Word: cantonment
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Dates: during 1940-1949
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Nationalist China, now formally abandoned by the U.S., crumbled faster & faster. On the day the State Department issued its White Paper, Red columns led by Manchurian General Lin Piao marched unopposed into Hunan's capital of Changsha, last major city between the Communist armies and Canton, seat of the Nationalist government...
...feel ashamed to be back in Canton under the present circumstances of retreat and failure. I cannot but admit that I must share a great part of the defeat . . . I am appalled at the existence of gambling and opium smuggling in Canton under the very nose of the government. [But] we must hold Canton, our last port . . . the last place from which we can use both our navy and air force ... I am ready to perish with the city...
Chiang's return engendered optimism in Canton. Said a high government official: "We were like sheep without a shepherd-now our leader has returned...
...rosy glow which had suffused Canton officialdom after this and Chiang's visit was immediately overcast by news from the north. Communist armies, quiet for more than two months, had begun to roll southward again. From Peiping, the Red radio announced that General Lin Piao, conqueror of Manchuria, was advancing into Hunan province on two fronts, apparently driving for the Nationalist strongpoint at Changsha. Four of Lin's divisions captured the Yangtze port of Ichang, 200 miles north of Changsha. In Shensi province, the Nationalist defenders abandoned Paochi, the western terminus of the Lunghai railroad, but counterattacked east...
...runway at Ohio's Akron-Canton airport one day this week stood a bright yellow, converted C87 that was once used by General Alexander A. Vandegrift, commandant of the U.S. Marines. Waiting for the take-off was a tall, sad-eyed man who was indeed the very model of a modern full-blown general, or admiral-or at least something mineral. His milky-blue uniform with brass buttons and bright gold stars & bars suggested considerable rank, if an indeterminate branch of service. But there was nothing indeterminate about the man inside the uniform. He was Samuel Floyd Keener...