Yangtze Patrol - Kemp Tolley

I had expected, knowing Tolley served on gunboats in China, for this to be a recounting of his days there, or maybe the era in general. Frankly, I hoped he might illuminate me as to who the lady was he referenced a few times in The Cruise of the Lanikai, but no dice. As in that book, he covers a much broader range than I expected, going back to the earliest attempts by Western nations to get their ships up the Yangtze (and to get permission to trade with the people there), and then moves forward, with a greatest focus on U.S. ships. Although, with their frequently close level of cooperation, he discusses the British a fair amount as well.

It treads some of the same ground as Far China Station, but it’s narrower in geographic focus, while wider in chronological range. Unlike that book, Tolley doesn’t stop at the Spanish-American War, but goes all the way up to the early days of the U.S. involvement in World War 2 (when all the gunboats that could be gotten out of the Yangtze, were). There’s also a postscript describing a brief attempt immediately after World War 2 by the Western powers to revive it. By then, Communist Chinese forces have the firepower to enforce their desire for those boats to scram. It provides a good sense of how things gradually turn against the foreigners. There isn’t a huge threat when there are hordes of warlords and duplicitous generals just trying to make a buck. The gunboats almost regard it as a game when they move along the river and a few shots ring out from the woods, since they get a chance to unload with their machine guns and cannons. As the Chinese grow more organized and focused, it becomes more apparent how limited the power of the gunboats to enforce Western interests can be. They’re vastly outnumbered, if better armed and trained. The ships can’t withstand heavy firepower once the Chinese get some artillery and learn to use it properly, and the fluctuating levels of the river limit the ability of the boats to respond. At certain times of year a boat either can’t get upriver, or can’t get back downriver from a station. The Chinese put together at least one mass strike that emphasized how much their labor was the underpinning for most of what Europe and the U.S. had going on there.

There’s a lot in there about life on the boats. The lack of recreation on board, or even in the ports of some of the towns further upriver. The stress of trying to get up the river, especially in vessels that ought to have been decommissioned a decade earlier. All the confusing variations of money and exchange rates, and the need to establish the price and specific service required before starting anything, whether it’s buying groceries, fuel oil, or getting a sampan ride back to the ship after a night boozing it up. Also, I learned about an alcoholic beverage I’d never heard of before, shandygraff. 50% beer and 50% ginger ale. Sounds vile - and now I want to convince Alex to drink it for my amusement - but the Americans were already so hard up for booze (especially once it was outlawed on board) sometimes they’d willingly drink gin if the British were offering.

Unlike Cruise of the Lanikai, Tolley only obliquely references his time serving on the Patrol. When he does, he usually refers to himself as the ex-navigation officer of the Oahu or something similar, but never tells you he’s actually talking about himself. I thought that was curious, given the number of stories he either lived through, or is relating from conversations he was involved in. He spends enough time repeating stories of drunken escapades, or reminiscing about lovely White Russian ladies I don’t think he could have been trying for a detached, scholarly approach. Maybe he felt it would distract from the focus of the book as a history of the Patrol as a whole, and make it look more like a memoir.

There are some comments in this book, as with Tigris Gunboats, I had to look askance at, but in general I didn't feel Tolley was passing judgment as much as Nunn had. Tolley describes the gunboats being sent to 'carry out the White Man's Burden,' or however he puts it, but it seems tongue in cheek. I'm pretty sure he recognizes they were there primarily to protect U.S. economic interests, and the Chinese would have done OK without them.

‘In the latter half of the nineteenth century, much of the silver had been drained out of China. Replenishment was made from Mexico, in the form of Mexican silver dollars. The thrifty Chinese saw no point in redoing a highly satisfactory minting job, so the coins were circulated “as-was.” In the majority illiterate, the average Chinaman saw no incongruity in that the rare silver dollar which came his way bore an unknown bird (eagle), perched on a roost foreign to Chinese soil (cactus) surrounded by unfamiliar hieroglyphics. It rang satisfactorily when expertly struck, acted properly when bitten, and had a uniform, recognizable appearance. This was enough.’