United States Marines on Legation Guard Duty in Peking, China, photograph album, circa 1920s.

Physical description: 1 photograph album

At the library

Special Collections

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Items in Manuscript Collection
Call number	Note	Status
MSS PHOTO 0555 FLAT BOX 1		In-library use

Description

Creators/Contributors

Corporate Author: United States. Marine Corps depicted.

Contents/Summary

Summary: Disbound oblong quarto album of 158 black and white photographs mounted on 25 leaves. The images are largely unidentified, but the things and locations depicted suggest it was compiled by a United States Marine, one of the Legation Guards in Peking, in the 1920s. One of the larger images depicts the Horse Marines, a mounted Marine unit, the only such Marine unit in China was stationed in Peking. The compiler was likely a member of the Marine Band, there are a number of images depicting the band and its members, posed both formally and informally. One image is identified on the negative as “Pay Day Peking 6/1/21”. Two individuals in another image are identified as H. L. Palmer and C. Dwight. There is an image identified as “Wireless tower Pekin”. The images depict encampment life, Marines on duty and off, drilling on the parade grounds in the compound, target practice, playing basketball with Chinese men, views of Peking and surrounding sites, scenes of street life in Peking, including an execution in the street, and more.

Subjects

Subjects: Beijing (China) > Photographs.; United States. Marine Corps
Genre: Photograph albums.

Bibliographic information

Publication date: 1920
Note: Cloth boards, detached but present, back-strip missing, front board worn and damp-stained. Some images with water damage.
Access: Open for research. Note that material must be requested at least 36 hours in advance of intended use.
Cite as: [identification of item], United States Marines on Legation Guard Duty in Peking, China, photograph album (Mss Photo 0555). Department of Special Collections and University Archives, Stanford University Libraries, Stanford, California.
Terms: While Special Collections is the owner of the physical items, permission to examine collection materials is not an authorization to publish. These materials are made available for use in research, teaching, and private study. Any transmission or reproduction beyond that allowed by fair use requires permission from the owners of rights, heir(s) or assigns. See: http://library.stanford.edu/spc/using-collections/permission-publish
Source: Purchasel 2016. Accession MSS 2017-070.
Note: The Legation Guard marine who created this album is unknown. Following the Boxer Rebellion and the end of World War I the United States Marines had the largest legation guard presence in Peking, larger even than the Japanese. The 1920s were a busy decade for the United States Marines in China. In addition to Legation guard duties in Peking, marines were dispatched to Tientsin to protect missionaries, and guarded American commercial and diplomatic interests in Shanghai including the dispatch of the 4th Marines to Shanghai from San Diego in 1927 in response to fighting between Chiang Kai-Shek’s Nationalist forces and northern warlords.