1931 China floods

Series of devastating floods March 2024 ly Hankow city hall.jpg Hankou city hall during the 1931 flood July–November 1931 (depending on river) 422,499–4,000,000Courtney 2018 249 ROC Central and eastern China The 1931 China floods, or the 1931 Yangtze–Huai River floods, were a series of devastating floods that occurred from June to August 1931 in China, hitting major cities such as Wuhan, Nanjing and beyond, and eventually culminating in a dike breach along Lake Gaoyou on 25 August 1931. Fatality estimates vary widely. A field survey by the University of Nanking led by John Lossing Buck immediately after the flood found "150,000 people had drowned, and that this number represented less than a quarter of all fatalities during the first 100 days of the flood."Buck 1932 May 2020 , as cited in National Flood Relief Commission 1933 150.December 2023 The official report found 140,000 drownedThe figure of 140,000 is also cited in Immanuel C. Y. Hsu Hsu Immanuel C. Y. The Rise of Modern China 546–547 4 New York Oxford University Press 1990 and claims that "2 million people died during the flood, having drowned or died from lack of food".National Flood Relief Commission 1933 , the caption of photo 11, between page 90 and 91. Also cited by Courtney 2018 249. A cholera epidemic in the subsequent year, from May 1932, was officially reported to have 31,974 deaths and 100,666 cases.National Flood Relief Commission 1933 299–300 . Also cited by Courtney 2018 87. Meteorological causes and physical consequences From 1928 to 1931, China was afflicted by a long drought. The subsequent winter of 1930–31 was particularly harsh, creating large deposits of snow and ice in mountainous areas. In early 1931, melting snow and ice flowed downstream and arrived in the middle course of the Yangtze during a period of heavy spring rain. Ordinarily, the region experienced three periods of high water during the spring, summer and autumn, respectively; however, in early 1931, there was a single continuous deluge. By June, those living in low areas had already been forced to abandon their homes.Courtney 2018 54 The summer was also characterized by extreme cyclonic activity. In July of that year alone, nine cyclones hit the region, which was significantly above the average of two per year.Pietz, David (2002). Engineering the State: The Huai River and Reconstruction in Nationalist China 1927–1937. Routledge. 0-415-93388-9. pp. xvii, 61–70. Four weather stations along the Yangtze River reported rain totaling over 600 mm in on for the month. The water flowing through the Yangtze reached its highest level since record-keeping began in the mid-nineteenth century.Courtney 2018 54 That autumn, further heavy rain added to the problem and some rivers did not return to their normal courses until November. The floods inundated approximately 180000 km2 – an area equivalent in size to England and half of Scotland, or the states of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut combined.National Flood Relief Commission 1933 4 The high-water mark recorded on 19 August at Hankou in Wuhan showed water levels 53 ft m on flip above the average, an average of 5.6 ft m on flip above the Shanghai Bund.Winchester, Simon (2004). The River at the Center of the World: A Journey Up the Yangtze, and Back in Chinese Time. Macmillan. 0-312-42337-3. In Chinese, this event is commonly known as 江淮水灾, which roughly translates to "Yangtze-Huai Flood Disaster". Waterways throughout much of the country were inundated, particularly the Yellow River and Grand Canal. The eight most seriously affected provinces were Anhui, Hubei, Hunan, Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Henan and Shandong. Beyond the core flood zone, areas as far south as Guangdong, as far north as Manchuria, and as far west as Sichuan were also inundated.Li 1994 230–231National Flood Relief Commission 1933 303 Appendix VII-12 Number of people sick per 1000 persons Death toll and damage thumb|300px|Victims of the flooding in August 1931 This flood is frequently featured in the list of disasters in China by death toll, sometimes topping lists of the world's deadliest natural disasters.Courtney 2018 249 At the time the government estimated that 25 million people had been affected by the flood.National Flood Relief Commission 1933 5, 203 Historians since have suggested that the true number may have been as many as 53 