VESSEL’S GALLANT PART

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 189, 12 August 1938, Page 7

VESSEL’S GALLANT PART

REFUGEES RESCUED FROM SHANGHAI DUTCH PEOPLE EXPRESS GRATITUDE. [ P?r Press Association.] AUCKLAND, Aug. 11. ' j Commemorating the gallant part played by the ship in the historic . evacuation ot refugees from Shanghai l on August 17 last year, a bronze | plaque in the smoking room of the •South Pacific Line’s passenger I steamer Tasman is a proudly trea- | tured battle honour. The Tasman, which arrived at I Auckland on her first visit to the DoI monion, was previously in the Royal Packet Navigation Company's servlet from the Orient to Java and South Africa, and saw a considerably I amount ot hostilities on the China ! coast. The brief inscription in Dutch i on the plaque recalls the part playid Iby the Tasman in the war zone. It I reads:— | "In remembrance of the evacil* j ation of Dutch women and children from Shanghai on August 17, 1937.” When British and American warships and other foreign shipping wer. speedily removing their nationals from the growing holocaust of Shang. hai, the Tasman was entrusted with the transport of Dutch and Hungarians to Hongkong. With bombs falling on both sides of the Whangpo-j River and shells screaming overhead, the work of rescue was undertaken under great difficulties, and heavy rain intensified the hardship. Chines, aeroplanes were flying overhead in formation and the Chinese and Japanese warships were firing furiously. As the Tasman moved down the river she ran the gauntlet of gunfire, shells falling on all sides. After the Tas. man had reached Hongkong with' refugees the Dutch nationals, th mark their gratitude to the ship, pr<» sented the plaque to the vessel.