Missing the action

Some were heroes, a few were villains, but all the volunteers of the Chinese Labour Corps (CLC) were transported halfway around the world to a distant land to take part in a war that could not have been more foreign.

Not so much the Unknown Warriors as the 'Unknown Workers', about 200,000 men - mainly from Shandong province - played a little-known but key role helping the Allies in the last years of the first world war, toiling within shellshot of the frontline for as little as 10 yuan a month.

Almost a century after the conflict ended, the CLC is finally receiving the recognition it deserves, thanks to a forthcoming book, A Good Reputation Endures Forever, that is the brainchild of Canadian-Chinese author Judy Lam Maxwell.

The title is taken from one of the inscriptions on the headstones of the 2,000 or so labourers who died overseas - including 10 shot after being court-martialled - and lie buried in Commonwealth cemeteries in Europe.

'I stumbled across the story of the CLC while researching the broader topic of Chinese emigration,' says Maxwell, who is co-ordinating production of a volume that will also include contributions on a variety of related topics by nine other writers.

'China was never properly acknowledged for its huge manpower contribution to the Allied war effort. There's a personal input too, apart from my Chinese ancestry - my grandfather fought at the battle of Passchendaele and I've often wondered if he saw any Chinese labourers while he was in Europe.'