million.Li 1994 May 2020 Estimated death tolls also vary widely. Contemporary studies conducted by John Lossing Buck allege that at least 150,000 people had drowned in the first few months of the flood, with hundreds of thousands more dying of starvation and disease over the following year. Using contemporary media reports, Chinese historians led by Li Wenhai have calculated the death toll at 422,420.Li 1994 230–231 Some Western sources allege that the death toll was between 3.7 and 4 million people based on their own claims of famine and disease.https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/flood/deluge.html Dealing with the Deluge PBS NOVA Online 26 March 1996 12 February 2013Glantz, Mickey. Glantz, Michael H (2003). Climate Affairs: A Primer. Island Press. 1-55963-919-9. p. 252. The Tanka people who traditionally live on boats along the Yangtze suffered greatly from the flooding.http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories/s334b.htm NOAA'S top global weather, water and climate events of the 20th century NOAA.gov 13 December 1999 29 November 2012 The flood destroyed vast swaths of housing and farmland. Throughout the entire Yangtze Valley, around 15% of the wheat and rice crops were destroyed, with the proportion being much higher in the flood-affected areas.Y.Y. Kueh 1995 https://books.google.com/books?id=bLlZmuPUQBwC Agricultural Instability in China, 1931–1990: Weather, Technology, and Institutions 0-19-828777-1 Oxford University Press The disaster also caused an economic shock with the price of vital commodities rising rapidly. The combined ecological and economic impacts of the disaster caused many areas to descend into famine. With no food, people were reduced to eating tree bark, weeds, and earth. Some sold their children to survive, while others resorted to cannibalism.Courtney 2018 64–65 The most lethal effect of the flood was the diseases that swept through the refugee population due to displacement, overcrowding, and the breakdown of sanitation. These included cholera, measles, malaria, dysentery, and schistosomiasis.Courtney 2018 76 As well as inundating rural areas, the flood caused widespread destruction to a number of cities. Refugees had been arriving in the city of Wuhan since the late spring. When the city itself was inundated in the early summer and after a catastrophic dike failure at just before 6:00 AM on 27 July,William Graves The Torrent of Life (Journey into China) https://archive.org/details/journeyintochina00nati 1982 5th National Geographic Society 978-0-87044-437-1 registration270 around 782,189 urban citizens and rural refugees were left homeless. The flood covered an area of 32 sqmi flip and the city was flooded under many feet of water for close to three months.269–270 Large numbers gathered on flood islands throughout the city, with 30,000 sheltering on a railway embankment in central Hankou. With little food and a complete breakdown in sanitation, thousands soon began to succumb to diseases.Courtney 2018 76 There was no warning, only a sudden great wall of water. Most of Wuhan's buildings in those days were only one story high, and for many people there was no escape- they died by the tens of thousands. ... I was just coming off duty at the company's main office, a fairly new three-story building near the center of town ... When I heard the terrible noise and saw the wall of water coming, I raced to the top story of the building. ... I was in one of the tallest and strongest buildings left standing. At that time no one knew whether the water would subside or rise even higher. Jin Shilong, Senior Engineer at the Hubei Flood Prevention Agency 270 The city of Nanjing, then the capital of Republican China, was also severely affected by the disaster. One of the most disastrous single events during the flood occurred on 25 August 1931, when the water rushing through the Grand Canal washed away dikes near Gaoyou Lake. In Gaoyou County alone, 18,000 people drowned and 58,000 died due to famine and diseases the following year.