Yu-Ying Li, Chinese Consul, Marseilles, France, 1940

Yu-Ying Li was the acting Chinese Consul in Marseilles in 1940.  Li was also the President of the National Academy there.  Many refugees in Marseilles received a visa stamp from Yu-Ying Li.  In Chinese characters that virtually no one could read, the stamp read, "Under no circumstances is this person to be allowed entrance to China."  Anxious refugees used the visa stamp as an exit visa.  Frank Bohn, of the American Federation of Labor (AFL), Varian Fry of the Emergency Rescue Committee (ERC), and other rescue and relief agencies utilized many of these Chinese visas to help refugees leave France for Spain, Portugal and other parts of Europe.