Paul French: Midnight in Peking

Paul French, British-born consultant, writer and acclaimed 'old China hand', took time out from his busy and jet-set schedule of book promotion to chat with CreativeHunt about his latest novel, Midnight in Peking: The Murder that Gripped a Besieged City . The work revisits Beijing of old, during a time of political and social unrest for both locals and laowai alike. Through meticulous and detailed research, not to mention a flair for bringing history to life, French throws light on a seemingly and tragically forgotten drama: the gruesome murder of a young foreigner, all set around the ghostly superstitions of the Fox Tower, and of course, the all too real dark spirits that lurked in Peking's hutongs, homes, brothels and bars some seventy-five years ago...


The tragedy of Pamela and her father is that they seem to be – until now – forgotton figures in history. How did you come to hear of them?
I read about Pamela's murder in a small footnote in a biography of the American journalist, and author of Red Star Over China, Edgar Snow. It simply said that Pamela had been a neighbour of the Snow's, had been brutally murdered in January 1937, dumped at the nearby Fox Tower and that sex, opium and foreigners behaving badly were thought to be involved but that the case was never solved.

What type of records, materials and archives did you call upon in the research of the book? Were they relatively accessible? How long did the whole process take?
I dug out all the newspaper articles from the time first - it was a cause célèbre and the most infamous murder in Peking for years. I found the original autopsy notes and some other diplomatic correspondence in American and British archives. However, my 'eureka' moment was when I was browsing in the UK's National Archives in Kew and found the uncatalogued notes of a private investigation by Pamela's father that, when I cross-referenced it with what else I knew and had discovered convinced me that the killer had been identified but that the paperwork had been overlooked as the papers arrived in London in 1943 when the British had even bigger things to worry about...like winning the war.

For a tale that's over 70 years old, it's remarkably vivid to read. How much color and background did Werner's notes provide, as opposed to creative license on your part?
He provided an awful lot of colour and background detail in his papers as did the newspaper reports of the time. I also spoke to about half a dozen people still alive who knew Pamela - they're all in their 90s now. I did add descriptions and, hopefully, good and accurate colour of 1930s Peking from my own research. However, there are no invented characters, locations, clues or suspects - it's all true and there's footnotes at the back for anyone who wants to go and look up the original papers.



The lead up to the true horror of the details of Pamela's violent death mirrors the encroaching violence and changes in old Beijing. Can you talk a little about some of the parallels?
Stalin said that one death is a tragedy and a million a statistic. I think that Pamela's gruesome murder crystallised the fears of many Pekingers, both Chinese and foreign, as it became evident that the Japanese were about to invade. China and the world were on the edge - everyone knew the end was coming and that things would get bad, but they had no idea just how bad things would get.

It is also true that many foreigners at the time did think that the Japanese invasion and defeat of China might not be a bad thing - that it would "clean up" China. Certainly many in the British community were insistent that a Chinese be found guilty of Pamela's murder to preserve British, or 'white', face in China even as it became increasingly obvious that this was a foreigner-on-foreigner crime.

What initially drew you to the sad tale of the Werners?
It was the symbolism of Pamela as one tragedy that preceded the massive tragedy of the Sino-Japanese and World war. It was also the case that I felt that Pamela should be remembered - she was 19, she was innocent, she didn't deserve to die and be mutilated in 1937. I didn't realise then that I'd find an answer to the crime.

I was horrified by the number of obstacles the police, British consul and ultimately FCO put in the way of justice for Pamela. It's a relief that that the book brings a degree of justice, however belated – was that something that spurred you on in your writing?
Unsolved murders disrupt natural justice and Pamela's was a symbol of the slide from civilisation into barbarism that engulfed pretty much all China by the autumn of 1937. Apart from me nobody cared about Pamela anymore - it was too long ago and, I would suggest, the FO and British establishment in China today, as then, would place commercial concerns ahead of any need for truth and justice. Bureaucrats and diplomats remain aloof and largely uncaring organisations and individuals when they feel their own position and equilibrium is threatened.

For those familiar with modern day Beijing, where can we go to re-walk some of the routes and roads described in the story, what's there now?
Despite the ongoing massive vandalism of Beijing and the almost total disregard for architecture and heritage, many of the locations remain. Pamela's home on Armour Factory Alley is still there, just behind the Beijing Railway Station and renamed Kueijiachang Hutong. The Fox Tower is now called, rather blandly, the Dongbienmen Tower and is home to the Red Gate Gallery near the second ring road on the north east corner of the old wall. The only part of the once magnificent Tartar Wall that remains just happens to be the small section of a quarter mile or so by the old Fox Tower. Remarkably too the old Badlands district still exists - though the cabarets, dive-bars and brothels are gone now - around Chuanban and Huogou Hutongs, again not far from the railway station. And of course the old Legation Quarter still exists though sadly most of the buildings are now inaccessible and stand behind big gates with humourless goons guarding them.

This follows your book about Carl Crow – what sort of characters inspire you to write, or is it particular points in history?
Both - I am interested in the history of foreigners in China. Crow fascinated as he was a genuine pioneering entrepreneur that arrived from America in 1911, was successful in the newspaper business ands advertising in Shanghai, became a best selling author and in his spare time drank tea with Sun Yat-sen, hung out with Madame Chiang Kai-shek and negotiated with hostage taking warlord bandits. I also wrote a book about foreign journalists in China who, let me assure you (and with no real disrespect to the current crop) were a damn sight more colourful and fun that now. Pamela's murder is just another aspect of the foreign interwar experience in China in this respect.

But I do like the 1930s and the war period - it's a honey pot to writers, researchers and readers. I like the last few years before society's collapse - the Weimar Berlin of Christopher Isherwood and Sally Bowles, the demi-monde Paris of Colette, the last year of old Peking and Shanghai.

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To read more about Paul French courtesy of his excellent blog, China Rhyming, click here. Midnight in Peking is published by Penguin and is available here