Stella Benson in Pakhoi, 1933

Pakhoi (now Beihai) was considered one of the remoter treaty ports to be posted to. Pakhoi was in Kwangsi (Guangxi) on the north shore of the Gulf of Tonkin, which placed it as an important port for trade west of Hong Kong and up into Yunnan, as well as its proximity to the French Indo-Chinese empire. Britain, America, Germany, Austria-Hungary, France, Italy, Portugal, and Belgium all had consulates there, built hospitals, schools and churches alongside the local branch of the Imperial Maritime Customs offices. In 1920 Benson, who was British and a suffragette but had spent time in America before moving on to teach in Hong Kong, met James (Shaemus) O’Gorman Anderson, an Anglo-Irish officer in the Customs Service. She followed him to his postings – first to Nanning, and then to Pakhoi. She was a prolific writer – their honeymoon driving across America was depicted in The Little World (1925) along with a number of novels and travelogues. Her novel The Far-Away Bride, was published in the United States first in 1930, and as (the rather obscure sounding) Tobit Transplanted in Britain in 1931. It won the Femina Vie Heureuse Prize for English writers in 1932. Sadly life in the east took its toll on Benson and she died in 1933 in Hongay (now Ha Long), in Vietnam. She is best known in England now for her friendship with Vera Brittain (she of Testament of Youth) and Winifred Holtby and Virgina Woolf (who also knew her) penned an obituary. I mention this as it shows that though people between the wars did travel far away – and Pakhoi was very remote at the time – they were able to maintain correspondences and careers despite the distances and rather basic communications systems.

Stella was actually quote pleased to be going to Pakhoi as she had previously been forced, for just a few weeks, to live in Hoi-how (now Haikou) on Hainan Island, a place she described a “scabby” and had suffered sickness. Stella was still very sick when she and Shaemus arrived at Pakhoi and she was carried ashore by the Russian harbour master. Stella liked their house, not least for its quiet and cool veranda (as shown below). There were only a handful of Europeans – some English and Germans as well as the Russian harbour master (and a few missionaries best avoided) and no access to fresh milk to help her convalesce. The missionaries were a big problem as they were divided and apparently fighting over a small matter of religious doctrine! The weather was extremely humid and hot and not conducive to a full recovery or much in the way of energy. She left Pakhoi to visit Vietnam with her husband (where she died) – leaving Pakhoi, her last view of China, she described its a “sugarily picturesque”.

This picture labelled, “Stella with Penko on the verandah at Pakhoi, 1933, shortly before her death

Beihai today