Song Meiling
Song Meiling ( Chinese 宋美齡 / 宋美龄 , Pinyin Sòng Měilíng , born March 5, 1897 in Shanghai , Jiangsu Province , Chinese Empire , † October 23, 2003 in New York City ) was the second wife of the Chinese Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and practiced as " Madame Chiang Kai-shek " exerted great political influence.
Life
Song Meiling was the youngest of the three Song sisters , whose husbands were among the most important politicians in China in the 20th century . She was the sister-in-law of the first Chinese leader, Sun Yat-sen . As Madame Chiang Kai-shek , she is described as the one who "ruled the keyboard of power". She came from the Chinese upper class and was the fourth of six children of the Methodist missionary and media tsar Charles Jones Soong ( 宋嘉樹 , Sòng Jiāshù ) from Shanghai . She received her education in the USA , where she grew up. In 1927 she married General Chiang Kai-shek, the successor to Sun Yat-sen. Her excellent knowledge of English , her charm and her social connections were extremely useful to Chiang Kai-shek during the course of the Second World War , who - operating in isolation in western China against the Imperial Japanese Army and the People's Army of Mao Zedong - on the military support from the Allies, specifically the USA.
During the Xi'an incident in December 1936, an attempted coup by the relatively autonomous Chinese warlord Zhang Xueliang , Song Meiling successfully participated in negotiations for her husband's release. Then she is said to have given her husband new self-confidence, as he said he had lost face. Song Meiling has repeatedly toured the USA on diplomatic and political missions. From Time magazine it was set three times on the front page. In 1937, she was the second woman ever to Wallis Simpson , along with Chiang Kai-shek Person of the Year of the Time Magazine . In Washington, Madame Chiang Kai-shek - as the face and voice of national China - was invited to address the Senate and the House of Representatives, something that no woman before her had succeeded in doing.
Together with her husband, who did not speak English, she conferred at the Cairo Conference in 1943, where she skilfully and successfully represented the interests of the national Chinese to the Allies, especially to Roosevelt and Churchill.
After the death of her husband in 1975, Song Meiling lived in New York City . She was 106 years old and died in New York on October 23, 2003.
literature
- May-ling Soong Chiang (Madame Chiang Kai-shek): This Is Our China . Harper & Brothers, 1940
-
Sterling Seagrave : Soong Dynasty . Harper & Row, New York 1985, ISBN 0-283-99238-7
- German: The Soong Dynasty. One family rules China . Fischer-Taschenbuch-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1988, ISBN 3-596-24390-4 . ( Fischer 4930)
- Chiang Meiling , in: Internationales Biographisches Archiv 04/2004 of January 12, 2004, in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely available)
Individual evidence
- ^ A b Antonius Lux (ed.): Great women of world history , Sebastian Lux Verlag , Munich 1963, p. 474
Web links
- Literature by and about Song Meiling in the catalog of the German National Library
- Newspaper article about Song Meiling in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
- Andrea Kath: October 23, 2003 - Anniversary of the death of Song Meiling WDR ZeitZeichen (podcast).
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Song Meiling |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | 宋美齡 (Chinese) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Chinese wife of the leader of the Republic of China Chiang Kai-shek |
| DATE OF BIRTH | March 5, 1897 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Shanghai |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 23, 2003 |
| Place of death | New York City |