S. Wells Williams: Early American Protestant Missions in China

S. WELLS WILLIAMS

EARLY AMERICAN PROTESTANT MISSIONS IN CHINA

A THESIS

SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THEOLOGY

GORDON-CONWELL THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY

SOUTH HAMILTON, MASSACHUSETTS

IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE

MASTER OF ARTS IN THEOLOGY

BY

ANDREW T. KAISER

DECEMBER 11, 1995

iii

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author would like to thank the Sterling Memorial Library of the Yale University Library System for providing access to the small portion of the Samuel Wells Williams Family Papers currently available on microfilm. The author regrets that time and financial considerations prevented a more detailed investigation of the entire collection of manuscripts so generously made available by the Department of Manuscripts and Archives. Heartfelt thanks and appreciation are also offered to Professors Richard Lints and Garth Rossell for their encouragement and support. Their wholehearted advocacy of interdisciplinary research made this project possible.

iv

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

"A Devoted And Pious, And Well Educated Printer" . . . . . . 4

"'till More Active Service Be Opened" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

"Doing Good in Any Line" . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 90

Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 106

Selected Writings of S. Wells Williams . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112

v

ABSTRACT

This paper is an examination of the life of Samuel Wells Williams

(1812-1884). During his long term of service in and around China

Williams served as a missionary printer for the American Board of

Commissioners for Foreign Missions, as translator for Com. Perry's

expeditions to Japan, as Secretary and Interpreter for the United States

Legation to China, and as the inaugural Professor of Chinese at Yale

University.

Specifically, the purpose of this work is to investigate the years of

Williams's service to the American Board as one of the first handful of

American Protestant missionaries to China. Circumstances in Williams's

life that are infrequently mentioned in contemporary scholarship on

missions in China are highlighted in an effort to introduce new categories

of discussion into the field. The paper is specifically interested in

combining the best insights of the theological and historical disciplines.

Topics examined include the Sunday school movement, life and

evangelism in Canton before the Treaty settlements, missionary views on

opium and war, American millennialism, differing views on missionary

methods (with reference to Rufus Anderson), and the role of providence

in Williams's faith.

The paper covers the years from Williams's birth in 1812 until

Williams's decision to resign from the employ of the American Board in

early 1857.

TO MY DEAR WIFE HEATHER

sine qua non…

1

CHAPTER ONE

Introduction

The forty-three years of service (1833-1876) in China completed by

Samuel Wells Williams as both a missionary and a diplomat cover some

of the most turbulent years in the history of East-West relations. It

seems self-evident that an investigation of such a man's life might

contribute much to our understanding of those days of change, and yet

his is a story too infrequently told.1 It is the purpose of this study to

correct this error, and to give voice to a character that has yet to be given

much attention by modern scholars.

Rather than reading Williams as a "missionary" according to the

definitions of contemporary scholarship, this study will attempt to take

him at his own words. This is of course an exercise in "enlarging the

context," and it requires that the scholar be constantly on the alert for

new paths of investigation for the subject may not fit neatly into the

molds which our scholarship has prepared for him or her.2 Williams's

1As of yet, there is no critical biography of Williams available. This paper relies heavily on the letters and journal entries recorded in Williams's son Fredrick Wells Williams's compilation The Life and Letters of Samuel Wells Williams, LL. D., Missionary, Diplomatist, Sinologue (New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1889; reprint, Wilmington, DA: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1972). Fortunately, the volume is largely composed of selections from S. Wells Williams's own letters and journals. These primary source materials will accordingly contribute much to this and any future studies of Williams. Unfortunately, it must be remembered that Williams's son served as the final redactor of all this material. Since little is known of the son it is often difficult to know how to establish the proper critical distance with regard to these sources.

2Perhaps few texts are more in need of such an enlarged context than Williams's own frequently quoted mention of "the Society for the Diffusion of Cannon Balls." When

2 story is an instructive one, in as much as it so often eludes and

challenges the categories traditionally used by Sinologists to describe

Christian missions in China. These departures arise specifically in the

areas where the context is enlarged.

Accordingly, this study will look at sides of Williams's life that

rarely receive attention by scholars and yet seem to have great bearing

upon both his character and the general course of his life. There is

power in the simple telling of a story. And while spatial constraints

prohibit the kind of full and fresh account of Williams's entire life which

is needed, it is hoped that the brief periods elucidated in this study will

suggest some potential new categories by which our understanding of

Williams as well as some of the other early missionaries to China might

be more fruitfully examined. These new tools for discussion will arise

from the details of Williams's own circumstances through both the

careful reading of the historical record and the insightful posing of

relevant theological questions.

Beginning with Williams's childhood and the family that raised

him, the study will move slowly through his adolescence until he first is

called to service in China. This will reveal the character of his faith, as

well as the nature of his call to Christian service. Next, the years

covering his initial period in China will be examined with particular

attention to the general nature of foreign life within China before the

settlement of the first Anglo-Chinese War and the specific duties which

Williams undertook while there. His ideas regarding the opium question viewed within the context of the entire journal entry, it is clear that Williams fears this final recourse, and has pity rather than bitterness or anger for the Chinese negotiators. The allusion to the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge is obvious, and to find cynicism in Williams's use of words such as "pity" and phrases such as "poor fellows" is to commit gross anachronism. See Williams, Life and Letters, 257.

3 and the war(s) it engendered will be developed and linked to his

Christian faith. Third, the years leading from his marriage until his

commissioning as Secretary and Interpreter to the American Legation will

be discussed. Here, his understanding of mission work will be

investigated noting especially the influence of millennial expectations and

the doctrine of providence, while the factors that shaped his decision to

engage in diplomatic employment will also be presented. Finally, these

historical and theological investigations will be brought together to

suggest ways in which contemporary discussions of nineteenth-century

missions in China can be enlarged to more accurately reflect the variety

of experience and character present during those formative days.

4

CHAPTER TWO

"A Devoted And Pious, And Well Educated Printer"

Information regarding Williams's life before he began his career in

China is understandably rare. The exploits of one of many children in a

small rural town may show promise, but rarely seem worthy of recording

until after works of greatness have been done. However, between

Williams's own writings and recollections and the account of his youth

left by his son Frederick it is possible to reconstruct the general course of

his adolescence and the key influences on him during his early years.

In 1637 a Puritan named Robert Williams from Norwich, England

disembarked after the dangerous cross-Atlantic journey and joined the

earliest settlers of what is now Roxbury, Massachusetts. Family legend

has it that during the arduous crossing to the new land, Robert's wife

had a dream amidst her discomfort and struggle which foreshadowed

"…that from her loins should come a line of pious and illustrious

preachers, whose sturdy voices should sound the truth to millions in

that land."3 A descendant eight generations later remarked that Robert

Williams had indeed become "the ancestor of more ministers—and more

long-lived ministers—than probably any other man in this country."4

3Williams, Life and Letters, 1.

4Williams, Life and Letters. 1.

5 Six generations later—and just as the pioneer Protestant

Robert Morrison began his ministry to China—a Williams by the

unfortunate name of William was living in Utica, New York as a printer.

Known as "Col. Williams" for his meritorious service defending New York

in the War of 1812, "Billy Williams" was a pillar of his community. He

insisted on being involved in every good charitable act of the community

from engineer in the volunteer fire department and editor of one of the

local newspapers to church elder and leader in the Sunday school

program.

Col. Williams soon had the good fortune to marry another settler

from New England named Miss Sophia Wells. Of good Puritan stock,

Miss Wells—or rather, Mrs. Williams—developed through the early death

of her father a penchant for thrift and right-living which was an example

to all who knew her. The family was full of charity towards others as the

Colonel customarily invited his apprentices to live with his family while

Sophia was "ever actively on the path of love and good works."5 But it

was not until the birth of their first son one year after their marriage that

Sophia was converted to the Christian faith. Afflicted by a terrible

disease from which she never fully recovered, Sophia experienced a

spiritual awakening with the encouragement of her husband.

The son whose birth accompanied Sophia's rebirth was named

Samuel Wells Williams. Born on September 22, 1812 in Utica, New York

as the first of fourteen children, little Samuel was whisked away by his

mother's family in an effort to protect him from his mother's sickness.

Born a little more than a year before Robert Morrison finished his first


6 Chinese translation of the New Testament, the young lad proved to

be wonderfully healthy and later remembered these days growing up on

his grandmother's farm as "some of the happiest days of my childhood."6

It was while living with his grandmother that he came to be called "Wells"

so as not to be confused with his uncle Samuel.7

Williams's youth was a typical one filled with a cascade of ever-

increasing antics and chores. Yet as a young lad at the opening of

nineteenth century America, play was likely to be less frequent for him

than for the typical youth of today. Williams's mother kept him ever

busy, sharing with the rest of respectable Britain and America a healthy

dread of that crouching evil "idleness." This is not to say that Williams

lacked the playful, adventuresome spirit so common in young boys;

rather, as his brother recollects, "If his pranks and scrapes were few, it

was doubtless owing to his abundant occupations."8 Indeed, he was still

quite young when Sunday school was enthusiastically added to his

already "abundant occupations." And it was in the Sunday school where

Williams learned the faith and was awakened to Christian service.9




9It must be stated immediately that this is only one of the many influences acting upon the young boy Wells—though it is a rather large influence and one frequently dismissed. Tantalizingly few details are available about his family life, apart from their support of the Utica Sunday school and their respect within the community. Additionally, the great economic, social, and religious fermentations sweeping New York at this time could be examined in greater depth beyond acknowledging the increased options they provided for young Williams's development. These are all potential influences on Williams for future research to develop more fully, but as space is limited and they seem more likely to be recognized by other scholars this section will focus on religious education.

7 Utica at the turn of the century, with its five or six thousand

residents, was poised to be catapulted by the completion of the nearby

Erie Canal into the upper ranks of New York's cities. America was

breathing deep the heady populism of the Jeffersonians, and

individualism was finally being codified as a virtue. In the spirit of

republican philanthropy so popular in the cities of those days, Utica

sought to alleviate "the plight of free blacks" by opening Sunday

schools.10 Sunday school in these early days provided simple literacy

training to all those unable to afford an education using lessons which

were "…either from the catechism or were verses from the Bible or from

hymns chosen and memorized by the scholar."11 In 1816, the same year

the seminal Chinese convert Liang Fa was baptised by William Milne, five

women between the ages of fourteen and sixteen began instruction at

Utica's first Sunday school.12 These young volunteers sought to educate

and reform those "'of all ages and without distinction of color' from 'the

lowest dregs of society.'"13 The school seems to have been initially

10Anne M. Boylan, Sunday School: The Formation of an American Institution, 1790-1880 (New haven: Yale University Press, 1988), 23. The classes were appropriately segregated, of course. It is not known whether "free blacks" were taught writing as well as reading in the Utica school. For a discussion of blacks in the early days of the Sunday schools see "Chapter Two" in Boylan, Sunday School, 22ff.

11Edwin Wilbur Rice, The Sunday-School Movement (1780-1917) and the American Sunday-School Union (1817-1917) (New York: Arno Press & The New York Times, 1971), 101. In the discourse of early Sunday schools in both England and America, students at the schools were called "scholars."

12Boylan, Sunday School, 114. Note: this paper follows P. Richard Bohr in using the proper rendering of Liang Fa's name within the text, while using the traditional spelling (Liang A-fa) for bibliographic reference to his works. See the opening to Bohr's essay in Suzanne Wilson Barnett and John King Fairbank, eds., Christianity in China: Early Protestant Missionary Writings (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1985), 35.

13Boylan, Sunday School, 34.

8 organized by Col. Williams, and by 1820 the local Methodists and

Baptists had joined with the Williamses' home church, the First

Presbyterian Church of Utica, to form the Utica Union Sunday-School.14

It was not long, however, before "common" schools supported by

tax dollars began to appear in the more developed and settled of the

states, particularly in the Northern states. These schools offered the

same training in literacy that the Sunday schools supplied—though here

the education was not necessarily available for adults. Rather than

replacing the Sunday school, the common schools liberated the Sunday

schools from the burden of providing basic literacy and allowed them to

concentrate on the more pressing issue of religious instruction.15 As the

evolving Sunday schools came to be viewed by clergymen and maternal

associations as "among the most valuable means of religious instruction"

they also began to gain the kind of middle class participation previously

hindered by the stigmas of poverty and illiteracy.16 And while illiterate

adults lost one of their last hopes at gaining the skills of letters, the

participation of children in the Sunday schools increasingly approached

the populist ideal of becoming a place where "'the rich and the poor' meet

together.'"17 Perhaps more important still, these children were then able

to receive intensive theological training.

14Williams, Life and Letters, 20; Rice, The Sunday-School Movement, 456.



17Boylan, Sunday School, 16. However, along with adults, black children also lost one of the few means of education available to them. See Boylan, Sunday School, 27.

9 Behind the original philanthropic concerns of the first

Sunday-schools and eventually surpassing these concerns lay the unrest

of "established" American culture at the turn of the century. As is so well

documented in Nathan Hatch's The Democratization of American

Christianity, the populist and expansionist impulses accompanying the

Second Great Awakening and America's new found independence posed

immense challenges to the orthodox churches and institutions of

traditional American society.18 The 1801 Plan of Union and the many

organizations created by the Congregationalist and Presbyterian

congregations during these first few decades of the nineteenth century

are a benchmark of the fears that filled the hearts and minds of the

pious. Though many Reformed churches initially resisted these new

Sunday schools for fear that their ecumenical nature would destroy

family religious instruction and catechistic training, the increasing

foment of the rapidly "Democratizing" nation eventually led them to

embrace the Sunday school instruction within the church as better than

what little moral and doctrinal instruction the common schools might

offer.

Nor were these fears ill-founded for the orthodox Calvinist in

Jeffersonian America. It seemed at times as if the world was crashing

down on top of the traditional believer. In towns all across the country

men and women like Lorenzo Dow, Joseph Smith and Billy Hibbard

would tear through the citizens disrupting the established order with

challenges such as

18Nathan O. Hatch, The Democratization of American Christianity (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989), passim. See especially Chapters Two and Six.

10 …larnin' isn't religion, and eddication don't give a man the power of the Spirit…. St. Peter was a fisherman—do you think he ever went to Yale College? No, no, beloved brethren and sisters.19

Many Presbyterians and Congregationalists chose to respond to threats

such as these by pushing religious education all the more and

championing "respectability, seriousness, intelligence, and piety."20

Thus, the founding of Andover Seminary in 1808 was symbolic not only

of established religion's defense against heterodox theology, but also of

established society's desire to resist the influence of the rougher and

lower portions of society so recently liberated and enfranchised.21 And,

as has been said before, what could be better suited for achieving those

ends than the strict religious instruction of society's children? In the

Sunday school, at least, the established churches would still teach their

children the Bible.

So, as Ann M. Boylan argues, the American Sunday-school moved

rapidly beyond its early goal of helping the under-privileged to place its

emphases upon the religious aspect of its teaching. In the new schools:

Teaching reading and writing was only a means to a greater end, not an end in itself. That greater end—an evangelical interpretation of the Bible—was to be achieved by teaching students to read the Bible, familiarizing them with its

19Hatch, Democratization, 20.

20Hatch, Democratization, 19.

21This is by no means an argument in favor of the social control theory. The abbreviated history of Jeffersonian America included here is only designed to give signposts for those unfamiliar with this period. The role played by individual families in the educational process and the nature of their resistance and cooperation must be acknowledged.

11 contents, and leading them to interpret it as their teachers did.22

When in his later life S. Wells Williams recalls his Sunday-school

days his memories are of Bible study and not English study. Since by at

least 1818 (just around his seventh birthday) young Wells was enrolled

in some sort of daily school in Utica—thus indicating the presence of

basic educational alternatives—it should come as no surprise that

literacy as a goal would have faded quickly from the minds of the Utica

Sunday school founders' minds.23 With the relegation of literacy to the

realm of the common school, the Sunday school was given all the more

time to devote to the discipline of Scripture study. In fact, Col. Williams

and the other men in town involved in organizing the Utica Sunday

school are remembered primarily as being committed to "the stupendous

project of making every child commit to memory the entire body of the

Holy Word."24

The amount of time these children spent engaged in Bible study is

difficult to believe. After a week spent in and out of the daily school

developing their reading and writing skills—employing lessons which

invariably used the Bible as their text—young Williams and his

classmates would trek to the First Presbyterian Church of Utica every

Sunday morning at half-past eight to hear the day's Scripture lesson

recited and explained by their instructors. The regular Sunday meeting

would next be attended, and immediately after church was dismissed the

22Boylan, Sunday School, 9-10.



12 afternoon session would begin with the entire school being

questioned on the lesson by the superintendents.25

Wells recalls his superintendent Mr. Truman Parmele as having

"an influence over the boys… of the purest and strongest kind."26

Parmele gained some renown for his mode of instruction and questioning

and in 1823 published his ideas in a volume called Questions on the

Historical Parts of the New Testament.27 Though far from exhaustive, the

questions were a great improvement over the individualistic graded

lessons of the day and were intended to encourage both scholars and

teachers to move beyond mere memorization and towards thoughtful

reflection.

Prior to the adoption of this system, the young scholars had

become involved in works of such supererogation that the two hours

typically allotted for recitation were hardly sufficient to allow the entire

class to participate. On one particular Sunday, after all the boys in one

class had recited whole chapters from the Gospels, a lad named Henry

Ivison rose and spoke five hundred verses without an error. "The

teachers wisely perceived that in such contests the spirit would speedily

be forgotten…, and forthwith limited the lessons to fifteen verses."28

25This description comes from Wells' own written recollections of his Sunday school days. Williams, Life and Letters, 21.


27Rice, Sunday-School Movement, 104.

28Williams, Life and Letters, 22. Ivison, an apprentice of Williams's father, and Williams were friends and worked together for some time in an Albany bookstore. Ivison went on to run the successful school book publishing company Ivison, Phinney, Blakeman. See National Cyclopædia of American Biography, vol. III. (New York: James T. White & Company, 1898), 24.

13 Williams was not left out of this frenzy, and indeed he remembers

on one special Sabbath evening examination receiving a book "for having

learned the New Testament through…."29 Though memorization of

scripture always played a large role in the Utica Sunday school program,

this was not empty exercise. Recall that Williams's earliest memory, as

mentioned above, was of reciting en masse portions of the catechism—

generally understood to be one of a given church's primary keys to

orthodox Biblical interpretation.30

Sunday school for young Williams was never "mere" memorization.

Williams's instructor was one of his father's apprentices—a boy named

George S. Wilson. This teenager was so popular with the Utica youths

that there was a waiting list to get into his class; students would take

diligent notes on the Sunday morning sermon in hopes of being called

upon to report to young Mr. Wilson what had been said.31 Wilson also

organized an extra-curricular association for the boys called the

"Juvenile Association for Doing Good." It was largely run by the boys—

though never without the presence of Mr. Wilson—and seems to have

consisted largely of holding decorous parliamentary meetings. As a

generous act of encouragement towards the young boys, Wilson also

promised to supply blank journals at his expense to any of the boys who

would fill them with original writing. Thus Williams and his classmates


30For more information on the Utica Sunday school see the Semi-Centennial of the Sunday School of the First Presbyterian Church of Utica, (New York, 1866). Williams's contribution to this memorial is the one found in Williams, Life and Letters, 21-2.


14 were encouraged to reflect in words what they saw, did and thought.

Williams penned a number of these little books recording such details as

a trip to Niagara Falls in December of 1823 and his personal reflections

on the incomprehensibility of suicide—"God does not call them into his

presence, but they must go."32

In light of this lengthy discussion of the nature of Sunday school

education and the schools of Williams's youth, it is impossible to ignore

the massive amount of time the young Williams must have spent before

the pages of the Bible. Indeed, as he grew out of the Sunday school

classes, Williams himself went on to become a teacher in the Utica

Sunday school. There is no real analogy in modern schooling that would

adequately describe the depth and degree of Biblical literacy which was

engendered by this sort of single-minded education.

Scholars have been arguing for centuries that words matter and

that in many ways a person is what he or she reads. Given the

astounding amount of time and diligent effort these first fruits of the

Sunday school movement invested in learning and reciting this one book,

it would be curious indeed if something of the ideas, concepts, and

principles of that one book failed to make some sort of impression on

their character. Repeatedly over the course of his later life, the words of

Scripture would come to Williams's mind as a source of comfort and

guidance.33 These years undoubtedly left an indelible mark on his

32From "Samuel Williams' Journal No. 2," December, 1823. Williams, Life and Letters, 23-4.

