The China Defence League and the 'One Bowl of Rice' Movement

Soong Ching-ling, the widow of Dr Sun Yat-sen, was residing in Shanghai when the war broke out, but after the city and then Nanjing fell she managed to evade the Japanese, who were looking for her, and travel to Hong Kong in December 1937. Taking advantage of Hong Kong’s privileged position to liaise with Mainland and other countries, she used the city as a base camp for patriotic anti-Japanese activities. Soong founded a number of Chinese and English publications in Hong Kong to report on the War of Resistance to overseas countries and garner support from the people of Hong Kong, overseas Chinese and the international community.

Soong Ching-ling established the China Defence League in Hong Kong with herself as chairperson on 14 June 1938, and it inspired the formation of anti-Japanese organisations in Europe, the US and Southeast Asia, which proceeded to provide assistance and support to China through the league. Setting up a children’s relief fund and organising charity performances and charity sales, the China Defence League helped more than three million Chinese orphans who were affected by the war. It also held fundraising activities in Hong Kong from time to time, the most successful of which was the ‘One Bowl of Rice’ movement in August 1941: coupons that could be exchanged for rice donated by the merchants sponsoring the campaign were sold to the public. Initially intended to last three days, the campaign attracted massive support and was extended to one month, by which time it had raised a total of HKD 25,000 for compatriots in the Mainland.