"It is an experience which never lacks interest": John Paton Davies' Letters from Postwar Moscow

Abstract

John Paton Davies Jr. was born in China in 1908 into a family of American Baptist missionaries. Throughout his life he had the warmest relationship with his parents. Davies received his education in the United States and China, graduated from Columbia University in 1931 and immediately entered the diplomatic careers. In 1933, after a short-time service as a Vice-Consul in Windsor, Ontario, he was sent to China and remained there until 1940. In August 1942, John Davies married Patricia Louise Grady (1920–2000), daughter of American diplomat Henry F. Grady (1882–1957), for love. Patricia played a significant part in Davies’ work and was known as a well-educated, keenly observant, and broad-minded person.