33Note in particular Williams's disarming account of and reflections upon the death of his wife. Such peace is almost unimaginable. Williams stayed watch an entire night with his dying wife reciting to her from memory God's promises as recorded in

15 character. His oldest son and biographer Frederick summarizes

Williams's Sunday school experiences with the following words.

Such was the stimulus which cultivated and increased the religious fervor of his nature, and here Wells first decided to enter upon a missionary life; in a school which, during fifty years, furnished more than thirty missionaries and ministers, it is not strange that the spiritual child should have developed into the Christian man.34

It has been mentioned before that Williams entered school in 1818.

However, as was common those days, Williams moved frequently from

one school to another as new schools opened and closed and teachers

came and went. In 1827 he was sent to a newly opened classical school

in the town of Paris Hill some few miles from his Grandmother Wells's

farm. While here he was boarded at the farmhouse opposite the school

where his teacher the Reverend Ely Burchard would instruct him in

literature and science. One of Williams's classmates, a Mr. A. O. Osborn,

recalls the fifteen year-old Williams as spending these years "almost

constantly reading some book—usually one brought from his father's

shop at home—in which he was ever deeply absorbed."35 The same Mr.

Osborn also suggests that Williams's reading of the biography of Mr.

Judd's mission to the Sandwich Islands during these years may have

first shaped his desire for the mission field.

In 1829 Charles Bartlett opened the Utica High School, later to

become the well-known Utica Gymnasium, and Williams returned to his

Scripture. Williams's notes in his deceased wife's journal are found in Williams, Life and Letters, 442-444.

34Williams, Life and Letters, 22-3.

35There is little other evidence to corroborate Osborn's recollections. Williams himself mentions no other missionaries as inspirations of heroes. Letter from Mr. A. O. Osborn. Williams, Life and Letters, 26.

16 hometown. Here he renewed once again his friendships with his old

Sunday school classmates, especially James D. Dana with whom he was

to sustain a remarkable lifelong friendship and correspondence. These

last few years of school in Utica are notable for the love and ability which

Williams began to show for the natural sciences. Here he developed the

passion for the "rare and curious in nature" that provided him with so

much amusement and recreation throughout his many travels in the

East.36

The next few years of Williams's life were exceedingly full. In 1830

his good friend James Dana headed for Yale. Due to insufficient funds,

Williams was unable to attend. Since his father intended him for the

family print shop and bookstore, Williams restrained his great

disappointment and resigned himself. Less than half a year later, in

February of 1831, Wells and his brother Frederick professed their faith

and joined the First Church of Utica. His son records that Williams's

decision "was due rather to a sense of fitness of his publicly confessing a

truth long believed, than to any influence of those about him."37 The

sincerity of this decision was demonstrated in the fall of that same year

when his mother Sophia finally succumbed to the sickness that had

stalked her since Williams's birth.

36Williams, Life and Letters, 28. During his multiple excursions to Japan and his long residency in Beijing, collecting natural specimens was to supply much recreation for the ever ambulant Williams.

37Williams, Life and Letters, 29. This suggests that Williams's public confession was not the fruit of revivalistic services. Unfortunately, this is an instance where S. Wells Williams's own words are glaringly absent in his son's biography. Sound redaction criticism, however, can find little reason why a turn of the century son might seek to hide or disguise a revivalistic conversion.

17 Rather than rejecting an empty institution or recanting words

made in haste, Williams embraced the faith he had only recently

professed publicly. Through the trial and sorrow of a dearly loved

mother's death, the boy of barely nineteen years developed "the habit and

desire of shaping his daily duty and conversation with reference to a

personal and ever-present God."38 Drawing upon the resources of his

Sunday school education, Williams here first demonstrates the

consistency of character and steady faith which so characterized his life.

His remarkable trust through trying circumstances finds its roots in his

familiarity with the promises of his God as recorded in the Bible. Robbed

by the death of his mother "of every vestige of the joy and beauty of

living," Williams for perhaps the first time shows his colors as a Christian

man. Indeed,

from the time of this bereavement [no one] who knew him well [could] fail to note that out of its lessons and experience first came to him that profound realization of a higher life, and that habit of bringing it to mind even in his busiest moments, which was for him the real meaning of religion and the moving spring of his whole career.39

The circumstances of his mother's death provided him with the

opportunity to continue his studies, and following his love for the natural

world he headed for the newly established Rensselaer Institute of Troy.

Upon arrival, Williams discovered to his great disappointment that the

school had a slim half dozen students and only Professor Amos Eaton to

instruct them. Eaton required his students to teach each other as much


39Williams, Life and Letters, 30. S. Wells Williams's conduct throughout these events again lacks outside attestation. Here, hagiography seems likely—though by no means necessary.

18 as to listen to him, and his bout with asthma during his later years

eventually required him to curtail many of his walking nature lectures

and retire to his study leaving his students to huddle by themselves

around the meager lab tables and do what they could. These few years

of nearly independent study served to prepare Williams for a lifetime of

study in a foreign and often lonely land.

Just over a year prior, on February 22, 1830, the first two

American missionaries to China from the American Board of

Commissioners for Foreign Missions arrived at the Portuguese port of

Macao aboard the ship Roman and three days later reached the Chinese

city of Canton.40 Their ship was owned by the magnanimous American

trader D. W. C. Olyphant who had offered passage on one of his ships

and a year's free residency in Canton for whomever the American Board

could send.41 Olyphant had first visited Canton in 1820 as an agent for

the New York firm of Thomas H. Smith which had made its fortune in the

years following the second American war with the English and the

decline of the seal and fur trades. When that firm was found insolvent in

1827, Olyphant returned to new York and established his own firm of

Olyphant and Company known so well for its support of missions and its

40G. R. Williamson, Memoir of the Rev. David Abeel, D. D., Late Missionary to China (Washington, Delaware: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1972), 52, 67. The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, often called the "American Board" for expediency, is at times also referred to in its abbreviated form as the "ABCFM."

41Kenneth Scott Latourette, The History of Early Relations between The United States and China, 1784-1844 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1917), 89. In fact, Olyphant was to provide free housing for the ABCFM mission in Canton for its first thirteen years. Excerpted from Williams's "Recollections" in Williams, Life and Letters, 78.

19 strict policies against opium trading.42 One author suggests that

Olyphant supplied the first Protestant missionary to China Robert

Morrison and his new family with residence in his quarters (later to be

called "Zion's Corner") in the Canton factories following the Morrisons'

second trip to China in 1826.43 Olyphant was to become a very dear

friend and helpmate of Williams during his years in China.44

The two special passengers on board Olyphant's Roman had been

sent largely in response to an appeal from Morrison to the ABCFM of

which he had been made a "corresponding member."45 The Reverend

David Abeel was an ordained Dutch Reformed minister of failing health

who had served congregations in New York state and volunteered his

services to the ABCFM.46 He was chosen originally to represent the

American Seaman's Friend Society amongst the sailors in Canton for one

year and then to serve the ABCFM in surveying South East Asia.47 The

other missionary sailing with Olyphant was Congregationalist Elijah

Coleman Bridgman from Massachusetts. He would become Williams's

42Latourette, United States and China, 53-4, 69. On Olyphant and opium, see also Eldon Griffin, Clippers and Consuls: American Consular and Commercial Relations with Eastern Asia, 1845-1860 (Ann Arbor: Edwards Brothers, Inc., 1938), 201n, 202.

43Just how much influence and wealth Olyphant had before the incorporation of his firm in1827 is not known. He was, however, a close friend of Morrison from the date of his arrival. A. J. Broomhall, Hudson Taylor & China's Open Century. vol. 1, Barbarians at the Gate (London: Hodder and Stroughton for Overseas Missionary Fellowship, 1981), 169.

44Wells named his second son "Olyphant" after his merchant friend. Williams, Life and Letters, 182.

45Broomhall, Hudson Taylor, vol. 1, 173-4.

46Williamson, Rev. David Abeel, 50-1.

47Williamson, Rev. David Abeel, 78.

20 immediate mentor in Canton and his long time companion.48

Bridgman immediately set himself up in Canton and commenced

language study and literary work for the ABCFM rapidly establishing a

small school for Chinese boys.49 The Andover graduate Bridgman was

joined in 1832 by Edwin Stevens of Yale who replaced Abeel with the

American Seaman's Friend Society in Canton.50

It was Morrison's hope that the new missionaries from America

would bring with them a printing press.51 In December of 1831, less

than a year after Bridgman and Abeel's arrival, a printing press was

received from the Bleecker Street Presbyterian Church of New York. The

press, named the Bruen Press after one of the church's pastors, was sent

at the urging of Olyphant who was a member of the New York church.52

With the arrival of the type a few months later, Bridgman put the press

to use and in May of 1832 at the urging of Morrison commenced

publication of the valuable journal The Chinese Repository.53

48Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 90-1. See also Williams, Life and Letters, 61-2. Note: Bridgman's arrival in Canton is incorrectly recorded by Frederick Williams as 1840.

49For a concise if limited summary of one side of Bridgman's labors in China see Fred W. Drakes' contribution to Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 92. See also Kenneth Scott Latourette, A History of Christian Missions in China (New York: Macmillan, 1929), 218.

50Four years later Stevens was with the ABCFM. He was the last person to actually minister for the ASFS in China during their short-lived mission in Canton. Latourette, Christian Missions in China. 218. This is apparently a revision of his early statement regarding the ASFS in his previous United States and China, 92-3.

51Latourette, United States and China, 91n.

52Williams, Life and Letters, 39, 78.

53Latourette, United States and China, 91n, 92. The Repository itself is a subject worthy of its own monograph. In particular, its relation to the merchant community

21 In 1832 Morrison, Bridgman and Stevens were the only

Protestant missionaries permanently resident in China. The workers

sent out by the London Missionary Society (Samuel Dyer, Jacob Tomlin,

and Walter Medhurst with the LMS press) were located either in Malacca,

Java, Batavia or Singapore.54 Dutch missionary Charles Gutzlaff was in

the midst of his second investigative journey up the coast of China in the

service of the British East India Company and had yet to take up his

government position at Hong Kong.55 Since the work of language study,

printing, and translation was too much for Morrison and Bridgman alone

(especially taxing were Morrison's labors for the British East India

Company), they appealed to the American Board to send help.56 In a

letter to American Board Secretary Rufus Anderson, Bridgman says "We

need a printer if the work goes on.… I am constantly pressed with

labor—hardly find time to eat or sleep." 57 Furthermore, this man

should be "a devoted and pious, and well educated printer."58

needs to be illuminated while the actual authorship of its editorials as well as the actual criteria used by Bridgman and Williams for accepting these editorials needs to be carefully investigated. Spatial constraints mean that this work will deal with The Repository in an unfortunately limited fashion.

54For remarkably detailed narratives of these pre-Canton days see the first volume Barbarians at the Gates in A. J. Broomhall's excellent series Hudson Taylor & China's Open Century. 6 vols. (London: Hodder and Stroughton for Overseas Missionary Fellowship, 1981-). For purposes of expediency, the London Missionary Society is often referred to by its abbreviated form as the "LMS."

55Ralph R. Covell, Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1986), 73-81.

56Latourette, United States and China, 93.

57Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 3. Bridgman to Rufus Anderson, December 8, 1832.

58Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 71. Bridgman to H. Hill, February 16, 1833.

22 The request was noted in Boston and eventually William

Williams, owner and operator of the largest bookstore in America west of

Albany, was asked if he might be able to supply the Board with a young

man fit to run the mission press in Canton.59 He wrote to his eldest son

Samuel Wells Williams at once. Just one short day after receiving his

father's note, Williams responded in writing on April 23, 1832 with his

willingness to go to China after the completion of his course of study at

the Rensselaer Institute in the autumn and some instruction in the

workings of a press. It would most likely mean giving up his plans to

become a naturalist but—with the steadfast faith that was to

characterize his entire life of service—Williams closed his letter with the

acknowledgment that "there are places enough to have a choice, and

good ones too."60

In the fall of 1832 Williams returned to his hometown of Utica and

engaged in a crash course on printing and bookmaking. Over the next

six months his father's notable establishment provided him with

experience covering the full gamut of the profession from composition

and printing to proofing and binding. For one who had always loved to

read books, Williams found this work tedious, laborsome, and "full of

business… but such business as I hate."61 In the spring of 1833 his

father William married Miss Catherine Huntington of Rome, New York.

59Williams, Life and Letters, 39. On William Williams's success see National Cyclopædia of American Biography, vol. I, 422. This biographical notice contains frustratingly little regarding his conduct as a father or his relationship with his children.

60Letter to his father from Troy, N.Y. on April 23, 1832. Williams, Life and Letters, 40.

61Letter to James Dana. Williams, Life and Letters, 49.

23 By the end of April Williams was ready to sail for China, and after a

brief delay Williams and fellow missionary Rev. Ira Tracy left New York on

Olyphant's Morrison on June 15, 1833.

24

CHAPTER THREE

"'till More Active Service Be Opened"

On September 22, 1833 Williams offered a bottle of currant wine

from his father's own 1812 vintage to be consumed at the captain's table:

somewhere in the midst of the Indian Ocean, Samuel Wells Williams had

reached the age of twenty-one.62 Just over one month later, the ship

Morrison dropped anchor twelve miles down the Pearl River from Canton

amidst the great merchant fleet of Whampoa and S. Wells Williams and

Reverend Tracy were rowed up river to the famous "Thirteen Factories" of

Canton.

Now the school boy had become the young missionary. Over the

next fourteen years—and indeed the rest of his life—Williams was to put

forth "painstaking and generous efforts in giving [his knowledge of China

and Chinese] to others."63 Rather than counting conversion notches on

his belt, Williams invested himself in arduous studies to develop and

pass on to those who came after him his knowledge and understanding

of China, her people, and their language.

These are not the virtues the modern reader associates with

nineteenth century missions. It is generally assumed that evangelistic


63Letter from the missionaries of Shanghai upon his departure from China. Williams, Life and Letters, 419.

25 fervor dictated the supposedly rash acts of these pioneers.

However, it must be remembered that Williams entered China during the

earliest period of Protestant missions in the Middle Kingdom.

Understood in the light of the entire history of Christianity in China, the

remarkable control and patience with which Williams approached the

mission task is rapidly revealed to be a wise and tempered strategy that

attempted to cope well with the reality of Qing Dynasty China at the

opening of the nineteenth century.

The history of China's earlier encounters with Christianity is

surprisingly long and far too little studied. Passing over the seventh

century Nestorians and the poorly understood twelfth century Catholic

missions of John of Montecorvino brings the record rapidly to the Jesuit

mission to the late Ming and early Qing courts.64

From the initial journeys of Francis Xavier in the first half of the

sixteenth century to the documented "success" of Matteo Ricci and

Michel Ruggiere in the late Ming and on through Johann Adam Schall

von Bell during the early Qing Dynasty, the Jesuits found converts first

among the gentry and then with the favor and encouragement of the

courts amongst the common people as well. Persecutions came and

went, though the Jesuits ability to survive the Ming collapse in 1644 and

to find still greater popularity with their new Manchu rulers is something

of a miracle. The colorful story of Schall casting cannon for the defense

of the ailing Ming only to be given office shortly thereafter by the newly

64For a good look at the earlier days, the two classic works are Arthur C. Moule, Christians in China Before the Year 1550 (London: S. P. C. K., 1930); and Latourette, Christian Missions in China. These should be combined with the excellent new contribution Samuel Hugh Moffett, A History of Christianity in China: Volume 1, Beginnings to 1500 (HarperSanFrancisco, 1992).

26 enthroned Shun Zhi (Qing) Emperor indicates, regardless of the

cynical motives present amongst China's rulers, an undeniable degree of

official toleration towards the priests.65

However, this period was brought to a close by what can be seen

as a precursor to the more chaotic East-West upheavals that would bring

down China's last imperial dynasty and eventually raise up a new

socialist dynasty. The well-known "rites controversy" describes the

disagreements that surrounded the Roman Church's efforts to resolve

the conflicts—apparent or real—between Catholic practice and Chinese

culture. Debates raged within the Catholic Church and her various

orders over the proper Chinese term for translating God. The Fathers in

China and in Rome struggled to come to grips with the relationship

between the reverence of deceased ancestors enjoined by Confucian

virtues of filial piety and the Biblical injunctions against idolatry.66 After

over a century of argumentation and ad hoc practice, Pope Clement XI

attempted to bring all practice into accord with Papal will by enjoining

"total, absolute, integral and inviolable observance" of all previously

issued condemnatory decrees in the forceful Papal Bull of 1715 Ex Illa

Die.67

65Latourette, Christian Missions in China, 105-6.

66Though such clear conflicts between Confucian rites and Christian practice are not frequently encountered in post-1949 China, these issues are still far from conclusively decided. For a succinct discussion of the theological points at stake see Covell, Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ, 59-67.

67This quotation comes from a translation of Ex Illa Die in George Minamiki, S.J., The Chinese Rites Controversy from its Beginning to Modern Times (Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1985), 58ff.

27 Imposed upon the more accommodating Jesuits of Ricci's

descent by the understandably ill-informed authorities of far distant

Rome, Ex Illa Die struck a fairly aggressive pose, repeating all the

previous pronouncements against many practices of traditional Chinese

culture and in some cases strengthening them. Chinese converts were

required, with little room for exception, to break from most traditional

ceremonies and rites with little regard for their supposed exclusively civil

significance. The great Emperor Kangxi—so often noted for his tolerance

and even appreciation for the Jesuits—was finally taxed beyond the

limits of his patience and in 1720 upon reading the injunctions of the

Pope he decried Ex Illa Die as sectarian and divisive.68 "There is no more

striking example of sheer ignorance."69

Kangxi's death in 1723 ushered in the reign of the Yongzheng

Emperor. Kangxi's son and heir then took his father's well-known

Sacred Edicts (Shengyu) of 1670, expanded upon them and had them

published as the Shengyu guangxun. Most significant for the purposes of

nineteenth century missions was the sermon on the seventh of the

sixteen maxims entitled "Destroy heterodox doctrines in order to render

honor to orthodox learning."

A classic restatement of Mencius, this section affirmed the

inherently good nature of humankind and the role of environment in

68The author recognizes that the nomen "Kangxi” actually refers to the reign period in esse. However, following the traditional practice of referring to Dynastic rulers by their reign titles legitimates this otherwise confused phrase. This convention is maintained throughout this paper.

69Kang Xi's written words as recorded in Michael Stainton, "Sources of 19th Century Chinese Opposition to the Missionaries and Christianity," Ching Feng XX, no. 3, (1977): 135.

28 shaping a person's actions.70 Yongzheng stressed good education

and a virtuous leader as the proper means for protecting these orthodox

truths from the heretical lies of such sectarian influences as Buddhism,

Taoism, the notorious White Lotus sect, and the Western religion of the

"Lord of Heaven" (Catholicism). When he described Catholicism with the

simple compound "bu jing" (unclassical), Yongzheng perfectly reflected

and summarized the philosophical background to the expulsion of the

Jesuit missionaries and the suppression of Christianity he had

commanded that very same year.71

Persecutions followed, missionaries were martyred, and

Yongzheng's writings were read, studied, memorized and recited for the

illiterate populace of China by dutiful local officials reared and nurtured

within the reigning school of Confucian orthodoxy.72 Borrowing Paul

Cohen's insightful concepts, the philosophical "heterodox-orthodox

antithesis" operating behind Chinese official religious pronouncements

had once again closed the door to the practice of Western religion within

the Middle Kingdom. From 1724 and the Shengyu guangxun until the

toleration clauses of the Anglo-Chinese Wars in the 1840's and 1850's,

70Paul A. Cohen, China and Christianity: The Missionary Movement and the Growth of Chinese Antiforeignism, 1860-1870 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963), 11ff.

71Stainton, "Sources of Opposition," 135.

72All schools would have agreed with the general condemnation of Western religion voiced in the Shengyu guangxun as subverting the peasant's loyalty to the state in accordance with the five relationships.

29 Christianity was not only philosophically but also legally

"heterodox."73 Missions to China were officially "illegal."

As mentioned above, at the time of Williams's arrival in China,

Protestant missions were still in their infant stage. The ethos behind

Yongzheng's Shengyu guangxun still prevailed and the Chinese officials

were none too friendly towards those who would peddle foreign religion

and thus foment rebellion. William Milne and his wife—the first

Protestants to follow Morrison—arrived at Macao in 1813 only to be

ordered to leave by the authorities.74 Thus Milne, and many of the other

early missionaries, set themselves to the task of building a "wall of light"

around China. Through language study and teaching; evangelization of

Chinese emigrants in neighboring places such as Malacca, Singapore

and Batavia; and the translation and publication of both Western and

Chinese materials for the mutual edification of both Chinese and

Westerners, these pioneers prepared themselves and China for the

inevitable future day when China's wall of seclusion finally would be

breached.75 Meanwhile, through every crack they could find, the

missionaries sought to shine the gospel into China.

