With the application were two letters.
12,596 Jan 4/64 [different handwriting]
Description of Ung Hoong Neok, a citizen of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, native of Shangahe, China.
Age, 25 years; Height, 5 ft 2 1/2 inches; Eyes, Black, hair, Black, Complexion, Olive.
Lancaster December 28th 1864
The undersigned citizens of Lancaster, Pa. hereby certify that the above named Ung Hoong Neok, is a native of China, who arrived in the United States in March 1855 and has resided in this city since that period. He is a loyal man and naturalized citizen.
[signatures]
Edw. M Kline
Edw. C Darlington
Dec. 28, 1863
The bearer Hoong Neok (of China) is a loyal man who aims to visit his native country.
[signature illegible]
William Frederic Worner wrote a biography of Hong Neok Woo titled, “A Chinese Soldier in the Civil War”, and it was printed in
Papers Read Before the Lancaster County Historical Society, March 4, 1921. The biography is available in
Google Books, and in various formats at the Internet Archive’s
Open Library. Worner included Woo’s biography in a self-published 1927 book,
Old Lancaster: Tales and Traditions.
The text of the biography was transcribed by Shaie-Mei Deng Temple and posted at
Association to commemorate the Chinese serving in the American Civil War. At the site are two portraits of Woo written by Miss Fay and Kwok Chuen Hau.
A recent biography of Woo can be read at
The Civil War in Pennsylvania web site.
The 1860 U.S. Federal Census recorded Woo, under the name “Ung Hong Neoke”, in John Messersmith’s household. They resided in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. Woo’s trade was printer. (See letter to
The New York Times)
The Spirit of Missions
May 1853
Report of Mr. J. T. Points, Superintendent of the Schools, and a Candidate for Holy Orders, to the Missionary Bishop.
Shanghai, December 1852.
…Although it has not been my happiness during this my first year here, to see any of those of whom I have had the care, openly avow themselves believers in, and followers after Christ, still I think I may safely report a decided improvement in the general deportment of most of the larger boys, and an increased interest in the study of those holy things which it is our especial object to teach them. One scholar only (
Ny Hong Nioke) was baptized by you on last Whitsuntide; but he had been for some time before my arrival a candidate for baptism. I think, however, that I can trace among others of the older boys, such workings of the Holy Spirit as will, I hope, soon cause them to seek Him who alone is able to save….
The Spirit of Missions
November 1853
Proceedings of the Board of Missions.
The Eighteenth Annual and Sixth Triennial Meeting.
New-York, October 6, 1853.
Eighteenth Annual Report of the Foreign Committee.
Appendix B.— The Report of the Foreign Committee.
Report of Mr. J. T. Points, Superintendent of the Schools, and a Candidate for Holy Orders, to the Missionary Bishop.
Shanghai, December 1852.
…Although it has not been my happiness during this my first year here, to see any of those of whom I have had the care, openly avow themselves believers in, and followers after Christ, still I think I may safely report a decided improvement in the general deportment of most of the larger boys, and an increased interest in the study of those holy things which it is our especial object to teach them. One scholar only (
Ny Hong Nioke) was baptized by you on last Whitsuntide; but he had been for some time before my arrival a candidate for baptism. I think, however, that I can trace among others of the older boys, such workings of the Holy Spirit as will, I hope, soon cause them to seek Him who alone is able to save….
The Spirit of Missions
February 1855
The Mission Schools.
As regards the boys’ school, which is the only part of our Missionary work outside the city about which I am competent to report, we have now, as in years gone by, much to encourage and little to discourage us. The scholars at present number about sixty, some of the larger ones having been allowed to leave the school and go to America, in various capacities and for various purposes. On board the U. S. steamer Susquehanna. which returned from China via San Francisco, three of them shipped as boys, with the expectation of remaining a while in the States, if they could find anything to do; and if not, of returning as cabin-boys in some ship bound for China. Even if they should not do much in America, their increased knowledge of English and their enlarged ideas will give them a better chance for beginning life here than they could otherwise have had. Their names are Ny Ta Zak,
Ny Hoong Nioke, and Loke Ah Nur. In the second one we feel an especial interest, as he was baptized about three years ago, and has since then been exemplary in his department. Another boy, and in some respects a very smart one, Tung Ah Ling, has shipped on the U. S. sloop Vandalia, in which he will next year go to America. My idea with respect to him is, to have him spend a few years in a machine-shop, as he has quite a mechanical turn....
Lancaster Inquirer
(Pennsylvania)
July 22, 1863
China at Gettysburg—Among the killed at Gettysburg was a young Chinaman, known as John Tommy. He was attached to the First Regiment Exclesior [sic] brigade, Captain Price’s company. John Tommy was the only representative of the Central Flowery Kingdom in the army of the Potomac, and was widely known both from that circumstance and certain peculiarities of his own. John Tommy came to this country immediately after the breaking out of the war, and was induced to enlist in Gen. Sickles’s brigade, at that time being raised in this city. He was then a mere lad, entirely ignorant of our language. Being smart and honest, he soon became a favorite at Red Hook, Staten Island, and was at once the butt and the wit of the whole regiment. After the regiment became located on the Maryland shore of the Potomac, he was captured by the Rebels, who treated him very kindly and sent him to Fredericksburg. Here Tommy become a great lion, and his picture was published in the Fredericksburg papers.—Subsequently he was sent to the Libby Prison, Richmond, where he met his captain, Benjamin Price, who had been taken prisoner at Williamsburg. After his parole, Tommy came to New York city, were [sic] he employed his time in attending upon his sick and wounded comrades. He was the kindest of nurses and spent his little means in providing delicacies for a sick fellow soldiers. In the subsequent engagements at Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and last at Gettysburg, John Tommy was one of the bravest soldiers in that bravest of brigades, the Exclesior [sic]. He seemed not to know what fear was, and was the universal favorite of all his fellow soldiers. He had not been wounded up to Gettysburg, but in Friday’s night he was struck by a shell, which tore off both legs at the thighs, and shortly bled to death. The company he was in went into the action with twenty eight men, and lost twenty in killed and wounded.—Tommy’s case is peculiar, as he was the only representative of the empire of China in the finest army on the planet. — N. Y. World.
We beg to inform the N. Y. World, and the world at large, that the Army of the Potomac, or rather its reserve, the Pennsylvania Militia, has another representative of the “Central Flowery Kingdom” in it ranks, in the person of Ung Hong Neok, formerly pressman in the Daily Inquirer office.
Ung Hong has brought to this city some years ago by Dr. Messersmith, while he was connected with the celebrated Japan Expedition under the late Commodore Perry.—Dr. Messersmith observing that the young Chinaman was possessed of considerable natural talent, gave him a good English education, and afterwards placed him on the Examiner office to be initiated into the mysteries and miseries of the “art, preservative of all arts.” Ung Hong remained in the Examiner office until the Daily Inquirer was started, when he accepted the position of pressman in our office and remained in our employ until a few weeks ago.
He was a member of the Artillery Cadets, and was noted as being the most expert member of that organization in handling the rifle. Ung Hong is a consistent member of the Episcopel [sic] church, and is also a strong temperance man, and much respected by all who know him. When Gov. Curtin issued his late call for the militia, Ung Hong was one of the first to respond and joined the “Hooker Guards,” Capt. Druckamiller. He is about 26 years of age, and is stout and robust, although scarcely five feet in height. From his antecedents we are satisfied that our Chinaman, if occasion should call for it, will do his whole duty.
Lancaster Inquirer
(Pennsylvania)
November 23, 1863
Tribute of Respect—At a meeting of the printers of Lancaster, held on Saturday evening, 21st inst., (J. F. Downey in the chair,) a motion was made for the appointment of a committee of five to draft resolutions expressive of their feelings on the occasion of the death of Wm. H. Pearsol, which was announced by the chair. The committee reported the following:
Whereas, By the decease of our late fellow printer, Wm. H. Pearsol, we have lost a good and valued member of our profession, and now who promised to be a valuable member of society: therefore.
Resolved, That we deeply sympathize with the bereaved family and friends of the deceased in their affliction.
Resolved, That we, the printers of Lancaster, feel the loss of our late friend as one who would soon have been a worthy member of our fraternity.
Resolved, That these resolutions be published in all the city papers, and a copy forward to the family of the departed.
J. D. Piatt, W. H. Metzger, J. B. Eicholtz, Frank Clinton, U. Hoong Neok.
Lancaster Inquirer
(Pennsylvania)
January 13, 1864
Personal—Ung Neok, of the Celestial Kingdom, who was brought to this city some years ago by Dr. Messersmith, started on his return to China this morning. While here Mr. Neok learned the mysteries (and miseries) of the typographical art, and became a very fair pressman, which position he, for a long time held in the Inquirer office. Mr. Neok is a young man of unblemished reputation, and a firm Christian, having joined the Episcopal Church some time ago. We wish him a safe and speedy return to his far distant home.
The Spirit of Missions
June 1866
Semi-annual Report of the Mission at Shanghai.
By the Rev. Elliot H. Thomson.
January, 1866.
…It gives me pleasure to inform you that Mr. Hoong-Neok will join the mission on the 1st of March next. He gives up a good situation which he holds under Messrs.
Russell & Co. He already gives us some aid in the work. I regard him as a valuable addition to our force here, being a native, and an earnest man.
The Spirit of Missions
October 1866
Faith and Hope.
The following extract from a letter from Rev. E. H. Thomson shows with what faith and patience the little band of missionaries in China labor and hope:
“I should love to see a good working set of men here. I will hope on. Our Chinese, Chai, Kiung, and Hoong Neok are a great comfort to me. The Lord has given me a good sensible wife, ready to aid me as far as I will let her.
“I must be thankful, then, and pray He may bless us even though we be not a strong band. But do not let the Church forget us.
“All is looking quite cheerful in the mission. There are several applicants for baptism, and our schools have more scholars than we can well teach.”
The Spirit of Missions
December 1866
Report of the Rev. Elliot H. Thomson.
Shanghai, June 29th, 1866.
The Native Catechists.
Our catechist Ting seems to promise well; he is teaching and studying at the same time. He speaks well, and has a good command of the literary language. Since my last report Hoong-Niok has left his secular employment, where he received a larger salary than we could allow him, and has joined us. I am much pleased with him. He is ever ready and willing to work. He is now studying with me, and uses the same Chinese teacher that I do to prosecute his Chinese studies. He needs this from having been in America so long.
Yung-Kiung is helping me still. I find him of great assistance in business matters, he having so much experience out here. He will join us in due time, and I feel that, as a help in the mission, he will be a very valuable addition to our force.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1867
Letter from the Rev. Elliot H. Thomson.
Chefoo, Aug. 30th, 1866.
…
With regard to Hoong Niok I send so many of his letters that I need say but little, only that they convey an idea of but a part of his usefulness. As far as one can judge from words and deeds, I believe him to be truly sincere in his piety, and to be ready to do all he can most heartily.
As to his usefulness as far as his capacities reach in his sphere, no foreigner can equal him, even after years of hard study. I wish we had ten or a hundred such men. I pray he may be preserved in the hour of temptation through which he will surely have to pass….
Letters from Mr. Yung Kiung Ngan.
…
Hoong-Niok and myself read on Monday and Tuesday.
…The weekly weekly readings with Hoong-Niok and Ting, and others, are held at my house on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, (Wednesdays the prayer meeting is held.) Ting’s knowledge of the Scriptures pleased me very much. He speaks as usual in the chapel on week days. I hear the gatherings are not large, because of the inclement weather, and latterly of the heat. The Soo-Chow Booboo (the Bible woman) continues her readings with Mrs. Yung Kiung.
Hoong-Niok will write you, and tell you what he has been doing; which, together with helping Mr. Hohing, keeps him, I have no doubt, busy.
July 30th.—In the mission everything is moving on harmoniously. July 22d I had the service in the city. In the afternoon was the regular missionary meeting of our native church. Although the day was warm, we had a large gathering. Ting gave an interesting address on the “object of our assembling.” It was rather too long perhaps to suit the majority of the audience, being three quarters of an hour. The Chinese, you know, are not accustomed to long, quiet sitting. Hoong-Niok’s report was also good, but too lengthy, encroaching too much upon the province of an exhortation. After the meeting the members decided that in future the service should not exceed one hour.
This is well, as we must not discourage the members; for at present the majority do not come for the sake of hearing long speeches….
The Spirit of Missions
February 1867
Letter from the Rev. Elliot H. Thomson.
Shanghai, Oct. 25th, 1866.
…Hoong Niok seems to be getting on steadily. He is studying with me, and also helps in various ways, and has charge of three schools.
The Spirit of Missions
April 1867
Letter from the Rev. E. H. Thomson.
Shanghai, December 26th, 1866.
We have had a very pleasant Christmas. All of our Chinese Christians came out to our church at Hoong-Que, and also all the members of the former English Church Mission. I mentioned to you that I had taken Dzaw, the deacon, over, and of course all his church members came with him. Our little church was crowded to overflowing. Mr. Chai and Deacon Dzaw took part in the services. I preached the sermon. After the sermon, Chai and Dzaw administered the Communion. The Church had been beautifully dressed by a Mrs. Jenkins, assisted by Hoong-Niok and others. Immediately after the Chinese service we had the foreign morning service and communion. I preached, and the Rev. Mr. Kaufman, the seamen’s chaplain, came during the service and read the Exhortion in the Communion. He is only in deacon’s order as yet.
At the collection we took up about eighty dollars, to aid in the expenses of the weekly evening services. I think there were twenty foreign communicants. During the time the foreign service was going on, the Chinese were having their Christmas feast at presbyter Chai’s house and at teacher Ting’s school-house. Hoong-Niok had charge of the children of the school in part of our house. After the foreign service was over, all the poor members were invited to the church, and presented with some useful piece of clothing, or a pair of shoes or a hat. These things were given by Mrs. Wm. G. Cuthbertson, of Shanghai, one of the staunch friends of our mission.….
The Spirit of Missions
May 1867
Semi-annual Report of the Rev. Elliot H. Thomson.
Shanghai, (China.) Jan. 4, 1867.
The Work at Shanghai.
…The schools have a very fair number of scholars. They are under the immediate charge of Mr. Wong, Mrs. Thomson, Hoong-niok, and Yung-king. I endeavor to visit them all and examine each once a month in regular order. The Chinese Native Missionary Society Schools are more directly under the charge of Mr. Hoong-niok, who does admirably with them….
The Native Catechists.
Hoong-niok continues his studies with care. He is now studying Moral Philosophy and Biblical literature in English and the Bible in Chinese. He is also a member of our Theological class in Chinese. He speaks three times a week at the different stations, and has a class in the evening for instructing the younger members in the catechism, &c.
The Mission Not Disintegrated.
When our new Bishop arrives he will find, even with the small force in the field, that he will have an abundance of work.
He will have Chai, Dzaw, Hoong-niok, Yung Kiung, myself, Ting and Wong at Shanghai, with Mr. Schereschewsky and Mr. Hohing at the North; we hope, also, Mr. Nelson.
I do not like the phrase I have seen in the papers that the China mission has been “disintegrated.” What do they mean? We have more stations than ever when Bishop Boone lived; we have as many, or more, scholars; we have more members who attend church; we have more native preachers and other helpers; we have a native female agent; we have two schools supported entirely by the Chinese themselves. I only hope this kind of disintegration may go on rapidly.….
The Spirit of Missions
June 1867
Letters from the Rev. Robert Nelson.
Shanghai, China, Feb. 8, 1867.
I have the pleasure of informing you that we arrived at this place in health and safety the 6th inst., just eight weeks from New York, ten days of which time were spent ashore—one at San Francisco and nine at Yokohama, Japan….
The evening of our arrival I had the pleasure of attending a Chinese prayer- meeting at the house of our young friend “Kiung,” whom you saw frequently when he was in America. Chai conducted the service, reading and commenting nicely upon the parable of the tares, which was the lesson for the evening. Chai’s own brother and wife, Yoong Kiung and his wife and sister, Hoong Niok, (formerly, you know, at Lancaster, Pa.,) and some others were present. The meeting with these links of our former co-workers, and fruits of their labors, was very pleasant, as you may well imagine. Sad as it was to miss the many familiar faces and voices we used to know, and which gave so much life to these well-known places, it was also cheering to see such living proofs that while “they rest from their labors, their works do follow them.”…
The Spirit of Missions
July 1867
Letter from the Rev. Robert Nelson.
Shanghai, March 8, 1867.
…Mr. Thomson’s special visit is to survey the region about Kuikiang, with a view of establishing, possibly, the mission centre, or headquarters, there, when the Bishop comes, according to his suggestions. He proposed to be absent a fortnight, and learn all he can about the advantages or disadvantages of the locality. By the aid of the several native assistants, Yoong Kiung, Hoong Niok, Dzaw, the deacon of the English Church Missionary Society, and Ting, we keep up the various services. Meantime, I am beginning to work into the management of the two departments falling to me, Chinese and English, Mr. Thomson anticipating a move to some other point when the Bishop comes….
The Spirit of Missions
November 1867
Semi-annual Report of the Mission at Shanghai.
Shanghai, China, June 29th, 1867.
…Hoong-Niok continues his studies with me, and his charge of the Native Mission Schools. These I may add are in a very prosperous condition.
He speaks at the different stations, and is as active and energetic as ever.
Tour in the Country.
He accompanied me in April and May on a long tour in the country. We visited some of the largest cities in this part of China, sold and distributed a great many books and tracts of various kinds. I had no passport, having forgotten to take one with me. However, we met with no hindrance from any one. We spoke often to large crowds; they always kindly received us and listened to what we had to say. So far as any obstacle that we met with would go to show, it would seem that this whole region is fully and entirely open to the preaching of the Gospel.….
The Spirit of Missions
December 1867
Letter of the Rev. Robert Nelson.
Shanghai, China, August 15, 1867.
Prayer Meeting and Missionary Meeting.
Then there is once a week a meeting for prayer, and reading, and expounding the Scriptures, attended by the various families near by who are Christian. In the conduct of this meeting too, the assistants take their part. The families who attend this meeting generally, are Chai’s and his brothers, Kiung’s, Hoong-Nioke’s, Ting’s, and several other men and women. Once a month there is a Missionary meeting of the various members of the Church, who are, or have been, through the schools, or are otherwise associated with the Mission. I believe this was originated by Bishop Williams, when here, on his way to the United States, with a view to benefiting the former members of the schools, and keeping up some esprit du corps among them, and keeping an influence over them. They contribute something also, which is applied to the support of two day schools, and are thus accomplishing something for their countrymen.
Instructing the Native Assistants.
Again, Mr. Thomson, with Kiung’s aid has a class once a week, principally of the assistants, who read regularly some instructive practical book, such as can be gotten, for the enlargement generally of their ideas. He also regularly instructs Hoong-Nioke more systematically and thoroughly….
