Kathleen Anne Baird Hall (Chinese name: He Mingqing - 何明清) (4 October 1896 – 3 April 1970) was a New Zealand nurse and Anglican missionary who served in China.
For several years she worked at the Peking Union Medical College, which was a well-funded hospital operated by protestant missionaries.
She frequently used her identity as a missionary as a cover to purchase medical supplies that were used by Chinese that were resisting the Japanese invasion.
Beijing was occupied by the Japanese at the start of the war, but it also had more ample medical resources within the city than rural areas on the outside.
Every time that she would travel to Beijing, she would take a list given to her by Dr. Bethune of various medical items that the communist soldiers needed.
A number of the people she trained at the missionary hospital in Anguo also went to join Dr. Bethune's medical team with the Eighth Army.
A story from an eyewitness named Gao Jingyun, recorded in 1989, even claimed that she used the Xuanwumen church to meet people heading to Chinese communist territory and helped transport bomb material for them.
I still remember in July, one Sunday morning, Song brought someone, later I learned that his name was Sun Lu, he was a student at Tsinghua university.
I told my dorm mates, they felt that Kathleen's plan was too dangerous, to just head straight to Baoding.
She said in Gaomei at a particular area on a street, there was a small family inn, the owner's face had a red birthmark.
On the third day, Ms. Hall appeared, telling us that she had brought 3 nurses from Beiping, and wanted to bring them to the hospital in Anguo.
After she came back again, she made us put on farmer's clothes, the Liberation Army said that we would only get past the Japanese lines by following her.
Another eyewitness named She Rong said In 1938, I received a scholarship and got full employment at the school, in the women's college.
Kathleen Hall sent Lu Zhongyu to come to the school to see me, I asked him many things about the liberated zone.
I asked Mr. Lu what they needed the most, he answered "hospital medicines and educated people, like doctors, nurses and students."
In Spain, the nationalists under Franco had been openly supported by the preaching of high ranking authorities in the Catholic church, despite their mass murders of civilians and rebellion against a lawful government.
"In the past several months, the main medical supplies have largely been reliant upon Ms. Hall's help, she has spent about 15000 Yuan on medicine.
Guo Qinglan, a nurse who worked in a hospital behind enemy lines wrote of her, "I think, only Kathleen Hall could have gotten me to the base...I was sitting with the patients in the first convoy, Kathleen Hall was wearing sunglasses, dressed up fully as a missionary, carefully and timely looking out for the things on the vehicle as well as our surroundings...the wooden and bamboo boxes were filled with medicines, underneath there was electric equipment and wireless radio, only on top it was covered with some tins of cookies" .
She would usually dress in clothes that made her deliberately look like a foreigner and missionary, in order to avoid Japanese suspicion of her activities.
The Anglican church was profoundly opposed to international communism and it had given her as well as other missionaries at the start of the war that they could not choose sides, or else they would be excommunicated.
The Japanese employed many collaborators among the Chinese and other occupied peoples, and they became aware of the true nature of what she was doing in China.
Kathleen made a request to the Anglican communion to help her rebuild the church and clinics.
While in Hong Kong, she made the decision to resign from the Anglican missionaries and to join the Chinese Defense league, in order to prepare for a return to China.
In October 1939, she and several others started a journey to go back to rejoin the communists in Shanxi, first travelling through Vietnam.
In 1960, she was allowed entry and made a friendship visit to Tian'anmen square in Beijing, where she met with Zhou Enlai and saw a statue of Norman Bethune, which she cried in front of.
On his deathbed, Norman Bethune wrote of her: 'Please convey my sincere thanks to Kathleen Hall, for all of her help'.
A book on her in Chinese was written by Ma Baoru, the former deputy director of tourism in Baoding city.