Not surprisingly, there were not very many missionaries during

this early period and of them only a very few were able actually to live in

73The distinction between the philosophical and legal is in many ways a false dichotomy in dynastic China, given that law was understood not so much as codified and abstract but as embodied in the person of the Emperor—"the Son of Heaven, the True Dragon." Yet to the degree that the Emperors following Yongzheng and the officials who served them shared the conceptual universe of the expanded Sacred Edicts, Western religion was theoretically and most practically against the Emperor and his state and thus "against the law."

74Latourette, Christian Missions in China, 213.

75Covell, Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ, 70-73.

30 China. As late as 1835 only twelve Protestant missionaries could be

found East of Burma. In 1832 there were a total of seven Protestant

missionaries serving China—five representing the London Missionary

Society and two representing the American Board of Commissioners for

Foreign Missions.76 Of those, only three—Morrison, Bridgman and

Stevens—were living in China when Williams and Tracy arrived.77

In fact, just to say that these few were "living in China" is

something of an overstatement. The Manchu officials had granted to

some of the foreign traders the right to residence in the notorious

"factories" of China.78 Stacked side by side along the banks of the Pearl

River, these thirteen Chinese style buildings extended back towards the

walls of Canton city in five- or six-hundred feet of consecutive

76For these and the preceding statistics see Latourette, Christian Missions in China. 213ff; 217ff. In 1832 Robert Morrison, Medhurst, Tomlin, Dyer, and Kidd served the LMS and Bridgman and Stevens served the ABCFM. Kidd was at the time back in England due to poor health. Others, such as Abeel (who later returned to Amoy) and Milne (who died in 1822), had entered and left the field prior to 1832. These numbers are still further confused by Stevens's and Abeel's initial relationship with the American Seaman's Friend Society (a mission aimed specifically towards Westerners). It also appears that after 1831 Abeel should be counted as a missionary to China (he was still involved in Chinese language study and serving the ABCFM at Singapore in 1833), while Stevens was in the service of the Seaman's Friend Society until spring of 1836. See Latourette, United States and China, 92; Williamson, Rev. David Abeel, 119.

77According to Latourette, Gutzlaff—who sailed for Asia in 1827—was the Netherlands Missionary Society's appointment to "the East Indies" and thus not exclusively to "China." He was, however, within the circle of evangelists with which Morrison and Bridgman frequently met and conversed and he visited Canton a number of times. His investigative journeys along the coast of China are significant for their effect upon the morale of the early missionaries and their effect upon the sending countries. As Williams seems to take little note of Gutzlaff's "findings" (apart from sharing Bridgman's doubts) little will be said of Gutzlaff here. For Gutzlaff's journeys see Covell, Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ, 73-81. On Gutzlaff himself cf. Broomhall, Hudson Taylor, vol. 1, 200-10, 323-50; and Jessie Lutz's "Karl F. A. Gutzlaff: Missionary Entrepreneur" in Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 61-87.

78Originally, factory "was the term employed throughout the East, to designate the factors of the East India Co., and had no sense at all synonymous with 'manufactory.'" Williams, Life and Letters, 56.

31 courtyards. In front of each whitewashed mansion flew the national

flag of its resident company, while a small park some one hundred by

fifty yards was open for the exercise of the merchants. The American

factory, "one of the best,” was three stories of quarters, storehouses, and

drawing rooms with a turret on top and a long corridor beneath

connecting the front chambers to those in the rear.79 Though

sumptuously appointed by the wealthy traders, these were far from ideal

quarters: the residences towards the back of the factories were known

for their darkness and general lack of breathable air.

These buildings were leased by the famed Hong merchants of

Canton. A group of thirteen Chinese merchants who had bought their

offices from the Emperor at great expense, these influential men were not

only free to engage in and supervise foreign trade, but were also

responsible to the extent of their lives for any untoward behavior of the

foreigners. These men were immediately responsible to the imperially

appointed superintendent of maritime customs referred to by the

foreigners as the "Hoppo".80

Hence it was the thirteen Hong merchants (the Cohong) whom all

of China expected to control the foreign barbarians. They sought to do

so by minimizing all contact between the foreigners and the Chinese

79Descriptions abound though frequently differ. This paragraph is a distillation of Broomhall, Hudson Taylor, 87-8; Lattourette, United States and China, 24-5, 81; and Williams, Life and Letters, 55-6.

80The Hoppo was mistakenly named by foreigners because of their belief that he was a representative of the Board of Revenue (hu bu). In reality, the superintendent of the haiguan bu (board of maritime customs) and his office's income was held directly to the Imperial Household (neiwu bu). See Frederic Wakeman, Jr., "The Canton Trade and the Opium War," The Cambridge History of China, vol. 10, John K. Fairbank and D. Twitchett, gen. eds., Late Ch'ing, 1800-1911, pt. 1, John K. Fairbank, ed., (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978), 161.

32 people. It was the Cohong who enforced the rules that forbid the

residents of the factories to enter the city walls of Canton, limited their

travel to the small park in front of the thirteen factories, required the

residents to leave Canton when the trading season was concluded,

required all official petitions to the Chinese government to go through

their hands and finally forbade the foreign residents native teachers from

whom to learn the Chinese language.81 The profits the foreign traders

brought the Hong merchants and the Imperial household were sufficient

to guarantee that these restrictions were only strictly enforced during

times of great duress. By 1833 little had changed since the middle of the

eighteenth century when the Cohong trade was formally established—

indeed since the first arrival of the British East India Company in 1664.

Within this curious system of control and exchange, Williams and

Tracy arrived in Canton where, as Williams writes,

I was reported to the hong merchants as a trader who had come to live in the Hong of Broad Fountains, and the hong merchant who owned the hong was security for my good conduct, though we never saw each other.82

The Hong of Broad Fountains was the American Factory and—once

registered with the Cohong—Williams and Tracy joined Bridgman and

Stevens there as guests gratis of the magnanimous Olyphant.

Olyphant's passion for missions had already earned his quarters at

"Number Two, American Hong" the nickname "Zion's Corner" from the

81Broomhall, Hudson Taylor, 85-8. Some of this material is excerpted from Williams's "Recollections" in Williams, Life and Letters, 58-60.

82Letter to Rufus Anderson. Williams, Life and Letters, 60.

33 foreigners in Canton.83 Since in 1832 there were 132 foreigners

spread between Canton, Macao and Lintin of whom only twenty were

Americans, the social circle of foreign life in China was fairly limited.

Missionaries and other residents came and went, but by as late as 1841

the number of Americans in the Canton vicinity had only increased to

thirty-seven.84 And they all lived in the same thirteen buildings. The

factories were hardly "China"; surrounded by fellow Westerners, served

by Chinese, living in whitewashed mansions filled with fine furniture and

appointments from the fortunes of the East India Company and her

trading sisters, the foreign "residents of Canton" were forced by the

Cohong to live in an odd expatriate Western ghetto.

No sooner was Williams off the boat than Bridgman gratefully

handed over to the young man the management of the mission printing

office.85 His immediate task was to print the current editions of The

Chinese Repository to which within a few months he began contributing

articles and essays. Begun in 1832 by Bridgman, The Repository was a

classic expression of the "wall of light" mission ethos. This publication

and its general content on China was to be "most decidedly Christian,

but not wholly religious."86 It sought to supply the local audience (the

merchants) with the information they required (information on China)

83For Hong address and "gratis " see Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 12. Canton Mission to Rufus Anderson, May 2, 1836. For "Zion's Corner" see Latourette, United States and China, 89.



86Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 61. Bridgman to Anderson, May 5, 1832. Underlining is from Bridgman's original.

34 and thus affect their sympathies and gain their subscriptions to

help cover mission costs not met by the American Board. Given the

"numerous discrepancies" in the available information regarding China

at the time, the principle object of the journal was

to review foreign books on China, with a view to notice the changes that have occurred, and how and when they were brought about, and to distinguish, as far as it can well be done, between what is, and what is not, now true.87

In the index volume released at the close of The Repository's twenty-year

run, Bridgman and Williams confess their roles as editors while at the

same time announcing that "No missionary society has ever shared in

[The Repository's] direction, nor directly contributed to its support."88

This served as Williams's primary occupation for the majority of his

period of service under the American Board.89

87Bridgman, "Introduction," The Chinese Repository, vol. I (May 1832), 2.

88Elijah Coleman Bridgman and S. Wells Williams, "Editorial Notice," General Index of Subjects Contained in the Twenty Volumes of the Chinese Repository, with an Arranged List of the Articles (Canton: Printed for the Proprietors, December 31, 1851), n.p.

89An examination of Williams's contributions as listed in the General Index challenges Murray A. Rubenstein's thesis that the American missionaries employed The Repository to encourage Western war with China. His contributions are mostly of a scientific nature—especially during his early days—while his later contributions involve mostly the translating and reprinting of official documents. Also, Williams's only contribution under the heading "War with the English" is a translation of an "Imperial Rescript." Cf. Murray A. Rubenstein, "The Wars They Wanted: American Missionaries' Use of The Chinese Repository Before the Opium War," The American Neptune, vol. XLVIII, no. 4 (Fall 1988), 271-82; and Bridgman and Williams, General Index, passim.

The questionable nature of Rubenstein's thesis is further supported when after the inclusion of John Quincy Adam's "Lecture on the War with China" is noticed the editor's response is then also read. Williams and Bridgman very clearly decry the injustice of the war, claiming that were it not for the evil opium, no war would occur! Chinese Repository, vol. XI, 289-274.

35 The Chinese Repository was "Printed for the Proprietors" who

were the members of the "Christian Union in China."90 Begun by Abeel,

Bridgman, King, Morrison and son, and two other men in 1830, the

Union was "formed to give wisdom and strength to our efforts and better

security to our friends abroad."91 With a depository and library, the

group kept tabs on the other mission stations in the region and collected

general news and knowledge. Accordingly, the group covered the

expenses of The Repository for at least its first year.92

In truth, Bridgman was rather distressed about The Repository. He

had received no instructions from the Board as to the proper use of the

press. By linking the journal to the Christian Union, he sought to avoid

the possible reprimand of the Board for misuse of the press while also

insuring that regardless of the publication's success or failure the Board

would have minimal financial responsibility for the potential losses.93

This frustration was repeated often in letters to Boston, asking for

instructions for the press and some kind of answer as to the

appropriateness of The Repository.94

90Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 62. Bridgman to Anderson, May 31, 1832.

91Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 37. Bridgman to Evarts, January 27, 1831.

92At some point Olyphant stepped in to help bear the expenses, eventually covering all the losses. See the discussion in Latourette, United States and China, 92n, 100n


94Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 68. Bridgman to Anderson, January 31, 1833.

36 To produce this journal Williams commenced working in the

"printing office" which had been supplied by Olyphant. The Bleecker

Street Church's Bruen Press had been placed in one of the four ground

floor rooms which comprised the printing office located between two

factories. The floor was cold stone and part of the shop lacked a rooftop

such that during inclement weather of any sort the office was unbearably

uncomfortable. To compound the trials of this work, Williams was

obligated to first learn the Portuguese language in order to be able to

communicate with his "skilled tradesmen from Macao.95 Because the

journal was an English language publication Williams was required not

only to proof all copy but also to diligently oversee all of the typesetting.

For the first few years Williams's letters to the Board dealt almost

exclusively with the details and questions of running a printing press.

No printing in Chinese was possible in the mission at this time—

there was little room in the tiny office, and Williams lacked the Chinese

language abilities such work would require. It is not even clear that the

mission possessed a full set of Chinese type—they may have had to

borrow type from the East India Company's press. Moreover, Bridgman

himself had yet to engage in much Chinese language work besides the

revision of Morrison's Bible. He was occupied with language study,

writing and editing The Repository, and teaching his young pupils—

among which Liang Fa's son Liang "A-tih" was now working to master

Greek and Hebrew.96 Scant months after Williams's arrival Bridgman

95Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 211. Williams to Anderson, December 13, 1833.


37 admitted that he had "never undertaken to preach, or even to

compose tracts, in Chinese."97

This is at least partly due to the fact that during these early days of

Protestant missions to China, the few men stationed in China were

regarded primarily as ministering to the other foreign residents in

Canton and Macao.98 With "Zion's Corner" as their base of operations

the small circle of Morrison, Bridgman, Stevens, Williams and Olyphant

joined in prayer and ministry to the Canton area.99 On one occasion,

after Abeel's departure to Singapore, Bridgman despaired for the "twenty

or thirty hundred seamen now at Whampoa" who were without the

services of a chaplain.100 Not only were the large numbers of seamen

left without instruction, but the foreign residents of Canton as well.

Until Stevens's arrival Bridgman led these small worship services in the

foreign community.101 The frequency with which the letters from the

Canton mission to the Board mention the attendance at these services

indicates that they were not just a side hobby for the missionaries. In

97Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 79. Bridgman to Anderson, November 11, 1833.

98Letter to Anderson. Williams, Life and Letters, 60.

99C. W. King, Olyphant's partner and nephew also joined these gatherings and had been present in 1830 at the instigation of the Christian Union at Canton. See Latourette, United States and China, 99; Edward V. Gulick, Peter Parker and the Opening of China (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973), 63.

100Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 51. Bridgman to Evarts, October 8, 1831.

101Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 37. Bridgman to Evarts, January 27, 1831. This letter also states that Olyphant's Canton representative and later partner Mr. Talbot remitted Abeel's $700 room and board debt upon his departure. According to Latourette, Talbot also served as American Consul. Latourette, United States and China, 81n.

38 May of 1832 Bridgman records ten to sixteen persons in attendance

at his Sabbath services and mentions distributing tracts and English

language Bibles to these communicants.102 Considering the English

language Repository as well, it is apparent that the Western traders,

sailors and diplomats of greater Canton were perceived to be a very

important mission field by these first missionaries in China.

This ministry, however, was not available to Williams. Bridgman,

as an Andover Graduate, was ordained and thus a qualified preacher of

the Word. Stevens was likewise an ordained Presbyterian minister.

Williams, however, had not received training at a seminary and was not

an ordained minister of the church. He was a printer by vocation, and so

he printed.

Besides the Canton mission's English language work there did

exist in China a Chinese language ministry of evangelization. The

operation of this mission was dependent on the efforts of Liang Fa. The

American Bible Society supplied some funds for the printing and

dissemination of tracts in Chinese within China. Their funds were

augmented and employed by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful

Knowledge in China. Begun in December of 1834, it had a larger

membership than the Christian Union due to its desire to

publish, in a cheap form, plain and easy treatises in the Chinese language, on such branches of useful knowledge as are suited to the existing state and conditions of the Chinese Empire.103


103Williams, The Middle Kingdom, vol. II, 340. The Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in China is generally abbreviated as the SDK. Bridgman's 1833

39 Most of its work was produced by missionaries stationed along the

"wall of light" such as Milne and Medhurst and the majority of its

materials were printed on the LMS press in Singapore. Like the

Christian Union, its existence was brief as the political events at the end

of the thirties and the opening of the forties opened new possibilities for

the evangelization of China.

Liang Fa, the renowned "first convert" from among the people of

China, functioned primarily as the colporteur for these publications.104

Leaving aside the Singapore work of the SDK, the letters from the Canton

mission (reporting progress to both the American Board and the

American Bible Society) mention two publications in Chinese which

Liang Fa distributed.105 One is Bridgman's Gospel Lessons in Chinese.

Bridgman and others with the Morrison Educational Society in Malacca

had made use of this collection of translated Scripture passages for

teaching the handful of young boys attending their schools. The other

was a proper tract called Quanshi liangyan (Good Words to Admonish the

admission that he had yet to compose tracts in Chinese and the discussion above seem to question some of Drake's comments in "E. C. Bridgman's Portrayal of the West" in Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 89-106, esp. 94. Bridgman's letters—though certainly longing at times for the freedom to preach the Gospel openly—are overwhelmingly concerned with bringing Chinese people to Christ, not opening China to the West.

104Williams is wrong on this point: Liang Fa was not the first convert from among the Chinese. Letter to his father from Canton on November 6, 1833. Williams, Life and Letters, 65. According to P. Richard Bohr, Liang Fa was baptized in November of 1816 by Milne. Lattourette states that on July 16 of that same year Morrison had baptized his first convert "Tsae A-ko." Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 40; Latourette, Christian Missions in China. 212-13.

105SDK materials were used largely amongst the overseas Chinese populations. They were, however, distributed by Gutzlaff, Stevens and the LMS missionaries during the mainland river probes and coastal explorations of the 1830's. See Covell, Confucius, The Buddha, and Christ, 73-81.

40 Age ).106 This was written by Liang Fa himself—not the

missionaries—"for the purpose of making 'God's great mercy known to

men and turning men's hearts to the worship of God alone.'"107 Not only

were both of these distributed by Liang Fa and the Chinese he hired to

assist him, but both Chinese language works were also printed by Liang

Fa in Chinese print shops in and around Canton.108

All of this began to change when on the fifteenth of July, 1834,

Lord Napier arrived in Canton with strict orders from British Foreign

Secretary Lord Palmerston to secure direct communication with the

Chinese authorities.109 This is exactly the thing which Chinese political

theory dictated should be avoided at all costs if occurring outside a clear

context of foreign inferiority.110 The ill-fated Napier was also told that

under no circumstances could he interfere with the opium trade: he had

106For a recent exposition of this earliest attempt at Chinese contextualization and the man who wrote it see Whalen W. Lai, "The First Chinese Christian Gospel: Liang A-Fa's 'Good Words to Admonish the World,'" Ching Feng vol. 38, no. 2 (June 1995), 83-105.

107From Liang Fa's work quoted in Barnett and Fairbank, Christianity in China, 40.


109Jack Beeching, The Chinese Opium Wars (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975), 44ff.

110This inferiority was expressed fundamentally in the Tribute system with its obligatory "kowtow" (ketou), the requirements that all government communication pass through non-government intermediaries (e.g., the hong merchants), and the system of communication which demanded that foreigners head all their official requests with the submissive "petition" (pin). This understanding of Chinese foreign policy, however, has been recently brought in to question. Some scholars suggest the motivation behind Chinese actions is a realistic posture of self-defense rather than the traditional ideology of tributary superiority. See, for instance, John E. Wills, Jr., "Tributary, Defensiveness, and Dependency: Uses and Limits of Some Basic Ideas About Mid-Qing Dynasty Foreign Relations," The American Neptune, vol. XLVIII, no. 4 (Fall 1988), 225-29.

41 no authority to act in this realm whatsoever.111 With the

termination of the British East India Company's monopoly on the China

trade on April 27, 1834, "normalized" diplomatic relations with the

government of China were necessary for Britain to monitor and control

its China trade which was now growing at an incredible rate. Napier as

the "Superintendent of Trade" in Canton was to be the foundation of new

equitable Sino-British relations.

Things went sour from the beginning of Napier's mission. He

immediately announced himself by letter to Lu Kun the viceroy of the

Liang Guang (comprising Guangdong and Guangxi provinces) and thus

ignored the requirement that communications be exchanged through the

Cohong. He then immediately went to Canton as a representative of the

British Crown who sought to treat with the Emperor's representative Lu

Kun as an equal. The viceroy was furious—Napier was not a merchant

and was thus not allowed in the Factories, let alone on Chinese soil!

After a handful of further blustery communication faux pas from Napier,

on August 16 of that same year Lu Kun ordered an embargo on British

trade. In the official statement that accompanied the edict ordering the

cessation of trade, the viceroy made it clear "that the whole wrong lies on

the barbarian eye [i.e., Lord Napier]."112

These events only hint at the real problems underlying the tension

in Sino-foreign relations. Opium was the focus of most of the problem,

and was either present or perceived as present in all foreign actions—

111Beeching, Opium Wars, 45.

112Williams, Middle Kingdom, vol. II, 472.

42 including missions.113 The circle of trade that drove the British

traffic in opium is well known. Cotton from the mills of Lancashire was

purchased by Indian opium-growers. The opium received in exchange for

the textiles was then sold in China. The immense funds raised here were

then converted into the precious China tea. These coveted leaves were

then brought back to Britain where they were taxed—providing one tenth

of the government's revenue—and then sold at great profit.114 Drug

trade—drug smuggling, given China's unambivalent denouncement of

the trade as illegal—played a vital role in the operation of the British

Empire's economy.

