Chee Soo (born Clifford Soo, also known as Clifford Gibbs, 4 June 1919 – 29 August 1994) was an author of books about the philosophy of Taoism and in particular Lee-style tai chi, Qigong, Ch'ang Ming, Traditional Chinese Medicine and Feng Shou 'Hand of the Wind' kung fu.
Biography
Early life
Born on 4 June 1919 in All Souls, Marylebone, London, Chee Soo was the son of Ah Chee Soo, a Chinese seaman and a pastry chef at the Westminster restaurant. His English mother was Beatrice Annie Alice Gibbs. They lived in Westminster. Although he enlisted in the British Army under the name Clifford Gibbs, his mother's maiden name, in later life he took his father's name and was known as Chee Soo. In a 1977 LBC radio interview Chee Soo described meeting a Chinese Martial Arts teacher from Shandong called Chan Kam Lee in Hyde Park when he was fourteen years old. Chee Soo said he was invited to Chan Lee's class in the summer of 1934, and this was the beginning of his martial arts training. Chee Soo said that Chan Kam Lee adopted him as a nephew, and taught him the arts whenever his work and time permitted.
Military career
In 1937 Chee Soo joined the 2nd Battalion of the Royal Tank Regiment part of the 7th Armoured division known as the Desert rats. During the Second World War, he was promoted to Lance-Corporal and Corporal in 1941, then to "Acting Serjeant" in 1942. He was awarded the Military Medal after the Battle of Beda Fomm in Libya in February 1941, part of Operation Compass. After his regiment were transferred to Burma he was captured by the Japanese on 19 April 1942 during the Battle of Yenangyaung and forced to work on the Death Railway as a POW where he contracted Malaria, he was later classified as a war crimes witness:
In 1939 the Second World War broke out, and Chee Soo did his share of fighting as a Tank Commander in the Second Battalion of the Royal Tank Corps, in France, in North Africa — where he won the Military Medal, and in Burma where, after a hectic battle, he was finally taken prisoner by the Japanese. He went through many periods of beatings, torture, starvation and very hard work as a member of a working party in the mountains between India and Burma. Finally, three years later, as the Japanese started to retreat from the advancing Allies, he managed to escape into the Shan Mountains of West Burma and made his way over very rugged terrain and through many jungles, till finally one month afterwards he was able to make contact with the Allies again. Three months after recuperation and treatment (for he then weighed only 84 lbs), he was flown back to England, where he was able to enjoy a long leave with his wife. After that, he was discharged from the forces and took a course in book-keeping, stock control, commercial history and sales promotion. Chee Soo claimed that he managed to make contact with Chan Lee again after the war was finished, and the class in Holborn was restarted. In 1950, Chee Soo formed his own class in Manor Road School, West Ham, East London.
The author Rupert Croft-Cooke who was Chee's friend from 1938 provides us with some biographical details of this period in Chee Soo's life in his book 'The Dogs of Peace'. Clifford Gibbs had got his rather grand name from Dr Barnardo's Homes, for he had been reared in one of these, the son of a Chinese father and English mother, neither of whom he had ever seen. I had known him before the war and was as proud as he was of the Military Medal he had earned as a Corporal in the Royal Armoured Corps in North Africa. He had been sent to Burma and taken prisoner by the Japanese, and suffered unspeakable tortures and humiliations because of his race, separated as he was from his fellow British. He had survived and, inwardly as inscrutable as a Conrad character, a little like Wang in Victory, he had married a blonde English girl and had an exquisite baby daughter whose godfather I became at a Sunday afternoon service in an East End Anglican church. Clifford, who went about life methodically, was severely industrious and found the means of saving for his family even in those days of grudging wages. But he had a humorous cheerful side to his character and enlivened my flat during his weekly visits between office hours and his return to Durban Street, E.15. He was an expert wrestler and had earned the Judo black belt. Only from the depths of his character emerged sometimes the exotic or oriental; in speech and manner he was very much an Englishman, and it was strange to hear from his curved lips words that might have been used by any London ex-soldier. I am glad to have had his friendship throughout those years.