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Bloody Saturday 80th Anniversary – Refugees From Chapei Arrive in the Settlement

Posted: August 10th, 2017 | No Comments »

This incredible picture from August 1937 shows Chinese refugees from Japanese-bombed Chapei (Zhabei) in Northern Shanghai packing up their belongings and heading into the International Settlement. It was taken by Swiss Shanghailander Karl Kengelbacher who took many striking and poignant images of refugees around Bloody Saturday.

You’ll notice that the truck used to take these refugees away from the bombs is called “Blitz 6” – this rather phased me for a moment as I thought perhaps it was a comment on the bombing. Bloody Saturday was the worst aerial attack on civilians in history at that point but it was several years before the term ‘Blitz’, from “Blitzkrieg” was used. However, Blitz was a brand name for a series of trucks produced by Opel in the 1930s and used during the war. That these poor folk had been “Blitzed” was not yet a slang term.



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