Four months of war. A pen and picture record of the hostilities between Japan and China in and around Shanghai, from August 9th till December 20th, 1937, from the press of the "North-China Daily News". by [Sapajou] - [1938]

Shanghai: North-China Daily News & Herald Limited, [1938]. Oblong 4to (22.5 x 28.5 cm), pp.[ii], 143, 13 cartoons by Sapajou, many photographic illustrations, printed maps on endpapers. A very good copy in the original cloth-backed boards. Front hinge tender. A detailed photographic record of the Japanese attack on Shanghai in 1937, with satirical cartoons by Sapajou (Georgii Sapojnikoff), a White Russian refugee who joined the staff of the Daily News & Herald in 1925 and published daily cartoons for them over the next fifteen years. The book covers the events from August 9 to December 19, 1937, beginning with the Oyama Incident and ending with Shanghai's capture by the Japanese. The Chinese retreat from Shanghai shattered Chiang Kai Shek's attempt to modernise China's armed forces, and ended the first major engagement in China's brutal war against Japan. This book's illustrations depict the bloody consequences of an air war fought over a densely populated city: bombed-out buildings, civilians strafed with machine gun fire, massive fires burning through the heart of the city, and tens of thousands of refugees displaced.