To compound matters, the East India Company's successful

attempts in the previous decade to undersell and drive out competition in

the opium trade left them in 1822 with a surplus of opium (increased

from 600 chests in 1815 to 4000 in 1822) to sell at rather low prices.115

The unfortunate opium-tea trade circle meant that the Chinese market

for the intoxicating paste had to be enlarged. So the trade was

encouraged and, with the opening of trade to all British companies in

1834, it exploded. From the 30,000 chests of opium sold in 1835,

already a marked increase over the 4,244 chests of 1820 and the

stunning18,956 chests of 1830, the volume of trade rocketed to 40,000

113It is hard not to compare this situation with contemporary Chinese mistrust of foreign Christians in China and the false pretenses under which they enter the country.



43 chests of "foreign mud" by 1838.116 Selling opium in China was

"clearly" in Britain's best interest.

But it was not in China's best interests. Chinese culture had never

condoned the use of the drug. In 1800 and again in 1813, the Jiaqing

Emperor had decreed strict prohibitions against the trade. The

Daoguang Emperor, by no means as effective as his predecessor,

nevertheless took actions in the 1820's: foreign ships were searched

outside Whampoa, and Chinese drug dealers were arrested and sent to

prison in Northwestern China. But through the connivances of foreign

smugglers, the unloading and transfer of the paste balls into Chinese

ships at Lintin just below the port of Canton, and the all too willing

corruption (addiction?) of local Chinese officials the trade went on and

blossomed. Court eunuchs and Imperial Guards were found to be

addicted to the drug in 1813. By 1835 China had an estimated two

million opium addicts.117

Perhaps even more threatening to China was the tremendous drain

on specie the illicit trade had created. With the British increase in opium

trade came an increase in China's expenditures of silver in purchase of

the drug. In the 1820's China's economy lost around two million taels of

silver each year to the illicit drug. By the early 1830's that figure had

increased to a staggering nine million taels annually.118 This drain

combined with the phenomenal growth of the Chinese population during

116Jonathan D. Spence, The Search for Modern China (New York: W.W. Norton and Company, Inc., 1990), 149; Beeching, Opium Wars, 38.


118Spence, Modern China, 149.

44 the preceding century to produce alarming inflation. Most serious

of all, was the compounding effect of these silver shortages and the

corruption of the local officials who converted rice and grain tax

payments into silver upon the poor and potentially rebellious peasants

struggling to pay their burdensome taxes.119 Peasant discontent meant

rebellion, and rebellion meant the loss of the tian ming (mandate of

heaven) and dynastic collapse. The opium trade had to be stopped, the

human resources of China preserved, and the precious silver restored to

her economy.

From 1834 until the conclusion of the first Anglo-Chinese War,

Sino-foreign relations were extremely tense and frequently interrupted.

No foreigner was immune to the confusions of these days, least of all the

missionaries. True, Olyphant and Company were free from the taint of

the opium trade and the Americans were less involved in the events than

their British neighbors; nevertheless, it was not good during these days

to be foreign in China, and it was not good for Chinese to interact with

foreigners.

On October 11, 1834 Williams reports that in the wake of Napier's

bombast the mission had been without native language teachers for over

a month. The punishments for teaching foreigners were severe, and it

was fear that kept the teachers away.120 In the same letter, he claims

119Susan Mann Jones and Philip A. Kuhn. "Dynastic decline and the roots of rebellion" in Fairbank and Twitchett, The Cambridge History of China, vol. 10, pt. 1, 129.

120Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 224. Williams to Anderson, October 11, 1834.

45 that Liang Fa was being sought by imperial soldiers.121 A little over

a week later, Liang Fa had been smuggled out through Lintin to Tracy in

Singapore. Chinese types were still not held at the Canton mission for

fear of endangering the mission and the Chinese workers. In fact, "For

the year past, the operations of the printing office in the house, has been

exclusively confined to work done in the English language."122 The few

works that were printed outside the house by Chinese printers "always

demand[ed] caution."123

Compounding the pressures from the Chinese officials came a

series of changes in 1834 internal to the Canton Mission. In May of that

year Tracy was called away to Singapore to maintain the American Board

mission there for Morrison and his son.124 Shortly thereafter, on the

first of August, Dr. Robert Morrison, China's first Protestant missionary,

succumbed to a high fever and passed away in his son John Robert's

arms.125 His loss, though not entirely unexpected was deeply felt by the

small community. Williams found comfort that after almost twenty-

seven years of service—"twenty-three of them alone as to any one

assisting him in China"—Dr. Morrison "was in a frame of mind that was

looking towards his rest and wishing (if it was the Lord's pleasure) to be

121Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 224. Williams to Anderson, October 11, 1834.




125Broomhall, Hudson Taylor, vol. 1, 221.

46 at peace in His kingdom."126 On October 26, 1834 Dr. Peter Parker

arrived as a new member of the American Board mission at Canton to

carry on and expand upon the medical work of Gutzlaff and Morrison.127

August of the next year found things at the mission still more

strained. The Daoguang Emperor had ordered the arrest of any and all

Chinese involved in the manufacture of two "Christian books" he had

discovered. Although the books were almost certainly the fruit of

Gutzlaff's illegal coastal explorations and thus were printed at the LMS

press in Singapore, imperial spies were nevertheless placed at the

entrances and exits of the various buildings of the Canton factories to

closely observe who entered and left, and why they did so—even Macao

was searched and watched by these imperial officers.128 Accordingly,

native Chinese teachers were nonexistent for the missionaries and no

workers could be found to work the mission press.129 In December it

was decided to remove the Bruen Press to Macao where Williams might

work unmolested. In the September 8, 1836 joint letter of the members

of the Canton Mission to the home office of the American Board, the

small band confessed that they had yet to hold any sort of public worship

126Letter to his father from Macao on August 8, 1834. Williams, Life and Letters, 71-2.

127Gulick, Peter Parker, 28.

128Missionary Herald, vol. 32, no. 4 (April 1836), 161; vol. 32, no. 6 (June 1836), 202-3. Events like this can only have served to increase the differences between the American Board and LMS missionaries to China already appearing with the revision of Morrison's Bible. Gutzlaff's brash actions, often with the support of the LMS community in the "wall of light," at times created unintended difficulties for the American Board residents in China.

129Letter to Anderson from Canton on August 20, 1835. Williams, Life and Letters, 76.

47 in Chinese. They also expressed the reasons for their remarkable

caution in distributing and printing Chinese literature.

The distribution of books also has been nearly or quite suspended for the present, it having been agreed that in our peculiar circumstance it would be unjustifiable to involve others in serious danger, without their own consent, by persisting in the attempt to circulate books directly under the eyes of the spies and officers of the government.130

As the members of the Canton Mission understood their position and

God's providence, it was the will of God that they continue to study and

be sequestered "'till more active service be opened."131

Off and on, over the previous four years, members of the Canton

mission had ventured forth outside of Canton and into the countryside to

distribute literature. The number of books taken was usually small—

only what could be carried in a sack slung over the back. This practice

seems to have been engaged in more freely near Macao and its relatively

friendly Portuguese authorities.

Williams records a number of short trips around Macao that were

prompted by a visit from a member of the British and Foreign Bible

Society.132 On one particular such occasion, Mr. Lay and Mr. Williams

set out for a day-trip to one of the islands across from Macao. They

visited one man's home and eventually ended up distributing their

literature to a group of peasants on the roadside. Williams was

130Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 13. Joint letter to Anderson, September 8, 1836.

131Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 13. Joint letter to Anderson, September 8, 1836.

132Letter to Anderson from Macao on November 29, 1836. Williams, Life and Letters, 87-91.

48 encouraged by their eagerness to obtain the books he and Lay

offered. Perhaps still more pleasing to him was the fact that "nothing in

their conduct could be taken as offensive or rude."133 This must have

been a great comfort given all the tensions of official relations between

China and the foreigners. However, to place these evangelistic efforts (of

the sort more typically expected from these early missionaries) in their

proper context, Williams admits that all told these summer excursions

circulated a meager one hundred and fifty volumes.134

Obviously, this was something of a sideline occupation for

Williams. The Repository was as demanding as always, and with the

relocation of the press to Macao came access to the Chinese fonts of the

late East India Company. Williams employed these in the printing of

Medhurst's Chinese Dictionary of the Hokkeen Dialect which had been left

unfinished with the 1834 close of the East India Company. The work

was taxing, as all dictionary work is, but it afforded Williams with an

invaluable amount of language work. It was during these days in Macao

that Williams first practiced his Chinese on a "congregation" of beggars

who would wait for him early Sunday mornings before heading off to beg

at the city gates.135

133Letter to Anderson from Macao on November 29, 1836. Williams, Life and Letters, 89.

134Letter to Anderson from Macao on November 29, 1836. Williams, Life and Letters, 91.

135Williams, Life and Letters, 82. This is most curious: why is the unordained Williams preaching? Clearly this was not an official church setting. Perhaps he is more practically telling them of his faith. Still, though Williams's "congregation" is clearly called so tongue in cheek, he does do more of this sort of preaching in the future. Note that this never replaces his printing and is always a sideline to his main occupations.

49 Again, this is not to suggest that Williams was changing the

nature of his "mission" in China. From the date of his arrival in China

until his amicable parting with the Board, Williams was officially

described as a printer. Thus in 1834 volume thirty of the ABCFM's home

publication the Missionary Herald lists the American Board mission in

China as being composed of three persons performing two distinct

functions: "Rev. Elijah C. Bridgman and Rev. Ira Tracy, Missionaries; S.

Wells Williams, Printer."136 1836 found him still a devoted printer.

Owing to the immense effort involved in printing Medhurst's

dictionary of the Fujianese dialect, Williams through his vocational

labors at the press was in actuality spending most of his time working

with the Chinese language. Indeed, these years in Macao provided

invaluable opportunities for language study for all the members of the

mission. Stevens was involved in Chinese study as well, though he also

contributed to The Repository and was of course responsible for the

Sabbath services in the small foreign church the missionaries had

encovenanted with a few other residents. Parker's ophthalmic hospital

opened in November of 1835 and between medical work and progress in

Chinese language study, he was more than occupied. Bridgman's time

was divided between the revision of Morrison's Bible and the editing of

The Repository.137

136Missionary Herald, vol. 30, no. 1 (January 1834), 6. This was still the case in January of 1842. Missionary Herald, vol. 38, no. 1 (January 1842), 4.

137The above division of labor is recorded by the missionaries themselves in Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1831-1837, vol. 1, no. 12. Joint letter to Anderson, May 2, 1836.

50 On January 5, 1837 Stevens passed away in Singapore while

on a missionary journey.138 This was a severe blow to the little band of

evangelists—now reduced to three. Stevens's ministry to the seamen at

Whampoa was never really recommenced.139 The missionaries

continued undaunted in their labors and in July of 1837, with

Medhurst's dictionary finally finished, Williams joined Gutzlaff and

Parker under Olyphant's nephew King's guidance in a journey to Japan

to assay its prospects with regards to Christian evangelization. And for

the accomplishment of this particular labor, as Williams simply states,

"We carry no books this first time, lest a good beginning be marred by

exciting their fears, but will endeavor to show them the practice of the

Christianity they hate by trying to do good."140

Aboard the ship Morrison once again, Williams was excited at the

prospect of returning seven Japanese sailors who had been shipwrecked

in America to their Eastern homeland. The journey went well enough,

but the ship was rebuffed with cannon immediately upon its arrival in

Edo Bay, and failed to make land anywhere in Japan. The poor lost

sailors returned to Macao more dejected than ever. This was the first

Protestant appraisal of Japan and though the mission itself failed,

Williams upon his return employed the unhappy Japanese in his print

shop and commenced to learn their language. This work with the sailors

138Compare the following: Williams, Life and letters, 91; Latourette, United States and China, 92-3.

139Latourette, United States and China, 92-3.

140Letter to his father from Macao on July 2, 1837. Williams, Life and Letters, 94.

51 produced a translation of the Gospel of Matthew into Japanese and

the first two Japanese Protestant servants of the Lord.141

The next few years were spent by Williams moving between the

study and the press. Most of his day was exhausted in language study:

first the Chinese work, and then the more taxing Japanese lessons (the

Japanese sessions were being conducted without the aid of any

grammars or vocabularies and thus were proving to be exceedingly

difficult). If time remained outside of these endeavors, Williams turned

to the press and the printing of the first portion of Bridgman's tutorial

Chinese Chrestomathy in the Canton Dialect newly completed upon his

return from Japan. Williams took upon himself the task not only of

printing the book, but also of enlarging upon its contents. Before the

volume was completed in 1841 he had invested much time and effort in

collecting authentic Chinese idioms and snippets from Chinese authors,

eventually supplying as much as half of the Chrestomathy's 734

pages.142

The degree to which Williams's life throughout his early years in

China was devoted to the solitary labors of the study is difficult to deny.

If his main release was found in the operation of the press, it must be

acknowledged that the distance from the desk in the study to the desk of

the editor and compositor is very short indeed. Apart from Parker's

hospital and the work amongst the foreign seamen of Whampoa

commenced by Abeel and Stevens, most of the work of the Canton

141For an excellent account of this expedition read Williams, Life and Letters, 93-100.


52 Mission was study. The knowledge these pioneers catalogued,

preserved in works like The Repository and the Chrestomathy, was to

provide invaluable information for those who would come after the doors

of the Middle Kingdom began to open to the outside world.

The late 1830's and early 1840's were filled with ever-increasing

tension as relations between China and the foreigners—especially the

British—pounding on her doors steadily worsened. From the time of

Williams's return from Japan until his departure for the United States in

November of 1844 he continued as best he could in the work of study

and writing. Peter Parker had returned to America in July of 1839,

leaving Williams and Bridgman to continue their work in Macao or

Canton, hoping that American neutrality would preserve their ability to

pursue their studies and writing.

But by 1841 things were really getting out of hand: armed

confrontations had grown increasingly common and disturbingly

destructive since 1839. The arrival of Commissioner Lin as

plenipotentiary at Canton in March of 1839 had signified renewed

determination on the part of the Qing court to curtail the devastating

drug trade.143 Lin's confiscation and destruction of some 20,000 chests

of foreign-grown opium by May of that year only made tangible the

tension which British Captain Elliot's September fourth encounter with

143By far, the best discussion of opium in China—not just its trade—is found in Jonathan D. Spence, Chinese Roundabout (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1992), 228-56.

53 three Chinese junks raised to the level of a war.144 Eventually

Prime Minister Palmerston sent troops and ships,145 Commissioner Lin

was discredited and, after a series of military attacks, sieges, and

blockades, the British dictated a treaty near the mouth of the Grand

Canal at the city of Nanjing on August 29, 1842.146

Williams, as an American, was officially a neutral in these

proceedings, but in as much as all Westerners were equally foreigners in

China, the vicissitudes in relations between the two nations often

impinged on his day-to-day life. From being trapped in the Factories of

Canton with the rest of the foreign community during Commissioner

Lin's opium siege147 and making subsequent moves between Canton and

Macao as circumstances dictated, to witnessing a bombardment outside

of Canton following upon the seizure of fellow missionary Vincent

Stanton,148 Williams experienced the First Anglo-Chinese War as

144Beeching, Opium Wars, 84, 91. Williams puts the exact number of opium chests confiscated by Lin at 20,283, though he mistakenly dates the destruction of the drug cache to "the summer of 1838." From Williams's "Recollections" in Williams, Life and Letters, 103.

145The force sent by Her Majesty's Government proved to bear a striking and curious resemblance to the force recommended and requested by the noted drug lord Jardine. Beeching, Opium Wars, 105.

146The little discussed Treaty of Chuenpi (January 1841)—perhaps not so "unequal" a treaty—was refused by both the British Palmerstonian Home Office and the Son of Heaven in distant Beijing. Beeching, Opium Wars, 126-7.

147Lin was of course also demanding that the British sailor(s) responsible for the murder of Lin Weixi be turned over for execution.

148This bombardment does not seem to be corroborated elsewhere. There were many different small conflagrations during these years, and perhaps Williams has his dates wrong. Letter to his father on August 20, 1840. Williams, Life and Letters, 119.

54 something outside of his life that nevertheless frequently broke into

his daily routine.

His reaction and comments following the Chinese attempts to curb

the British and foreign importation of opium serve well to illuminate the

strength of his aversion to the drug trade and his desire to avoid conflict,

as well as the nature his great trust in Providence.

Following Commissioner Lin's siege of the factories and seizure of

the opium, Williams wrote a passionate letter to the home office in

Boston.149 Noting with graphic disgust how opium was "destroying the

bodies of the Chinese by the thousands" and how it "steeped them with

the odor of the grave and soon introduced them to its precincts,"

Williams "rejoic[ed] at the check this trade has received [at Commissioner

Lin's hands]." Contrary to modern arguments that for Williams and the

early missionaries "the concept of national sovereignty was not applicable

to the Chinese,"150 Williams writes pointedly in this same letter of his

earnest hope that the people of England would

149Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1, no. 168. Williams to Anderson, May 17, 1839.

150Stuart Creighton Miller's confusion on this point seems to arise from his assumption that unlike papers today, The Repository printed only editorials it completely agreed with. Though this is generally true, The Repository's overseas situation made it atypical. Like the "job printing" Williams carried on his press to support the mission, The Repository made concessions to the merchants to draw their interest, influence them and secure their subscription. Additionally, the pages were many and the writers were few—contributions were always appreciated. For Miller's nuance free reading of the missionaries as monolithic war-mongers see Stuart Creighton Miller, "Ends and Means: Missionary Justification of Force in Nineteenth Century China," John King Fairbank, ed.,The Missionary Enterprise in China and America (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974), 249-82 (The quote can be found on page 250). Regarding nuances, letters written in 1839 and after show a marked difference in attitude towards the war between Williams and Bridgman, and a still larger distance between these two and the caustic Parker.

55 …overlook any little [Chinese] breach of the so called law of nations in considering [Chinese] efforts to throw off such an incubus of death. Our prayer is that God, whose hand is so signally visible will overrule all the changes to his own glory, and the good of China.151

This is not another supposedly typical "good will come out of evil"

platitude of the sort so frequently dismissed by modern readers.152 The

good of China is specifically the elimination of opium and Williams is

writing precisely to express his disgust at the peddling of this destructive

paste. His disgust rapidly overrides any concern for that popular tool of

exploitation “the so called law of nations.” And yet without denying or

avoiding the real injustices of the opium trade and its defense, Williams

ultimately hopes that God will glorify Himself through these events.153

The justifications and motivations for British aggression in China—

so inextricably linked to the drug trade—were far from "wholeheartedly"

endorsed by Williams.154 Though he was fully aware of the benefits a

151Note Williams's cynicism regarding the "so called law of nations." Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1, no. 168. Williams to Anderson, May 17, 1839.

152Williams believed that people who resorted to such pithy sayings sought "only a sheer excuse for leaving themselves in indolence." Letter to his father from Macao on April 26, 1841. Williams, Life and Letters, 122.

153This is "hope" in the most technical Biblical sense. He looks expectantly towards something that will certainly come. This confounding of modern understandings of hope (e.g., "I hope I win the lottery") with the missionary's own sense of hope is an example of the difficulties modern redactors of the missionaries face when evaluating their actions and especially their motives.

154Besides being a generalization, Tong's claim that the missionaries "wholeheartedly desired a British victory" grossly misrepresents the mood and attitude of Williams and others regarding the war. England was favored, if at all, only because a British loss seemed to mean the complete cessation of missions in China—after which China might close up entirely like Japan. This fear, however, by no means makes all of the missionaries fans of the British cause, or of the British means. This caveat clearly applies to Williams. Cf. any of the immediately preceding and following letters with Te-

56 more open China might present to the dissemination of the Gospel,

he writes that he is

…far from being sure that this turn up [i. e., Sino-British hostilities] is going to advance the Gospel half so much as we think it is. England has taken the opium trade upon herself nationally, and can that be a cause to bless? For the success of her arms here would extend that wicked traffic ten thousand times more than the Church is ready to extend her stakes here. The 50,000 chests now annually brought to China would rise to hundreds of thousands shortly, and only think of the destruction of it.…155

Williams is not a warmonger, blind to the injustice of the British casus

belli. On the contrary, he is very realistic regarding the dangers and the

great possibilities of the apparently inevitable British victory, and seems

to sense the greater magnitude of the dangers. But the intimate

familiarity with Scripture which Williams accumulated during his days

as a Sunday school scholar in Utica told him that in spite of the

wickedness in human hearts, God will save.156 His belief in God’s

sustaining Providence is expressed well in his later life when he writes

regarding the American Civil War that "God's hand will guide and uphold

his own ark and forward his own purpose, for he sees the end from the

beginning."157

This period from Williams's 1839 return from Edo Bay, Japan

until his return to the States in 1844 marked Williams's introduction

kong Tong, United States Diplomacy in China, 1844-60 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964), 25.

