FOOD SCARCE ROAD RACE AT DUNEDIN

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 69, 19 September 1938, Page 7

FOOD SCARCE

ROAD RACE AT DUNEDIN

PLIGHT? OF HANKOW

NEW ZEALANDER'S LETTER

"Hankow Is really feeling the pinch aow^^pqd is definitely getting scarce and: the price of candles has increased 100 .pjer.ceht: i n the last few days. The most striking thing, I think, is that the, rickshaws'' tyres are beginning to ■wear out and no supplies are obtainable... As a result about 50 per cent, of the rickshaws are now running on the-iron rims." So writes Dr. H. C. Tremewan, reporting to the joint council of the order of St. John and the New Zealand Red Cross Society Far East Relief Committee. iri a letter dated August 26 Dr. Tremewan writes:—. . . ; "There are still a lot of civilians left, of but the cost of food is practically forcing the people to leave the town.' The hospital that I am working , af has. not moved to a safer place, principally because all the concession area is. occupied by military forces." 1 In a previous letter dated August 21, Dr. Tremewan says:— "Well, I am now at Hankow and am exceedingly busy. They had a big air raid at Hankow and the city just across the river last Sunday. A large percentage of the Chinese doctors left and Dr. Maxwell sent a telegram to me at Ichang to proceed to Hankow as soon as possible, as he was wanting extra assistance with the civilian wounded at the Church General Hospital in Wuchang. Before I could get here, however, there were two further raids, onr pf<: which involved the hospital with disastrous effects; consequently I am now at the Methodist Hospital in. Hankov^ just across the river from the arsenal. This place has not been hit yet and we are shifting house and home in ' about a week. Seventeen bombers visited the arsenal this morning, which gave us plenty of extra work. Every hospital in the city is full and there are not enough doctors or* nurses left in town to cope with the situation. POWER AND WATER OFF. "We are about two miles away from the Concession area right in the Chinese city," continues the letter. "The Concession arda still has all modern conveniences, but our powerhouse and waterworks were blown up the other day, so we have neither light nor water, and with 200 patients here it is a bit awkward. One misguided bomb was sufficiently close for the concussion to break our. X-ray tube, so we are without an X-ray. Every day there is a mass migration of people from this area into the Concession. They leave at daylight, sit about, the streets there all day, and come back at dark. The ones who do not spend the day there rush the hospital at the alarm as they have a rather misguided belief that they are safe on foreign property. We had some tiles broken this morning, presumably by anti-aircraft , pieces coming down. "I have seen some grim things in China, but I .think this last week has been as bad as anything yet. There have been air-raids about every day —they seem to be aiming mostly at military but they don't always hit them, and about half the bombs are of the incendiary type. Indications are that it will gradually get worse. This morning Japanese planes arrived here without the alarm being sounded, which is not very surprising since Hankow is more or less surrounded on three sides. Added to this there is an outbreak of cholera."

(By Telegraph—Press Association.) i DUNEDIN, September 17. Running a fine race, M. Mackinnon won the Port Chalmers-Dunedin harrier J road race yesterday afternoon with G. S Munro second and F. W. Fincham third. fastest time in this seven-mile race went to L. I. Curtis, who recorded 39 mm 46sec, an excellent achievement. G. L. Austin did second fastest time nvith 40min 57sec, and G. R. Colston ihird fastest with 41min42secv