Proceedings of the Board of Missions. Thirty-second Annual Meeting. New York, October 16th, 1867.
Appendix E.
Hoong-Niok continues his studies with me, and his charge of the Native Mission Schools. These I may add are in a very prosperous condition. He speaks at the different stations, and is as active and energetic as ever. He accompanied me in April and May on a long tour in the country. We visited some of the largest cities in this part of China, sold and distributed great many books and tracts of various kinds….
The Spirit of Missions
March 1868
A Letter from Our Chinese Presbyter.
…The letter also contains an account of a deception practiced upon the people by certain heathen priests, and the method pursued by Mr. Wong, and Hoong Niok, a native catechist, in finding put and exposing the imposture, and causing the “Magical Fountain” to be destroyed. They found that sixteen hundred people, affected with various diseases, had paid money to the priests for some of the water from this “fountain” to heal them of their complaints. The account shows the deceitfulness of the priests, the credulity of the people, and the happy influence which Christian natives may exercise....
The Magical Fountain.
There is still another subject which 1 am going to write to you about. Some three miles from my house there is a temple called “Siau Wong Miau.” The country temples are very much alike; they have one large central room or hall, in which the chief idol is set up with the smaller ones on each side. Sometimes each smaller god has an altar or table on which offerings are also made. These idols are very ugly, common-looking, roughly-painted; they are made of mud and straw, chiefly, but sometimes of wood. Attached to this main hall, on each side and back, are various other apartments, used by the priests for sleeping rooms and the like. At this temple, about which I wish to tell you a story, there were some very poor priests who live by a little work and a great deal of cheating and deceiving the poor ignorant country people, and the town’s people also, at times. They get up stories, of their idol having, done something wonderful, and thus get the people to come and offer incense, and buy candles to burn before the idols; and thus the priests get money. At one time last year, they got up a great report of their having a wonderful fountain which sprung up just before their great idol. The water of this fountain was magical in its effect. All kinds of diseases could be healed by it. They called it Sein-sz, or water of the genii. They believe in eight great genii which they call Sien-niung. These Sien-niung can do all sorts of wonderful things. Now when the fame of this wonderful water began to spread abroad great numbers went to get it, some from the town also. They came to worship the idol, buy the water, and then drink it themselves, or take it to their friends. One of my neighbors went to get some; he paid forty cents for it, with the promise of three dollars if he got well. Things were going on thus, till Hoog-niok, one of the catechists in our mission, and myself determined to go out and examine into this matter. When we reached the place there was a great crowd of worshipers. There were also the treasurer, the master of the temple, and a number of other deceivers of the people. There was a railing around the place or spot from which the water issued. There was also a great idol by it.
Finding Out the Trick.
We went in to see where the water came from. They did not like our going in for fear we should discover their trick. We did not regard what they said, but went in and saw a little hole filled with water. We ran our hands down into it, and found at the bottom a piece of an old stone-jar buried in the mud beneath the water. We then dipped out the water and felt around the bottom of the hole, till at last the secrets of the fountain came to light. We found they had a pipe hidden in the ground, which passed from the bottom of the hole to the next room, in which there was an old woman who kept up the supply of water, by pouring into the pipe when the worshipers came. She was paid for her part of the work also. When we found it all out they then confessed it, and said it was because they were so poor.
Making Them Destroy the Fountain.
They begged us not to tell. They then offered us a share in the profits if we would join them, but we threatened them with punishment and made them destroy the whole thing. They had the names of some one thousand six hundred persons who bought the water of them. Thus, my dear friends, you may see a little of the wickedness of these priests, and how they lead the people after their idols. May the day soon come when China shall cast away her idols of wood and stone.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1869
…Attention is asked in this connection, to the letters and other communications of our colored and native Missionaries, as they are published from time to time in The Spirit of Missions, and the News from, the Foreign Field. They evince a degree of attainment, intelligence and Christian spirit which must be gratifying to every friend of Foreign Missions. They show in clear light, success in our efforts in the past. If it be remembered that Jones, Seton, Brownell and others, are indigenous fruits of the Mission in Africa; and, that Kong Chai Wong, Yung Kiung Ngan, Niok Ng, and others, of the Mission in China; and, then if we call to mind the number and character of the colored agents in the two Missions, Liberian and Haitien, whose letters, journals and labors prove their qualifications for their work, it would seem that no man calling himself Christian, with such evidence before him, will deny that our Foreign Missions have been successful, and give high promise and positive encouragement for the future….
The Spirit of Missions
September 1869
China.
From Bishop Williams.
On Board Steamer “New York,” May 17th, 1869.
Native Women Confirmed at an Out-station
Among those confirmed at this time were four women from a little village near by, at which Mr. Hoong Niok Ng opened a little out-station and day-school, with money furnished by himself and a few of our converts. Such efforts to do good to, and spread the Gospel among, their own people—originated entirely among themselves—are very gratifying evidences of real life, and show that they are waking up to some sense of their responsibilities….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1869
China.
Report of the Station at Shanghai.
Churches—Two.
1. Christ Church—The native Chinese, Rev. W.K. Chai, Presbyter, in charge; the Services in the vernacular language.
2. Church of our Saviour—The Mission Chapel, Rev. Robert Nelson in charge. The Services in English and Chinese at different hours; the Chinese Morning Service in the vernacular, except a portion of the Psalter; the Gospels and the Epistles, with the Collects, now in course of arrangement. Hong Neok, candidate for Orders, Assistant….
…At Tsa Ka Pang, a hamlet, about two miles from the Shanghai Mission premises, a school has been opened under the charge of Hong Neok, candidate for Orders, whose labors are favorably reported. Such have been his ministrations among the villagers, that five, after due instruction and examination in the doctrines of the Bible and the Prayer-Book, have been baptized and confirmed.
Mission Hospital.—This Institution, opened more than a year since by Mr. Thomson, has been highly successful. A larger building has been erected on the Mission grounds, to meet its pressing wants, from the contributions of the European and Chinese residents of Shanghai. It is open for the reception of patients three days in the week. The number of applicants varies from four hundred to six hundred per day. Here is a growing field for Missionary effort, and that under the most favorable circumstances. The Chinese heart, softened by the Christian sympathy and skill of the attendants, is opened and prepared for the reception of saving truth.
Dr. McGowan, an American physician, and Drs. Jamieson and Henderson (English), kindly attend in turn each day, their services being gratuitously rendered. Hong Neok, under their instructions, has been the principal Chinese assistant from the beginning, and has gained the marked approbation of his superiors….
The Spirit of Missions
November 1869
China.
…“Among those confirmed at this time were four women from a little village near by, at which Mr. Hoong Niok Ng opened a little out-station and day-school, with money furnished by himself and a few of our converts. Such efforts to do good to, and spread the Gospel among, their own people—originated entirely among themselves—are very gratifying evidences of real life, and show that they are waking up to some sense of their responsibilities.”
The Spirit of Missions
December 1869
Board of Missions.
Report.
Chapel of the Holy Saviour.
Business Meeting.
Monday Evening.
Public Missionary Meeting.
Those who have to-day listened to the Report of our Foreign Committee, the Reports of the Missionary Bishop to Africa and the Missionary Bishop to China, are somewhat acquainted with the features of our foreign work. Very interesting is the account of the Mission in China, where the natives themselves are at work for the spreading of the Gospel. There is another illustration of this in the Report of the Foreign Committee:
The following facts relative to another out-station are very significant:
Among those confirmed at this time were four women from a little village near by, at which Mr. Hoong Neok Ng opened a little out-station and day-school with money furnished by himself and a few of our converts. Such efforts to do good to their own people, and spread the Gospel among them, originating entirely among themselves, are very gratifying evidences of real life, and show that they are waking up to some sense of their responsibilities. This is simply an illustration of the reality of the conversion of those who have been reached by our Missionaries….
Report of the Missionary Bishop to China.
…The largest success of Missions to China has been in the towns and villages away from the open ports; and the sooner and wider we can extend our influence in this direction, the greater our prospect of making progress. A new illustration of this is seen at the little village of Tsa-Ka-Pang, within a short distance of our Mission. Here a few of our converts undertook, of their own accord, to open and support a day-school, which is visited twice a week by our active, energetic Candidate for Orders, Mr. Hoong Niok. The neighbors, who are assembled by the ringing of a bell as soon as he arrives, listen attentively to the instruction given to the children, and are afterwards addressed with a few earnest words, and dismissed with prayer. The result has been, that five persons have been baptized and confirmed and other Catechumens are now under instruction. Mr. Hoong Niok is very zealous, and has, besides this, the charge of two other day-schools supported by the Chinese. He is, also, the principal, most efficient Chinese Assistant at the Hospital, and acts as lay-reader to Mr. Nelson, at the Church of our Saviour.
Hoong Niok Ng (Native Catechist and Candidate for Orders)……Shanghai.
Prepared in Compliance with Acts of the Legislature
Vol. V
Samuel Penniman Bates
B. Singerly, State Printer, 1871
The Protestant Episcopal Almanac and Church Directory for the Year of Our Lord 1876.
China Mission.
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Shanghai
The Spirit of Missions
February 1871
China.
Letter from the Rev. R. Nelson.
Shanghai, China, Nov. 12th, 1870.
Trouble Arising from the Accidental Shooting of a Chinaman.
There was a case brought to our hospital some two or three weeks since, which caused some little commotion here, and as it also exhibits some phases of Chinese character, not always brought to the surface, I will give you a little account of it. A Chinaman was brought to be treated who had been shot with a shot gun, the charge of which had scatteringly lodged over the whole surface of his back. The wounded man said that it was an accidental thing, as the testimony afterwards elicited went to prove. The surgeons who attended him could discover no evidence of any of the shot having penetrated much below the skin; but the man was affected with some trouble in his lungs, whether connected with the wound, or not, it does not appear. After two or three days the man died, and, his friends not coming to remove him in time, arrangements had to be made for him, and the body removed from the hospital. The friends now turned up, and lodged various complaints, and the chief Mandarin of the city held an inquest, when it was too late to draw any inference from the body itself; but he determined to make it true that the man was shot intentionally. The case was examined by the magistrate again, in company with the British Consul (the man who had unfortunately shot the Chinaman was an Englishman), who, not finding ground to convict the accused man of murder, declined, of course, to do so. But the Mandarin was very indignant, and speechified extensively to the crowd gathered, and with the dead body in the midst, accusing our assistant, “Hoong-Neok” (who had charge of the man while in the hospital, and who was called on as a witness), of receiving money from foreigners to give false testimony, and declaring boldly, that if the foreign official would not decide this case to suit him, he should have to decide in the same way if a foreigner were shot by a Chinaman. And Hoong-Neok’s comment upon the case was that the speech of the Mandarin was the very thing to encourage the Chinese to go and shoot a foreigner.
And a very just comment it was. Indeed, the whole case exhibits the Chinese Mandarin in his true light, as regardless of justice, hating the foreigner to death, and, perhaps, having a money consideration at the bottom of all.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1871
What the Church Is Doing in China.
Connected with the Shanghai Mission are several out-stations:
…2d. Tsa-Ka-Pang, about a mile and a half distant from the Mission. The Services here are rendered by “Hoong-Nook,” the other candidate for Orders, with the aid of an old school teacher there.
This effort is a very interesting one. A few of the converts some years ago, undertook of their own accord to open and support a day-school there. The neighbors who were assembled by the ringing of a bell whenever Mr. Hoong-Nook, the Catechist, arrived, have listened attentively to the instruction given to the children, and have been afterwards addressed with a few earnest words, and dismissed with Prayer. Sixteen persons have been Baptized and Confirmed as the fruits of this work within a year or two.
The Spirit of Missions
November 1871
“Hong Niok, Chinese Convert and Candidate for Orders.”
A Sketch of His History, By Miss Fay.
Hong Niok is really quite a remarkable man—a man of strong health and of untiring energy; generous, warm-hearted and impulsive; one whose entire self-confidence never seems to falter or change for a moment; with him an impulse of duty is followed by corresponding action; I have known him to leave his dying child to conduct the ordinary chapel Services when it was “his turn.” In this, though, he seems guided by an admiration of Chinese examples of lofty self-denying virtue as well as by the example of Him Who has said, “He that loveth father or mother more than Me, is not worthy of Me.” Chinese annals say that “the great Yü was absent eight years from his home, during which period he several times passed his own door; yet his duty to the Emperor was so absorbing that he never once looked towards his home, lest the sight of it or of his children might weaken his resolution, or hinder the accomplishment of the mission with which he was charged by the sovereign.” It is easy to see that the religion of Jesus, grafted on such principles, ought to make staunch Christians, and as easy to see that such Christians might be wanting in the graces of humility, meekness and consideration for others, as well as in the silence and gentleness that become self-knowledge.
Hong Niok was a little boy in our Mission boarding-school when I went to Shanghai, some twenty-one years since; and as I was a young teacher in those days, he was one among twenty boys whom Bishop Boone gave me in charge to teach English the day after my arrival in the Mission. I taught him several years, and considered him rather a patient, plodding boy, with a good amount of self-esteem and self-will, neither of which I took much notice of, as he was uniformly respectful to me, and obedient to all my little rules, and generally stood well in his classes. As time passed on, a new teacher was put in charge of our school. A class of my boys, fifteen in number, considered sufficiently advanced to be promoted, were placed, with others, under his charge for more efficient teaching. Hong Niok was of the number, and for a little while seemed pleased with the change. I must say in defence of the boys—for they nearly all rebelled against the new superintendent—that the pages of algebra, geometry, history, philosophy, etc., that were required of them every day, besides their Chinese studies, did seem rather impossible. At all events, one after another took refuge in running away from the school. One morning, on going into my class-room, I saw a slate lying on my desk, on which was written: “Now dear Miss Fay, I run away like other boys. Superintendent say I am dunce. I think I stupid. I go. Your affectionate Hong Niok.”
From that time he disappeared from our school, and I saw no more of him for several years. In the meantime, the superintendent returned to America, and, for lack of other teachers, the boys’ boarding-school again fell into the hands of the ladies. A good number of the old runaway scholars reappeared, among whom was Hong Niok, and begged to be permitted to enter the school again; but Bishop Boone did not think best to readmit them; so they found places of employment, knowing just enough of the English language to bring the teaching of it into general disrepute among the Chinese, as well as the English residents. Several of them got situations as table-boys on board an American man-of-war then lying in port, which sailed for New York soon after. Among this number was Hong Niok, who left the vessel on its arrival in port, and remained in this country about eight years, learning to speak the language, and also learning the printing business in the establishment of some good Christian man and friend of Missions in Pennsylvania. I have often heard Hong Niok speak of him, but do not remember his name. He seems to have been well satisfied with his Chinese protege, as, after he was master of the business, he was anxious that he should remain, and offered him a fair price for his work. But Hong Niok’s heart was with his own people and in his own country; so he refused all overtures to remain here, and returned to Shanghai just after the death of our beloved Bishop Boone. Mr. Thomson was then the only one left of our former large Mission (I was in the English Church Missionary Society’s Mission at that time). The funds of our Mission were low, and Mr. T. had no means of employing Hong Niok, or rather no means of paying him, so Hong Niok engaged himself as an interpreter in an English establishment where Chinese workmen were used. In the meantime, he attended all the Sunday and sometimes the Evening Services of the Mission, and began a course of reading with Mr. T., preparatory to being admitted a candidate for Holy Orders.
He showed, too, great love for the theory and practice of medicine, nursing and caring for the sick. A medical Missionary, Dr. McGowan, whose name you may see in the Reports of our Mission hospital, took a great fancy to him; lent him books, gave him occasional instruction, took him with him in his visits to Chinese patients, till he became so expert in the names and uses of medicines, and in treating the ordinary diseases of the country people, that Dr. McGowan often trusted him to administer medicine to them during his absence; and then, under charge of Mr. T. and the Doctor, of dispensing medicines, on certain days of the week, at our Mission chapel, to the Chinese, after the Services were over; and he never failed to accompany his medicines with a good amount of religious advice to his patients. This was the beginning of our present flourishing, Mission hospital, in which he still holds a prominent and efficient position, is still learning, and is of great importance in interpreting for the two very superior English medical men who are in charge. He assists in the difficult surgical operations, and performs the simpler ones alone; has charge of the medicines, makes up prescriptions, keeps the Chinese applicants in excellent order, which is sometimes rather difficult, as there are often three or four hundred or more in one afternoon to administer to and send away. After Mr. T. left for this country, at the request of Mr. Nelson I used often to go to the hospital, to assist in administering to the women and children. Hong Niok’s order, energy and despatch were quite my admiration; and his graceful English, as he assigned me my duties, did not at all remind me of the poor little note he had left on my writing-desk some years before.
But I fear I am making this sketch too long, so I will finish by saying that since Bishop Williams has had charge of the Mission, Hong Niok has been admitted candidate for Orders, and devoted all his time to Mission work, studying theology first with Mr. T., and since his absence, with Mr. Nelson or the Bishop. The Summer after Mr. T. left Shanghai, our good pastor, Wong Chai, had a severe illness, and was ordered to go to Hankow for his health, which left Trinity Church in the city without a pastor. The Bishop was in Oosaka. Mr. Nelson had four regular Services to conduct every Sunday—three in our Mission chapel and one at Kong Wan. Hong Niok assisted him, reading Morning Prayers, and had besides two or three Services among the Chinese; so Mr. Nelson sent me to Trinity Church to attend to the reading of the Morning Prayers, look after the people, the schools (we have six or seven that attend the Mission there), and Hong Niok was to come in after the reading, in time to “preach” or speak to the people. In this way I had an opportunity of seeing him in the pulpit, or rather the chancel, as I had during the week of seeing him in the hospital. I at first thought it would be the “extreme of self-denial,” as I told Mr. N., “to sit there, with one eye on the school children and congregation generally, and listen to Hong Niok ‘preaching.’”
But I soon became so much interested, and was so surprised to see how eloquently he could speak, I considered it a special favor that I had the opportunity of listening to him. For a Chinese, he has a wonderful gift of speaking, seizing upon the most simple and effective truths of our holy religion, and impressing them upon the hearts of his hearers. It was also very gratifying to see how attentively he was listened to by the whole congregation.
Hong Niok is probably the best and most efficient teacher and superintendent of schools that we have ever had among the Chinese. Mr. Thomson made him superintendent of all the Mission schools while I was in the English Mission. On my return, I took the full charge of my own schools. I had six when I left for New York, which I suppose have mostly fallen back into his hands, as the Chinese teachers have great respect for him; and I most earnestly pray that grace may be given to him equal to his day, that he may “continue Christ’s faithful servant unto his life's end.”