155Letter to his father from Macao on April 26, 1841. Williams, Life and Letters, 122.

156At an older age, Williams began to look back on life with the view that God often mingles his judgments and his mercies. See Williams, Life and Letters, 325, 357.


57 into international politics. Though little mention is made of

Williams's role in the drafting of the American 1844 Treaty of Wangxia,

the letter of thanks he personally received from Caleb Cushing suggests

that the translations he contributed to the negotiation process were of

some worth.158

Nevertheless, given his future political involvement, Williams's

comments during these events are surprisingly non-political.

The bonds of social intercourse among the Chinese are strong for a healthy nation, and God's hand should be seen in thus forming their social polity; but it is not based on the knowledge of His truth, His designs to a world through His son, nor on His overruling Providence. It is better to leave all these cases in His hands; we are quite willing to do so when they look favorably, but we think we must help Him a little in caring, when we think the prospect is gloomy and troublesome to ourselves.159

Remarks such as the above are common in his writings and consistently

show Williams’s habit of looking towards God rather than humankind to

deliver humans from their own evil. This is neither idealistic or naive, for

it is founded upon the knowledge that it is God who is accomplishing His

will.160 Even towards the end of the climactic events of 1842, Williams

continues to look for God's "gracious guidance" so that the approaching

changes expected with the close of hostilities might be accomplished

"without that fermentation which will probably send it [into atoms]…",


159Letter to his father on August 20, 1840. Williams, Life and Letters, 121.

160Nor is this to be seen as otherworldly: as shown above, he is clearly aware of what it is that man is doing here. Notice again that this balanced "Christian realism" draws its limited confidence from faith in God's faithful ability to sustain and direct, rather than from trust in prophecies either specific or general (see below for Williams and millennialism).

58 and that God would rather "preserve them [the Chinese] in unity

and [lead] them to high places in his kingdom!"161 Here again Williams

is acutely aware of the real possibility of dangerous fragmentation within

a changing China. But still he hopes.

This hope cannot be brushed aside. How different this hope

appears from either the cynicism of the modern politician or the naive

idealism with which missions is often tacitly credited. When Williams

looked to God to accomplish His perfect will in history he was facing the

trials and struggles of life head on—not brushing them under a divine

rug. God would bring sense and meaning out of human evil and

meaninglessness. As Williams grew older and increasingly involved in

international politics this same home-grown faith in the One who

providentially sustains continued to shape his actions and outlook.

161Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1, no. 86. Williams to Anderson, May 12, 18[4]2. This text was difficult to read due to unusually unclear handwriting—the written date appears to be 1862— and a damaged original letter.

59

CHAPTER FOUR

"Doing Good In Any Line"

The days that Williams passed during the events of the First Anglo-

Chinese War were largely occupied with writing, editing and printing The

Repository, as well as writing, editing and printing both a dictionary of

the mandarin dialect and small introductory grammar for those striving

to learn the Chinese language.162

In November of 1844 Williams was finally given the opportunity he

had been seeking for quite some time to visit his home once again.

Renowned merchant Gideon Nye generously offered Williams a passage

to the States by way of the Middle East and Europe.163 Though Nye was

never able join Williams, the trip was a joy to the youthful man and

provided valued exposure to the wider world as well as a tremendous

opportunity to pursue the purchase of a set of Chinese or Manchu types

for the Mission press.164 Though his searches in Europe were

frustrated, he found upon returning to the States that the Hon. Walter

Lowrie of the Presbyterian Board of Missions was willing to help Williams

162The two works are titled Ying hwa yun-fu lih-kiai (An English and Chinese Vocabulary in the Court Dialect ) and Easy Lessons in Chinese, respectively.

163Williams, Life and Letters, 131ff.

164Over the course of this year-long trip Williams spent two weeks with D. O. Allen in Bombay, travelled the Holy Land extensively, collected books for the Canton Mission library, and indulged his life-long habit of observing and collecting natural specimens.

60 in his pursuit of the movable Chinese type.165 Williams noted, also,

that his services were much in demand by the various mission societies

seeking to broaden their knowledge through soliciting lectures—and

these societies would gladly pay for his tales and statistics.

Accordingly, Williams gave himself to this work wholeheartedly

traveling frequently throughout the Northeast and as far West as Ohio.

Between 1845 and 1846 Williams delivered some one hundred lectures of

various length and content.166 In late 1846 he moved in with his

brother H. Dwight in New York and began the immense project of turning

the notes of those myriad lectures into a volume of general knowledge on

China. As he wrote and lectured, Williams's knowledge became

increasingly well known, and his contacts and relations expanded taking

him to New Haven quite frequently and getting him elected to the

American Oriental Society.

The most significant of these expanded relations was commenced

at his brother's house when Williams was introduced to Miss Sarah

Walworth, daughter of a New York chancellor. On May 29, 1847, after

only the briefest of acquaintances, the thirty-four year old Williams wrote

to young Miss Sarah:

In a word, my chief object in proposing a correspondence is to learn whether you are disposed to engage in the good work of missions and are willing to consider any proposal to accompany me.167



167Letter to Miss Walworth from St. Johnsbury on May 29, 1847. Williams, Life and Letters, 152.

61 She accepted this "proposal" and their correspondence rapidly grew

into love. On Thanksgiving Day, 1847 the two were married in Miss

Walworth's hometown of Plattsburgh New York.168

The publication and distribution in early 1848 of the first edition of

Williams's The Middle Kingdom marked a significant event in the history

of the Western study of China. Williams's main goal as stated in both

the original and revised editions of the text was "to divest the Chinese

people and civilization of that peculiar and indefinable impression of

ridicule which has been so generally given them by foreign authors."169

This the book did so most admirably, debunking many of China's more

"colorful" practices, and providing a wealth of information reflecting

surprisingly well the actual circumstances of life in nineteenth century

China. The book was well received and rapidly became a staple for

sinologists for nearly half a century. Perhaps due to the knowledge

evinced in the pages of The Middle Kingdom, Union College saw fit to

confer the honorary degree of LL. D. upon Williams in the summer of

1848.170 On June 1 of that year, he and his wife Sarah left New York

bound for Canton.171

168Though her good character is attested to regularly, details of her life with Williams are few. Something of the quality of her relationship with Williams can be adduced from his moving account of her death. See Williams, Life and Letters, 442-444. Neither Williams nor his son mention the Walworth family's associations with revivalistic Catholicism or Charels Finney.

169Williams, Middle Kingdom, vol. 1, xiv.


171Given that their first son Walworth was born on October 18, 1848—only one month after their arrival in China—it would appear that Mrs. Williams spent three of the last four months of her first pregnancy aboard ship traveling half way around the world!

62 When Williams returned to China, in spite of the agreeable

absence of the constrictive Cohong system of trade, Williams returned to

very much the same labors as had absorbed him before the Sino-British

war. According to the treaties signed between China and the various

foreign nations in the early 1840's, foreigners were now accountable to

their own national laws and courts while living in China and guaranteed

the right to live and trade not just in Canton, but in four other ports

(Shanghai, Amoy, Ningbo and Fuzhou) along China's coast. Foreigners

were also allowed to secure Chinese nationals for the purposes of

learning the Chinese language. Perhaps more significantly, and due

largely to the negotiations of the French prior to the signing of the Treaty

of Whampoa in October of 1844, the Daoguang Emperor was moved to

issue an edict finally lifting the official ban on Catholic religion in

China.172 According to the memorial presented by the Imperial

negotiator Qiying to the Emperor on behalf of the French legation,

all natives and foreigners without distinction, who learn and practise the religion of the Lord of Heaven, and do not excite trouble by improper conduct, [should] be exempted from criminality.173

At the same time, this document also made clear that any attempts to

"enter the country[side] to propagate religion" would be construed as

criminal actions. On December 22, 1845, just after Williams had

172This ban had been in effect since 1722 and the edicts of Kang Xi and his son (q.v. Chapter Two above). Though it has been well established that local Chinese officials rarely supported Daoguang's edict for various reasons ranging from ignorance, confusion, and hostility to graft and discrimination, little attention has been given to the fact that for the missionaries this edict meant that their evangelistic endeavors were finally condoned by the Chinese government within the five ports. They rejoiced in this new freedom.

173Williams, Middle Kingdom, vol. II, 356ff.

63 commenced his first return journey to the States, Qiying expanded

the rescript to apply to Protestants as well.

For Williams with his new family, all of these changes meant first

of all that upon his return to China, he was free to secure housing

outside of the factories. This brought him into more normal day-to-day

relations with the citizens in and around Canton. He was also able to

legally secure a language teacher, as well as to engage in public worship

in the Chinese language. Such services had commenced immediately

upon the repeal of the ban, and Williams immediately joined in these

Sabbath meetings.174 Additionally, Bridgman had removed to the now

accessible Shanghai to open a new mission station there while

completing the so-called Delegates Version of Morrison's New

Testament.175

This last development meant that the full responsibility for

producing The Repository fell almost exclusively on Williams's shoulders.

This was so until the close of its run and required immense amounts of

time and energy. Williams consistently contributed a large portion of the

material and did all the editing and proofing; on one occasion he

singlehandedly authored an entire edition of the magazine from cover to

174Once again, it is not clear how Williams's lack of ordination played itself out in these situations. Was he preaching under another's authority? The simplest answer would be that praxis simply overruled whatever objections right doctrine might have voiced. Yet it cannot be forgotten that Williams consistently maintained that he was not ordained and repeatedly resisted Anderson's pleas for his ordination (see below).

175Letters exchanged at this time between Williams and Anderson suggest that Williams heartily disagreed with Bridgman's desires to open another station. This disagreement, as well as Bridgman's solitary nature and reluctance to act and preach, contributed to the sense of distance the two men's relationship acquired in later years.

64 cover.176 Adding his other writing projects—dictionaries, language

primers, and his annual Anglo-Chinese Calendar—it is clear that the

general nature of his work in the mission had actually changed little

since his efforts before the first treaties. Between the labors of the

study, an overwhelming and growing correspondence, the requirements

of the press, his Sabbath services at Dr. Parker's Canton hospital, and

his new fatherly responsibilities with his own babies, Williams observed

that he had "almost no time to eat."177

As Williams continued his work in Canton and Macao for the next

five years, China began to experience convulsions which perhaps have

yet to run their full course. 1850 saw the death of the Daoguang

Emperor and the ascension of his arrogant and xenophobic son, the

Xianfeng Emperor. His stubbornness would require China to learn again

the lessons of the last two decades. At the same time, rebellion was

growing increasingly common and difficult to suppress within the Middle

Kingdom. When the events in China collided violently with the desires of

the Western nations for the second time in the nineteenth century,

Williams would find himself placed right in their midst.

176Though this is claimed by Williams's son, I have been unable by use of the index to ascertain either its veracity or the volume of The Repository to which it supposedly applies. Williams, Life and Letters, 168.

177Williams, Life and Letters, 172. Nor were the responsibilities of fatherhood taken lightly by Williams, or relegated entirely to his dear Sarah. As he writes upon his son Walworth's birth, "It is a new sensation to hear the wailing of one's own child and feel that an immortal spirit has been entrusted to our care to bring up in the fear of God and consecrate to his service. I feel as if this dear boy was more in my keeping than all the Chinese, and that his salvation more depended upon me than upon any other person." Letter to his brother from Canton on February 24, 1849. Williams, Life and Letters, 164.

65 In 1852 the first of a series of events that would lead to an

apparent change in vocation for Williams came to pass. First and

perhaps most important, Williams brought to a close the twenty year run

of The Chinese Repository. By this time, the special information the

Repository sought to provide its readers was no longer in such great

demand. The cost of the journal was as high as ever, and the demand

was very low—"only 300 subscribers at three dollars each, which hardly

paid the workmen's wages."178 At the same time, Williams noticed the

great difficulty involved in getting anyone not already sympathetic with

the cause to read religious materials. Thus, in a letter written to his

brother William F. Williams, a missionary to Mesopotamia, Williams

writes "I find my confidence in distributing tracts lessening, especially

when unaccompanied with oral teaching."179

Meanwhile, Williams was facing pressure from the Home Office of

the American Board. In his communications with Rufus Anderson there

occurred an extensive discussion beginning in 1850 regarding primarily

The Repository and the operations of the press at Canton but also the

continuation of Williams as "printer." The first question involved

conflicting understandings of missions, while the second involved the

more personal questions of vocation. These two themes played

themselves out over the rest of Williams's life as he apparently left

missions for politics, and then left China for New Haven.180

178From Williams's "Recollections" in Williams, Life and Letters, 178.

179Letter to his brother William from Canton on December 25, 1851. Williams, Life and Letters, 178.

180The first of these two changes will be discussed below, while space requires that the second transition be left for further study. I am suggesting that neither change

66 To gain an adequate understanding of Williams's approach to

missions, the prevailing sympathies of the organization which called and

sent him must first be examined. The same climate of both fear and

promise which spawned the Sunday school movement at the beginning of

the nineteenth century also contributed to the rise of foreign missions

and the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions in

particular. From the "haystack prayer meeting" of 1806, to the

organization of the "Brethren" at Williams College, on to Andover

Seminary and the 1809-10 appeal to the General Association of

Massachusetts to send American Christians overseas, the story of the

birth of the ABCFM is well known and well documented.181 A brief

review of this story highlights the theological currents swirling around its

foundations.

The turn of the century marked the arrival of the Second Great

Awakening as witnessed in the revivals which swept the country. The

various theological debates and the impiety they represented, the

ascendancy of Jeffersonian heresy, the French Revolution, and the

prevalence of war—all things which would lead later to the blossoming of

the Sunday schools—were all factors which drove ministers to call their

flocks to repentance. During this initial period—prior to the Cane Ridge

revivals of Kentucky—these New England revivals "centered on the

Congregational and Presbyterian campuses where Edwardsian ideas

reflects a change in Williams's goal to serve God, help China, and further His Gospel in China.

181On the Haystack prayer meeting see ABCFM, The Haystack Centennial: Ninety-Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Board. (Boston: ABCFM, 1907), 3-4. For general history of the American Board see Rufus Anderson, Memorial Volume of the First Fifty Years of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, 5th ed. (Boston: The Board, 1862).

67 dominated."182 The American Board of Commissioners for Foreign

Missions was a direct product of these theological surges.

In 1798 a young man by the name of Samuel Mills, Jr. was

converted during one of his father's sermons and became a devoted

follower of the radical Calvinism of Hopkins so prevalent at the turn of

the century.183 Mills entered Williams College, soon to be rocked by

revival, and began to pray regularly with a handful of other similarly

effected young men. Caught out of cover during a thunderstorm during

one eventful prayer meeting, the men sought shelter near a haystack.

Out of that evening of prayer arose the secret society of "The Brethren."

Begun in September of 1808, its object was "to effect, in the persons of

its members, a mission or missions to the heathen."184 The organization

and its papers moved quietly to the newly formed Andover Theological

Seminary with Mills and there it prospered.

The seminary at Andover was created as a response to all of the

controversies facing the church in New England at the opening of the

nineteenth century. The election of non-Trinitarian Henry Ware to the

Hollis Professorship of Divinity at Harvard was the final straw for the

orthodox Calvinists of Massachusetts. The orthodox journal The

Panoplist was begun, and in 1807 donations were accepted to form a

theological institution at Phillips Academy in Andover. Young men and

182J. A. De Jong, As the Waters Cover the Sea: Millennial Expectations and the Rise of Anglo-American Missions, 1640-1810 (n.p.: J. H. Kok N. V. Kampen, 1970), 223.

183Mills's father and his town had been touched by revivals in the neighboring towns. Jong, Millennial Expectations, 223.

184Anderson, Memorial Volume, 39.

68 professors flocked to the school in reaction to the recent gains of

liberal religion.

The Panoplist was started with the original purpose in mind of

countering the heterodox claims of sectarian religion. Owing largely to

the great tension and passion the battles within Congregationalism had

engendered, The Panoplist soon earned a large readership. Under the

inspiration of its founder Jedediah Morse, the magazine gave regular

notice of various missionary accomplishments. For its articles, The

Panoplist regularly used material from the various British missionary

journals such as The London Evangelical Magazine and The London

Christian Observer.185 Thus along with a fresh account of the latest

salvoes in the theological battles reshaping post-revolutionary America

came an introduction to world missions. These tales of European

adventurers in exotic lands served not only to inspire American

Christians with stories of heroism and self-sacrifice for the Gospel but

also to reveal the relative impiety of the American church—especially

when compared with her missions-minded British sister.

It was while at the Andover Theological Seminary in 1809 and

1810 that Mills and a handful of his compatriots appealed to the

Massachusetts General Assembly to found a foreign missions

organization. Their plea was accepted and the American Board of

Commissioners for Foreign Missions came into existence. The seminary,

the The Panoplist, and the American Board all demonstrated a degree of

cooperation between the Hopkinsians and other Calvinists. Though all

185O. W. Elsbree, The Rise of the Missionary Spirit in America, 1790-1815, (Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1980), 95.

69 these efforts sought primarily the eradication of all heterodox

doctrine, there was also a missions emphasis explicit within all these

projects which was derivative of the millennialism implicit in the

revivalism which had so recently swept through the orthodox camps.

In the wake of Edwards and his chiliastic eschatology, it was

difficult to be a turn-of-the century Christian and not to think in

millennial terms. Those who sought to avoid the issue were too often lost

in the hype that naturally followed and repeated the frequent statements

of men such as Bellamy, Hopkins, Griffin, Nott and the promises of

"Theophilus" in the pages of The Panoplist. Drawing upon the

calculations of Edwards and Hopkins regarding the length of the ages

and the exact timing of the out pouring of the sixth bowl of Revelation

16:12, Theophilus promised that the final reformation was coming and

the age of unparalleled evangelistic success was at hand: the mission

age had dawned.186 Samuel Hopkins, meanwhile, had calculated in 1793

that the end of the age would come in 1866—leaving little time for

evangelism—based upon the words of Revelation, the 1517 date of the

Reformation and the proper age of the earth.187

Such prognosticating and prophetic interpretation surrounded the

ABCFM from its very instigation. In their 1811 annual "Address to the

Christian Public…", Morse, Worcester, and Evarts of the Board

interpreted all the social, political, economic and natural signs of their

days in terms of the approaching millenium.188 Leonard Woods, in his

186Jong, Millennial Expectations, 217-8.

187Elsbree, Missionary Spirit, 126-127.

188Jong, Millennial Expectations, 226.

70 February 6, 1812 ordination sermon for the first missionaries sent

out by the Board, took stock of the events of his days and promised his

hearers that "All the passing events of the civil and religious world, in

connection with prophecy, indicate the approach of better days."189 The

role which millennial expectations played in the American foundation of

its foreign mission societies—and especially the American Board—is

difficult to ignore.

These theological suppositions were expressed well by Timothy

Dwight in a sermon delivered to the American Board at their fourth

annual meeting. First of all, missions was to bring about "the glorious

end of redemption." Moreover, this millennium "…is advancing; it is

hastening;" and through fervency of labors in the mission field this

glorious day of worldly and eternal peace, wealth and unity would be

brought about. This "great harvest of the world" was drawing to an end

in the next two centuries and, though victory was assured, there was still

much work to do.190

These feelings were shared by Rufus Anderson when he took on

Evarts's field correspondence from the Home Office. In the same year

that S. Wells Williams's father William received the request from the

American Board for a young healthy printer, the American Board itself

received Anderson as its new young healthy corresponding secretary and

189Jong, Millennial Expectations, 225.

190The preceding paraphrase comes from Timothy Dwight, A Sermon, Delivered in Boston, September 16, 1813. Before the American Board of Commissioners, for foreign Missions, at their Fourth Annual Meeting, in Charles L. Chaney, The Birth of Missions in America (South Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 1976), 282-5.

71 board member.191 Throughout much of the long and distinguished

history of the American Board, Anderson was the guiding ideologue and

visionary behind its operations.

