Overview
Chiefly correspondence, both official and personal, pertaining to Lester Knox Little's service as inspector general of the Chinese Customs Service in the pre-revolutionary China of the 1940s.
Dates
- Creation: 1932-1964
Conditions Governing Access
There are no restrictions on physical access to this material.
Extent
2.5 linear feet (1 box and 18 volumes)The bulk of the collection is correpondence, both official and personal, pertaining to Little's service as inspector general of the Chinese Customs Service in the pre-revolutionary China of the 1940s. Official correspondence is with foreign embassies, naval and military authorities, Chinese and foreign officials, and U.S. embassy staff. Also contains papers relating to his mission to the League of Nations as Commissioner on Special Duty with the Chinese Delegation, 1932, concerning the Japanese seizure of customs houses in Manchuria; correspondence and reports, 1950-1951, on the customs service in Japan and the Philippines; correspondence, 1951-1952, relating to the Advisory Committee on Undeveloped Areas; correspondence, 1954, with the Chinese Inspectorate of Customs in Taiwan; and miscellaneous professional correspondence, 1953-1964.
Biographical / Historical
Little (1892-1981) graduated from Dartmouth College in 1914 and later became the last foreign head of the Chinese Customs Service. He was in mainland China from the early 1940s until shortly after the revolution, then had various assignments in the Far East until 1954.
Arrangement
Organized into the following series:
- I. MS Am 1999: Correspondence relating to Lester Little Knox's commission as Inspector General of Chinese Customs Service
- II. MS Am 1999.1-1999.14: Personal correspondence
- III. MS Am 1999.15-1999.18: Official correspondence
Immediate Source of Acquisition
*81M-75. Gift of Lester K. Little, Mei Shan Cornish, N. H. P.O. Plainfield, NH 03781; received: 1974 November - December.
- Title
- Little, Lester Knox, 1892-1981. Lester Knox Little papers: Guide.
- Author
- Houghton Library, Harvard College Library
- Language of description
- und
- EAD ID
- hou00499
Repository Details
Part of the Houghton Library Repository
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