Date: Fri 29-Jan-1999

Publication: Ant

Author: JUDIR

Quick Words:

China-Braswell-Easton

Full Text:

Remembering Another China

(with 4 cuts)

By Rita Easton

NORWALK, CONN. -- The effects of a Chinese salt seller's son and a wealthy

Christian Chinese Bible salesman's daughter are scheduled to cross the block

in two sessions at Braswell Galleries on January 30.

While few pieces of great value or distinction remain to be offered, a history

not forgotten is represented by the consignment, that of glamorous,

Wellesley-educated Soong Mei-ling, who beguiled China's Generalissimo Chiang

Kai-shek.

The general was hardly indifferent to her charms, but Mother Soong told him

that only if he would become a Christian could he marry her daughter. Chiang

answered he would not adopt a new religion merely to win a bride, but that, if

Miss Soong would marry him, he would agree to study Christianity, and then do

as he saw fit.

No ordained Christian pastor could be found who thought General Chiang free to

marry Miss Soong, as he kept a concubine known as "Mrs Chiang" (whether that

pair was legally married is still unclear), so a lay YMCA secretary united

Soong and the general in holy matrimony.

From the day General Chiang thus took his number two wife, both his character

and his fortunes rapidly took on a certain grandeur. Eventually he also became

a Christian. Through this marriage he became the post-mortem brother-in-law of

the Kuomintang's late sainted Sun Yat-sen, who had married one of Mei-ling's

sisters, and also brother-in-law of Dr H.H. Kung, famed descendant of China's

greatest sage, Confucius, who also married a Soong girl.

The 1927 nuptials formed one of the most celebrated partnerships in the

world's political history, with 30-year-old Mei-ling, now Madame Chiang,

wielding power in her country's affairs as no woman in the West did.

In 1937, the couple was voted International Man and Wife of the Year by Time

magazine.

"Through 1937 the Chinese have been led -- not without glory -- by one supreme

leader and his remarkable wife. Under this Man & Wife the traditionally

disunited Chinese people -- millions of whom seldom used the word `China' in

the past -- have slowly been given national consciousness," an article in the

publication declared that year.

The Puritanism eventually instituted by the Chiangs was reputed to have

resulted in Madame Chiang ordering several Chinese officials of her Air

Ministry shot to reduce thieving, amidst threats that those who did not

practice the new Puritanism might expect the worst -- and this was no empty

threat. In the years following their strict and sometimes violent rule,

Generalissimo Chiang fled mainland China for Taiwan, driven out by the Chinese

Communists, while Madame Chiang fled to the United States.

The Lattington, Long Island estate called Hillcrest, a mansion on 37 acres

belonging to Mme Chiang's sister, Soong Ailing, was, for more than 50 years,

one of several Chiang residences. Along with its contents, it was purchased in

August of 1998 for $2.8 million from descendants of Soong Ailing by Irwin

Stillman, the president of the Stillman Organization, a Manhattan construction

company. The property is now on the market for $6.5 million, offered by Joan

Helen de Kay, a real estate broker handling the estate for Prudential Long

Island Realty.

The contents of the home, according to Gary Braswell, president of Braswell

Auction Galleries, have yielded little of interest to art and antiques

collectors and dealers, as the Chiang family removed most of the items of

value. Souvenir hunters and former Chinese Nationals are expected to attend

the auction in large numbers, hoping to acquire mementos.

However, a dozen pieces of importance will be offered at the gallery on

January 31, with the balance of the house contents, household goods and

furnishings, including Madame Chiang's bedroom set. Those items will include

massive bronze and crystal matching chandeliers, estimated to bring

$40/60,000; a Felix Ziem oil on canvas, estimated at $12/18,000; a James

Bertrand oil on canvas, estimated at $18/20,000; a Georgian library chair,

estimated at $2,5/3,500; as well as Oriental rugs, decorative accessories,

furniture and household goods.

Eight hundred lots will be offered. A $25 admission fee to the auction is

required, although previously registered bidders of two years' standing are

exempt from the fee.

An open house preview was held on site in Lattington on Sunday, December 13,

after announcements and directions to the property were published in

newspapers in Taiwan, in Chinese communities across the United States, and on

the Internet. One hundred and fifty parking places were provided for the crowd

expected to attend -- but by midday tens of thousands of people of Chinese

descent converged on the winding lanes of Lattington and the nearby village of

Locust Valley on the North Shore of Long Island, hoping to catch a glimpse of

the estate that was Madame Chiang's home for more than five decades.

"Once inside, the excited visitors became calm, almost reverential, like they

were on a religious or historic pilgrimage," said Braswell. "The people really

didn't come with the idea of buying anything, they just wanted to look and see

where and how Madame Chiang lived her life. They would sit on a couch or a

chair in her bedroom while other members of the family took pictures."

Braswell spent Sunday night in the house along with the caretakers, concerned

that some might try to enter after dark.

"We were all overwhelmed by the turnout," he continued. "Never in a million

years did we expect anything like this. It's as if we're showing a home that

belonged to the Queen of England and everyone came."

The local authorities -- including Clarence Michalis, the Mayor of Lattington;

fire marshals; and the Nassau County police -- became so concerned that they

ordered the estate closed at 11 am on Sunday. But the cars kept coming, the

lines of vehicles tying up traffic to Exit 39 of the Long Island Expressway,

more than six miles away.

Among the people turned away at the entrance of Hillcrest was Charlie Tsai, a

computer engineer who came with his wife from Holmdel, N.J., after reading

about the open house in a Taiwanese newspaper on the Internet.

"We're very disappointed," he said. "This is a part of our heritage and we are

sorry that it is all being sold, piece by piece. It has meaning to Chinese

people everywhere. It's as if someone sold Mount Vernon and all of George

Washington's things to a developer. What would Americans think when all their

history was taken away from them?"

Madame Chiang Kai-shek was 100 years old in January of 1999, and lives in

Manhattan. Her birthday was celebrated at Tavern on the Green in New York City

with friends and relatives.