cald12
16 1981 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Shi jie duan pian xiao shuo. Kaoteweier deng zhu ; Sha Ling yi. (Taibei : Jian shang, 1981). (Shi jie ming zhu ju xian ; 1). [Übersetzung von Short stories von Caldwell].
世界短篇小說 		Publication / Cald13
17 1983 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Kelaodai. Kaotewi'er zhu ; He Fan yi. (Taibei : Xia Lin Hanying, 1983). (Chun wen xue cong shu ; 13). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. Claudelle Inglish. (Boston : Little, Brown, 1958).
克勞黛 		Publication / Cald10
18 1984 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Gao yuan shi jia. Kaodewei'er zhu ; Wang Fengzhen yi. (Kunming : Yunnan ren min chu ban she, 1984). Übersetzung von Caldwell, Erskine. A house in the uplands. (New York, N.Y. : Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1946).
高原世家 		Publication / Cald7
19 1985 [Caldwell, Erskine]. Kaodewei'er zhong duan pian xiao shuo xuan. Chen Liangting, Liu Wenlan yi. (Shanghai : Shanghai yi wen chu ban she, 1985). (Er shi ji wai guo wen xue cong shu). [Übersetzung ausgewählter Novellen und Short stories von Caldwell].
考德威尔中短篇小说选 		Publication / Cald9

Secondary Literature (1)

# Year Bibliographical Data Type / Abbreviation Linked Data
1 2014 Caldwell, Jay E. Erskine Caldwell, Margaret Bourke-White, and the popular front (Moscow 1941). Diss. Univ. of Arizona, 2014.
http://www.google.ch/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&ved
=0CCgQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Farizona.openrepository.com%2Farizona
%2Fbitstream%2F10150%2F316913%2F1%2Fazu_etd_13199_sip1m.pdf&ei=
pHjPU_-RFKPC0QWwsIGQDQ&usg=AFQjCNFYs9BauspdMIScbj--nTOPYAtQAw. 		Publication / Cald1
  • Source: Caldwell, Erskine. Transit China. In : Caldwell, Jay E. Erskine Caldwell, Margaret Bourke-White, and the popular front (Moscow 1941). [ID D32805]. Erskine Caldwell papers, Special Collections Research Cetner, Syracuse University Library. (Cald8, Publication)
  • Person: Bourke-White, Margaret
  • Person: Caldwell, Jay E.