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CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

 June 1949. Communist parade. The banner proclaims: "Against bureaucratic Capitalism, Feudalism, and Imperialism."

Henri Cartier-Bresson

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CHINA. Shanghai. June 1949.

 Political meeting with the leaders' portraits behind.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

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CHINA. Shanghai. December 1948-January 1949.

 Beggars attack a bale of cotton on docks along the Bund where banks and business firms conduct their prosperous trades. These women will either sell their handfuls of cotton or use it to line the quilted jackets for their families. Many were starving and freezing in this last winter of the long civil war.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

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CHINA. December 1948-January 1949.

 Shanghai. As the value of the paper money sank, the Kuomintang decided to distribute 40 grams of gold per person. With the gold rush, in December, thousands came out and waited in line for hours. The policemen, equipped with the remnants of the armies of the International Concession, were not unkind, trying to get the people back. They only splashed them with the dirty water of the puddle.

Henri Cartier -Bresson

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CHINA. Shanghai. December 1948-January 1949.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA.Shanghai. December 1948 - January 1949.

Complete with spats and umbrellas, a Kuomintang officer awaits his departure from the station just before the final collapse of Nationalist control of the city. The Communist troops have already advanced to the far bank of the Yangtze River.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

 Children await rice distribution. They belong to a charitable institution that provides them an education and minimum nourishment. This school was established under the direction of SUN Yat-Sen's widow.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

As law and order collapsed along with the fall of the Nationalist government in Nanking, rice stores were pillaged by those who needed food for their starving families.

Henri Cartier-BResson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

Refugees.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949

 Children await coolies and rickshaws to help them transport things across humpback bridges. They chase after the rickshaw to make them pay for this unsolicited service. Shanghai is dominated by skyscrapers, which the last three floors are occupied by foreign press societies where press correspondents live. Civil administration and foreign military offices occupy the rest of the building.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

After the Communist victory, a well-to-do commuter carries his pocket money in bound bundles.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

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CHINA. Shanghai. 1949

 The sign above the sidewalk library reads: "Develop the production, make the economy prosper".

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949. 

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

 General Chen-yi, military commander of Shanghai speaks to party dignitaries at the victory celebrations of August 7. Behind him, a portrait of Chu Teh, commander-in-chief of the People's Liberation Army. Chen-yi was one of the first to join Mao Tse-tung's revolutionary party in 1921.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

 Students in the August 1st victory parade demonstrate against the black market as they march along Bund. In the background, the Soong Bank owned by Chiang Kaï-shek's father-in-law.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949.

August 1 was a day given to celebrating the Communist conquest of Shanghai. The characters on the banner in the background read: President Mao Tse-tung.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

[ignismedia-blog]

CHINA. Shanghai. 1949. 

 People's march. Protestant-American university students. A placard proclaims that the People's Army will soon overtake Canton, the temporary capital of the Kuo-min-tang.

Slowly the Communist gained terrain and take the controll of Shanghai the 27th of May.

Henri Cartier-Bresson