The Spirit of Missions
January 1872
Mr. Woo Hoong-Niok, Candidate for Orders……Shanghai.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1872
Miss Fay’s School.
Few names among the workers in the Foreign Field are more familiar to our ears than that of Miss Lydia M. Fay, who, after nearly twenty years of faithful labor, has lately made a visit home, and has now returned to China. The readers of The Spirit of Missions will remember, in the November number, a sketch, by Miss Fay, of the history of Hong Niok, a Chinese convert and Candidate for Orders; and, as soon as the portrait arrives which is to accompany it, another will be given of Ting-Seen-Sang, also a Candidate for Orders, who has charge of the Mission station at Kong Wan. Those who know nothing of the Boys’ Boarding-school in Shanghai, so dear to Miss Fay’s heart, save the little which they gather from these sketches, may feel their interest increase when they consider the vicissitudes through which it must have passed during all these twenty years of work and waiting….
The Spirit of Missions
June 1872
Letter from Miss Fay.
…The Boys’ Boarding-school, the Hospital, and the Kong Wan Mission are going on as usual Hoong Niok proposed the other day that I should go on with Mr. Nelson’s teaching of him and Kia-Sung Ting, which I would have done, but Ting lost his youngest child a few days after Mr. Nelson left. His wife is quite inconsolable; he does not like to leave her; so I have only seen him once since—and now Hoong Niok has inflamed eyes—and does not read at all—though he can attend to most of his duties at the hospital, and will, I hope, soon be able to read and study. Then, if Bishop Williams does not come over from Japan, I shall go on with their lessons till Mr. Nelson returns.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1872
Sunday at a Chinese Mission Station—A Letter from Miss Fay.
Shanghai, May 5, 1872.
My dear Miss Emery: As you are kind enough to say you are interested in all the details of my every-day life, I am going to tell you how I passed this afternoon.
Soon after an early dinner, Hong Nioke, one of our catechists and candidates for Holy Orders, called for me to go with him to one of our out-stations in the village of Law Zok, where he has two day-schools and occasional religious services. I took two of the larger of my school-boys along, as they assist much in the responsive part of the Church Service, and I like to accustom them to the routine of Mission work at the out-stations where, I trust, they may, in time, make efficient helpers.….
Church Service Among the Chinese.
As Hong Nioke entered the desk, and I sat down near it, the room was soon filled; and many lingered about the door outside, as there was no room to enter. You, “at home,” who worship in costly churches, where a quiet, well-bred congregation join in a reverently ordered Service, can have little idea of our “meetings” here, where the congregations know nothing of real worship, or of the living God Whom they ought to obey. All this must be taught them, and I have never met any one more gifted in this kind of initiatory instruction than our catechist, Hong Nioke. Thoroughly imbued with the spirit of our holy religion, and knowing well the Chinese mind, their superstitions and modes of thinking, he finds little difficulty in keeping a congregation in order, and fixing their attention on what he is saying….
Visit to a Buddhist Temple and Nunnery.
As the little girl kept by my side, after we left the house, I asked her several questions, and, among others, if she would like me to go to her home. She seemed much pleased with the idea at first, but then made some excuse, and looked quite grave, evidently being afraid the nuns might not approve of her bringing a foreign teacher into their midst. Yet, as Hong Nioke offered to accompany me, I decided to go; and telling her so, she seemed to take courage.
I wish I could describe to you a Buddhist temple and nunnery—its high, dark walls; its numerous courts; its long, low, rambling halls and chambers, filled with shrines and a multitudinous variety of idols of all shapes, sizes, and conditions—numerous gilded Buddhas, with blue hair, black mouth, and red eyes, sometimes represented standing, and sometimes sitting on a lotus-flower; the goddess of Mercy, who assumes a great many forms, the most popular of which is “the thousand-handed goddess of Mercy,” in allusion to the great benefits she is supposed to bestow on those who worship her; and the smaller idol gods and goddesses, with the avenging deities that fill up every niche and corner around and on both sides of the high altar, before which incense is continually burning, and benighted worshippers continually kneeling—all make up a scene too sad and too complicated for description.
We were ushered in through several small courts, in which stood huge tripods, or incense-burners, into a reception-room, where two or three nuns received us very civilly. I asked for the lady-abbess, but was told she was not at home. The sub-abbess, however, soon appeared, accompanied by-several more nuns, and we were invited into a larger reception-room—one side of which was quite filled with idols—in the centre of which was a gaudily gilt shrine, hung with tawdry artificial flowers, in which sat a full-sized goddess of Mercy, clad in gorgeous embroidery, with a gilt crown on her head, from which depended strings of pearls that nearly covered her face like a veil of rich fringe.
As we were invited to sit down, we did so, and I began conversation by asking the sub-abbess some questions about their mode of living, which is supposed to be very strict and abstemious. In return, she asked me many questions about the “doctrine of Jesus”; how many fast-days I kept in the year; and if I passed all my time in repeating prayers, which is considered one of the first and highest duties of the Buddhists.
Tea was then brought in, served in tiny covered china cups, and placed on a small table at our side. As I took the cover off my cup to taste the tea with, in place of a teaspoon, there seemed to be only a few rose-leaves in the bottom of the cup, and the water quite colorless; yet, on tasting it, I found the flavor exquisite—such tea as is only seen in China.
We sat about half an hour longer, and then, as the perfume of burning sandal-wood, and the smoke of the incense, gave me a headache, I rose to take leave, amid many protestations of Chinese politeness that I should not go so soon, and many pressing invitations to come again; and walked sadly away thinking, “Who is sufficient for these things?” and how can a simple Missionary exert an influence in these strongly fortified holds of the Arch-deceiver? In a Christian land, one can form little idea of what idolatry really is; or with how much of learning, wealth, gorgeous display, and attractive courtesy it is bound around the homes, the hearts, the affections, the very lives of the heathen, who know no other religion.
The Spirit of Missions
November 1872
Arrival of Thirty Chinese Boys.
An Appeal in Behalf of Three of Them from Miss Fay.
New Haven, Sept. 14, 1872.
…the following appeal from Miss Fay, from whose loving care three of these boys were taken:
Three of my school-boys are among the number that leave by this mail for America, in charge of Mr. Laisun. It is said their destination is New Haven; this, however, is not quite certain. But I do so wish you may see Mr. Laisun in New York, and use your influence that “my boys” may be put under some Episcopal supervision. The three are members of the Church by Holy Baptism, and I do hope and pray the “Church at home” may take an interest in them. I stood sponsor for the youngest ere my visit to America. He is a bright little fellow, quite a child of the Church; his father was one of my scholars, and I stood sponsor for him some eighteen years ago, and he was a regular communicant in the Church for a number of years before his death. His wife also was a Christian, educated in Miss Jones girls’ school. After the death of her husband she taught my girls’ day-school, at Kong-wan. During my absence she died, leaving this little boy quite dependent upon the Mission. Our Bishop received him into the Boys’ Boarding-school, wrote me a letter about him, which I showed to Mrs. Preston, and she interested a lady in his behalf who promised to pay fifty dollars a year for his support, which she has done for the last two years. On my return the Bishop gave him into my charge, and as he was very anxious to go to America, I gave him permission to enter the Imperial Government school on trial, which is a preliminary step to their being accepted for America. I hear the heads of the department were more than satisfied with him—delighted with his quick wit and intelligence.
Number two is the child of heathen parents. His father is dead, and the mother on her second marriage gave this son to his father's mother, that is, his grandmother, who is a devoted Christian, and was a communicant in the Church when I arrived in China, some twenty-two years ago. She is now very old and infirm, and neither expects nor wishes to live much longer. A short time after my return to Shanghai, she paid me a visit, begging me to adopt her grandson, whom the Bishop had also received into the boarding-school. I at first refused; but she seemed so distressed, that I promised to do so if Hoong Niok would be his guardian and assist me. He never refuses such requests! Another meeting was therefore arranged, and a middle man called to write an agreement, the purport of which the old lady dictated herself, that I should have the whole control of the child, that he should remain in school till he was educated etc., etc., and that his future should be decided by me, i.e., Fekoo Niang, etc. Hoong Niok merely signed the paper, but he was the first to propose his going to America. But I told him I could not give it a thought until I knew what his grandmamma would think of it, as we had taken him to relieve her of all anxiety about him, and I would on no account send him to America unless she wished it Hoong Niok therefore called on her, and to my surprise she seemed quite anxious that he should go; but she begged me to write to some of my Christian friends that they would take a kind interest in him. He is thirteen years old, and was baptized as an adult….
Christian Work Among the Heathen.
Episcopal Mission, Shanghai, 11th July, 1872.
My dear Miss Emery: As I have before sent you some account of my visits to the out-stations of our Mission which are principally in charge of our native Pastors and catechists, I trust you may feel some interest in read- ing the notes of a visit I made with Hong Niok, last Sunday, at Cha-ka-pang, where he has a boys’ day-school, and holds regular Services on Sunday. The room in which the school is taught is of a good size, and is also used for the religious Services of this station. If I say this room was about as clean as the reception-rooms of ordinary Chinese temples are; and that there was a somewhat dirty bed, surrounded by a very dirty mosquito curtain, in one corner, a tolerably dirty table in another corner, where the teacher and his family eat their daily rice, and a second table in the centre of the room, where the boys sat at their studies; that the low ceiling was well festooned with cobwebs and dirt, and that there was no floor to the room but the hard-trodden earth upon which the house was built—it might shock some of my fastidious friends at home, who would be ready to exclaim, What! hold religious Services in such a hovel, and teach people to worship Him Who made all worlds, and Who has said the silver and the gold are His, in such a filthy place! I own that some such thoughts as these passed through my own mind, as I sat down upon a bench, and drew up the skirts of my dress to keep it off the dirty damp ground. But when I considered the extreme poverty of the people, and thought of the lowly Jesus, Who, born in a manger, had not where to lay His Sacred Head, and died to save them, I was content; particularly as there are many reasons for not building even small churches at those stations which are not under the special supervision of a foreign Missionary.
We have a nice large church in the city, and a nice Mission chapel near us, the inside of which was recently painted at the expense of our esteemed consul, Geo. F. Seward, Esq., who, to our great regret, left Shanghai not long since with his family.
I have before spoken of the extreme simplicity and contentment of the country people in China; and I am still more struck with these features of their character since my return from America. After the Morning Service was over, Hong Niok invited the people, as usual, to remain for conversation, which they are always very ready to do, particularly if there is a foreign lady “to be talked to,” or who will answer questions. He had been preaching to the people on the duties involved in the First Commandment, and spoke particularly of the sin of worshipping one’s ancestors, saying, no doubt very justly, that many Chinese were more careful to offer costly sacrifices to their parents after death, than to provide for their daily wants while living. He reproved them somewhat sharply on this point, telling them it would be better to minister carefully to the wants and wishes of their parents while living, and at their death commit them to the hands of the true GOD, Who alone ought to be worshipped….
…I was intending to send you a continuation of my visit with Hong Niok to Lau Zak; and an account of another visit to the nunnery, and of a return visit from three of the Ne Koos “nuns” that I received last week, the first time they had ever been in a foreign house. I offered them tea and fruit, according to Chinese custom, which they tasted in a most sparing, dainty manner (also according to Chinese custom)….
The Day of Rest
Monthly Supplement
October 25, 1873
Bishop Williams, of the American Episcopal Church at Japan, recently ordained two native clergymen at Shanghai in China. He writes: —During my visit to China from which I have just returned there was held a most interesting service. On May 1st, the feast of St. Philip and St. James,
Mr. Hoong Niok-Ng and Mr. Kia-Sung Ting were admitted to the order of Deacons. Mr. Hoong Niok had been a candidate for five years and Mr. Ting for four years, and had been previously examined in their studies. For three days before their ordination they were very thoroughly examined in the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Prayer Book and the Articles by Mr. Nelson, Mr. Thomson, Mr. Wong and the Bishop.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1874
…There they sat, some of them grave and wealthy men by the side of their families, some of them with grown sons and daughters, and there was the Rev. Mr. Yung Kiung Yen, now in Priest’s orders, who used to assist me in dictating translations to a Chinese teacher, and then with a set of Scripture catechisms on the Old Testament which are still used in our Mission schools. He was the quickest, cleverest, most amiable, and quiet of all my class of boys. By the side of him sat another, a brother of our good Pastor Wong, who used to be quite a pet of Miss Jones, though he was at times a little unmanageable. He is now a man of considerable wealth, holding a good position in Chinese society, a communicant and most constant attendant at church. He has two grown daughters, both communicants; both sing in our Chinese choir, and both are married. The husband of one was sitting by him, elegantly dressed, and he, in a new satin robe, with a mandarin’s cap and crystal button on his head, looked the very embodiment of contentment and happiness, as did many of the “old scholars,” as we call them. But my chief delight was in the well-ordered Christian congregation, the appropriate and joyous Christmas carols, hymns and chants sung by the Chinese choir, accompanied with the organ played by Pastor Wong’s daughter, the offices of devotion as performed by the Chinese Clergy, Rev. Mr. Wong and
Rev. Hoong Niok, also one of the old scholars, assisted by Ping Tsu (one of my present pupils, who was licensed a lay-reader, to assist Pastor Wong, at this and the out-stations, by Bishop Williams at his last autumnal visit here….
(click link, scroll to PDF page 87)
The Spirit of Missions
June 1874
…But Easter Day was such a delight to us—this dreary past was soon forgotten and we could truly say, “Rise, heart” thy Lord is risen. Sing his praise without delay.”
The first services of the day, held in the Church of Our Saviour, began at nine o’clock A.M. Pastor Wong said the morning prayers, the Bishop reading the Declaration of Absolution—the Epistle and Holy Gospel. After a short sermon in Chinese the Holy Communion was celebrated by the Bishop, assisted by Pastor Wong. At eleven there was a full morning Service in English—Rev. Mr. Miller said the morning prayers and preached the sermon. The Bishop administered the Holy Communion, assisted by Mr. Miller.
At half-past one, the Bishop held another service in Chinese and administered the Rite of Confirmation to several Chinese men and women and to one of the pupils of the Boys’ Boarding School.
At three o’clock, the Bishop held another Service in Chinese at the newly constructed church at Kong Wan.
Rev. Hung Neok Woo said Evening Prayer, the Bishop reading the Declaration of Absolution, and preached a sermon upon the Resurrection of Jesus. The Bishop administered the Holy Communion assisted by Mr. Woo. The Service was the special delight of us all who have watched he beginning and progress of the Kong Wan Station. It was the first time the Holy Communion had ever been administered at one of the out-stations—and it will be a day long to be remembered with glad and grateful joy. Quite a number of communicants were present from Shanghai and Hong Kew Stations, which have been hitherto, but I trust will no longer be, the only stations in which the Holy Communion has been celebrated on our great east days or on other days.
(click link, scroll to PDF pages 90 and 91)
The Spirit of Missions
January 1875
The following letter from the Native Deacon Rev. Hoong Neok Woo is full of interesting particulars. The Station at Kong Wan is about five miles from Shanghai, and here, chiefly through the labors of the Rev. Dr. Nelson, a chapel was built which was consecrated by Bishop Williams on All Saints’ Day, 1873.
On the departure shortly afterward of Dr. Nelson for the United States, the Rev. Mr. Woo was put in charge of this station.
Letter from Rev. Hoong Neok Woo.
Kong Wan, July 25, 1874.
Rev. and Dear Brother: If I could write well, I would write yon. once a month, but I cannot; so you must excuse me. To-day, I endeavor to write you a few lines, with my simple and feeble ways, to let you know where and what become of me of late.
Removal to Kong Wan.
Family and myself move to this place on the 24th of October, 1873. During which time my whole family enjoying the full blessings of our Heavenly Father, with good health.
The house we occupied consists of six good rooms, three up and three-down, with an kitchen and a small fruit garden attached in the rear, and an small yard in the front, encircled with good brick walls from ten to fifteen feet high, on the east, north and west, and a paper factory on the south. Since the change and some improvements I made on this premises last fall, it become quite a comfortable house for my family, during the spring, summer and autumn, but very cold in the winter. The two middle rooms up and down we made our sitting or receiving rooms-upper one for female, and the lower one for male visitors. We also holding our daily morning and evening prayers in them, as well as Wednesday evening prayer meetings. When very wet and rainy Sundays, we held Sunday Services in them too. Two side rooms above for bed-rooms. Two lower rooms, one for day-school, the other one for sundry purposes.
Day School.
The day-school only commence on the 1st of 2d moon, or on the 16th of March. Fifteen scholars, include my son Tsok-Chen. Eight of them, have study the morning and evening prayers, litany, psalms and hymns, besides the questions and answers of the holy Creed and the Chinese classic. Several of them have finish the Creed and are on the Ten Commandments. They all attend the morning prayers as well as the Sunday Services. They responsed with their teacher and the few converts, in the Litany, and follow me in singing the few hymns we used in our Services and the family prayers. I am very glad indeed, to inform you, that the boys not only can do what I already stated ; but several of them have desires, and express their wish to join the Church. They also refused their parents order to worship their ancestors, and the idols.
An Interesting Case.
One boy is especially remarkable—he is only ten years old according Chinese accounts, but only nine years in English counting. He is the only child of the family, so he was quite a pet to his parents. While he was a babe, his parents. were told by some witchcraft, their little son must be adopt to one of the three principal idols in this town, or else their son will not live, of course it was done, so the boy’s name ever since called after that idol’s name Lu Fok. Surprise to hear from him one day remarks to his parents, that he was well care and well protected by the true God in heaven, not Lu Fok the idols. That he will not worship the idols any more, nor he will recognize the wooden man as his adopted father hereafter. May the Holy Spirit lead and guide him to the fold of Christ.
We have visitors so far, a great many visitors on each Chinese principal festivals, mostly females of the first and second class; of course we entertain them as well as we can. At one occasion, in May last, we have had about eighty people on one day for three successive days. Of course we put forth the holy name of Christ and as well as His blessed Gospel. Majority of these people, no doubt, never before met a Christian family, nor have heard our Saviour’s name and His Gospel. Many of them seem very anxious to know more about Christ and the Christian Doctrine (Ya-Soo Dau Lee). I have no doubt, if these people were near here or our chapel, many of them might become the children of our gracious Lord. Though we cannot convert them at present, may the good seed we sown in them, some days will spring up and bring forth good fruits.
Sunday Services.
Our Sunday Services are well-attended. Very many times our little chapel was crowded with countrymen, women, and children. Most these people were well behaved. Only now and then an ignorant fellow made some foolish remark, or yell out after some one. I dare say we have many tearers, but sorry to say that we have had few believers.
First Baptismal Service in the Chapel.