As late as 1869, Anderson was still convinced that "the 'fullness of

time' has come for the commanded and predicted publication of the

gospel through the world."192 Largely due to these expectations of the

"promised advent of the Spirit" Anderson was driven to call for the

dissolution of subsidiary means of evangelism and for the promotion of

untiring preaching of the gospel.193 This, of course, is the so-called

"Apostolic model" of evangelism for which he is so well known. For

Anderson and the American Board he so indelibly influenced, education,

hospitals, and welfare work were not to be the primary means of

evangelism. Rather,

The object and work of the missionary are preeminently spiritual.… And the means he employs in this ministry of reconciliation, are as singular and spiritual as the end he has in view. He preaches the cross of Christ. …[his] grand agent is oral instruction.194

Williams shared neither Anderson's understanding of mission nor the

insipid millennialism with which it was undergird. These issues found

191R. Pierce Beaver, ed., To Advance the Gospel: Selections from the Writings of Rufus Anderson (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967), 11.

192Rufus Anderson, Foreign Missions: Their Relations and Claims (New York: Charles Scribner and Company, 1869), 27.

193This is seen clearly in Anderson's The Promised Advent of the Spirit—a cogent and well-thought out melding of practical missionary exhortation and "rightly dividing the ages." For his rather typical and orthodox Edwardsian use of scripture see §3, ¶4 of The Promised Advent of the Spirit in Beaver, To Advance the Gospel, 47ff.

194Quoted from Anderson's 1845 sermon The Theory of Missions to the Heathen in Beaver, To Advance the Gospel, 77-79. Italics are Anderson's.

72 expression in their disagreement over the nature of mission

employment as recorded in an unusually abrasive letter written by

Williams to Anderson in November of 1850.195

Over the course of this lengthy letter Williams defended his

operation of the press while berating the American Board first of all for

requiring him to "defend" his service at all, and second of all for their

inconsistent policies. He was sent as a free agent with little instruction

and now he was being judged for not doing in hindsight what they now

suggested might have been a better procedure. Moreover, Anderson's

multiple changes of opinion on the efficacy of The Repository—and

especially his admission that it was a good and constructive venture but

just not an acceptable labor for American Board missionaries—seemed to

ring increasingly hollow in Williams's ears.196 Finally, the Canton

Mission's willingness to accept "secular jobs" for its press was questioned

by Anderson, even though Williams and Bridgman had repeatedly stated

how insufficient their funds were to cover their expenses.197 Their

careful ingenuity had repaid debts owed to merchants, carefully avoided

195This is an incredibly important letter, revealing schisms that perhaps helped move Williams away from ordination while at the same time encouraging him to examine other modes of service. Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1846-60, vol. 1, no. 307. Williams to Anderson, November 1, 1850. Though it is an irrelevant point in Williams's estimation, hindsight finds Williams's passing remark that his press is run just as D. O. Allen runs his Bombay press to be quite significant.

196Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1846-60, vol. 1, no. 307. Williams to Anderson, November 1, 1850.

197At this time the American Board is facing financial constraints and urging economy upon its missionaries. Williams points out in this same letter that the Canton mission has never had sufficient funds to operate without the income from the job work of the press. Also, Williams was "somewhat at a loss to know" what Anderson meant "by the phrase 'secular job.'" Surely printing tracts and Sacred Scriptures were not to be classified as mere jobs? That was not how he conceived of his labors in the China field!

73 condoning or aiding the opium trade in any way, and covered the

expenses of the mission which the Board had repeatedly shown itself

unable to do. If these "subsidiary means" were seen as a distraction to

true missions by Anderson and his peers within the wood paneled offices

of Boston, Williams saw them as the means of influencing both foreign

and Chinese sinners for Christ, and often times the only way to put food

on the mission's tables! In Williams's eyes, the Canton Mission was

being betrayed by its officers.

Though Williams certainly shared Anderson's respect for the oral

preaching of the Gospel—as his doubts regarding the efficacy of tracts

demonstrate—and he certainly shared Anderson's desire to "preach the

cross of Christ," he was less ready to dismiss subsidiary means of

evangelism.

In an early semi-annual joint letter of the mission, Williams as

author pens an unequivocal call for the furtherance of what he calls

"preparatory labors" which he says would be just as much needed if

China were fully accessible. These labors include both the effort to "give

correct information regarding China" and the attempts to supply "the

sick and helpless much needed and charitable aid as will soften their

hearts and remove their prejudices against foreigners."198 A year and a

half later finds him praising the practiced piety of his friend Olyphant—a

merchant by vocation and clearly not an ordained missionary. "The

198Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1, no. 9. Joint letter to Anderson, March 7, 1837.

74 missionary teaches, but such persons live, the Gospel in a manner

more fully understood and appreciated."199

Additionally, it seems as if Williams did not share the millennial

focus of his supporters in Boston. Certainly, he lacked the theological

education of the founders of the American Board. And yet he was clearly

a man well versed in the words of Scripture. Given the exhaustive

nature of his Sunday school experiences, it is striking that Williams

chose not to interpret the events he was witnessing in terms of Biblical

prophecy.200 After having passed through war and the forcible opening

of a heathen nation to the nations of Christendom, Williams has no

grand statements regarding fulfilled prophecy. Indeed, before the

conclusion of the hostilities of the first Anglo-Chinese War, Williams

looks simply to Providence and is in fact thankful that "one cannot pry

into futurity."201

This simple faith in God's guiding and sustaining hand leads

Williams to draw different conclusions about the nature of missions

work. He was, after all, sent as a printer and not a missionary. And as

he approached his twentieth year in the service of the American Board, it

seemed to him that given the great challenges facing evangelism in

199Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1., no. 18. Joint letter to Anderson in Williams's hand, October 5, 1838.

200I have only found one instance, in a letter to a supporter in Utica written from Beijing in 1868, where Williams uses the word "millennium." He discusses the requirement that the Gospel be preached in all nations, notes recent progress in this regard, and then concludes that this progress makes makes him "the more willing to bide God's time in this undertaking which seems immense only to our little selves." Letter to Mrs. H. C. Wood from Tremont Temple, Beijing on June 29, 1868. Williams, Life and Letters, 375.

201See also the discussion above regarding the opium trade. Letter to his father of August 20, 1840. Williams, Life and Letters, 121.

75 China, "subsidiary means, like schools and hospitals, in which to

teach and practice the principles of Christianity, are worthy of not a little

care." He had seen first hand the remarkable success of Parker's

hospital wherein "the Gospel is constantly made known."202

This is by no means saying that Williams was unaware of or

eschewed theology when approaching missions. He knew, for instance,

that often times too much stress was given to what would later come to

be called the "social gospel."203 He understood the imperative to preach.

In a revealing and private letter to Anderson in 1849 Williams confesses

his frustration with Bridgman's unwillingness to preach the Gospel out

loud: the man spent so much time in his study and was so circumspect

and withdrawn outside of it that Williams wondered how he expected to

share Christ with anyone!204 But at the same time Williams still saw the

practical opportunities which hospitals and schools provided for

interacting with natives and for gaining their trust and respect.

Williams’s discussion with Anderson was rooted in certain

theological suppositions, but they were not the specific prophetic

interpretations so influential in the popular theologies of those days.

Rather, Williams's theology had at its center the guiding providence of

202Letter written to his brother William on June 21, 1852. Williams, Life and Letters, 180.

203Later, in 1864, Williams penned an essay for the Observer making clear his stand on "The Gospel and Civilization—Which is to Go First?" For Williams, the question is simple: the Gospel goes first. Missions are necessary to protect pagans from the evils of "pseudo-civilization" (those with the advantages of Western civilization and technology but feeling "no sense of weakness of wickedness such as the Bible describes." Letter to the Editors of the New York Observer from Beijing on January 11, 1864. Williams, Life and Letters, 351-354.

204Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1846-60, vol. 1, no. 291. Williams to Anderson, January 29, 1849.

76 the God who faithfully accomplished his will throughout all of

history. As far as what methods were best suited for evangelism,

Williams acknowledged simply that "it is difficult to tell beforehand what

will prove the most promising path." So he worked where he was, doing

what he could, following the paths that seemed most expedient while all

the while trusting that God would use him and ensure that His will

would be accomplished.

Williams’s trust was founded on the faithful and utterly reliable

saving acts of God in the Bible. In a beautiful passage which

demonstrates Williams's familiarity with scripture while at the same time

showing his distance from the prophetic interpreters of the previous

generation, the printer from New York explains his reason for continuing

as a Christian to participate in whatever work God might bring before

him.

Blessed is the work of doing good in any line; all finally run into the same Sea of Glass where its earthly agents wil one day be so happy in casting their crowns before Jesus, that they wil quite forget discussions as to whose rill was straightest, and deepest, and had the purest water.205

These comments are particularly moving in light of the other pressures

Williams was feeling from the Board. On top of the question regarding

the continuance of the press and the hospital, Anderson also urged

Williams to be ordained as a minister and missionary.206

205Letter written to his brother William on June 21, 1852. Williams, Life and Letters, 181.

206Williams still resisted being ordained—his vocation was books and printing. This again raises the fascinating question of Williams's preaching and ministering to the local Chinese. Was Anderson aware of this? We assume he was. Perhaps Williams preached, but refrained from sacramental functions as a proper Presbyterian. Or perhaps—more likely and still more controversial—Williams was being influenced by the

77 Before these debates could be settled, however, Williams

found himself swept away by a scheme he had little part in instigating

and little desired to participate in. On April 6, 1853 Commodore

Matthew C. Perry sailed in to Hong Kong harbor and marked the second

signpost pointing towards a new vocation in Williams's life. On the basis

of Williams's 1837 abortive trip to Japan, his experience with the

Japanese sailors and his meager scripture translations into Chinese, the

government of the United States requested that he accompany Perry on a

diplomatic mission to Japan as official interpreter. Williams felt grossly

under qualified—1837 was a long time ago—but he eventually agreed.

This time the journey was a success. The party was eventually

received, Williams set foot on Japanese soil, and he immediately began to

catalog its unique natural characteristics. Owing to centuries of Dutch

trade out of Nagasaki and the presence of a number of Dutch speaking

sailors amongst Perry's fleet, Williams's meager Japanese was not so

much tested, as given the opportunity to develop without any diplomatic

pressures whatsoever. The mission returned after two months and

promised to revisit Japan a year hence to establish treaty relations with

the Japanese Emperor.207

Upon his return to Macao on August 7, 1853, Williams resumed

immediately and without regret his labors in the chapel and his work on

ecumenism which so rightly affects those who serve the gospel outside of their own homes. As early as 1836, Williams had already developed what he called "a great disrelish of those sectarian terms of denominations which are used in Western lands…. Dr. Morrison never called himself any other than a Christian missionary, and I'm sure I don't know today what denomination of dissenters he did favor." Williams, Life and letters, 93.

207An account of this journey composed almost entirely of Williams's letters and journal entries can be found in Williams, Life and Letters, 183-198.

78 a "Tonic Dictionary" of Chinese and English. Missions work was

largely unhindered except where opium—"the bane of China"—was to be

found, although by this time the Taiping Rebels had captured Nanjing

and were moving quite threateningly towards Beijing. Williams

suspected that the Taiping might actually succeed in overturning the

Manchu foreign dynasty. He was hopeful that whatever change occurred

would bring good—though this is on account of God's overruling hand

which "can make them advance His cause," and not due to any

disillusions about the Taiping beliefs which were confounded with "much

that savors of Mohammedanism and paganism."208

These were very chaotic times for China. Inflation, specie drain,

taxation, corruption, rebellion and natural disaster were combining and

recombining in devastating proportions. When the Yellow River changed

its course on July 5, 1853 nature added her terrible judgment to the

criticisms China's people had been offering for almost a century. In 1795

a group of displaced peasants in the mountainous regions of

Southwestern China had set up their own defenses and administration

invoking the name of an ancient Buddhist sect called the White Lotus.

With their cry "the officials force the people to rebel," these rebels

struggled and fought against the Imperial forces for ten years, unable to

feed themselves on marginal land, unable to find unpopulated tillable

land, and thus unable to bear the official tax burden.209 This same

millennial Buddhist teaching had justified a similar rebellion in

208Letter to his brother on August 20, 1853. Williams, Life and Letters, 201.

209John King Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution, 1800-1985 (New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1986), 64.

79 Shandong Province only twenty years before.210 In fact, rebellion

plagued much of the Qianlong Emperor's reign (1736-96) covering the

entire countryside from the 1780's Heaven and Earth Society revolt

which rocked Taiwan (then still part of the Middle Kingdom), to the

multiple Muslim revolts which erupted in Gansu Province and points

west and the perpetual stirrings of the Miao tribes in southwest

China.211 All these uprisings required great expenditure of lives and

revenues from the imperial government, as they invariably ended in

heavy fighting and mass executions. The 1813 revolt by the Society of

Divine Justice was finally suppressed by the legally normative means of

total execution: 20,000 heads rolled.212

All of this information, when combined, serves to demonstrate the

great tension which gripped China before the guns of the West thundered

at her gates. The Qing Dynasty was struggling desperately to keep a

tight lid on a boiling pot. Population, famine, national trade, and official

corruption all threatened to boil over. When these tensions found

popular expression in the form of rebellion and revolt in the nineteenth

century, the ruling Manchus were painfully reminded of their own

foreignness. The suppression of the second White Lotus Rebellion in the

first decade of the eighteenth century was possible only through the use

of the by now superior Chinese militia. The otherwise loyal Manchu

bannermen had been made weak by decades of graft on the part their

210Spence, Modern China, 112.

211Spence, Modern China, 114-15.


80 commanders.213 The Manchu dynasty had its hands full, and

putting off foreigners, "using barbarians to control barbarians" and in

some ways ignoring the Western powers made sense.214 The Qing

Dynasty was shaky, and the West seemed at most a blister in Canton—

though an impertinent one at that.

Even after the first Anglo-Chinese War (skirmish?) had been

fought, the Manchu Son of Heaven faced still more severe problems at

home. It would be difficult to seriously question the massive and very

real threat the Taiping Rebellion posed to the dynasty.215 The intense

violence and destruction exacted by the Taiping, foreign and Imperial

forces in China's heartland during the fourteen year conflict was

tremendously destabilizing, producing dislocation, famine and death.

One record of one county in the Taiping-occupied breadbasket of China

Anhui Province states that from 1860 to 1864 no food could be grown.

Over that same five-year period the local population dropped from over

300,000 to a staggering 6,000.216 This was just one small locality, over

a small fraction of the total years of desolation, in only one of the largest

of many such rebellions.

213Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution, 64.

214Note, however, that contemporary scholarship is beginning to suggest a more aware and actively self-serving defensive posture on the part of Chinese foreign policy planning.

215Though the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom clearly employed an anti-Confucian justification for its authority (another sign of unrest!), its claim to rule China is demonstrated clearly by Hong Xiuquan's taking of a dynastic title (Taiping tianguo) for his new society in 1850. See Fredric Wakeman, Jr., The Fall of Imperial China (New York: The Free Press, 1975), 148-149.

216Due to war, famine, dislocation and natural disasters. From Ping-ti Ho, Studies on the Population of China, 1368-1953 . (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1959), 239. Cited in Wakeman, Imperial China, 159.

81 From 1850 to 1873—arguably the most turbulent decades of

Qing foreign relations including Williams's drafting of the American

Treaty of Tianjin and the shameful and tragic sacking of the irretrievable

Summer Palace—it is estimated that the Chinese population dropped by

some sixty million persons as a result of rebellions and their

consequences.217 Of this total, only a tiny fraction of the casualties can

be linked to Sino-foreign engagements.218 Is it any wonder that as the

foreign allies closed on Beijing in September of 1860, the Manchu Prince

Seng chose to deploy the bulk of his troops against a force of

approaching rebels from Shaanxi Province?219 The Qing Court

understood the danger the internal turmoil of this period posed. So

much so, that one year after his defeat at Beijing, the same Prince Seng

was driven to ask the Allies for additional artillery to aid in the

suppression of another rebellion raging in Shandong Province.220

The West was becoming increasingly familiar with the nature and

degree of rebellion within China just as Perry opened intercourse with

Japan. On January14, 1854 Williams sailed once again with Perry for

217Fairbank, The Great Chinese Revolution, 81. This is a classic example of the frustration many scholars feel when reading Fairbank's Revolution. Without scholarly apparatus, he is often able to say more than he can warrant. The evidence used from Revolution in this work has been chosen due to either its congruence with other records or its unusual persuasiveness. On the value of Revolution and the challenges of reading it carefully see Spence, Chinese Roundabout, 337-349.

218I have been unable to find an exact figure—partly because of Ward and Gordon's actions against the Taiping, and partly because of the generally distorted nature of statistics reported to the Manchu government. The total was almost certainly less than one million casualties—and I suspect more in the area of 100,000.



82 Japan.221 This time, Williams was heartily employed by Perry,

performing primarily the tasks of translating the treaties for the

American negotiators.222 Williams himself actually signed the treaties,

and his familiarity with the treaties with China in the 1840's led him to

suggest that a "most favored nation" clause be inserted. His advice was

heeded, and the Treaty of Kanagawa included under its Ninth Article in

Williams's own words a guarantee of equal representation and treatment

for all foreign nations in Japan. On August 11, 1854 Williams returned

to his family and home at Canton after visiting a number of cities in

Japan, the Lewchew Islands, Ningbo and Amoy.

This brought to an end the second series of events driving Williams

towards a change in vocation. The mission completed, Commodore Perry

was overflowing with praise regarding the services Williams had

rendered. In fact, Perry felt that "with high abilities, untiring industry,

and a conciliating disposition,” Williams was "the very man to be

employed in such business."223 For his own part, Williams was glad to

get back to his labors at the press. Eagerly back at work on his

dictionary, Williams's experience in international politics had been of

some interest to him, though it had by no means left him enamored. As

he had found out first hand, piety often suffered in the service of one's

nation.

221This journey and the negotiations which it entailed are recorded from Williams's own journal of the expedition in Williams, Life and Letters, 206-233.

222According to Williams's journal treaties were exchanged first in Dutch and then in Chinese—the latter were translated by Williams—while each nation had three copies of the treaty in their native language as well. Williams, Life and Letters, 214.

223Letter from Perry to Williams on September 6, 1854 before leaving Hongkong for the States. Williams, Life and Letters, 229ff.

83 the desecration of the Sabbath in a man-of-war is as great as in a pagan country, where it is not known; as to keeping the day holy, I fear amid such a melée of men talking, moving, and working, the thing's impossible.224

In the summer of 1855, Dr. Parker was appointed to fill the

position of United States Commissioner to China. Parker was still in the

States at the time, and with the Doctor's post as Secretary and

Interpreter to the Legation left vacant, the State Department decided in

Washington to commission its new-found star of East Asian languages

and diplomacy, S. Wells Williams, as the next interpreter.225

Being commissioned before he had been given any opportunity to

voice his own desires regarding the matter, Williams was caught a little

off guard. True, things had been touchy with the Board as of late, but he

was not in any position to abandon the mission and wholly disregard the

desires of the Board. As he wrote to his brother Frederick,

Whether I shall accept it or not will depend altogether on the proceeding of the committee as to their printing-office, for they wrote last year that they would rather like to give it up, and proposed I should be disconnected from the Board and get a living making books and doing Bible and tract printing. If they carry out this proposition I shall have to look around for something else to do, for the printing-office won't maintain me.… I am on the whole, however, rather unwilling to take this government position, and look for no enjoyments in its duties….226


225An fascinating record of Parker's idiosyncratic style of statecraft—and his stubborn temper—could be compiled by appealing to the two following especially colorful works where they discuss his service: Griffin, Clippers and Consuls; Tong, United States Diplomacy in China.

226Letter to his brother Frederic. Williams, Life and Letters, 234-5. This last point is less significant than it at first appears, for Williams was in the habit of turning over all payments received to the mission treasury. All income from his writings—

84 Williams knew very well what sort of work the position would

involve: he would translate official papers. Reflecting as he finally

accepted the position in 1857, Williams remarked that "during the last

eight years, I have done nearly all the translating of this sort for the

American and other consulates,—excepting the English,— and have

received no compensation therefor[sic]."227 But since the American

government was without officers in China and Williams had no word

from the Board, he decided to accept the position provisionally and

superintend the legation until Parker's return on December 31, 1855.

A year later found him alone in Shanghai still provisionally serving

the Legation, his Tonic Dictionary of the Canton Dialect finished, and

Anderson and the American Board still incommunicado regarding the

press at the Canton mission. The silence of the Board augured closure

for the press in Williams's estimation, and he had found the legation

work not as disagreeable as he had expected. As Williams wrote at the

time, "I am still undecided as to accepting the position of Secretary of

Legation, but matters now look much more to acceptance than

otherwise."228

Meanwhile, things were once again heating up in Canton.

Relations between foreign representatives and the provincial governors

had not changed much—let alone improved—since the treaties following

including The Middle Kingdom and his Tonic Dictionary—the products of his press, and even his salary from the Japan missions he understood to be his dues to the Board. Williams, Life and Letters, 232.

