Chinese film actress and personality of the 1930’s, Lily Lee, or Peiping Lily as she was called, was born in 1910. From a well-to-do family, she was originally from Tsingtao (now Qingdao), where she and G.H. (Jim) Thomas started their affair. According to a 1941 Hong Kong newspaper account: “She rides daily at Shatin, she swims, she drives even the largest car skillfully and she’s pretty hot at billiards. In addition she is thinking of taking up flying.”

Suspected of being a spy for the Japanese, she was arrested in 1938 in Chungking, but through the help of Thomas and others who vouched for her innocence, was released after several months in prison — just moments before she was to be shot. In the summer of 1939 she met up with Thomas in Europe, where they spent several weeks visiting Rome, Venice and Paris. At the outbreak of World War II in September, she visited him and his ultraconservative family in his hometown, Hempstead, N.Y. They intended to get married, but it was not to be.

Lily returned that same year to Hong Kong, where she starred in "The Perfect Woman," a romance in Mandarin. After the war she made several more films in Hong Kong. She made her last stage appearance in Taipei, Taiwan, in 1958.

Thomas, however, who in 1945 married an Englishwoman who had served in the WRENS (Women's Royal Navy Service), would never forget Lily Lee. Whenever he heard the Cole Porter tune "You'd be so easy to love" (1936), he would remember dancing with Lily at the Park Hotel in Shanghai.

NOTE: Lily Lee is not to be confused with the well-known 1930's actress Li-li Li, who died in 2005.

There is actually very little mention of Lily Lee in "An American in China" as it is based on Thomas's letters to his parents, which barely allude to his relationship with this glamorous Chinese personality.

Lily Lee is mentioned briefly in another book, the well-known China to Me, by Emily Hahn (Blakiston, 1944; 1999 reprint by e-reads). An excerpt follows:

“Shanghai is a wonderful city for the theater. I have heard some of the best plays produced in Shanghai. Have you heard any of the famous girl performers? Have you heard Lily Lee? She is really good.”

Lily Lee, I remembered suddenly a girl Sinmay had brought to my house one afternoon, with a story of squandered fortunes. I had seen Lily again in Hong Kong. I told Ping-Chia about it. “We had dinner at Lily's house,” I explained. “She's improved wonderfully in her English, hasn't she?” He looked mysterious. “There's a reason for that he explained.”

“Oh I know.” It was a romantic story that Lily told me at the dinner table that night, while Sinmay drank rice wine and chattered with friends. “She had fallen in love with an American."

– From "China to Me" by Emily Hahn