The Chinese Labour Corps was a force of workers recruited by the British government in World War I to support the troops by performing support work and manual labor.
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In 1916, Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig requested that 21,000 labourers be recruited to fill the manpower shortage caused by casualties during World War I.[1] As China was initially not a belligerent nation, her nationals were not allowed by their government to participate in the fighting - although the Chinese later declared war against Germany and Austria–Hungary, on 14 August 1917.[2]
The scheme to recruit Chinese to serve as non-military personnel was pioneered by the French government. A contract to supply 50,000 labourers was agreed upon on 14 May 1916 and their first shipment left Tianjin for Dagu and Marseille in July 1916. The British government also signed an agreement with the Chinese authorities to supply labourers. The recruiting was launched by the War Committee in London in 1916 to form a Labour Corps of labourers from China to serve in France and to be known as the Chinese Labour Corps.[2]
The Chinese Labour Corps comprised Chinese men who mostly came from Shandong Province,[3] and to a lesser extent from Liaoning, Jilin, Jiangsu, Hubei, Hunan, Anhui and Gansu Provinces.[2] The first transport ship carrying 1,088 labourers sailed from the main depot at Weihaiwei on 18 January 1917. The journey to France took 3 months.[4]
A total of about 140,000 Chinese workers served on the Western Front during and after the War.[5] Among them, 100,000 served in the British Chinese Labour Corps. About 40,000 served with the French forces, and hundreds of Chinese students served as translators.[6]
By the end of 1917 there were 54,000 Chinese labourers with the Commonwealth forces in France and Belgium. In March the Admiralty declared itself no longer able to supply the ships for transport and the British government were obliged to bring recruitment to an end. The men already serving in France completed their contracts.[4] By the time of the Armistice, the Chinese Labour Corps numbered nearly 96,000,[4] while 30,000 were working for the French.[1] In May 1919, 80,000 Chinese Labour Corps were still at work.[4]
The workers were tasked with carrying out essential work to support the frontline troops, such as building dugouts, repairing roads and railways, digging trenches and filling sandbags. Throughout the war, trade union pressure prevented the introduction of Chinese labourers to the British Isles.[2] Sidney and Beatrice Webb suggested that the Chinese Labour Corps were restricted to carrying out menial unskilled labour due to pressure from British trade unions.[7]
Not only Chinese workers were supplied. There were Labour Corps serving in France from Egypt, Fiji, India, Malta, Mauritius, Seychelles, the British West Indies as well as a Native Labour Corps from South Africa.[2] It was estimated that at the end of the war over 300,000 workers from the Colonies had aided in labour. There were 100,000 Egyptians, 21,000 Indians and 20,000 South Africans working throughout France and the Middle East by the end of the war in 1918.[1]
After the end of the war the surviving Chinese labourers were given transport back to China between December 1918 and September 1920.[8]
The Corps did not take part in combat. According to the records kept by the British and French recruiters, around 2,000 Chinese Labour Corps died during World War I,[6] most from the 1918-1919 Spanish Flu, some as a direct result of enemy action or of wounds received in the course of their duties. This figure is contested by some Chinese scholars who say the number was as high as 20,000.[6]
They were classified as war casualties and were buried in 17 cemeteries in the North of France with a total of about 2000 tombs (also a few tombs in one cemetery in Belgium).[4] One of the four following proverbs were inscribed on the standard Commonwealth War Grave Portland stone gravestones: "Faithful unto death", "A good reputation endures forever", "A noble duty bravely done" and "Though dead he still liveth".[3] Cemeteries include:
The workers saw firsthand that life in Europe was far from ideal, and reported this on their return to China after the war. Chinese intellectuals of the New Culture Movement looked on the CLC as a point of pride - Chen Duxiu, for instance, bragged that "while the sun does not set on the British Empire, neither does it set on Chinese workers abroad." But the ill treatment of these workers was added to the list of grievances against Britain. A more positive impact was on the educated youth who came to France to work with them, such as James Yen, whose literacy programs under the auspices of the YMCA showed him the worth and dignity of the Chinese common man. He worked out a 1,000 Character Primer which introduced basic literacy and became the basis of his work in China. [11] Chinese intellectuals who worked with the CLC included Jiang Tingfu, Lin Yutang, and several others.