On 24th of May, being the Whitsunday, chosen by me to have the first baptism Services in our new chapel. The Rev. Mr. Thomson read the whole baptism Services, he allow me baptize four adults and two children. Two old couple were the grand parents of the children. Their son have joined our Church since 1869. Poor man, he has quite a time, with his wife ever since, until of late. His wife used to curse him most fearfully: even his neighbors could no longer bear to hear her so, any more. But the poor fellow over bear it all, until last year, we moved here, somehow, my dear wife seems can get along with her, got her so far, not curse her husband any more for become Christian; not only so, but she herself every now and then attend our preachings too. We have spoken to her beforehand as well as her husband, that her father-in-law and mother-in-law and as well as her two children will also receive the holy baptism but she consented all. And on the Whitsunday morning, she has her little girl and boy well wash and dressed in their best, and have them baptized. May the Holy Spirit work in her and turn her mind to follow the path of the rest of her family.
One of the Four Adults Baptized.
The Rev. Kiah Sung Ting’s youngest brother is amongst the four adults mentioned above. He is a shop-keeper, an active and industrious good young man.
Funeral Service.
Funeral—The first Christian funeral Services held in this new chapel on 2d of July. The day was very warm. The deceased was a relation of mine, who has been in my family, more or less, about six years. He join our Church three years ago. Though he has behave unchristianly for about a year, while he was absent from my family, but he seems truly repent of his folly, and shown himself in his behavior afterwards. So my dear wife and myself received him again in our family. He did the best to show us that he was real in love of our Lord Jesus until his very death. He died on the 1st of July, at half-past three o’clock P.M. His death was very easy and peaceful, right after we got up from the floor after our prayers, he took his last breath. The deceased was fifty-two years old. His funeral Service was very well attended. The few Christians mixed among the large crowd of pagans present seems all like our Services. They listened very attentively at my reading of the Holy Scriptures and the exhortation on the subject of death.
A Church Bell and Tower.
On the 22d of July, a bell donated by Miss Fay’s friends in America about two years ago, and kindly given to my chapel, by Miss Fay, was put up on a wooden tower, thirty feet high, at a cost of sixty taels, by a good American Christian builder, Mr. C. P. Blethen. This church is also indebted to Rev. Dr. Nelson; for his kind and earnest influence got the money for the ground and the building, as well as the costs of the bell tower. Not only this church, but the people of this whole town and the neighboring villages were indebted to him, and our Mission. We expected some foolish people would make some trouble about the tower, before it is up, but somewhat the sentiment against the Christianity and about the Fung Shew* has changed. Instead of troubles, a majority were please to see it and hear the ringing of the bell. Thanks be to our Heavenly Father for all the above. May His blessings still continue amongst His unworthy servants and these benighted people, ere long may more understand our Lord Jesus Christ, and His holy Gospel. May this chapel, before long, not only fill with the pagans to look on, or hearing the Gospel only, but fill with the converted pagans and believers of the Gospel to glorify His holy Name.
Central Location.
Kong Wan is the centre of this section of the country. As far as I was informed, there is about one thousand families and shops, in this town, average six persons to a family, will be about six thousand men, women and children. Not only centre of four large places, such as Shanghai, Tsung-Zu, Woo-Sung and Yang-Kang, but quite number of smaller towns and villages all around, within half a mile to five miles apart. The Romanists are about equal to the Protestant in this town. But great many more in the country around. Majority of them were the six or seventh generations. They have several chapel in the country or other towns, but none in this.
_____
*Superstition respecting the interruption of good influences by high structures.
Examinations at the Bridgman Memorial School.
Shanghai, China, August 4, 1874.
(letter from Jeanette R. Thomson)
…In the midst of the exercises we had another hymn as a sort of relief, and then, after all had recited, as much as time would admit, we chanted the Te Deum. The guests were some of the lady patrons of the school, Miss Fay and other Missionary friends, Rev. Mr. Wong, and Rev. Hoong-Neok and several of the Chinese teachers….
The Spirit of Missions
May 1875
China.
Rev. E.H. Thomson’s General Report of Shanghai Station.
Shanghai, China, December 31, 1874.
Different Departments of the Work.
The field at Shanghai may be divided into three districts or parishes if you like. First, the work in its different departments as attached to the church of “Our Saviour,” at Hong Kew, under the Rev. Kong Chai Wong. Secondly, the same as attached to “Christ’s” church in the city; and next that at “Trinity” church, Kong-Wan, under the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo….
The Work at Kong-Wan.
This is under the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo and has been encouraging.
The feelings of the people towards the Christian teacher have much improved, a friendly disposition has taken the place of the desire to oppose and make trouble; his family can now pass along the street without being abused in vile terms. May they come at last to receive the truth in the love of it.
Mr. Woo has held regular Services in the chapel twice on Sunday and had preaching during the week, with a lecture and prayers with the members on Fridays. He has also attended the Woo-sung station weekly, and has been very useful in making collections, for the Hospital, from foreigners and natives. His studies have suffered somewhat from these calls upon him, but I trust that he may be able to apply himself more diligently in that direction for the coming year. Tsiang Kiung-Niur has been regular in his duties at Woo-sung, he being the Catechist at that station, having preaching two or three times a week, and a Service on Sunday; he also works in the surrounding district. Some of those who have come up as candidates for baptism were brought in by his labors.
It is proposed to extend the work of this field, by placing the colporteur who studied and worked with me this year, under Mr. Woo, and press on towards the west and north to the district city of Pau-Shan and the many outside towns and villages. The railroad which they are now making through this region will doubtless have some effect in breaking down some of the old superstitions and facilitating the movements of the workers from town to town. It will be the first railroad in this old empire, and as such has a good deal of interest thrown around it.
In a word I would say of the Kong Wan field it is a most promising one. Let us pray that under the Rev. Mr. Woo and those with him a great work may be accomplished.
Below I give the statistics of the stations with a summary of the whole....
Letter from the Rev. Kong Chai Wong.
Shanghai, February 13, 1875.
Rev. and dear Sir: It is my duty to give you the report of the last six months ending December last.
…During the last six months I baptized two men at this station. And last December I went up with Mr. Thomson to Kong Wan to examine six candidates; after which, Rev. Mr. Hoong Neok requested me to baptize them, and I did so in the presence of Mr. Thomson, himself, and the congregation….
The Spirit of Missions
August 1875
China.
Extract from Bishop Williams’ Letter.
Steamer Oregonian, June 1, 1875.
Shanghai.
Mr. Thomson and family are well, and he is working hard as usual—preaching—teaching
Mr. Hoong Neok and Mr. Ting and his boarding and day schools for boys and girls, and attending to the hundred and one things which claim his attention. His boarding-schools for boys and girls seem to be very well worked, and will, I trust, prove most useful helps to the work.
The Spirit of Missions
December 1875
Report of the Foreign Committee. Oct., 1875
Shanghai.
…The work at “Trinity Church,” Kong Wan, is under the
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo. The condition of affairs at this station is greatly improved. Assisted by a Catechist, Mr. Woo has held numerous Sunday and other Services, besides attending weekly at the Woo-Sung station. There have been seven adults baptized. There is one day-school, containing seventeen scholars. This is quite a new enterprise, the consecration of the Church having been reported last year.
The Protestant Episcopal Almanac & Church Directory for the Year of Our Lord 1876
China Mission.
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Shanghai.
China.
Hankow;
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Shanghai; Rev. Kia
The Spirit of Missions
January 1876
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo…..Shanghai
The Spirit of Missions
February 1876
Foreign Department.
February, 1876.
A Day of Rejoicing in Our China Mission.
The following letter from the Rev. W. J. Boone, conveys the gratifying intelligence of the baptism, on one day, at one of the out-stations near Shanghai, of no less than thirty-three persons. The ceremony was performed by the Rev. Kong Chai Wong, the native presbyter who, in the absence of the Rev. Dr. Nelson, has the pastoral oversight of the Kong Wan district.
The ingathering of so large a number at once into the fold of Christ is the result of God’s blessing upon the labors of the Catechist, and of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, the native deacon who is in charge of Kong Wan, and the village in which the baptism took place. Most of the converts in China have been made through the instrumentality of Missionaries from this country; but our Mission has now arrived at that stage when faithful and efficient native agents have been raised up, and whose labors are owned and blessed of God. This ingathering on a single day at San Ting K’u is unequaled in the history of our Mission, both in the number and the varying ages of those baptized; and it may be taken as an indication that as the native agency is increased, so there will be a much larger turning of the people unto the Lord than has hitherto been the case. Mr. Boone states that he is more than ever convinced that the chief efforts of the Missionaries should be to gather and train Native Ministers and Teachers ; as, understanding every peculiarity of thought and prejudice of the people, they prove effective laborers.
Letter from Rev. W. J. Boone.
Shanghai, Nov. 27, 1875.
My dear Dr.: I have already written you of my sad affliction, and must now tell you of a day of rejoicing for the Mission. On the 25th instant, having worked hard the day before to get free for a holiday, I joined the Rev. Mr. Wong at 8 A. M., to go, via Kong Wan, to San Ting K’u, a village nine or ten miles distant. Having respect for his years, he journeyed on a wheelbarrow, while I trudged along, being still the junior member of the Mission. It was a bright, cool November day, just the weather for such a trip. By 9.15 we made Kong Wan, and joined Rev. Mr. Hoong Neok Woo, who with some friends was at Morning Prayer. We had overtaken on the road five of Mr. Thomson’s older schoolboys, and shortly after us, he joined the now considerable party bound for regions beyond. We got off at 9.45 and by 11.15 had reached the village where the catechist, Tan-ping-lin, lives. From Mr. Woo, as we walked along, I learned more than I had before known of this work.
The Labors of Messrs. Ting and Woo.
As far back as when Mr. Ting lived at Kong Wan, before his ordination to the Diaconate, he had some acquaintance with the people of these villages, and at some time previous to our visit, four of them had received Baptism. Since Mr. Woo moved to Kong Wan he has had more to do with them, they coming frequently to his house when “in town,” and drawn to him by his hearty interest in all that concerned their bodies and souls. One head man of the village, at his advice, came to our Hongkew hospital and was cured of a dog bite, which, under native treatment, had gone from bad to worse and become a serious matter. They asked to have a school and chapel, and then a Catechist, to whom they would give a room and besides what they could. Six or eight months ago Tan went there, and has since been adopted as a son by the man who was at our hospital. Mr. Woo has gone down once a week, and the catechist has spent half his time there and half at Kong Wan. There are some thirteen villages, averaging one hundred and twenty people each, within a radius of two miles. The chapel was at San Ting K’u, just beyond our halting place. We rested till 12 M., when an ample feast, Chinese of course, engaged our attention till 1 P.M., as though the Chinese are fast eaters, their ceremonies make special meals like this tedious affairs. That it was an event to them you may suppose, as Mr. Thomson had been there only once before, and now we were three Priests and their well-known Deacon, and some fifteen visitors besides.
Baptism of Thirty-three Persons
At 1.30 the Service began at the chapel, two Chinese rooms thrown into one, in which a new railed place, not quite finished, served as chancel It was as full as it could be crowded—over two hundred persons I judge. Evening Prayer was said to the end of the Second Lesson, by Mr. Wong, when the candidates for Holy Baptism were called, and he had the blessed privilege of pouring the sanctified water for mystical washing upon the heads of thirty-three children of God, as we trust, who now sought pardon in their Saviour’s death, being buried with Him that they might rise to newness of life. Mr. Thomson finished the Service, after which both of them gave earnest exhortation to those who had become Christ’s soldiers and servants, that they should walk worthy of their high calling, and reach out to all the neighboring villages to bring others to the fold which they by God’s grace had found.
An Unexampled Event in Our Mission.
The child of two and the old patriarch of sixty-four were joined in this Service, unexampled in our work in China so far. Twelve men and three lads, ten women and a girl of about twelve years, and seven children, were the gathering of this harvest. Much work has yet to be done before they can know and follow the way of life as becometh the saints of God; but as for some six months they have been taught, and others more recently desirous of Baptism are reserved for some later day, I can not think that rashness can be charged on those who are responsible for this work. I could only wish them God-speed, and long for the day when through God’s blessing on native agency, as here in this case, we up the river might rejoice over a like gracious work. Humanly speaking, Mr. Woo’s zeal and energy, and, I doubt not, the faithful teaching of Tan, deserve such a reward; and yet they would be the first to say that it was the work of God the Holy Ghost May our godly helpers be multiplied.
Our Chief Efforts Should Be Towards Raising a Native Ministry.
I am ever more and more convinced that our chief efforts should be to gather and train such. They work to great advantage among people whose every peculiarity of those thought and prejudice they understand and to a great degree share. Such simple people as these villagers are more ready hearers of the Gospel, and the labor of the fields is not so absorbing as that of the mart, and they have no pride of scholarship and superior wisdom. Kindness wins their hearts, and simple truth they can gladly receive when it pleases God to lift the veil from off their long-blinded eyes. I trust this day’s work will be as encouraging to you as to us all.
Yours, etc.
Letter from Rev. Kong Chai Wong.
Shanghai, Nov. 29, 1875.
Rev. and dear Sir: I hope these few lines will be interesting to you.
We thank God that His great blessing has prospered our work lately.
From October to November, in a month, I have married for two family uniting Christian marriage. One is Zu Soong Ngn, married to Rev. Hoong Neok Woo’s sister, formerly Miss E. G. Jones’ boarding-school scholar in the Mission. The other one is Dr. Su Voong, married to Cha Cha, another scholar of Miss Jones. She is the last of all her scholars of her days in the Mission work. Several times Cha Cha’s mother wanted to have her betrothed to heathen family, but she would never consent to, for she told her mother she will not marry to a heathen, because from her childhood she never had any idolatrous custom or worshiping any idols, and for her truthfulness the Lord has provided for her a best Christian husband to reward her good wishes. So I am glad of what I did to see another two Christian family has increased. You would be surprised to hear a large number of people have been admitted to Christ Church, in Kong Wan, under Rev. Hoong Neok Woo's charge. Since Rev. Dr. Nelson’s absence, I was in his place to act the ministry of a Priest’s duties. I baptized thirty-three last week, Thursday, Nov. 26th, at San Ting K’u station, a place near Kong Wan northward seven miles off. Yesterday, the First Sunday in Advent, at Kong Wan’s chapel I baptized seven more, one child, two women and four men—forty in number. Rev. Mr. Thomson and Rev. Mr. Boone were present at the first Service; they will tell you the distinct persons. Our faithful Deacon, Hoong Neok Woo, in his Mission work there at Kong Wan, is very favorably known through the hospital influence, of which he know something when the people there want it. Beside that he has a good, kind, hearty and hospitable way to everybody there; but the greater part is the Holy Spirit that works in them, to which the Saviour has answered our prayer. In the middle of September I baptized four, two men and two women, at the Church of Our Saviour. Many thanks for your kind letter of June 22d. We hope to hear for us a new Bishop soon.
Yours, very sincerely.
The Spirit of Missions
May 1876
Copy of the Literal Translation of a Letter from a Native Chinese (Choo-sz-sing)—a Pupil in Miss Fay’s School.
Extract from Miss Fay’s Letter which accompanied the Letter from Choo-sz-sing.
“I have just finished the translation of a letter from your little protege, Choo-sz-sing. It is in reply to yours, and he assured me it is entirely his own composition. I have given you a perfecty [sic] literal translation, thinking it would interest you more to see his own peculiar mode of thinking than it would if I had translated it after my own style, using the first person I or me, which the Chinese consider very disrespectful, as they do all epithets of affection, such as ‘dear friend,’ ‘dear Madam,’ or anything of that sort, which you see he entirely avoids in his letter.”
To the Honorable Lady Mason greeting:
Choo-sz-sing a pupil still in school on receiving a letter (from this Lady) his heart was filled with joy and delight. He thought it must be true that “God had made of one blood all nations under Heaven,” and, though he dwells in the uttermost part of the world among the heathen, this foreign Lady has thought of him and written him a letter, and he is only a boy in school! In the early morning and night-time will this school boy pray the great and good God to preserve and take care of this honored Lady, giving her health and strength of body with peace and repose of mind and heart. The pupil who writes this dwells in Shanghai at the High school of the Hong Kew station of the Episcopal Mission where he has been more than three years, not only without meeting any adversity or sorrow but receiving much good under the benevolent and wise rule of Fe Koo Niang (Miss Fay) eating the rice and wearing the clothes provided by her generous kindness—while studying the books and obeying the teachers as she directs;—moreover God moving her heart, during the last few months, has called him to assist in teaching other boys in a Day school, for which extra work he receives $1.00 per month which he gives to his mother as she is very poor.
But the Holy Gospel is preached to the poor even in “The Middle Kingdom” and the Spirit of God has mov«d the heart of his mother to believe in Jesus. She lives 12 miles from the school in the village of Kong Wan, yet there too the glad news of a Saviour has reached.
“
Hong Niok Woo” (who 20 years ago was also a pupil in Miss Fay’s school as is now the writer of this letter to Lady Mason) is now an ordained Minuter living at Kong Wan in charge of a Foreign built church where he preaches the Gospel of Jesus to many people every day—and by him was his mother baptized into the Church, renouncing all her idols and all idol worship and striving to serve the only true God Who alone can save sinners by the blood of Jesus and the sanctifying of the Holy Spirit.
And now when Lady Mason, strong in the faith of Christian lands, prays for the poor and feeble who believe in Jesus among the millions of idolaters, will she pray for Choo-sz-sing’s mother as well as himself that she too may be strong in the faith of the Lord Jesus, and that her son be counted worthy to preach His Gospel to the heathen among whom they dwell.
Lest Lady Mason should be weary of reading this, and write no more, her pupil with grateful heart and bowed head will now say Adeiu
Choo-sz-sing.
Written from the Flowery Land in the 1st year of the reign of the Emperor Kwong Su, 1875.
The Spirit of Missions
July 1876
China.
Extracts from Rev. Dr. Nelson’s Letter.
Shanghai, April 13, 1876.
Kong Wan.
…I am sorry to say that the wife of our respected Deacon and active fellow-laborer, Hoong Neok, has had a long and serious spell of illness, causing us all a good deal of apprehension.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1876
China.
Letter from Rev. E.H. Thomason.
Shanghai, May 30, 1876.
