Qualla: Bussiere Garden

Bussiere Garden: Introduction

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit N509FZ, CC BY-SA 4.0. Picture a French doctor in Chinese robes, pedaling a bicycle loaded with medicine through 30 kilometers of Japanese-occupied countryside toward the Western Hills. Jean-Augustin Bussiere did this more than once during the Second Sino-Japanese War, running supplies from Peking to guerrilla fighters in the mountains. His villa, Bussiere Garden, still stands in the hills of Haidian District -- a hybrid of Chinese courtyard architecture and European stonework that tells the story of a man who spent 41 years bridging two civilizations.

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Image: N509FZ | CC BY-SA 4.0

Bussiere Garden: The Doctor Who Stayed

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hat600, CC BY-SA 4.0. Bussiere arrived in Beijing in 1913 as a physician attached to the French legation and affiliated with the Peking Union Medical College. He came to import French medical equipment and expertise; he stayed for four decades. He married a Chinese woman named Wu Sidan, embraced Chine...

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Image: Hat600 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Bussiere Garden: A Garden Between Worlds

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit N509FZ, CC BY-SA 4.0. The estate Bussiere built in the hills north of Sujiaguo Town reflects its owner's double identity. It comprises three distinct structures: a Western-style barbican -- a three-story granite castle with a stone plaque from 1936 inscribed "To Practice Medicine to Save People" -- se...

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Image: N509FZ | CC BY-SA 4.0

Bussiere Garden: Nobel Poets and Revolutionary Telegraphs

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Hat600, CC BY-SA 4.0. Bussiere Garden attracted a remarkable circle. The French poet Saint-John Perse, who would later win the Nobel Prize in Literature, visited China in Bussiere's company. His long expressionist poem Anabase was written against the landscape of the desert and nearby Mount Miaofeng. ...

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Image: Hat600 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Bussiere Garden: A Legacy Renewed

Sat, 14 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit N509FZ, CC BY-SA 4.0. Bussiere returned to France in 1954 at the age of 82. His son Jean Louis, born the following year, became a cardiologist known in China as "Bussiere Junior." In 2001, the Haidian District government designated the garden a key cultural relics protection unit, and in 2011 it was a...

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Image: N509FZ | CC BY-SA 4.0