227Letter to Anderson from Macao on January 28, 1857. Williams, Life and Letters, 245.

228Letter to his brother William from Shanghai on October 7, 1856. Williams, Life and Letters, 238-9.

85 the first Anglo-Chinese War. Leaving aside the various petty

insurrections which swarmed around Canton in this turbulent decade,

these tensions finally erupted after the infamous "Arrow Incident" of

October 8, 1856. In pursuit of a foreign sailor guilty of piracy, Chinese

officials raided the 127-ton lorcha Arrow, arrested her crew and,

according to a British eyewitness, hoisted down the Union Jack she had

been flying so proudly. This was an insult to the flag! Even though a

nearby Portuguese Captain had not seen any British flags aboard the

Arrow for the last six days, the event was pushed through some rather

limp rationalizations and rapidly developed into a serious casus belli for

the British nation against the Chinese Imperial government.229 Events

spiraled out of control and by October 28 the British were firing upon the

Canton offices of the Imperial Commissioner, ostensibly demanding

"treaty revisions."230

Americans had been warned in advance to withdraw from Canton

by the Imperial Commissioner, which they did—all except for U. S.

Consul to Hong Kong James Keenan. He foolishly grabbed an American

flag and an American "volunteer" and marched into Canton behind the

British, waving and displaying the stars and bars everywhere. This

foolish action led the Chinese to fire upon an American warship

sounding the Macao-Canton passage on November 15. The U. S. Naval

commander Commodore James Armstrong took this offense against the

American flag quite seriously and proceeded to bombard and capture five

229Beeching has recorded the accounts of both the Portuguese captain and the British Captain Kennedy who claimed to have witnessed the belligerent seizure of the lorcha crew. Beeching, Opium Wars, 213ff.

230Tong, United States Diplomacy in China, 185.

86 of the Chinese Barrier Forts in the three days following November

20.231 This event is one of the few instances of combat between the

Chinese and American armed forces wherein American neutrality was

breached.232

Conflict followed and intensified throughout the fall and early

winter of 1856. Williams had now returned to Canton, and on December

11, he decided to visit his family who still resided in Macao for a week-

long holiday. But on December 14, 1856, in what was at the time hailed

as an act of retribution for the destruction so recently wrought by the

foreign armed forces, the foreign factories at Canton were burned to the

ground. Large portions of neighboring Chinese shops and homes were

destroyed as well, including the printing office of the American Board

Canton Mission.

Subsequent historical investigations have brought into question

the veracity of accounts blaming the Chinese for the great fire. Whether

intentional or not, the fire seems to have erupted from within the

American quarters. When local Chinese brought fire engines to

extinguish the blaze, they were fought off by armed British soldiers.233

Regardless of the true cause of the fire, it was successful in sealing the

mind of Williams.

231Tong, United States Diplomacy in China, 186-7.

232The participation in the raids on the Dagu Forts by offering to tow British ships to and from the battle is the other major instance of an American breach of supposed neutrality. This terrible battle was witnessed by Williams. Williams, Life and Letters, 299-312.

233Tong, United States Diplomacy in China, 189-92.

87 Taking pen in hand, Williams wrote to Anderson on January

28, 1857 explaining the lengthy process by which he had come to sever

his relationship with the Board. It was the destruction of the press in

the fire that liberated Williams from the obligations he felt to the Board.

Had it not been lost, Williams would "have tried to effect some

arrangement so that it should not cease altogether."234 In fact, Williams

makes it clear that his departure from the mission is not in his mind a

permanent one, but a temporary one "made in consequence of the

enforced suspension of printing operations."235 In a letter written the

day before to his brother William, Williams expresses the same desire to

continue his relationship with the Board adding,

I have a great respect for the Board and its officers, and believe that it is managed as well and made as good material as any mission society extant. If I can do as much good to the Chinese now as before, and not use mission money, I shall not regret it. Yet where it will end and where the progress of events will drift me, I cannot say, and have, indeed, some fears.236

Williams, as has already been established, was never ordained and

always described as a "printer" in distinction from being counted a

234Letter to Anderson from Macao on January 28, 1857. Williams, Life and Letters, 246-7.


236Letter to his brother William from Macao on January 27, 1857. Williams, Life and Letters, 242-3.

These words challenge Paul Cohen's use of Williams as an example of "the disproportionately large number of early missionaries to assume secular responsibilities, which… resulted in a blurring, if not complete eclipsing, of their identities as missionaries." While it is certainly true that Parker, Morrison, Gutzlaff and others served terms under the employment of Western governments, Cohen's words here tacitly endorse a distinction—between the sacred and the secular—which not all missionaries supported. Paul A. Cohen, "Christian Missions and Their Impact to 1900," Fairbank and Twitchett, The Cambridge History of China, vol. 10, pt. 1, 549.

88 "missionary." Though it is true that with the opening of the treaty

ports and the official toleration of Christianity he came increasingly to

engage in the duties of preaching and evangelizing, the official records of

the Board as well as the distribution of his efforts amongst the various

tasks open to him show him indisputably to be a printer.237 Moreover,

his concern for "preparatory labors" or "subsidiary means" suggest a

certain willingness to define the field of labors that advance Christian

missions more broadly than some. Williams himself already questioned

Anderson on his criticism of so called "secular jobs" for the press, while

at the same time he also defended such work as an invaluable source of

funds for missions. To put it simply, Williams had always been primarily

engaged in the so-called secular responsibilities of the press and so no

conflict or blurring between his labors for and his responsibilities to—if

not the American Board—the Christian mission to China. After recalling

briefly his disagreements with the Board over the running of the press,

Williams closes his January1857 letter of explanation to Anderson by

brushing his own criticisms aside and expressing his earnest hope to

further missions while taking on his new line of employment.

This may all now pass, however, for it bears nothing on the feelings I now entertain towards the good cause of missions in China and my desire to do a little towards its advancement. I believe that God has stores of mercy yet to give China….238

237For example, the 1842 tabular view of the Canton Mission shows Williams again to be clearly classified as a "printer" and not a "missionary." Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1837-44, vol. 1, no. 3. Annual Tabular View, 1842.


89 In Williams own mind, he was always first and foremost a

servant of the Lord. And as he left the employ of American Board of

Commissioners for Foreign Missions, he did not leave the service of

missions. Rather he found a new venue through which to further the

cause of Christ in China. Like Olyphant whom he admired so for "living"

the Gospel, Williams still saw himself to be just as much in the service of

China missions as he had been while running the press in Canton. This

confidence came from his deep knowledge of God's providential guiding.

As Williams had remarked in writing just before his first encounter with

Perry set in motion the events that would eventually propel him into

diplomatic service, "Blessed is the work of doing good in any line."239

Williams was still confident that the same God who delivered Israel

would superintend all.

239For extended quote, see above. Letter written to his brother William on June 21, 1852. Williams, Life and Letters, 181.

90

CHAPTER FIVE

Conclusion

This all too brief look at the first half of Williams's life reveals a

number of factors that have not been given sufficient consideration in

attempts to evaluate his role as a missionary in China before the Treaty

of Tianjin and its articles of toleration.

First of all, Williams was raised in an environment very far

removed from the twentieth century. The degree to which the words and

concepts of the Bible filled his early days almost defies belief. Whether in

common school or Sunday school, Williams found scripture at the center

of all of his learning. Having directed such massive amounts of time and

energy towards this one book, it would be surprising if its ideas,

characters, stories and ideas failed to permeate his life.

Clearly, all of Williams's writings and actions must be read with

this perspective in mind. Many of his letters closed with beautiful

benedictions that—as foolish as they may sound to the modern reader—

must be accepted as reliable vehicles for Williams's own authorial intent.

Current skepticism over the value of Providence cannot be read back into

Williams's life. He himself was not a cynic. In his later life, and in his

personal letters to his family these sincere sayings and the faith in a

sustaining God which engenders them abound all the more.

I can trust in God that you are also kept in health and quiet, and the darling girls around you give you pleasure, occupation, care, and mother's joy, in their health and

91 amusements. Yet, even if I knew now that you had suffered; or they had ailed, causing you double sorrow and pain in their sorrow and pain, I would ask God to enable me to rejoice and feel that he had done us good. I can humbly and joyfully leave you all in his hands, and do so every day, our prayers meeting in his ears.… …Good bye, sweetest treasure—Keep up good spirits by casting all your cares on One whose heart is large enough to take in all your wants and woes, and power great enough to furnish all you really desire. Soon both of us must go by ourselves to the home whence none return, there to give account of all our conduct to each other. A kiss to the darlings and you…240

Second, the actual Sitz im Leben of the foreign missionary in China

prior to the Unequal Treaties must be adequately understood. Though

popular readings of this period may inflate the nature of native hostility

and violence towards the foreigners, the fact remains that contact

between Westerners and Chinese was quite circumscribed. Life in the

Thirteen Factories left few options available to the early missionaries.

Surreptitiously securing native teachers, from which to learn the

challenging language of China, Williams's time was spent overwhelmingly

between the study and the press. With time, his labors expanded to

include the full circle of literary endeavor from researching and writing,

to editing and publishing. For Williams, this was his labor for the Lord.

And it left little time for disseminating tracts or preaching in the streets—

both of which were eschewed during the earliest period by Williams and

Bridgman due to their as yet limited abilities in Chinese and the danger

such activities might cause to any Chinese persons who might become

involved. The serious and ground-breaking scholarship demonstrated in

240 Letter to his wife from Edo Bay off Kanagawa on March 11, 1854. Samuel Wells Williams Family Papers, Yale University Library, Microflim.

92 his Middle Kingdom further underlines his commitment to

understanding China and sharing that knowledge with others to the

benefit of the Gospel in China. Williams most decidedly does not fit the

activist "Bible-thumper" stereotype of the modern day evangelical

fundamentalist missionary.241

Third, Williams was fully aware of the evils of the opium trade and

the war that it caused. If the current estimates of opium use among

nineteenth century Chinese are even remotely close to the actual

numbers involved, Williams could not have failed to see the effects of this

drug on the population.242 He wrote eloquently and passionately of its

evil, and stated unequivocally that the first Anglo-Chinese war was

fought over the drug. He saw God opening the world to His Gospel as he

noted that "Troublous times may usher in the Gospel;" but he always

hoped that resistance "by force" might be avoided.243 If he failed to end

his writings with flaming condemnations of British or Chinese

aggressions, it was only because of the indomitable hope with which he

was supplied through his faith in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.

241In a private section of a letter to Anderson, Williams confesses his frustration with fellow Board employee Rev. S. W. Bonney. Although this was 1849 and as such Christian proselytism had gained a certain "legality" in the treaty ports, Williams was offended by Bonney's "injudicious" approach to spreading the Gospel. Bonney acted with "…suddenness, and disregard for the feelings of the people.… It is in vain to talk to him, or point out the impropriety of forcing tracts into the chair of the governor as he is passing thro' the streets, [or] of talking with women publicly in the streets." Correspondence of the ABCFM, South China, 1846-1860, vol. 1, no. 291. Williams to Anderson, January 29, 1849.

242If doubt still remains on Williams's opinion regarding the drug and its trade, see his section on opium smoking and its effects in Williams, Middle Kingdom, vol. II, 382-387.

243Letter to his brother William from Lewchew on January 30, 1854. Samuel Wells Williams Family Papers, Yale University Library, Microflim.

93 Fourth, the nature of this hope was such that it rested not on

a right dividing of the times, or a proper reading of millennial prophecies.

As steeped as his own sending organization may have been in the

millennial expectancy of early nineteenth century America, Williams does

not see the world through these lenses. Rather, his intimate familiarity

with Scripture makes him fully aware of God's faithful acts in history.

He knows the outcome of history, and out of this grows his very real

hope. For, "we have only to keep on during this sojourn, regretting

nothing but sin, and trusting in joy and peace beyond this scene of

probation."244

Though Williams is eager to make the Gospel known to all nations,

this desire is not based on the knowledge of some rapidly moving

timeline or an impending new age. Perhaps heeding Jesus's own words

in Acts 1:7 he refuses "to pry into futurity" but rather seeks to serve God

as best he can where he is. Out of love for those who do not know

Christ, Williams uses whatever is before him to make Christ known.

Since his faith is in an active providential God, and not human

calculations of impending millennial fulfillment, Williams is free to work

where He is trusting that God will bring about His divine will for China in

His own time.

This, finally, is why for Williams the decision to leave the American

Board and enter the full-time employ of the United States Government is

neither a betrayal nor a sign of compromise. This is simply a

continuation of his "preparatory labors." Indeed, he is glad that he can

244 Letter to James Dana from Canton on April 30, 1853. Samuel Wells Williams Family Papers, Yale University Library, Microflim.

94 still serve the cause of missions while no longer being a drain on the

mission's finances. He knew that all would cast their crowns before the

Sea of Glass, and that the phrase "well done, good and faithful servant"

was not restricted for the ordained. In continuing throughout his years

of diplomatic service to work on the production of linguistic aids and

lexicons for the benefit of newcomers to China missions he made true on

his sincere desire to further the Gospel in China.245 While S. Wells Williams has been the explicit subject of this study,

this work should in no way be construed as a narrow and specialized

examination whose significance lies only with those interested in the life

of Williams. Much has been written on the supposed cultural

imperialism inherent in the nineteenth century mission to China, but

these writings all too frequently fail to adequately locate the missionaries

they discuss within their proper contexts.246 This usually comes from a

combination of ignorance regarding the categories with which the

missionaries themselves discuss and judge their own actions and

motivations, and an unwillingness to subscribe to the missionaries any

individuality.247

245Recall that his 1874 Syllabic Dictionary was made available to missionaries in China at a fifty percent discount covered by Williams himself. Letter to his brother R. S. Williams from Beijing on December 9, 1874. Williams, Life and Letters, 400.

246Some of the works of this sort more frequently encountered (and mentioned above) include: Stuart Creighton Miller, "Ends and Means: Missionary Justification of Force in Nineteenth Century China;" and Paul A. Cohen, China and Christianity: The Missionary Movement and the Growth of Chinese Antiforeignism, 1860-1870 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963). While Cohen's work especially is an invaluable contribution to our understanding of Chinese responses to Christian missions in China, neither of these works adequately understands the myriad issues and dimensions included under the broad rubric of missions.

247An excellent example of these kinds of errors can be seen in Murray A. Rubenstein, "The Wars They Wanted." After briefly noting on page 274 Williams's lack

95 The subtle and careful reading given by contemporary

historians to sympathetic Chinese figures is often left behind when the

missionaries are examined. Accordingly, works such as The Chinese

Repository and Chinese Recorder are read as if all their contributors and

editorialists share the same monolithic view of China—a particularly

flagrant abuse when the views of the mighty opium traders Jardine and

Matheson are lumped with those of the missionary printer Williams and

the pious opium-free trader Olyphant. In other instances, little effort is

made to recognize how the actions and hopes of the missionaries

changed and developed during the different periods during which they

served in China. What could and could not be done—not to mention

what was actually thought and done—by missionaries before the

conclusion of the First Anglo-Chinese War would have been very different

from the options available to missionaries after 1860.

Scholars should also be aware of what it meant first, to be a

Christian, and second, to be a missionary within the specific context of

the subject he or she is studying. This is largely a theological question—

and an essential one at that. Put simply, there are many different

definitions of evangelism, mission, and conversion, and each will require

different thoughts and actions from its adherents. Given the frequency

with which the theological suppositions of nineteenth century Christians of seminary training and ordination, Rubenstein goes on (page 275, second column) to speak about what "they" all felt about opening China. Throughout the rest of the piece he sights article after article with no reference to its actual author as deducible from Bridgman and Williams's Index. While he recognizes the role millennial expectations played in nineteenth century America (and rapidly reduces the phenomena to social upheavals and professional survival techniques), he again assumes all American missionaries—including Morrison?—were equally impacted by these ideas. Rubenstein thus falsely attributes the missionaries with a kind of monolithic thinking that ignores their own unique character, circumstances and opinions. For attribution of Repository articles (note presence of British authors!) see Bridgman and Williams, General Index of the Chinese Repository.

96 conflict with the world views subscribed to by modern scholars, it

should be self-evident that there is much room for increased sensitivity

and understanding regarding the very nature of missions as conceived by

the missionaries themselves.248

This kind of careful and accurate reading of this pioneer period of

Protestant missions to China requires that the various issues addressed

in this paper be investigated afresh for each individual missionary.

Questions of faith, theological and missiological approaches, background

influences, attitudes towards culture, understandings of conversion,

relations within and outside of China, the exact historical circumstances

within which a subject is operating —these are far from tertiary

concerns. Often times, these are keys which unlock the missionaries

character. It should be clear that the imperialist/non-imperialist

categories currently employed are insufficient to attest to the full nature

of the early mission to China. Though this question may very well

continue to remain a significant one within the history of Christian

missions to China, new categories must be examined as well.

248This becomes evident upon reading, as an example, the preface to Paul A. Varg, Missionaries, Chinese, and Diplomats: The American Protestant Missionary Movement in China, 1890-1952 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1958), vii and following. The author's suggestion that "The theological language of the early missionaries might be more meaningful to the lay person today if translated into the language of modern psychology" a priori dismisses the validity of the missionaries' self-understanding of "theological absolutes" as "a life-shaping force in themselves." Varg rightly understands that there were many national and cultural issues which at times became entangled in the missionary project (especially during the period germane to Varg's study). It is true that few missionaries can be explained "wholly on the basis of their theology." Nevertheless, religion cannot be reduced to mere cultural and psychological phenomenon without betraying the essence of the Christian faith which the missionaries claimed as their motivation. It is anachronistic and poor scholarship to read our contemporary religious skepticism into the saints of the past.

97 The goal of this project has been to re-introduce one

missionary, S. Wells Williams, into the contemporary scholarly dialogue

on his own terms. In so doing, new categories have been established

which make it possible for Williams and other early missionaries to be

understood in a fuller—though decidedly more complex—context. People

are complex, and the closer one gets to a person or event the more

details evolve and the more complicated the subject becomes. It is hoped

that the issues discussed here will open the door for more accurate

readings of the many other men and women who spent their lives as

ambassadors of Christ in China.

99

A CHRONOLOGY

S. Wells Williams

1637 Robert Williams comes from Norwich England to Roxbury.

1780 Thomas and Ezekiel (fifth generation of Robert) leave Framingham for New Hartford in Whitestown, NY.

1800 Deacon Thomas' son William Williams joins Ashael Seward's printing business—upon his coming of age it is Seward & Williams, W.W. being very successful: Col. in War of 1812, local fire Chief, deacon, elder

1807 Robert Morrison arrives at Canton (London Missionary Society).

October 22, 1812 Samuel Wells Williams (SWW), eldest of fourteen, is born to Sophia Wells (pious, prayer warrior, concern for mission, exemplar mother) and William Williams.

December 31, 1813 Robert Morrison completes Chinese New Testament.

1814 Morrison baptizes the first Chinese convert.

1816 The Sunday school comes to Utica instigated by father William Williams. SWW commits entire NT to memory with classmates.

1816 Wm. Milne baptizes Liang Fa.

1818 SWW begins his schooling at the age of 6.

November 25, 1819 Morrison completes his Chinese Bible.

1827 SWW boards at a classical school run by Rev. Ely Burchard.

1829 SWW returns to attend the Utica High School (Utica Gymnasium) under Charles Bartlett.

February 22, 1830 Bridgman and Abeel arrive at Macao (ABCFM).

1830 Friend J. Dana attends Yale; Williams family lacks funds for SWW to attend Yale and intend him for father's bookstore.

February, 1831 SWW and brother Frederic make public profession of faith and join First Church of Utica.

Autumn, 1831 Death of SWW's mother Sophia Wells Williams.

100 November 23, 1831 SWW arrives at Rensselaer Institute of Troy (to study

botany and natural science).

June 18, 1831-1835 Karl Gutzlaff (Netherlands Missionary Society) makes three unofficial journeys up the coast of China disguised as a trader on an opium ship.

Spring of 1832 Father recommends that SWW be sent to run the printing press at the new American Board mission in Canton—the press recently donated by Bleecker Street Presb. of NY

March 1833 William Williams remarries to Catherine Huntington of Rome, N.Y.

May, 1832 Chinese Repository commences publication in Canton with Elijah C. Bridgman as editor.

June 15, 1833 SWW sails from New York on Mr. Olyphant's ship Morrison.

October 25, 1833 The Morrison anchors in Whampoa, 12 miles south of Canton—Wells immediately begins language study and work in the print room.