My Dear Dr. Senison: I have just come in from one of our new stations in the country to the south of us. Our Mission work has to some extent been working northward as far as Kongwan and San Ting-kur-Shaw. It has long been my wish that our work should also embrace the great field to the south of the native city—almost a new field. None of the Protestant Missions, I believe, have stations in that direction. As Dr. Nelson has returned, I will leave the northern work under his charge, with the efficient men, Rev. Messrs. Wong and
Hoong Neok, and with the new candidates for the Ministry, to assist in carrying it forward. I have in the city, our work at the west gate, the two Boarding Schools and the day schools in this direction, with the three stations, the Pagoda, and two new ones just opened. I have Mr. Ting, the Deacon, and Mr. Dzung, the Catechist, who teaches half the day in the Boarding School for Boys ; also a young man who was with Mr. Hoong Neok for a time. May the Lord bless our efforts in this direction; it is a hard field, and two of our stations are in sight of the great Roman Catholic School and educational establishment known as Dye-Kaway, I suppose the largest of its kind in China. It makes us feel that our work is but the day of small things, as we pass their great halls filled with scholars, their great buildings one after another extending for a quarter of a mile. We must appear as a feable folk in the eyes of the natives.
As I arrived at the village about mid-day, when the schools were having recesses, our room for preaching was nearly filled with healthy looking country children. I gave them a little talk, and then dismissed them as far as it was possible to get rid of them, to have a talk with the older persons. They all listened with good attention, assenting, as I went in my remarks, to any expression of morals that met with their approval. We have the native Catechists, to whom I referred above, living at this point, it being about midway between the other two points. I do hope our work in this region may be blessed, and many may be brought into the fold of Christ.
I must close this rather tiny note by acknowledging your kind form of the 1st April.
With my best wishes and prayers, I remain, yours sincerely.
The Spirit of Missions
October 1876
China.
Extracts from Letters of the Rev. Robert Nelson, D.D.
Shanghai, July 13, 1876.
First Railroad in China.
“Within the past month there has been opened between Shanghai and Kong Wan a railroad (the first in China), to be extended to Woo Sung, the old port of Shanghai, about nine or ten miles off. Kong Wan, where my chapel is, and where the Rev. Mr. Hoong Neok lives, is near the line of the railway and about half way to Woo Sung. The road is now open and trains are regularly running as far as Kong Wan, several times a day. And this, you may well imagine, is a great event for this old conservative country. The Chinese, of all grades, are making holiday excursions in crowds on the new road, to see and try it for themselves. This has been built with foreign capital, and, of course, by foreign engineers, and the main idea of it is to exhibit an actual sample of a railroad in operation, with the hope that the prejudice and opposition of the officials, which have hindered and prevented it heretofore, might thus be overcome.”…
The Spirit of Missions
November 1876
Report of the Foreign Committee.
China Mission.
Location.—(1) Shanghai and its suburbs. (2) Wuchang. (3) Hankow. (4) Peking.
Missionary Staff.—Foreign Missionaries, 5 Presbyters; Foreign Missionary Physician, 1; Foreign (Female) Missionaries, 8; Native Presbyters, 2; Native Deacons, 2; Native Catechist, 1; Native Teacher, 1—Total, 20.
Mission Stations of Shanghai and its Suburbs.
(1) Christ Church in the City, West Gate Chapel, West Gate Station, Loong Hwo, Dzan oo Kiung, Tsih Paw—6. Under the pastoral care of the ROT. E. H. Thomson and the Rev. Kia Sung Ting.
(2) Hong Blew, Lau Zak, Hong Tsing, Tsa-Ka-Pang, Yung-Ziang-Kong and Hospital—6. Under the pastoral care of the Rev. Kong Chai Wong.
(3) Kong Wan Chapel, San Ting K’u, Kong Wan Tramway Station—8. Under the pastoral care of the Rev. Dr. Nelson and the
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Native Deacon.
The above enumerated fifteen Stations are served also by the following assistants: Zoo Sung Yen, Koh ah See, Dzung Soong, L’u Dan, Ping Ling, Ng Tsing-Chang, Woo-Piug-Taw, Tsing-King Ma, Tsang-Tsing Van and several Bible Readers.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1877
China.
Letters from the Rev. Dr. Nelson.
Shanghai, China, November 15, 1876.
…This celebration was the occasion of a pleasant gathering of nearly all the Missionaries here, with other of Miss Fay's friends and ours, who congratulated her highly on the completion of so long a term of service here, and on the accomplishment of so much work. A notable feature of the case was the flattering congratulations of the Chinese. But I suppose you will hear more and more interesting accounts from other pens, so I pass to the other case mentioned, the opening of the “Emma Jones” Girls’ School. In the same compound with this house and the “Church of Our Saviour,” and immediately in rear of the church, is a small house which was prepared for, and occupied by,
Rev. Hoong Neok and family before their removal to Kong Wan. This house was rented out for several years, but finally got to such a point of wear as to be uninhabitable without considerable repair. So I concluded that as it must be repaired to save it, I would have it so arranged as to adapt it for the purpose of the Girls’ School my daughter Mary was desirous to have. Several of her special friends, and particularly the Captain and other officers of the IT. S. steamer “Ashuelot,” became interested in her work, and contributed a nice little sum of money towards it. This at once made it practicable, at a moderate expense to the Mission (200 taels), to repair and arrange the building and furnish the school with all its necessaries. Of this 200 taels I counted 100 as the balance of 250 taels appropriated some time ago to the Kong Wan Chapel, of which I used but 150 in that way (having obtained from other sources most of what was needed). The “Emma Jones” School is now an actual fact, but of course on a small scale as yet, proportionate to the actual funds in hand. It is now ready for enlargement as means may be supplied. My daughter is much interested in it, and by her former acquaintance with the Shanghai dialect (which has gradually come back to her), and by her study of the language since her return here, she is now able to communicate readily with the pupils and employees. The house is capable of accommodating, twenty pupils easily. I trust that by God’s blessing this small beginning may develope into greater things to His glory.
Faithfully yours.
_____
Shanghai, China, Dec. 13, 1876.
…In my special parish, embracing the two central points of “Kong-Wan” and “San-Ting-Kur,” the congregations continue to be good and the people attentive, and our little circles of Christians are getting large enough and influential enough to be known and felt by their neighbors and those outside of them, generally, and also by their united force mutually to uphold one another.
Sunday before last, at Kong-Wan, assisted by
Rev. Hoong Neok, I admitted to Baptism seven adults and two children. And on Thursday last, at San-Ting-Kur, assisted by Rev. Messrs. Wong-Chai, and Yen, Yung Kiung, I baptized twelve, of whom three were little children. The Services at this latter place were of perhaps more than usual interest, the congregations being full and attentive, and the admission of these candidates completing the membership with the Church of several whole families of which some individuals had been baptized before. Miss Harris and my daughter, Rev. Messrs. Wong-Chai, Yung Kiung and Hoong Neok, and the families of Chai and Hoong Neok, were all present on the occasion. We left Shanghai by the railway for Woo Sung, about nine miles from here, and thence took boats and were sculled along a wide creek some two miles further having but little way then to walk to the village of San-Ting-Kur..
Besides the Baptismal Services, there was afterwards a funeral of one of our Church people who was head of quite a large and well-to-do family. This funeral gave us an opportunity of instructing our Christians, as well as their heathen neighbors, in the doctrines of Scripture pertaining to death and the future life. And this was the more important, as funerals are always times and occasions of great trial and temptation to Chinese Christians; the danger being that they will participate in, or allow to others, the practice of some heathen rites, as the worship of ancestors, the eating meats offered to the dead, or consulting the necromancers about the “fung-shuy” that they may know where and how to set the coffin.
One thing that impressed some of our party, was the sight, in the house of one of our elderly Christian brethren, then alive and there present with us, of his coffin, occupying a prominent place, all ready for him when he should need it. This possession, a coffin, is one on which the Chinese, as they advance in life, set great value. I well remember the case of one of our communicants, being unexpectedly brought near his end, sending out with all speed to have a carpenter and materials brought to the house where he was ill, that before he died he might hear the sound of the workman preparing his coffin. They set much store also by a suit of grave-clothes ready for them when they come to die. In no way can a son express his regard for a parent more acceptably or piously, than by providing a coffin and grave-clothes during the parent’s life. As I was once setting off with my family for a fortnight’s trip into the interior, one of our attendants on the boat called out to some one in the great crowd on the shore, to tell his mother that if she died before his return her grave-clothes were ready and would be found in such and such a place. And this was as much as to say, “See, all of you, what a good son I am.”
The “Girls’ School Building,” for some years past leased by the Municipal Council of Shanghai, is still leased by them, but now only by the month, so that it can be had on a month’s notice, whenever the Bishop may come and desire it.
With kind regards, and very faithfully yours.
_____
Second Letter from Miss Nelson.
Shanghai, China, December 13, 1876.
…A week ago, I went with my father, the Rev. Mr. Wong and
Mr. Hoong Neok, with their respective families, Miss Harris, Rev. Mr. Yen, and several other Chinese, to San-Ting-Kur. We went on the railroad, about ten miles, and then took a boat the rest of the way. Arrived there, we first had a lunch at the house of one of the native Christians—a somewhat odd mixture of Chinese and Foreign food, and then went on to the chapel, where father baptized twelve persons.
Believe me always to be, yours lovingly,
Mary C. Nelson.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1877
Extract from Letter of Miss Fay.
Duane Hall, Hongkew, April 10, 1877.
…In a letter dated May 1, Miss Fay further says of the Candidates for Holy Orders in Duane Hall:…”Two of them were appointed lay readers three years ago by Bishop Williams, in which duties they have continued ever since, and are continuing to assist Pastor Wong in reading the Church Service here and at the out-stations. A third was appointed lay reader by the Rev. Dr. Nelson, as acting for the Standing Committee.
“Two go to Kong Wan every Saturday afternoon (which is the only half holiday they get during the week) to assist the
Rev. Hoong Neok (Native Deacon) in hospital duties—so that all have extra duties besides teaching from seven o’clock in the morning to five p. m. The two who have charge of the boarders in Duane Hall are not free then, as they have study hours to attend to, and each teacher has a number of boys in his sleeping-room to look after. The six teachers have nearly a hundred boys in their charge; ninety-eight names are on the school registers, and it is comparatively little help they get from me except in the way of advice!”
The Spirit of Missions
November 1877
Report from Foreign Committee.
Kong-Wan and San-Ting-Kur.
The Rev. Robert Nelson, D.D., states that in his special parish, embracing the two central points of Kong-Wan and San-Ting-Kur, the congregations continue to be good, the people attentive, and the circles of Christians are growing larger and more influential. At Kong-Wan he has baptized seven adults and two children, and at San-Ting-Kur nine adults and three children. The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo is also associated with this work, and is an efficient helper therein.
Dr. Nelson gives regular instruction in the Duane Hall and Divinity School, and conducts the special examinations of various day-schools.
The Spirit of Missions
December 1877
China.
It was stated in the Report of the Foreign Committee that, for some reason unknown, but one of the Reports from the Missionaries in the Shanghai District had been received. It now appears that by a failure of the mail the blanks, which were forwarded from the Mission Rooms in April, did not reach the Standing Committee. Informal Reports have since come to hand from the other ordained Missionaries. We there- fore publish extracts from the Reports of the Rev. Dr. Nelson and the Rev. E. II. Thomson, and compilations from those of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo , and the Rev. Kia Sung Ting.* The documents are too long to be published entire.
*The Rev. Mr. Ting’s death is announced in this number.
Extract from the Report of the Rev. Dr. Nelson.
Shanghai, China, August 21, 1877.
The customary blanks for Reports of our Mission work not having reached us, I send you an informal account of matters immediately connected with my work.
III.
My special field of Chinese work, or parish, is the section of the surrounding country, of which Kong-Wan (five miles from Shanghai) is the chief station, and contains the only chapel building. It has several other points where Services, more or less regular, are held. San-Ting-Kur is the only other point where we can have a regular Sunday Service. The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, our Deacon in this particular field, takes that Service, and as my English Service with the congregation of foreigners here, occupies me in the morning, the morning Service on Sunday at Kong-Wan has to be made a sort of catechetical Service, conducted by Rev. Mr. Yen’s brother, Mr. Yen Zoo-Soong, one of the Candidates for Holy Orders. In the afternoon I go down, and generally the congregations are very full and attentive. Mr. Woo’s residing in this large village (of some 6,000 inhabitants) is a great advantage….
Statistics.
Within the year ending the 30th of June, in my Mission field there were, Baptisms: Adult, 27 ; children, 15 ; total, 42. (These are the same as those in the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo’s table of statistics, sent herewith.) In my work among foreigners there were, Baptisms: infants, 6; marriage, 1; funerals, 13; communicants, 12; Communion alms, $366.50.
From the Report of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo
The chapel at Kong Wan was built in 1873. Since then there have been baptized in it nineteen men, fourteen women and eleven children of this town, one man from Woo Sung and two children from Pah-z-Jan. Two Services are held regularly in this chapel every Sunday. The morning Service is conducted entirely by Mr. Zu Soong Yen, and the afternoon Service by the Rev. Dr. Nelson, assisted by myself. The attendance at these Services is large, especially in the afternoon. Sometimes there are not only an insufficient number of seats but not even standing room for all those who desire to be present. We will have to enlarge the chapel soon.
Services Through the Week.
On three afternoons in the week there is preaching to the heathen in this chapel.
Every Monday night I have quite a large gathering of converts as well as heathen at the residence of one of the best families in the town. Sometimes the passers-by mock us, but, thank God, the mockers are not so daring as they used to be.
On Saturday I vaccinate the children who are brought, over five hundred having been vaccinated from January to May.
A Leading Man of the Town Desirous of Baptism.
The head of this family is the most honest and upright man I ever saw among the heathen. He reads our Chinese Prayer Book and the Four Gospels, and has been a Candidate for Baptism since October, 1873. The reason we have not baptized him is that he has two wives. He is very willing to live separately from the second wife, and will support her comfortably, but she is unwilling to leave. May God bless this woman and make her of a right mind so that this good man, and she herself also, may be admitted into the Church.
Every Wednesday night there is a meeting in my house for prayers and preaching, attended principally by the members of the Church, the Candidates for Baptism and the day-school children who live near by.
Death of an Aged Convert.
I have buried an old female convert, who was received into the Church twenty-one years ago by my most beloved teacher the late Rev. Cleveland Keith. She spoke to me most highly and affectionately of our departed friend upon her dying bed.
Other Services.
Every clear Friday night, and on most Sunday afternoons, there is a short Service with preaching at a room near the railroad station, attended sometimes by as many as seventy persons. About a mile from this place, in the extreme western part of Kong Wan, a day-school was commenced last February. About three miles south-west of this school is another; so you see that our Mission here is pretty well extended. When the Judgment Day comes the Kong Wan people cannot say that they did not hear the Blessed Name, and the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, because it has been freely preached to them.
San Ting Kur.
At San Ting Kur I have lost three of the best men by death. Two were converts and the other was a Candidate for Baptism. Their death has made a considerable change. On every Sunday morning I hold Service in the house used as a chapel, and after Service I dispense medicine to all who need it. I have a Bible woman and colporteur at this station. There are two small day-schools here, half of the children in which are Christians.
Nan Ziang.
Nan Ziang is a large town in which we commenced a station on the third of May last. We rented a house and turned the lower rooms into a chapel, and the other rooms we use for school purposes, etc. I trust some good people or Sunday-school scholars will give what is necessary to support a well educated teacher for this school. Eighty-four dollars a year will do it. We go to this station every Thursday. As far as I can see Nan Ziang will be a great and interesting place for our Mission. If the railway went to it we could get there in half an hour, but now it takes three or four hours to do it by wheelbarrow or boat.
Candidates for Confirmation.
There are thirty-two men and twenty-seven women in Kong Wan and the out-stations awaiting Confirmation by the Bishop when he arrives. Two very intelligent young men have applied to me for recommendation to the Standing Committee for admission as Candidates for Holy Orders. One of them I have recommended, but the other I have desired to wait for another year. They are both teaching day-schools at Kong Wan.
Catechists.
My Catechist, Mr. Tsang, is a very warm-hearted and sincere old man, and he is very useful in assisting me in the visitation of the school, and preaching at the different stations. I have lately engaged a younger man, also as an assistant, and he will go to the different stations with me or Mr. Tsang.
The Christian Religion Is Becoming More Understood.
The Christian religion in this great and benighted country is becoming better understood. The people everywhere seem to begin to know something about the “religion of Jesus.” I trust those who are in power know as much as the people generally.
Excuse the length of this letter. I trust it will be of some interest to you, and all the friends of the Church of Christ. Please pray for us and our work, and may the Holt Spirit of God be with us, and in all our undertakings.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1878
Extracts from Letter of Rev. Dr. Nelson.
Shanghai, China, September 18, 1877.
My dear Dr. Denison: I have to perform the sad duty of announcing to you the death, by cholera, on the 14th inst., of the Rev. Kia-Sung Ting, our respected Brother and valued Deacon. The disease was so rapid in its work that, though about 9 o’clock A.M. he was out in the town a half-mile from his house, before 8 P.M. he was gone. Neither Mr. Wong, Mr. Woo nor I saw him, or knew anything of the case until it was all over.
That morning, Friday, Mr. Woo came from Mr. Thomson’s over here, to Hong-Kew (the original site of our Mission), passing by Mr. Ting’s house, but seeing no one there. By the 2 P.M. train Mr. Woo and I went to Woo-Sung, and thence to San Ting Kur, to see a sick member there, and returning I got home about 8 P.M., and Mr. Woo passed Mr. Ting’s a little later, again seeing no one, and on reaching Mr. Thomson's heard Mr. Ting was ill. He was then actually dead.
I had been at home about an hour (had taken supper and was engaged in family worship) when Zoo-Soong Yen rushed in and informed us that Mr. Ting was very ill with cholera and they feared he was dying. I immediately gathered such medicines and appliances as I thought might be of use and went by the house of our Mission Physician, Dr. Johnston, who went on with me, but to find on our arrival that Mr. Ting had been dead perhaps an hour and a half. (The distance of the West Gate of the city from here, Hong-Kew, is two miles or more.) The account given is, that after returning home from bis walk to the French part of the foreign settlement in the morning, in which he took some simple Chinese food, he complained of feeling unwell and went to bed. The case growing serious, Mr. Ting, knowing that Mr. Thomson was away, and that the Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo was off to San Ting Kur, objected to sending over here, as it was so far, and so sent for the sexton of Christ Church in the City, and a Chinese doctor, who stuck needles into his knees and fingers to bleed him, but got no blood. I cannot learn anything that he said during the day. He seems to have spoken very little from the first, but near the end to have put his hand on his breast and then pointed towards heaven.
These are all the particulars I can learn of his sickness and last hours. He was counted forty-two years of age, and had been four years and four and a half months in the Order of Deacons, to which he was admitted May 1, 1873.