被遗忘的1931年中国水灾 http://www.iqh.net.cn/info.asp?column_id=1822 Tsinghua University Institute of Qing History 20 January 2019 zh 3 April 2016 https://web.archive.org/web/20160403061310/http://www.iqh.net.cn/info.asp?column_id=1822 dead Rebuilding of dikes at Lake Gaoyou Thomas Harnsberger, a missionary of the Presbyterian Church in Taizhou, Jiangsu, was one of the two central figures (alongside General Wang Shuxiang,Bin Hu Yunhua Ji 8 December 2009 追忆苏皖边区政府参议会驻会议员、著名爱国人士----王叔相先生 Recalling Mr. Wang Shuxiang, a member of the Senate of the Su-An Border Region Government and a famous patriot http://www.swbqjz.com/shownews2.asp?news_id=96 https://web.archive.org/web/20200510143907/http://www.swbqjz.com/shownews2.asp?news_id=96 10 May 2020 苏皖边区政府旧址纪念馆 zh a PhD in hydraulics) who supervised the rebuilding of the dikes at Lake Gaoyou, as well as securing the funds for it.Harnsberger Steve 7 September 2006 Forgotten history revealed http://aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/files/Shanghai_Star_9-7-06.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20200505183845/http://aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/files/Shanghai_Star_9-7-06.pdf 5 May 2020 Shanghai StarYingying Wu China's worst natural disaster http://www.shanghaidaily.com/article/list.asp?id=82&type=feature&page=19 https://web.archive.org/web/20060117052139/http://english.eastday.com/eastday/englishedition/features/userobject1ai1782587.html 17 January 2006 Shanghai StarAshley Beth 30 January 2006 Flood of memories http://www.aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/files/Flood%20of%20Memories%20-%20Marin%20IJ%20-%201-30--06.pdf https://web.archive.org/web/20200505185926/http://www.aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/files/Flood%20of%20Memories%20-%20Marin%20IJ%20-%201-30--06.pdf 5 May 2020 Marin Independent Journal However, the flood remains widely unknown to the Chinese. Steve Harnsberger, the grandson of Thomas Harnsberger, wrote in 2007, "The 1931 flood killed 15 times the number of people lost in the Indonesian tsunamis of December 2004, and yet scarcely a word has been written of it. History focused instead on other disasters that year. China's attention was on a civil war between the Communists and Nationalists and the Japanese were invading in the North, while the world was deep into the Great Depression."Harnsberger Steve 25 September 2007 The Great Floods Of 1931 At Gaoyou: August 26, 1931 – The Floods Come http://www.aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/the_floods.aspx dead https://web.archive.org/web/20200510130325/http://www.aboutgaoyou.com/history/floods/the_floods.aspx 10 May 2020 10 May 2020 AboutGaoyou.com Government reactions Republican Era (1930s–1940s) The 1931 flood was one of the first major tests for the Kuomintang Government. As the scale of the disaster became apparent, the government established the National Flood Relief Commission under the auspices of T.V. Soong, a prominent politician in the Kuomintang and brother-in-law of Chiang Kai-shek.National Flood Relief Commission 1933 11 The commission employed a range of Chinese and foreign experts, including figures such as famous epidemiologist Wu Liande, health minister Liu Ruiheng, public health worker John Grant, and hydraulic engineer Oliver Todd. It also secured the assistance of the League of Nations. Even the famous aviators Charles Lindbergh and his wife Anne Lindbergh became involved, as they were commissioned to conduct an aerial survey of the flood zone. Although Song Ziwen remained the head of the commission, the day-to-day running the relief effort was entrusted to John Hope Simpson, a British refugee expert. Charity poured in to help with the relief effort from throughout the world, with overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia being particularly generous. In the United States, the celebrated author Pearl Buck wrote short stories to encourage charitable donations. The relief effort became much more difficult following the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in the autumn of 1931, which caused the Chinese bond market to collapse. Eventually, the government managed to secure a large loan of wheat and flour from the United States.Courtney 2018 15 In the wake of the disaster, the government set up organizations such as the Huai River Conservancy Commission to address flood problems. However, due to a lack of funding and the chaos of the Second Sino-Japanese War and the subsequent Chinese Civil War, the various commissions were only able to construct small dams along the Yangtze River.Li, Cheng & Barnett, Arthur Doak (1997). Rediscovering China: Dynamics and Dilemmas of Reform. Rowman & Littlefield. 