April 22, 1834 Expiration of the British East India Company's monopolistic charter for control of all China trade

July 1834 Lord Napier's attempt to gain access to the Governor General at Canton and open diplomatic relations fails completely—Sino-foreign relations at Canton are very tense.

August 1, 1834 Death of Dr. Robert Morrison, the Pioneer of Protestant Mission work in China

Late August 1834 Medhurst and Edwin Stevens set out on Olyphant's Huron to test for themselves Gutzlaff's reports of openness. No disguises or other behaviors antithetical to Christian faith were engaged in.

1834 Peter Parker, pioneer of medical missions, arrives from New York and opens a dispensary and hospital in Canton.

December 1835 The mission decides to move SWW and his press from Canton to Macao, where the Portuguese authorities allow him to work unmolested.

July 4, 1837 SWW and Parker (Gutzlaff joins half-way) sail to Japan on the Morrison to return some shipwrecked Japanese sailors.

• Attempt was made to land at Kagoshima in Satzuma • Morrison was fired upon by muskets and cannon!? • Japanese sailors returned with Gutzlaff and SWW, Genesis,

Matthew and the complete Johanine corpus is translated into Japanese;

• Two sailors make decisions for Christ, model changed lives and become the first fruits in Japan praying for the conversion of their countrymen

101 December 12, 1839 Chinese officials attempt to execute a Chinese opium

smuggler in front of the Factories. Foreigners interfere and some sailors force the officials to leave. Ensuing Chinese mob attacks foreign Factories—no damage is done, save the strangulation of the opium smuggler.

March 24, 1839 Canton Commissioner Lin "besieges" the Canton Factories. Six weeks later, the British surrender their opium stocks. Lin burns some 20,000 plus chests of opium just below the Bogue Forts.

August 29, 1842 Qiying and Henry Pottinger sign the Treaty of Nanking abolishing the Chinese Cohong, offering an opium tariff, ceding Hong Kong to Britain and opening the five "Treaty Ports" (Canton, Amoy, Fuzhou, Ningpo and Shanghai) to British trade and residence.

July 3, 1844 The American Treaty is negotiated between Caleb Cushing and Qiying on the basis of the "most-favored-nation" clause in the Nanjing Treaty. Extra-territoriality is extended and made explicit.

1845 Emperor Daoguang issues an edict of toleration regarding Christianity in China.

October 15, 1845 After a trip through India, Egypt, and Europe sightseeing and searching for a set of Chinese type, SWW arrives in NY. Here he lectures to raise funds for new Chinese fonts (in January of 1845 he spent a few weeks with D. O. Allen in Bombay).

1845 After a not so pleasant stay in Hong Kong, the China Mission of the American Board moved its offices from Macao back to Canton.

1846 SWW compiles lectures to write The Middle Kingdom.

May 29, 1847 SWW proposes marriage in a letter to Miss Sarah Walworth.

November 25, 1847 Sarah and Wells are married in Plattsburgh.

1847 Coolie trade to America begins and blossoms with the subsequent announcement of the gold rush.

March 14, 1848 Second edition of The Middle Kingdom is printed

Summer 1848 At the urging of Dr. Nott, Union College confers upon SWW an honorary LL. D.

September 1, 1848 Dr. and Mrs. Williams arrive at Canton.

October 18, 1848 Walworth Williams is born.

1849 From this point on SWW runs Repository all alone—Bridgman is in Shanghai. SWW also translates most of the official Chinese documents for all consulates (save the British) unofficially and without compensation.

102 1849-1856 SWW's "Anglo-Chinese Calendar" is published.

1850 The reign of the xenophobic Xianfeng Emperor commences.

May 19, 1850 Katherine Williams is born.

June 10, 1850 SWW's father William Williams dies in Utica.

1852 Wells closes The Chinese Repository due to low demand and high cost.

June 28, 1852 Olyphant Williams is born.

March 19, 1853 Hong Xiuquan and his Taiping Rebels capture Nanjing.

July 5, 1853 The Yellow River changes its course.

May 12, 1853 SWW leavs Macao for Lewchew and Japan as interpreter for Commodore Matthew Calbraith Perry.

August 7, 1853 SWW returns to Macao and his printing press.

March 1, 1854 Hudson Taylor first arrives in China (Shanghai).

January 14, 1854 SWW accompanies Perry on his second trip to Japan.

March 31, 1854 Perry and SWW sign the Treaty of Kanagawa promising fair treatment and access to trade in certain ports to American merchants and sailors. SWW had inserted a "most-favored-nation" clause.

1855-1873 Repeated Muslim insurrections disrupt Yunnan province and points West distracting Imperial energies.

Summer 1855 Another girl is born to the Williamses (making two boys and two girls to date).

1855 Delegates' version of the Chinese Bible is published.

October 1, 1855 SWW moves to Shanghai and Dr. Peter Parker's offices to provisionally superintend the American legation for the year until Dr. Parker returns from the States.

October 8, 1856 The Arrow incident takes place, lending causus belli to British indignation.

Late autumn 1856 With the stoppage of all foreign trade at Canton, the American Legation decides to remove all of its offices from Chinese soil to Macao. During the exodus, Chinese forts fire on American ships and American frigates retaliate with a brutal bombardment of the Bogue forts. These are the only hostilities [?] entered into by Americans against China.

103 December 11, 1856 SWW now back in Canton, decides to visit his family in

Macao, "expecting to return in a week."

December 14, 1856 The foreign factories at Canton are set afire by the Chinese. SWW's press and fonts are destroyed along with many already printed works not yet removed to Macao.

January 1857 SWW accepts position as interpreter or Secretary of the Legation for the United States of America in China, understanding that the Board does not wish to fund a new press and set of fonts for its China Mission. He thus stays in Macao and resigns from the ABCFM.

October 1857 Dr. Parker leaves his post in SWW's hands and returns to America.

November 1857 Wm. B. Reed assumes charge of the American Legation to China.

December 1857 After a five-month blockade, British and French bombard and capture Canton.

May 20, 1858 British and French take the Dagu forts.

June 1858 The Russian, American, British and French (resp.) Treaties of Tianjin are signed with the Chinese. SWW interprets and negotiates with Martin for Reed. SWW pens article granting toleration to Christians in China.

October 1858 The Taipings break out of Nanjing.

June 1859 Seeking treaty revision, the British, French and American envoys are rebuffed at the Dagu Forts, the British suffering a rare and terrible defeat. SWW watches as a "neutral" from an American warship.

July 28, 1859 The American Envoys (Com. Ward and SWW and Martin) arrive in Beijing.

August 16, 1859 The American Treaty is ratified by the Emperor in Beijing.

December 1859 SWW cracks down on coolie traders and even pens an anti-coolie tract in Chinese

February 1860 SWW returns to New England on leave of absence, horrified by slavery and troubled by thoughts of war.

March 19, 1860 Taiping massacre at Hangzhou

June 2, 1860 The Ever-Victorious Army is organized.

August 21, 1860 British and French succeed in capturing the Dagu Forts.

104 October 18, 1860 After extensive and terrible looting, the Imperial Summer

Palace is burnt to the ground at Lord Elgin's command. The Allies enter Beijing without resistance.

October 24, 1860 British and French finally ratify their versions of the Treaty of Tianjin (1858).

Late 1860 The Xianfeng Emperor dies.

April 1861 The American Civil War begins.

June 1861 SWW, wife and youngest daughter sail for China. During the journey their oldest son Walworth dies in Utica.

Summer 1862 SWW and Reed's successor Burlingame visit Beijing. SWW returns to family in Macao but decides to move to Beijing where he feels his influence might be of some use.

June 16, 1863 SWW and family arrive in Beijing to take up official residence.

July 19, 1864 Taiping Princes are defeated and beheaded by Qing General Zeng Guofen at Nanjing after a series of victories by the Ever-Victorious Army.

March 1865 Lincoln is assassinated.

May 10, 1865 The American Civil War ends.

November 1869 SWW's wife and children (?) leave from Shanghai through Europe and back to the States. SWW returns to the Legation in Beijing.

June 21, 1870 The Tianjin Massacre

May 1871 Brother Frederic Williams dies after years of Missionary service in Mesopotamia.

November 1871 SWW goes to Shanghai to finish and print his Syllabic Dictionary.

Summer 1872 SWW and friends summer in Japan (with total freedom to travel) due to oppressive Shanghai heat. He shortly returns to Shanghai.

May 1873 Wife Sarah returns at word of his poor health—he recovers and they return to Beijing, the dictionary completed.

November 30, 1874 SWW interprets for Minister Avery as he presents his credentials to the Emperor.

Spring 1875 SWW and family head home via Europe on SWW's second official leave of absence.

March 1876 SWW returns to Beijing to prepare for his successor upon his impending retirement due to loss of eyesight.

105 October 25, 1876 SWW leaves Beijing and China for the last time exactly 43

years after his first arrival in Canton.

June 1877 SWW appointed Chair of Chinese Language and Literature at Yale University.

1878 Great Famine in Northern China

Autumn 1879 SWW authors a petition for the Yale Faculty to urge President Hayes to veto the bigoted Chinese Immigration Act of 1879.

January 26, 1881 SWW's wife Sarah passes away with the dawn.

March 7, 1881 SWW is elected President of the American Bible Society.

1881 SWW is elected President of the American Oriental Society.

February 1882 SWW loses "the power of utterance" (a stroke?) while leading prayers in his home. He slowly (over 6 months) recovers his faculties.

October 1883 The final revision of SWW's Middle Kingdom rolls from the presses.

February 16, 1884 SWW dies of anemia in his New Haven home.

106

Selected Bibliography

American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM). The Haystack Centennial: The Ninety-seventh Annual Meeting of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. Boston: ABCFM, 1907.

ABCFM. Papers on microfilm. LaMont Library, Harvard University. Reels 256-265 and Index. Correspondence: "South China, 1831-1837", "South China, 1838-1844", and "South China, 1846-1860."

The American Neptune, vol. XLVIII, no. 4 (Fall 1988), Fresh Perspectives on Qing Dynasty Maritime Relations, Jonathan Goldstein, guest ed.

Anderson, Rufus. Foreign Missions: Their Relations and Claims. New York: Charles Scribner and Company, 1869.

Anderson, Rufus. Memorial Volume of the First Fifty Years of the ABCFM. Boston: ABCFM, 1861.

Anderson, Rufus. Memorial Volume of the First Fifty Years of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. 5th ed. Boston: The Board, 1862.

Barnett, Suzanne Wilson and John King Fairbank, eds. Christianity in China: Early Protestant Missionary Writings. Harvard University Press, 1985.

Bavinck, J. H. An Introduction to the Science of Missions. Translated by David Hugh Freeman. Philadelphia: The Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1961.

Beaver, R. Pierce, ed. To Advance the Gospel: Selections from the Writings of Rufus Anderson. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1967.

Beeching, Jack. The Chinese Opium Wars. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1975.

Boylan, Anne M. Sunday School: The Formation of an American Institution, 1790-1880. New haven: Yale University Press, 1988.

107 Broomhall, A. J. Hudson Taylor & China's Open Century. 6 vols.

London: Hodder and Stroughton for Overseas Missionary Fellowship, 1981-.

Ch'en, Jerome. China and the West: Society and Culture 1815-1937. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1979.

Chaney, Charles L. The Birth of Missions in America. South Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 1976.

The China Mission Handbook. First Issue. Shanghai: American Presbyterian Mission Press, 1896.

The Chinese Recorder. Published as The Missionary Recorder. Fuzhou, 1867; The Chinese Recorder and Missionary Journal. Fuzhou, 1868-72; idem. Shanghai, 1874-. The name was shortened to The Chinese Recorder circa 1911.

Clouse, Robert G., ed. The Meaning of the Millennium: Four Views. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1977.

Cohen, Paul A. China and Christianity: The Missionary Movement and the Growth of Chinese Antiforeignism, 1860-1870. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1963.

Cohen, Paul A. "Christian Missions and Their Impact to 1900." In Late Ch'ing, 1800-1911. Part 1. Edited by John K. Fairbank. The Cambridge History of China. Vol.10. General Editors John K. Fairbank and D. Twitchett. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1978.

Covell, Ralph R. Confucius, the Buddha, and Christ. Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1986.

Covell, Ralph R. W. A. P. Martin: Pioneer of Progress in China. Washington, D.C.: Christian College Consortium, 1978.

Davis, John Jefferson. Christ's Victorious Kingdom: Postmillennialism Reconsidered. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1986.

De Jong, J. A. As the Waters Cover the Sea: Millennial Expectations and the Rise of Anglo-American Missions, 1640-1810. n.p.: J. H. Kok N. V. Kampen, 1970.

Edwards, Jonathan. The History of Redemption. Marshallton, Delaware: The National Foundation for Christian Education, 1969.

108 Elsbree, O. W. The Rise of the Missionary Spirit in America, 1790-

1815. Philadelphia: Porcupine Press, 1980.

Erickson, Millard J. Christian Theology. 3 vols. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1983-85; Single volume edition, Eleventh printing, 1994.

Erickson, Millard J. Contemporary Options in Eschatology: A Study of the Millennium. Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1977.

Fairbank, John King and Reischauer, Edwin O., eds. China: Tradition and Transformation. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1989.

Fairbank, John King, ed. The Missionary Enterprise in China and America. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1974.

Fairbank, John King. The Great Chinese Revolution, 1800-1985. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1986.

Fairbank, John King. The United States and China. 4th ed., rev. and enl. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1983.

Gernet, Jacques. China and the Christian Impact: A Conflict of Cultures. London: Cambridge University Press, 1985.

Grenz, Stanley J. The Millennial Maze: Sorting Out Evangelical Options. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1992.

Griffin, Eldon. Clippers and Consuls: American Consular and Commercial Relations with Eastern Asia, 1845-1860. Ann Arbor: Edwards Brothers, Inc., 1938.

Grove, S. A. The Scottish Philosophy of Common Sense. Oxford: Clarendon, 1960.

Gulick, Edward V. Peter Parker and the Opening of China. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1973.

Harris, Paul H. "Cultural Imperialism and American Protestant Missionaries: Collaboration and Dependency in Mid-Nineteenth-Century China." Pacific Historical Review LX, no. 3 (August 1991): 309-338.

Hatch, Nathan O. The Democratization of American Christianity. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989.

109 Hibbert, Christopher. The Dragon Wakes: China and the West,

1793-1911. New York: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1970.

Hoekema, Anthony A. The Bible and the Future. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1979.

Hutchison, William R. Errand to the World: American Protestant Thought and Foreign Missions. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1987.

Lasch, Christopher. The True and Only Heaven: Progress and Its Critics. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 1991.

Latourette, Kenneth Scott. A History of Christian Missions in China. New York: Macmillan, 1929.

Latourette, Kenneth Scott. The Chinese: Their History and Culture. New York: Macmillan Company, 1947.

Latourette, Kenneth Scott. The History of Early Relations between the United States and China, 1784-1844. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1917.

London Missionary Society.London Missionary Society Pamphlets. London: T. Chapman of Fleet Street, 1796.

Lovett, Richard. History of the London Missionary Society, 1795-1895. London: Henry Frowde, 1899.

Lynn, Robert W., and Elliot Wright. The Big Little School: Two Hundred Years of the Sunday School. 2d ed., rev. and enl. Birmingham, Alabama: Religious Education Press and Nasheville: Abingdon, 1980.

Miller, Perry. The Life of the Mind in America: From the Revolution to the Civil War. New York: 1965.

Minamiki, George, S.J. The Chinese Rites Controversy from its Beginning to Modern Times. Chicago: Loyola University Press, 1985.

The Missionary Herald. Boston: ABFCM, 1805-.

Moffett, Samuel Hugh. A History of Christianity in Asia. 2 vols. HarperSanFrancisco, 1992.

Newbigin, Lesslie. Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture. Grand Rapids, William. B. Eerdmans, 1986.

110 Newbigin, Lesslie. The Gospel in A Pluralist Society. Grand Rapids,

William. B. Eerdmans, 1989.

Packer, J. I. Evangelism and the Sovereignty of God. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1971.

Rice, Edwin Wilbur. The Sunday-School Movement (1780-1917) and the American Sunday-School Union (1817-1917). New York: Arno Press & The New York Times, 1971.

Robert, Dana L. "'The Crisis of Missions': Premillennial Mission Theory and the Origins of Independent Evangelical Missions." In Earthen Vessels: American Evangelicals and Foreign Missions, 1880-1980, ed. by Joel A. Carpenter and Wilbert R. Shenk, 29-46. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1990.

Sandeen, Ernest R. The Roots of Fundamentalism: British and American Millenarianism, 1800-1930. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1970.

Smith, Arthur H. Rex Christus: An Outline Study of China. New York: Macmillan Company, 1908.

Spence, Jonathan D. Chinese Roundabout. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1992.

Spence, Jonathan D. The Search for Modern China. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, Inc., 1990.

Spence, Jonathan D. To Change China: Western Advisers in China, 1620-1960. New York: Little, Brown and Company, 1969; reprint, New York: Penguin Books, 1980.

St. Clair, Michael J. Millenarian Movements in Historical Context. New York: Garland Publishing, Inc., 1992.

Stainton, Michael. "Sources of 19th Century Chinese Opposition to the Missionaries and Christianity." Ching Feng XX, no. 3 (1977): 130-47.

Taylor, Louise M. Catalogue of Books on China in the Essex Institute. Salem: The Essex Institute, 1926.

Tong, Te-kong. United States Diplomacy in China, 1844-60. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1964.

111 Tuveson, Ernest Lee. Redeemer Nation: The Idea of America's

Millennial Role. Chicago: The University of Chicago, 1968.

Varg, Paul A. Missionaries, Chinese, and Diplomats: The American Protestant Missionary Movement in China, 1890-1952. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1958.

Vinton Book Copy. Vol. 1 and indices. Compiled by John A. Vinton et al. Photocopy. New York: United Church Board for World Ministries, 1994.

Wakeman, Fredric, Jr. The Fall of Imperial China. New York: The Free Press, 1975.

Walvoord, John F. The Millennial Kingdom. Findlay, OH: Dunham Publishing Company, 1959.

Williams, F. W., comp. The Life and Letters of Samuel Wells Williams, LL. D., Missionary, Diplomatist, Sinologue. New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1889; reprint, Wilmington, DA: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1972.

Williamson, G. I. The Westminster Confession of Faith for Study Classes. Philadelphia: Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Company, 1964.

Williamson, G. R. Memoir of the Rev. David Abeel, D. D., Late Missionary to China. Washington, Delaware: Scholarly Resources, Inc., 1972.

Wu, Chao-kwang. The International Aspect of the Missionary Movement in China. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins Press, 1930.

112

SELECTED WRITINGS

OF

Samuel Wells Williams

The Chinese Commercial Guide. Hong Kong: A. Shortrede and Company,

1863.

Chinese Immigration. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1879.

The Chinese Repository. Edited by E. C. Bridgman and S. Wells Williams. 20 vols. Macao or Canton, 1832-1851.

"Controversy Among the Protestant Missionaries on the Proper Translation of the Words God and Spirit into Chinese." Bibliotheca Sacra 35 (October 1878).

General Index of Subjects Contained in the Twenty Volumes of the Chinese Repository, with an Arranged List of the Articles. Authored by Elijah Coleman Bridgman and S. Wells Williams. Canton: Printed for the Proprietors, December 31, 1851.

A History of China, "with a chapter on recent events by F. W. Williams." New York, 1897.

The Middle Kingdom: A Survey of the Geography, Government, Education, Social Life, Arts, Religion, etc., of the Chinese Empire and Its Inhabitants. 2 vols. New York: John Wiley, 1847; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1848; rev. ed., New York, 1883.

"Narrative of the American Embassy to Peking in July, 1859." The Journal of the North China Branch of the R. A. S. vol. 1, no. 3.

Our Relations with the Chinese Empire. San Francisco, 1877.

"Our Treaties with China." The New Englander (May 1879).

"Recollections of China." Journal of the China Branch Asiatic Society, no. VIII, (1874). Shanghai.

Samuel Wells Williams Family Papers (HM22). Yale University Library. September 1970 microfilm of MS 547. Sterling Memorial Library.

113 A Syllabic Dictionary of the Chinese Language. Shanghai: American

Presbyterian Mission Press, 1874.

"Use of Certain Chinese Numismatic Work in Fixing the Chronology of China." Transactions of the Chronological Institute, vol. 1, pt. 1, (1852).

Ying hwa yun-fu lih-kiai: An English and Chinese Vocabulary in the Court Dialect. Macao: Chinese Repository, 1844.

S. Wells Williams: Early American Protestant Missions in China

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