His death weakens greatly, as we see, the working force of our Mission. Of all our Clergy he was the best educated in Chinese. His intellect was vigorous and active, his apprehension ready and clear, and his perception true. His capacity for utterance and abundance of mental resource made him a fluent and often forcible preacher. His knowledge of the language too, both written and spoken, coupled with his quick understanding, made him a valuable assistant in translation. I could write much that is pleasant to think of about his simplicity of character, his courtesy of manner and his kindness of disposition.
On Saturday, the 15th inst., in the afternoon, we had the burial Service at the residence, I reading the opening Sentences and Psalms, Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo reading the Lesson, and the Rev. Kong-Chai Wong the Committal Service and Prayers. A considerable crowd having gathered there, I thought it a fit occasion to set before them the Christian’s hope in death, in contrast with any they could draw from their own systems, on which they depended.
The Rev. Kia-Sung Ting was born in Soo-Chow, the capital city of this province, some seventy miles from Shanghai. His father was of a well-to-do class of shopmen there, having property of his own, and he educated his sons well. An elder brother of our Deacon was said to be a very scholarly man. The family of Mr. Ting, and that of our former Deacon, Rev. Chu-Kiung Tong, were friends, and it was through that friendship that Mr. Ting first became acquainted with the Rev. Kong- Chai Wong, on a visit of his to Soo-Chow, and afterwards with others of our Mission.
When the Tai Pings had possession of Soo-Chow, the Ting family, like many others, were despoiled of their property, and in consequence the Tings came to Shanghai, where the acquaintance spoken of was renewed; and this led to Kia-Sung Ting being put into a vacancy in one of our Mission day-schools as its teacher, and to his becoming also a learner and believer, and eventually a teacher and preacher of the Gospel, whereby he and his house and many others, we trust, should be saved.
We sorely need help. Do press on some recruits to this field.
Faithfully yours in the Gospel.
The Spirit of Missions
April 1878
Letter from Mrs. Thomson.
Shanghai, China.
My Dear Miss Emery: About three weeks ago we returned from a visit to friends in Chee-foo and Tung-Chow. We had been in Shanghai nearly six years without a change, and we therefore looked forward with pleasure to getting rest and refreshment by going to Shantung. Our three eldest children had gone up there the last of May with friends returning from the Missionary Conference, and they were anticipating our coming with great joy. Our good Deacon, Rev. Hoong Niok Woo, kindly consented to come up from Kong-Wan and stay every night on our premises for protection during our absence….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1878
Letter from Miss Fay’s Chinese Bible-Reader.
Shanghai, China.
To the Secretary of the Woman’s Auxiliary.
My Dear Madam: I received your kind reply to my last letter a few days ago, and though this time I have nothing particular to write, yet I think I may report to you some of my late progress.
I have been on my work as usual. Several sick women whom I often attended has been dead a short time since. One of them died in the hospital, age twenty-six, a virgin still unmarried, unlike others of her age generally in our country; and she was oblige to be supported by her brother instead of a husband. She came to our hospital with the hope of heal her long maimed, swollen foot, but was first disappointed at the doctor's word that the foot has to be taken off. Afterward the kind-hearted Rev. Hoong-niok comforted her by consulted the physician not to cut off her foot, without first try to heal it for some time, to her satisfaction, because the poor creature said mournfully that she would rather cut away her whole life than to lost her single foot, for how shall she be able to live on her future days thus, not having a right supporter nor any possession of her own. Accordingly, Mr. Hoong-niok’s word was agreed to, and after one month the foot became much better, so the woman and everybody in the hospital rejoiced with the hope of her whole recovery. But unfortunately, this poor woman was afterward infected with a kind of fever, which came on several persons in the hospital, All got well, and the woman was recovered also, but for having eaten some dangerous food, she soon took over again and died under it….
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1878
Report of the Foreign Committee.
China Mission.
Location.—(1) Shanghai and suburbs; (2) Wuchang; (3) Hankow.
Missionary Staff.—Bishop, 1; Presbyters (foreign 4, native 2), 6; Deacons (foreign 2, native 1), 3; Candidates for Holy Orders (who also act as Teachers and Lay Readers), 16; Missionary Physician (foreign), 1; female Missionaries (foreign), 8; Catechists, Teachers, Bible-readers, and hospital assist- ants (native), 49.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel I.J. Schereschewsky, D.D., Missionary Bishop of Shanghai.
The Rev. Robert Nelson, D.D.. Sbanchai.
The Rev. Elliot n. Thomson, Shanghai.
The Rev W. J. Boone.
The Rev. 8. R J Hoyt, Wuchang.
The Rev. Kong Chai Wong, Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Kiung Yen, Hankow.
The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Shanghai.
The Rev. Wm. S. Sayres.
The Rev. Daniel M. Bates, Jr.
A.C. Bunn, M.D., Missionary Physician, Wuchang.
Mr. Soong Lien Dzung, Shanghai.
Mrs. Nelson, Shanghai.
Mrs. Thomson, Shanghai.
Mrs. Boone.
Mrs. Sayres.
Mrs. Bates.
Miss Lydia M. Fay, Shanghai.
Miss Mary C. Nelson.
XI.—Kong-Wan Station and Surroundings.
At the town of Kong-Wan, about five miles from Shanghai, the Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo continues to reside and to minister in various ways, personally and by assistants, to the souls, bodies, and general welfare of people in that region.
About six miles from Kong-Wan lies the village, or collection of hamlets called San Ting Kur, containing about 100 families. Lying between Kong Wan and San Ting Kur are four large villages of perhaps over 100 families each. Two miles beyond San Ting is a much larger village, or town, named Yang Kong. These and many more such villages lie scattered in every direction from Kong-Wan, and constitute a considerable field white for the harvest. In only one of the above mentioned villages is there any Christian Mission but ours. In the excepted one are some Roman Catholic families whose forefathers were Romanists. The numbers of these have decreased of late years, some having lapsed into a sort of intermediate state between Romanism and heathenism.
At still another point in this same direction, about fifteen miles from Shanghai—the town of Noe Zeang—we have a school and station. Here the Southern Methodist Church has a Missionary family and building. This is a much larger town, containing several thousand (probably ten thousand or more) inhabitants. Within the limits of the above field lies our work of the Kong-Wan department. At several of the points mentioned the Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo practices the (by many here counted occult) art of vaccination, and dispenses medicines to the sick.
Baird Hall.
In the Baird Hall School we have at present 22 scholars. Two of these are Candidates for Holy Orders, and show themselves very earnest and useful young men; three have gone out, one of whom is a teacher in Kong-Wan, and also a Candidate for Holy Orders under the Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo’s charge; one is at the hospital, and one has been at Wuchang assisting Dr. Bunn and studying medicine under his care. The next class has some promising boys, of whom I hope to give a good report at some future day.
Additional Facts from Other Sources.
Shanghai District.
Hong Que and Kong-Wan.
The Rev. Dr. Nelson holds Services twice on Sunday in the Church of our Saviour, at Hong Que, for the benefit of the foreign residents; and in the afternoon he preaches to the native congregation at Kong-Wan. Services and preaching to the natives are also held on other days at Kong-Wan, San-Ting Kur, and other places. He reports the Baptism of sixteen adults and eight infants, and states that the work is quite hopeful at present.
The Rev. Hoong-Neok Woo holds services and preaches at seven other places besides the chapel at Kong-Wan. He says that the interest is increasing and the work improving at all these places, except at San-Ting Kur. He reports the Baptism of ten adult natives.
The Rev. Mr. Wong continues in charge of the work among the natives at Hong-Que. He reports six adult natives baptized, and eight infants; a good congregation; and well-attended Sunday- and day-schools.
China’s Millions
January 1879, Number 43
A Tract Society for China.
We have been kindly supplied with the following minutes of a meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Chinese Tract Society, held on the 29th November, at the Deanery, Shanghai ; the following being present: —The Right Rev. Bishop Russell, the Right Rev. Bishop Schereschewsky, the Very Rev. Dean Butcher, Rev. Dr. E. C. Lord, Rev. Dr. J. Edkins, Dr. Suvoong, Rev. W. Muirhead, Rev. J. W. Davis, Rev.J. M. W. Farnham, Rev. J. W. Lambuth,
Rev. Woo Hoong-niok, Rev. Bau Tsih-dzae, Rev. Paen Sing-z, and Rev. Wong Jung-ya.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1879
In Memoriam—Lydia Mary Fay
…The Rev. Mr. Thomson writes:
One of the old body of standard-bearers has fallen in the field. Who will come to live, labor, suffer, and, if needs be, die for the great Master’s work?…We would indeed have been glad to have had her here with us in Shanghai; but next to being here, Che-foo, with the friends there, was the best place.
On Sunday (yesterday) afternoon there was a large gathering at one of the city churches, when Miss Fay’s death was announced, and some kind words in her memory were spoken. The Rev. Mr. Wong then arose and made a beautiful address, speaking of her great regard for the Chinese, and the high standard of goodness and learning that she had set for her scholars.
The
Rev. Mr. Woo arose to speak, but was so overcome with feelings of grief that he could not utter a word. Truly, his wordless address was more eloquent than words….
(click link; see PDF pages 109 and 110)
Eastern State Journal
(White Plains, New York)
February 21, 1879
p c5: —The Rev. Woo-Hoong Niok Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors residing at Shanghai, China.
The Mohawk Valley Register
(Fort Plain, New York)
February 28, 1879
p1 c8: The Rev. Woo-Hoong Niok Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors residing in Shanghai, China.
The Morning Herald and Daily Gazette
(Utica, New York)
March 5, 1879
p c2: —Rev. Woo-Hoong-Niok-Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors residing in Shanghai, China.
The Evening Post
(New York, New York)
March 6, 1879
p c4: —The Rev. Woo-Hoong-Niok Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors living in Shanghai, China.
Public Ledger
(Memphis, Tennessee)
March 13, 1879
p4 c6: —The Rev. Woo-Hoong-Niok Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors living in Shanghai, China.
Carthage Republican and the Northern New Yorker
(New York)
March 18, 1879
p c4: —The Rev. Woo-Hoong-Niok Bau-Tsih-Dzae is one of the pastors living in Shanghai, China.
The Spirit of Missions
May 1879
Mrs. Schereschewsky writes to a parish officer of the Auxiliary.
“We have seen another of our native clergy, the
Rev. Woo Hoong Neok, who has proved so thoroughly useful and trustworthy in all that he has undertaken. Mr. Thomson told me of him, that he (Mr. Woo) could tell of more work that might be done that could be accomplished in a year. This one statement made me feel how needful it was for us all to be up and doing, and we pray God that the Church at home may be made more and more zealous for the cause of Christ in this land.
(click link, scroll to PDF page 112)
The Spirit of Missions
January 1880
p24: Report of the Rev. Yung Kiung Yen.
Shanghai, June 30th, 1879.
…The three female teachers are Christians, one of whom is distantly related to the
Rev. Mr. Woo, and another is the daughter of the sexton…
The Spirit of Missions
March 1880
China.
The latest dates are to December 23d. The Ordination of Mr. Sayres to the Priesthood, noticed above, on the 17th, and his departure with his wife on the 19th of that month for their new Station at Wuchang, as also the consecration of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo's new chapel at San Ting Kur, are the prominent items of intelligence. The consecration took place on Friday, December 19th. The locality is about twelve miles north from Shanghai. It is mentioned that the new building, known as St. Stephen’s, cost $1,034, of which sum Mr. Woo’s sister contributed $200. From a long account of the ceremony in the North China Herald we extract what follows:
…The Bishop and the Clergy, native and foreign, in the order of juniority, entering the front door of the chapel, went in procession up the aisle to the chancel, the Bishop and Clergy alternately reading as they moved the verses of the 24th Psalm. The Bishop within the rail read the address to the people and the prayers proper to the occasion, and the sentence of consecration was laid on the Communion-table. After which the opening Sentences of the regular Service and the General Confession were read by the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, who was thus, very appropriately, the first Minister to officiate in the newly-consecrated chapel, the building of which is so largely due to his individual efforts. The Lessons and Creed were read by the Rev. Y.K. Yen. The Rev. Dr. Nelson read the prayers, and the canticles and hymns were sung with spirit by the teachers and pupils of the several schools….
The Spirit of Missions
April 1880
Letters from Miss Nelson.
Shanghai, China, January 13th, 1880.
…Two little incidents that have occurred within the past six weeks will serve to illustrate their readiness to help those who are in trouble and need. The first relates to a little girl, whose mother, one of our native Christians, lately died, leaving six children, the youngest only ten days old. One little girl of five years Mr. Hoong Neok asked me to take into the school. The matron asked that she might not be brought until she had some clothes ready for her. Two or three days afterward I went into the school, and the matron showed me two sets of under-clothes, consisting of two jackets, two pairs of drawers, two bibs, a pair of stockings and a pair of shoes, and in addition, a thick wadded jacket and a thick wadded pair of trousers, with a nice outer suit of clothes (also a jacket and pair of trousers), and all these made by the school-children, but not during their work hours. They made them in the evening during their play hour, and instead of amusing themselves.
When Mr. Hoong Neok went to get the little girl, however, he found that her mother’s sister had kidnapped her, and refused to bring her back. Then what should we do with the clothes? She had a younger sister, two years old, and the father has given her to us, and she has fallen heir to them….
The Spirit of Missions
July 1880
Letter from the Rev. W. J. Boone.
Removal of Miss Fay’s Remains.
Shanghai, China, April 28th, 1880.
Both yourself and many friends of the late Miss Fay will be very glad to hear that her remains have now been laid to rest here at Shanghai, the place so linked with all the memories of her life-work in her schools.
Through the kindness of Messrs. Jadine Matheson, Dr. Nelson had free passage to Che Foo to attend to the removal. On Sunday, the 11th inst., he returned, and on Monday, at a Mission meeting, it was decided that, as there was no room at the old cemetery for even this one grave, near my father’s and others of our Mission, we must get a plot for the Mission in the new cemetery.
On Wednesday, the 14th, we had Services at the Mortuary Chapel. It was filled at three o’clock by many Chinese pupils and friends, and the
Rev. Mr. Woo and Mr. Yen took the Burial Service, and the Rev. Mr. Wong made a commemorative address. At four, a second gathering of foreigners testified to the wide-reaching influence she had in the community here. Myself and the Very Rev. Dean Butcher took the first part of the Service. The Bishop spoke of Miss Fay’s work, and urged that some help toward educating these students she had taught would be the worthiest way of making a memorial offering. Dr. Nelson said the Committal Service, and the Bishop the closing prayers. All expressed great satisfaction that this transfer had been accomplished. It was so strongly Miss Fay’s wish to die and be buried here that all her friends could not but share it with her. Her name will live long among this people, who honor such a life aside even from its Christian character.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1880
Ordinations.
China.—In the temporary chapel of St. John’s College, on the 25th of May, the Rt. Rev. Samuel I. J. Schereschewsky, D.D., Missionary Bishop of Shanghai, admitted to Deacon’s orders Messrs. Yung Tsz Yang, Sung Lu Chun, and Zu Sung Yen; the latter, a brother of the Rev. Professor Yen of St. John’s, received a portion of his education at Gambler, Ohio. At the same time and place the Bishop advanced to the Priesthood the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, who was ordained Deacon in 1874. The Rev. Mr. Boone, as Chaplain of the College, writes particularly of this service; but for lack of space his letter will have to lie over until next month.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1880
Letter from the Rev. W.J. Boone.
St. John’s, Shanghai, May 25th, 1880.
To-day has been a red-letter day with us here. The Bishop held his Trinity Ordination on this week-day so as not to interfere with our local congregations. The weather, bright and cool, has been perfect, and as many as we could invite came, having no church, as yet, to which we might welcome even all converts with their friends. The Church of Our Saviour, Hongkew, is undergoing repairs, and is but little larger than our college chapel (a room, to which is added a chancel, in the college), while Christ Church, in the city, is so badly located and the city folk so insulting and unfriendly when we go in company to any marked Service that our converts shrink from going there. So the 200 who came filled to overflowing our space and blocked the doors and windows, and the foreign ladies had to take possession of the large vestry-room. The Bishop had, after the ordination, eleven Clergymen with him, Canon Scott, Bishop-elect of Peking, being the only one not connected with our Mission work. The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, of Kong Wan, was advanced to the Priesthood, in view of his earnest work as a Deacon since 1874….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1880
China.
From Report of the Rev. Dr. Nelson.
Shanghai, July 17th, 1880.
…The new native Presbyter, the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, has been known to you for years in the several capacities of hospital assistant, Catechist, and Deacon. And now he has been judged fit for a higher office and ministry, as possessing such zeal and efficiency in his work as to be some compensation for such things as in his case required dispensation….
Baptisms.
In my special field, at Kong Wan, on the 23d of November last I baptized (assisted by the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo) twenty-five persons, among whom were several cases of interest….
Report of the Rev. Yung Kiung Yen, M.A.
St. John’s College, Shanghai,
July 5th, 1880.
The Two Out-stations,
The one is Nan Ziang. It was begun by the
Rev. Mr. Woo as a vaccination dispensary in 1877, and a school was added in 1879. It became a part of his extended jurisdiction, and he visited it every Thursday. Having no resident Clergyman, and consequently no regular Sunday or week-day Services, it has been known more as a dispensary* than as a religious outpost. It is now detached from Mr. Woo's field—it being too far from his home, and his hands already too full—and the Rev. Dzung Soong-Lieu, a newly-ordained Deacon, will be sent thither as a resident Missionary. He will, of course, have the burden of the work….
Nan Ziang is an unwalled town, eight miles from St. John’s, and thirteen from Shanghai. It is on the high waterway which leads from Shanghai to Kahding and Soochow. It has four business streets, extending in all directions from a temple of Buddha which occupies a central position, and each branch is one mile long. It has the appearance of life and activity, and is more populous and flourishing than many a walled town. The American Southern Methodist Mission has a chapel, a girls’ boarding-school, a dispensary, and two day-schools. A family and a single lady have charge of them. The benevolent work of free vaccination, given by the Rev. Dr. Lambeth, and the Rev. Mr. Woo of our own Church, has won the good-will of the townsmen, and consequently there is less disinclination to let houses for Missionary purposes than in any other similar place. One mile to the east is a Roman Catholic chapel, but I do not know its condition….
_____
*130 children were vaccinated last year.
Philadelphia Inquirer
(Pennsylvania)
October 14, 1880
General Convention.
Missionary Work of the Episcopal Church.
Report of the Bishop of Shanghai...
Four Native Clergymen.
...The Rv. Hong Neok Woo, of Kong Wan, who had by earnest zeal and much work earned his advancement, was ordained priest; and Mr. Sung Lu Chun, an experienced and able catchiest under Mr. Thompson, and Mr. Zu Sun Yen, and who was for a time in America, and has since studied with Dr. Nelson, helping him at the same time at Kong Wan, were made deacons. With them was joined Mr. Yung Tsih Yang, of Wuchang, long the useful and honored head of the Bishop Boone memorial School there, and the catechist at the Fu Kai Chapel.