0-8476-8338-9. pp. 168–169. As part of an anti-superstition campaign by the Kuomintang Government, a Dragon King Temple was demolished in Wuhan shortly before the flood-hit. This coincidence led to widespread discontent afterwards, as many locals linked the disaster to the anger of Dragon King, a rainmaking deity. As a response, prominent officials, including He Baohua, mayor of Wuhan, and Xia Douyin, then the local garrison commander and later governor of Hubei Province, held ritual ceremonies and kowtowed to the deity. Meanwhile, many believed that evacuation efforts were hindered by superstition. According to a contemporary report, thousands "are convinced that Hankow is doomed and refuse to help themselves or be helped. They sit stoically awaiting death."Courtney Chris The Dragon King and the 1931 Wuhan flood: religious rumors and environmental disasters in republican China Twentieth-Century China 2015 40 2 83–104 10.1179/1521538515Z.00000000059 Communist Era (1949–present) In 1953, after the end of the Chinese Civil War, Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong travelled to areas neighbouring the Yangtze River to promote the Three Gorges Dam flood control project. "The Socialist Three Gorges Dam project should excel other major projects in Chinese history such as Qin Shi Huang's Great Wall and Sui Yang Di's Grand Canal", he stated. Scientists and officials who raised doubts, such as Chen Mingshu, were persecuted as rightists. Li Siguang, a prominent scientist and minister of geological resources, told Mao he would commit suicide if he could not stop the construction of the dam. The project did not move beyond the planning stage in Mao's time, due to a lack of resources, rising Sino-Soviet tensions and the disruptions of the Great Leap Forward. The project was restarted in the 1980s, and the hydroelectric Three Gorges Dam began full operation in 2012, becoming the world's largest power station in terms of installed capacity.Cutler J. Cleveland https://books.google.com/books?id=ScL77rOCZn0C&pg=PA44 Handbook of Energy: Chronologies, Top Ten Lists, and Word Clouds Elsevier Science 15 November 2013 Christopher G. Morris 44 978-0-12-417019-3https://books.google.com/books?id=h3zSBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA219 Renewable Energy: A First Course Robert Ehrlich (physicist) Ehrlich Robert 13 March 2013 CRC Press 978-1-4665-9944-4 219China See also List of disasters in China by death toll Cannibalism in Asia Footnotes References Official report available free online On food relief, refugee camps, farm rehabilitation, sanitation, etc Report of the National Flood Relief Commission National Flood Relief Commission 1933 Shanghai The Comacrib Press https://archive.org/details/reportofthenatio032042mbp Internet Archive On the engineering aspect of dyke breaching and their reconstruction none 国民政府救済水災委員会工振報告 National Flood Relief Commission 1933 Shanghai Chung Hwa Book zh https://dl.ndl.go.jp/info:ndljp/pid/1452069 Japanese National Diet Library's digital collection Officially-sponsored report by universities The 1931 flood in China: an economic survey by the Department of Agricultural Economics, College of Agriculture and Forestry, the University of Nanking, in cooperation with the National Flood Relief Commission John Lossing Buck Buck John Lossing University of Nanking Nanking 1932 Monograph The Nature of Disaster in China The 1931 Yangzi River Flood Chris Courtney 2018 Cambridge University Press 10.1017/9781108278362 9781108278362 https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/nature-of-disaster-in-china/1483BBD53BA764B54EE882EF699B1299 Ni, Wencai (2006). A documentary on uncovering the history of the 1931 Great Flood in Gaoyou and dyke reconstruction. Beijing: Beijing Workers Press. (倪文才. 1931年高邮特大洪灾和运堤修复历史再现纪实. 2006. 北京: 中国工人出版社.) Li 1994 中国近代十大灾荒 李文海 程歗 刘仰东 夏明方 Li Wenhai (historian) December 1994 Shanghai People's Press ("The Ten Great Disasters of Modern China" by Li Wenhai et al.) External links "The 1931 Central China Flood" DisasterHistory.Org (English and Chinese Versions) "An Analysis of Flood and Social Risks Based on the 1931 Changjiang & Huai River Flood During the Republic of China". ILIB.cn. "Extremely heavy meiyu over the Yangtze and Huaihe vaneies in 1931" 1931年江淮异常梅雨 (in Chinese). CQVIP.com. Category:Yangtze River floods China Floods, 1931 Category:20th-century floods in Asia Category:1930s floods Category:1931 natural disasters Category:Floods in China