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1880
Ordinations in the Field.
China.—The Rev. William Seaman Sayres, Priest. [March.]
Mr. Yung Tsz Yang, Deacon. [August.]
Mr. Sung Lu Chun, Deacon. [August.]
Mr. Zu Sung Yen, Deacon. [August.]
The Rev. Hong Neok Woo, Priest. [August.]
[Appendix to Foreign Committee’s Report—C.]
Annual Report of the Missionary Bishop of Shanghai,
For the year ending June 30th, 1880.
Chapel at San Ting Kur.
The consecration of St. Stephen’s, San Ting Kur, on December 19th, marked a step forward in Mr. Woo’s field which caused much joy. The cost of the site and chapel was met in good part by contributions of those who knew this special work….
Ordination of Four Native Clergymen.
The Rev. Hong Neok Woo, of Kong Wan, who has by earnest zeal and much work earned his advancement, was ordained Priest…
…1880.—February 22d, at the Nativity, Wuchang, confirmed 43; May 25th, at the College chapel, St. John’s, advanced the Rev. Hong Neok Woo, of Kong Wan, to the Priesthood, and ordained Mr. Sung Lu Chun, Mr. Zu Sung Yen, and, from Wuchang, Mr. young Tsz Yang, Deacons.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1881
From Report of the Rev. E. H. Thomson.
Shanghai, China, July 10th, 1880.My Dear Bishop: I enclose herewith the tabular statement required by the Foreign Committee. In sending this I beg to report as follows on the work in this part of the field:
Out-stations.—…Poh-tsa Station is under the charge of the Catechist San-yuen, assisted by the Colporteur Ve Nay Kway. It is a new place, and we cannot yet judge of it as to results. All such new openings, those which we make ourselves, require a good deal of time; while when we are called to a field by some one who has heard the truth elsewhere and desires us to begin the work near them, results follow quickly. San Ting-Kur,
Mr. Woo’s out-station, was one such instance….
From the Report of the Rev. Kong Chai Wong.
Shanghai, July 5th, 1880.
You request another sheet of report beside the blank I fill up, so I shall begin with the hospital preaching work.
…Lau Zak Station has two day-schools—one for boys has thirty scholars and one for girls has fifteen—which we call Bishop Boone’s Memorial Schools. I have preached there twice a week, on Sundays and on Wednesdays. I have no converts yet except for the former teachers
Report of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo.
Kong Wan, Pau-San Yuen District, July 12th, 1880.
My Dear Bishop: The great blessings of our Heavenly Father have preserved us all safely for the past year, and enabled us to have the pleasure of filling the yearly blank of the report of the work of our Mission to the Foreign Committee and our Church at large in the United States.
Let us first of all offer our prayers and thanksgiving to God Almighty for His infinite mercy and loving kindness to us all, and that by His spiritual influence and power He has brought twenty-six more souls into the Church in this district, and also for the completion of the chapel and the rooms on the same premises for a small family at San-Ting-Kur.
The work of the dispensary and vaccination since we occupied the new chapel is very much increased. Not only the poor farmers and their wives and children come to get the medicine or to receive vaccination, but the shop-keepers and people from different towns and villages are also commencing to come. Although they come for the relief of their bodies, yet it gives them a chance to hear our preaching and exhortation with their own ears, and to see our Services performed in the chapel with their own eyes. Some of them when they come see the white surplice on me with curiosity and wonder, others fix earnest and attentive eyes on my face, as if they want to know all that I read and preach and about our singing of the hymns.
After our Services are over they wait their turn to come forward to get the medicine. Besides the medicine I often give them advice for the good of their bodies as well as their souls. Although it takes them two or three hours before they can go home, yet they seem to appreciate our treatment, and go away from us with parting words and cheerful faces. In many cases they come back three or more times, and often bring others with them.
I trust, after the Rev. Zu-Soong Yen and family goes there, the Church affairs will be greatly improved. At the same time the dispensary work should be continued on, because I believe it is the best means to bring the people to us and learn them to know about the salvation of their souls, and that Jesus Christ is their only Saviour and their Lord.
Kong-Wan, my proper station, I believe is the third largest town in the Pau-San Yuen district. It contains about 6,000 people. About half of the shop-keepers are from other parts of the country. The natives are principally farmers and vegetable-gardeners, mostly uneducated. There are now four day-schools in town. One of them was supported by the district magistrate: two for boys and one for girls were supported by our Mission.
Miss Daw Chen-Yieh, the Girls’ School teacher, is one of the Rev. Mr. Thomson’s female pupils. She has been engaged to one of the young men in St. John’s College, who is a Candidate for Holy Orders.
Mr. Chur Soong-Zien, one of the Boys’ School teachers, is a very useful assistant of mine. During the spring months he gave me very good help on the vaccination days. Pray the Lord to bless him and his wife, and the children may soon follow his advice, and come along with him and his mother and brother to the feet of our Saviour.
The day-schools at Pah-z-Jan, Sung-Kar-zak, and King-Yoong-zak for boys has continued to do their good work, in giving the farmers’ sons a good and religious education; besides it gives us the chance to meet the people from different sections of the country and speak to them of the truth of Jesus Christ their Saviour. Out of the twenty-six who were baptized the past year, I am glad to state that nine were pupils of our different day-schools. The good work of vaccination is continued at our churches at Kong-Wan, at Non-Ziang, and at San-Ting-Kur. The number of children vaccinated during the year is as follows: In the Kong-Wan church, 411; Non-Ziang preaching rooms, 122; San-Ting-Kur preaching rooms, 28; private families, 23; total, 584.
Monday evening we have meeting for prayer and preaching in one of the private houses on the public street, and the Wednesday evening prayers and Bible-class and the Church Catechism class are still kept up in my house. I have no doubt these meetings will do good to the public, as well as benefit our members.
Non-Ziang is the largest town in the Kar-Ding-Yuen district. It contains about 10,000 people. Is about twelve miles west of Kong-Wan, and about nine miles north-west of St. John’s.
I hope after Mr. Dzang and his family and Mr. Sung and family go there our work will be improved, and in a few years that the seed we have sown for the past three years will spring out and bring forth good fruits.
My Catechist, Mr. Tsiang, has been sick for nearly a year. I am glad to state that he is quite well again, and is able to give me help for the past few months.
My Bible-woman, Mrs. Chur, is an active woman, who is doing her duty faithfully.
The Sunday Services in the Kong-Wan church are entirely due to the Rev. Dr. Nelson and to the Rev. Zu-Soong Yen for the past twelve months. I very seldom have the time to take part in them, for I am engaged at San-Ting-Kur and King-Voong-zak stations.
The ladies’ quarterly meeting started by Mrs. Schereschewsky at Kong-Wan is a very good idea. I pray that the Lord will keep Mrs. Schereschewsky in good health, and that she may lead it on and promote good-will among the women of our Church, and lead them to take more interest in our Church work hereafter.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1881
Progress in China.
By the Rev. John Liggins, sometime Missionary in China.
The Late Honorary Secretary.
Last month we embodied under this caption the words of several of the Missionaries, written upon receipt of the intelligence of Dr. Denison’s death. We append a further selection. The letter which follows immediately is perhaps the most remarkable of them all. The three Chinese Presbyters and the Chinese Deacon who have been in this country, the Rev. Messrs. Kong Chai Wong, Yung Kiung and Zu Soong Yen, and Hong Neok Woo, unite in the following expression:
It is with sorrow that we received from you the news of Rev. Dr. Denison’s death. To us, the undersigned, he was known not only in his official capacity, but as a kind, generous, and considerate friend—some for a short time, and other during many years—and as such he had been remembered by us with gratitude and affection. We consider it a privilege to know such a good man, and now that he is no more, shall cherish his memory with undiminished respect, hoping to renew our friendship in a better world.
The end of a life spent in the fear of the Lord, and in the most important branch of the Church work, cannot be otherwise than blessed, and, therefore, while we sympathize with the Committee for the loss of a wise counselor, with the foreign fields of a friend, and with his family of a dear relative, we are assured that what is loss to them and to us is a gain to him.
As a mark of respect to our fatherly friend we wear a badge of mourning for thirty days.
China.
St. Stephen’s Chapel, San ting-kur.
The illustration opposite is from a sketch of our new Chapel at San Ting-kur. The building was erected through the efforts of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, assisted by the Mission, and some of his friends. The work at this point originated in the influence of the Hospital for Chinese in Hong Kew, under the charge of our Mission. An old farmer who had been severely bitten by a dog, having consulted in vain the native physician, came to the Hospital to be healed. He was entirely cured in two weeks. During this time he heard the daily preaching of the Gospel and became a Christian. On returning to his home at San Ting-kur he invited Mr. Woo to come and preach in his village. Mr. Woo went, and his visits there resulted in a number of persons becoming Christians. A native house was rented and the rooms were fitted up for a chapel. Mr. Woo found much to contend with in the superstitions of the people and from their foolish fancies. On one occasion a new bell tower, near the preaching place, was torn down, the farmers declaring that it was a cause of fever in the neighborhood. Mr. Woo, however, afterward convinced them of their folly, and they agreed to pay the cost of rebuilding the tower. There are now about thirty-four Christians attending the chapel. There is a sort of branch dispensary of the Hong Kew Hospital at this place, to which numbers come and are prescribed for. The people are all farmers, and are generally friendly and kindly disposed to the work.
The Rev. Zu Soong Yen has been recently appointed to take charge of this station, and his going there will relieve Mr. Woo, who has heretofore had more than he could well attend to. The new Minister has our best wishes. May the work prosper in his hands for the good of man and the glory of God.—Mrs. E. H. Thomson.
The Spirit of Missions
June 1881
From the Rev. W. J. Boone.
St. John’s College, Shanghai,
February, 1881.
…Wednesday, A.M.—The College classes took up Descriptive Geography and General History of the old world Empires and showed how carefully the Rev. D. M. Bates had drilled them. From 2 p. m. to 5, the College and Grammar School were examined in Classics and the Scriptures. The
Rev. H. N. Woo at St. Paul’s, Kong Wan, collected some six Day-schools, and at the Bridgman Memorial, Mr. and Mrs. Thomson reported that their girls did well, as usual….
The Spirit of Missions
September 1881
China.
Letter from the Rev. E. H. Thomson.
The Bishop’s Visitations.
Shanghai, May 7th, 1881.
…We went to the house of the
Rev. Mr. Woo and found him at home. He has an old house which is quite comfortable for a Chinese dwelling. It was once very handsome with fine carved-work beams and a garden adorned with rock work, but the carving is now dingy and the rock work in ruins.
Mr. Woo had family prayers and gave us a nice supper, partly Chinese, and we soon retired to our room for the night. The next morning we started early for San-Ting-Kur, our deacon Rev. Zu-soong Yen’s station….
…The Rev. Messrs. Woo and Yen read the Morning Service. The Bishop took the Communion Service. The Bishop uses the Mandarin dialect in reading, it being that which he prefers. He requested Mr. Woo to repeat a part of the Confirmation Service lest the candidates who do not speak that dialect had not understood him. It was quite a large class, being the first Confirmation which had been held in the new church….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1881
Report of H. W. Boone, M.D.
Shanghai, St. John’s College,
June 29th, 1881.
…At St. John’s the number of patients attended to since the first of September, 1880, is 2,634. Vaccination was carried on at the hospital, and at St. John’s dispensary. The patients at St. Luke’s have been under the care of the
Rev. Mr. Wong, the pastor of the parish, and the Rev. Mr. Woo, rector of the Church at Kong Wan, and they have had daily instruction in the great truths of our religion. At St. John’s the Candidates for Holy Orders visit the dispensary and minister to the spiritual wants of the patients who, Chinese fashion, sit for hours in the waiting room….
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1881
China.
Missionary Staff.—Bishop, 1; Presbyters (foreign 3, native 3), 6; Deacons (foreign 1, native 3), 4; Divinity Students (seven of whom also act as Teachers and Lay-readers), 15; Missionary Physicians (foreign), 2; Missionary Teachers (foreign), (Male 1, Female 7), 8; Medical Students, 6; Catechists, Teachers, Bible-readers), 15; Missionary Physicians (foreign), 2; Missionary Teachers (foreign), (Male 1, Female 7), 8; Medical Students, 6; Catechists, Teachers, Bible-readers, and hospital assistants (native), 31.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel I. J. Schereschewsky, D.D., Missionary Bishop, Shanghai.
The Rev. Elliot H. Thomson. Shanghai.
The Rev. Kong Chai Wong, Shanghai.
The Rev. William J. Boone, Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Kiung Yen, M.A., Shanghai.
The Rev. Hong Neok Woo, Shanghai.
The Rev. William S. Sayres. Wuchang.
The Rev. Sung Tsz Yang, Wuchang.
The Rev. Sung Lu Chun, Shanghai.
The Rev. Zu Soong Yen, Shanghai.
The Rev. Frederick R. Graves (in passage).
Henry W. Boone, M.D., Missionary Physician, Shanghai.
William A. Peas, M.D., Missionary Physician, Wuchang
Prof. Edwin K. Buttles (in passage).
Mrs. Schereschewsky, Shanghai.
Mrs. Thomson, Shanghai.
Mrs. W. J. Boone, Shanghai.
Mrs. H. W. Boone, Shanghai.
Miss Josephine H. Roberts, Wuchang.
Miss Anna Stevens (in passage).
Miss Elizabeth K. Boyd (in passage).
Miss Wong, Shanghai.
…From the other Chinese Clergymen are received, also, full reports of their work. The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo shows less rapid progress than in some former years; but his courage is no less firm….
[Appendix to Foreign Committee’s Report—D.]
Annual Report of the Missionary of Shanghai,
For the year ending June 30th, 1881.
Wuchang, July 6th, 1881.
Kong Wan.
The Rev. Hong Neok Woo is as usual occupied in carrying on his faithful work at Kong Wan. He has also the superintendence of San Ting Kur where the Rev. Zu Soong Yen is stationed, Ta Zang, and two smaller Stations, which have been recently established, and where a few Baptisms have taken place.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1883
…The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo reports, under date of Kong Wan, July 18th, 1882, the death of Mr. Tsiong King Main, a faithful Catechist, who had been in ill health several years. He had been a worker in Mr. Woo’s district for eleven years, and was a devout and self-denying Christian.
Mr. Woo also describes at length an unsuccessful attempt to plant a new Station in Tai Chong, a walled town, to which place he was assigned in the early part of last year. The Rev. Z.S. Yen and he had quietly purchased a house, with about one eighth of an acre of ground, on one of the principal streets of the city, and on May 5th, Mr. Woo started in boats, with Mr. Chu and his family and Mr Tsang Hoan Tsun, and with their household goods, for his new work.
On their arrival at Tai Chong, as they were arranging their house, they were notified that the “literati” of the city had protested to the District Magistrate against the building of a church upon the Mission property. Mr. Woo replied that he did not intend to build a church, but only to occupy the house which he had rented, and open a dispensary for vaccination. On being asked if he would give a written promise not to build a church, Mr. Woo said that he would.
The next day being Sunday, Divine Service was held with closed doors, and in the afternoon Messrs. Woo and Tsang walked through the city and out of the western gate, and on their return learned that several officials—“De-pans” and “Ya-mans”—had called in their absence and inquired for Mr. Woo. A little later they returned, and summoned him to appear before the Magistrate immediately. Although rain was pouring heavily, Mr. Woo accompanied them, arriving at the “Ya-man” or judgment-hall a little after nine o’clock in the evening.
As soon as the “De-pan” announced Mr. Woo’s arrival, great confusion arose among the rough crowd assembled about the “Ya-man.” The lanterns in the judgment-hall were at once lighted, a drum was beaten three times, the doors of the hall were thrown open, the Magistrate, in full uniform, took his seat, and Mr. Woo was led into his presence. The Magistrate then questioned Mr. Woo and some of the officials in reference to the purchase of the property for the Mission. While this examination proceeded, tow or three of the most violent among the crowd cried out several times that Mr. Woo should be put out of the hall and be killed, and one of them laid hands upon him before the Magistrate’s face.
Several persons then asked the Magistrate to require Mr. Woo to deliver up to him the deeds of the property. Mr. Woo replied that the papers were in the hands of the Standing Committee, as he had bought the property for the our Church, not for himself. They next demanded that he should receive again the money that had been paid for the property, and return the latter to the person from whom it had been bought. The Magistrate advised Mr. Woo with a very friendly manner to do this, as so great opposition to his plans had been manifested, and furnished him a guard to protect him on his return to his house.
The result of this trying experience was that Mr. Woo determined to postpone for the present the attempt to found the new station, and to refer the matter to the Standing Committee, in the hope that arrangements for work in Tai Chong may yet be made. In the meantime the Standing Committee has appealed to the United States Consul-General for redress, and he has promised to do all in his power to obtain it.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1883
China.
Visit of the Bishop of Yedo.
On Saturday, the 28th—the Festival of St. Simon and St. Jude—the Ordination took place of Mr. Sowerby to the Diaconate and Mr. Graves to the Priesthood in the Church of Our Saviour….Great regret was felt at the absence of
Rev. Messrs. Woo and Chun, who were away for the benefit of their health, and returned to Shanghai only in time to see Bishop Williams before he left for Japan….
…The Rev. Mr. Sih was the “Bishop Talbot” scholar and from Duane Hall, and has worked in the Church of Our Saviour. He is now at Nan Kong, a new station under the charge of the Rev. H. N. Woo….
St. Luke’s Hospital, Hong Kew, Shanghai.
…Meanwhile matters did not stand still in China. The
Rev. Mr. Woo and Dr. Boone obtained financial aid from the Chinese in Shanghai, and bought the remainder of the triangular block upon which St. Luke’s Hospital stands, and are erecting thereon an additional ward of two stories and seventy by thirty feet in size, and will convey both land and building, by deed, to the Mission….
The Spirit of Missions
March 1883
Letter from Dr. Boone.
Since our reference to St. Luke’s Hospital in the February number, letter has been received from Dr. Boone, dated Shanghai, December 18th, in which he says:
“I see my way now to a very systematic course of medical instruction, dissection, and post-mortem work; also to clinical work in the hospital and to a corps of European professors, and must try to get a fair number of students; not too many, for the teaching is of the line upon line, precept upon precept order.
“With the town work, St. John’s to be visited regularly, the medical college, building work, and occasional visits to our out-stations, my hands are full to overflowing.
“The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo has always been my right hand in all this work— getting patients, raising funds, and helping in council; he is a host in himself. He was very ill this fall with fever brought on and aggravated by his self-denying labors among the sick.”…
The Spirit of Missions
May 1883
China.
The School Examinations.
…The next day I met the scholars at Hong-kew, in the Church of Our Saviour. The Rev. Messrs. Wong, Yen and Woo were present. Three Girls’ Schools were gathered here, and all the Boys’ Schools in the district. I think you would have been pleased could you have seen the church filled with the bright-eyed boys and girls here, as well as at Kong Wan and the native city of Shanghai. The pupils were examined in the same studies as at Kong Wan, and in like manner repeated by rote chapter after chapter of Holy Scripture and Catechism. The girls looked very pretty with their clean faces and bright-colored tiaras. Each child was rewarded with oranges and cakes.
On the following day, February 1st, I attended the examination of the Shanghai City Schools, the Rev. Mr. Woo only being present. The exercises were similar to those at the other places. I was amused at one boy who had committed all the Bible and Catechisms available, and had learned a good deal of Paley’s “Evidences of Christianity” (Dr. Martin’s translation). I curbed his ambition, and put him back to studying the Bible till he was older….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1883
Report of St. Luke’s Hospital and dispensary, Hong Kew, Shanghai.
St. John’s College, Shanghai.
June 30th, 1883.
To the Rt. Rev. S. I. J. Schereschewsky, D.D., Missionary Bishop of Shanghai.
Rt. Rev. and dear Sir:
I beg to submit the following report of the Medical Mission at this place for the past year. Our work has been blessed indeed, both in the numbers applying for and receiving relief, and also in the very strong and earnest interest which this medical work has aroused among the Chinese. Some of the leading Chinese merchants and gentlemen in Shanghai began to take an interest in our work more than two years ago. They conferred with the
Rev. Mr. Woo and me, and by our advice purchased the second half of the block on which our Hospital stood, so that we then owned the entire block. They then put up buildings on plans of mine, and on the 10th of June I moved my patients into the new wards. The building formerly used for two years and a half was vacated in order to have it repaired, painted and put in perfect order….
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1883
China.
Missionary Staff.—Bishop, 1 (absent); Presbyters (foreign 6, native 3), 9; Deacons (foreign 1, native 7), 8; Candidates for Holy Orders (of whom 8 also act as Teachers and Lay-readers), 13; Missionary Physicians (foreign), 2*; Missionary Teachers (foreign), 11; Trained Nurse (foreign), 1; Medical Students, 6; Catechists and Assistants (Native), 10; Teachers (Native), 36; Bible-readers (Native), 8.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel I. J. Schereschewsky, D.D., Missionary Bishop (Absent).
The Rev. Elliot H. Thomson (In the U.S.).
The Rev. Kong Chai Wong, Shanghai.
The Rev. William J. Boone, Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Kiung Yen, M.A., Shanghai.
The Rev. Hong Neok Woo, Pa-z-Jan.
The Rev. Wm. S. Sayres. Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Tsz Yang, Hankow.
The Rev. Sung Lu Chun, Nan Ziang.
The Rev. Zu Soong Yen, Kong Wan.
The Rev. Frederick R. Graves (In the U.S.).
The Rev. Herbert Sowerby, Wuchang.
The Rev. Ching Chang Wu, Shanghai.
The Rev. Ssz Chia Hwa, Tsung Zu.
The Rev. Yuin Yu Sih, Nan Kong.
The Rev. Yu Tang Chu, Da Tsong.
The Rev. George H. Appleton, Shanghai.
The Rev. Arthur H. Locke, Wuchang.
Henry W. Boone, M.D., Missionary Physician, Shanghai.
William A. Deas, M.D., Missionary Physician, Wuchang
M. Helen Thompson, M.D., Missionary Physician.
Mrs. Schereschewsky, (Absent).
Mrs. Thomson, (In the U.S.).
Mrs. W. J. Boone, Shanghai.
Mrs. Sayres, Shanghai.
Mrs. Graves, (In the U.S.).
Mrs. Sowerby, Wuchang.
Mrs. Appleton, Shanghai.
Mrs. Locke, Wuchang.
Mrs. Kate J. Sayers, Trained Nurse (In passage).
Miss Martha Bruce, Shanghai
Miss Sara E. Lawson, Shanghai.
Miss Esther A. Spencer, Teacher of English (In passage).
Miss Wong, Shanghai.
Shanghai.
…Important advance movements have been made in our Medical Mission at this point in the putting up of new Hospital buildings, the purchase of a house near St. Luke’s Hospital for the residence of the Missionary Physician, the association with him in the clinical work of Dr. Jamieson, English practitioner in the Foreign Concession, and the erection of a building for the Medical School. A full description of these structures will be found in Dr. Boone’s Report published in The Spirit op Missions for October. The perfection of all their arrangements, the fact that a large proportion of their cost was paid by Chinese citizens, whose interest was elicited largely by the
Rev. Mr. Woo, the assurance that the Medical College in China is now, though not yet fully developed, well begun—all these facts mark an epoch in the history of our Medical Missions….
…The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo reports from his residence at Kia Ding that he, assisted by one Deacon and several Catechists, has carried on an evangelistic work in four places in that city and neighborhood. At each of these public worship has been held once every Sunday, and at three of them on two additional days of every week. The average attendance has been about 35. Kia Ding is a city of 25,000 inhabitants within the district bordering Shanghai, and was opened as a Missionary Station only last year. Mr. Woo, lion-hearted and indefatigable, is, as always, full of the pioneer spirit, and if his life be spared the Committee are confident that he will, with God's help, make a strong station of Kia Ding. He reports the state of his work as greatly improved in comparison with that of last year, and the attendance upon Services increasing….
Annual Report of the China Mission.
For the year ending June 30th, 1883.
Medical Work.—
…At Kia Ding, at three points, and at Nan Kong,
Mr. Woo and his helpers are gaining acquaintances, and in every way possible laying foundations for future years. …
The Spirit of Missions
January 1884
Ordinations and Confirmations in Shanghai.
…On Thursday morning, at 10 o’clock, the Service was held in the College Chapel. We robed in the Theological class-room, and went up the side aisle with the hymn, “O Spirit of the Living God,” as our processional, in the following order: Messers. Hsia and Yang, the Rev. Messrs. Chu and Hwa, and Yen and Chun, Deacons; and the
Rev. Messrs. Woo and and Sayres, Yen and Boone, the Rev. Mr. Wong, and the Bishop. We had hoped that Archdeacon Moule (the Bishop’s brother) would have paired with Mr. Wong, but he was just too late, and, with the Rev. Mr. Smith of the English Cathedral, and Mr. Lih, our Deacon (also too late), was in the congregation….
The
Rev. H. N. Woo’s report to the Bishop of Shanghai of work done by him during the year ending the 30th of June last, contains much that is interesting. Mr. Woo’s work was done principally at Kia-Ding and Na-Kong and their vicinity. The rented house in which the workers live at Kia-Ding was occupied in February last, and contains fourteen rooms, which are devoted to the day-school for boys, the chapel, dispensary and private purposes.
Service is held each Sunday morning in this house at Kia-Ding, and is well attended. Every Sunday afternoon a Service is held in the chapel at Kawy-Kia Bridge station, and in the chapel at the “West-Gate Market station,” as well as daily preaching during the week.
The dispensary has been well patronized, forty-two children having been vaccinated there. Two children were also vaccinated in the family of a Secretary of the City Magistrate. Some of those attended to at the dispensary were brought to it from a distance of from four to ten miles. Mr. Woo had not yet been able to open his dispensary publicly for a general treatment of the sick, for lack of means to pro- vide for the expense of doing so. He estimates that the population of Kia-Ding and its suburbs is not less than 25,000, and there are besides, numerous villages and hamlets in the near neighborhood, from which the city is conveniently reached by boats and land conveyances. Mr. Woo very wisely believes that the way to open the minds and hearts of the heathen in the new Mission stations to the Gospel, is by the treatment of their sick bodies and the healing of their diseases. He is, therefore, very anxious that this work should be begun at Kia- Ding.
Mr. Woo summarizes his most valuable and successful work in raising funds for St. Luke’s Hospital, Hong-Kew, last year, an account of which has already been published. He states that the name of the Chinese gentleman, who contributed about $5,000, the largest part of the fund, reported last year, for enlarging the usefulness of St. Luke’s Hospital, and raised among native residents of Shanghai, is Mr. Chao Ping Li. Mr. Li has also promised to aid the Mission in procuring more money for the hospital in Shanghai, hereafter. Mr. Li is not a Christian, and all the friends of the hospital will unite with Mr. Woo in his prayer, that this generous man may be “blessed in his body as wells his soul,” and that “the Lord may guide and influence him to conversion.”
Beside the work at the regular stations, Mr. Woo reports that there has been frequent preaching by himself and his two assistants in public places, where many native heathen religion afford special opportunities of reaching large numbers of people in this way. On such days, crowds of people are moving about the city, dwellers in the town, and people from the surrounding country. At such times very many persons will listen. Preaching is also carried on upon boats and in the tea-shops, when opportunity offers for it.
Na-Kong, the second station reported upon, is a country station. As at all such places, preaching has gone on during the year. But in this case few tangible results can be reported. The members of one family there have applied for Baptism and are now under preparation for that Sacrament.
The Day-Schools.
There are four boys’ schools and one girls’ school connected with my work at this place. I am glad to inform you that the girls’ school is very flourishing this year. Mr. Woo remarked that the girls' school never had so many scholars since the school commenced. This year all the new pupils are to be required to pay for part of their tuition unless their parents are too poor. The reason I made this new rule was to induce the pupils to come regularly and devote their whole time to study. Besides, the scholars’ parents will feel that they have paid something toward their children’s education and give more respect to our schools….
Vaccination.
This interesting work it is necessary for every native Clergyman and Catechist to learn, because it is one of the best means of bringing the people into communication with us, in order that we may be brought in contact not only with the common people of the farmer class, but also with respectable merchants and literary families. This work gives us the opportunity of preaching the Gospel coming to hear the and the salvation of our Lord Jesus Christ to them. The Chinese always bring their children to us to be vaccinated during the whole of the spring and fall, especially the former. The reason is that the parents have more time to devote to and attend to their children. Four hundred and thirty-seven children were brought for vaccination; also several private families were vaccinated at Kong Wan, San Ting Kur, Dah-zang and one out-station during the past year. We only had forty-four children this year at Dah-zang, considerably less than at former times, because last year there was opened another place by the Chinese charitable society in that town, similar to ours. We charged fifty-six cash (equivalent to five cents) for each child as register fess. The rule which was adopted some time ago by the Rev. Mr. Woo, still remains. I was invited by a gentleman to vaccinate his son at Yang Kong, a town about two miles west of San Ting Kur. He was a high literary man, what we call a Chu-Ning, and he was very highly esteemed by the people about there. I am sure this is the only good opportunity that has offered to become acquainted with such a man.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1884
China.
…We append an account of the opening of the new wards of St. Luke’s, taken from a local paper recently received. Mention has been made of the fact in these pages, but further particulars of interest are given:
“The new wards of St. Luke’s Hospital were formally opened on Thursday afternoon. These wards, of which there are two, were built at a cost of $10,000, the greater portion of which sum was generously contributed by Mr. Li Chao-ping and the rest by a few friends of that gentleman. They are spacious, well-ventilated, and each capable of accommodating sixteen patients. Attached to the wards are consulting and operating rooms, the latter being furnished with the latest surgical appliances. The Hospital is capable of accommodating 60 patients; at present there are 25 under treatment, of whom 6 are Japanese, 1 German and the rest Chinese.
China.
…“The chair was taken by Mr. J. G. Purdon, and there were present, Rev. Messrs. W. S. Sayres, J. Lambuth, D.D., W. S. Holt, Reed and
Hong Neok Woo, Allen, D.D., Anderson, Park, Drs. Lambuth, Boone (Surgeon), and Jamieson (Hon. Surgeon), Chong Woo (Resident Surgeon), Messrs. J.B. Glover, E. B. Drew, C. Thorne, Chen (Magistrate of the Mixed Court), Li Chao-ping, Wong, Wei, Man-pu, He Wen-shin, Chien Shao-shan, and several ladies….
…“The Rev. Hong Neok Woo then gave an interesting account of the work accomplished by St. Luke’s Hospital, from its inception to the present time, the substance of which, however, has appeared in successive annual reports….
Report of the Rev. William J. Boone.
…I feel that the late examinations are full of encouragement and I was also greatly pleased at the hold
Mr. Woo had secured at the new points opened during the last year and which, as a rest, I visited at the Easter recess, and of which I wrote at the time.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1884
To the Rev. K. C. Wong.
…(signed)
W. J. Boone, W. S. Sayres, Y K. Yen,
H. N. Woo, Co-Presbyters.
S. H. Yang, S. L. Chun, Z. S. Yen, C. C. Wu, 8. C. Hwa, Y. Y. Sih, Y. T. Chu, C. P. Hsia, Deacons.
The Spirit of Missions
May 1884
Letter from the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo
Kia Ding, January 22d, 1884.
I have not been able to write you for a long time; I am glad to draw you a few lines again. The past five weeks or so I have been in Shanghai soliciting the yearly fund for the current expenses of the St. Luke’s Hospital of the present year. For about two months before I was more or less unwell; not able to do much of anything at all. All the necessary preaching was performed by the Rev. Mr. Stone (Zah Yuen Niok) and Mr. Ts-Ming Tsang. Mr. Kia-Tsing Lee, another young Candidate for Orders was also quite sick at the same time. Mr. Lee suffered severely, first with an abscess, then with fistulas, afterward with typhoid. For about two weeks or so, he was so bad, that my wife and myself did not expect him to live again. But the God is Almighty; not only to restore his health, but much more vigor even than before his first illness. At his worst state of fever, he himself thought he must die; and ordered his wife to remain with us, and asked us to look after her after his death, etc. Though I thought he could not be able to get over the fever, his health was so low from previous sufferings, yet I encouraged him as much as I was able in words as well as deeds, besides our prayers, etc. At the same time I advised him to swear to God, that he would be more faithful to His great work, and serve Him more sincerely, if his life should be spared to him again. So he did, and God did spare his life. Now Mr. Lee is very active and works faithfully ever since his full recovery, last November. Mrs. Lee is also very happy and assists our Master’s work sincerely as ever. While my family were absent, Mr. and Mrs Lee in charge of this station, worked, and entertained the neighbors and friends who came to our house. The weekly examinations of the three schools, and the preachings of the day and evening at three stations, and the occasional visits to the neighboring towns and hamlets were entirely, I am glad to state, by the Rev. Mr. Stone and Messrs. Tsang, Lee and two day-school teachers, for the past three months. The young men are very much improved in working during the last six months. A month or so from now, I hope I will be able to start a dispensary for medicine, etc., besides the vaccination. By so doing, we will have two good advantages; first we can make friends with those who come to us from different localities of this city and the country; secondly, our preaching of the precious Gospel of Christ can reach to the ears of women as well as men, and besides, give the chance to the young men to see more humanity and kind manners toward the sick and needy. I have cured several opium-smokers the last year, some of them were business men. If I start a dispensary this year, no doubt there will be many more such cases come to seek for help. I am so glad that the Rev. Mr., and Mrs. Thomson have succeeded in getting quite a lot of medicines for my dispensary. I have a friend who helped me to a sum of money to begin the dispensary. Indeed, this is very encouraging, and a good beginning to me in this new field of Church work.
I have no doubt, you knew ere this, that the friends of the late Rev. Mr. Young of Ohio, have subscribed a certain sum of money toward a chapel, to be built in this city, as a memorial to that godly man. Of this I have written a short letter in the Standard of the Cross published last autumn, thanking Mr. Young's beloved friends for their kind and noble acts. It needs at least $2,200 for the above good work in this city! A common building alone is not of much account. It needs about $250 to $300, at least, for a lot; $1,200 to $1,500 for a chapel building; say $300—for an out-building and walls; and $100, for furniture and sundries items. This is a new place, we have no one to help us, therefore we need entirely to depend upon the Church in America to help us. There have been several good lots offered to us; as I have neither money nor orders to buy, consequently I have had to refuse the offers.
I arrived in this city yesterday afternoon. I am glad to be present at the yearly examination of the three day-schools of this city to-day. The examination commenced at 10 a.m. and ended at 2 1/2 p.m. Total thirty-nine boys and two girls present. Five boys absent on home duties. Four girls left on account of there being no female teacher after attending about two months. The children have done right well in Christian books as well as in Chinese. Most of them were the first year in the Christian schools. The teachers were all Christians. The west gate school has the smallest number of boys on account of opening the school one month later, because we could not have the house sooner. This year after the Chinese New Year holidays it will have, no doubt, the usual number of boys, as other schools.
Our preaching is carried on regularly every other day, during the week, at Kawy-Kia Bridge station in the city, and at west gate station outside the west gate. Also three evening preachings at the former place, especially for the clerks of the stores and the mechanics, who have no chance to come to our preaching in day-time. We have a good many inquirers of the Gospel; but none of them have decided to join the Church of God in this city, as yet.
Na-Kong is a town of four great thorough-fares for boats. Most people there seem down on the Romanists. What the Romanists did there before I do not know. However, we have so far,, two families having the intention of joining our Church there. One family lives in town, and the other one lives in the country, about a mile from Na-Kong. The men and wives were all sensible people. Their children quite bright and obedient. I have good hope that they will all be baptized together this year. May God bless and guide them all in the right way and help us to make them two real earnest Christian families. The day-school for boys will also increase in the number of children there this year. A regular Sunday Service will take place in this town shortly. My catechist, Mr. Que, is stationed there at present. I hope that I will be able to get his whole family removed there very soon.
My family, as well as my fellow-workers here, are all well at present.
The Spirit of Missions
June 1884
Letter from the Rev. Kong Chai Wong.
The following is, in substance, from our oldest Chinese Presbyter, of whom an account was given, and whose likeness appeared in the March number:
Shanghai, February 7th, 1884.
…On the 10th of January, 1884, I was invited to accompany the
Rev. Mr. Woo by boat upon a visit to the country ten miles from us. After twelve hours we reached there. The invitation was from Mr. Ho-kway Chee, that we might celebrate the marriage of his son. The wedding had been appointed for seven p.m. The house was then crowded by about five hundred people, leaving no way for the bride and bridegroom. There was great noise of women’s and children’s voices. At eleven p.m. there were left about fifty people. Mr. Woo helped me by keeping the people quiet with kind words while I married the couple. Mr. Chee’s is the only Christian family in that quarter. We hoped that that happy event would do the people good, and what I hear of their having said was very right and very good….
The Spirit of Missions
September 1884
China.
Laying of the Corner-stone of St. John’s Memorial Church. From the Rev. W. J. Boone, Bishop-elect.
St. John’s College, June 16th.
The corner-stone was duly laid on Whitsun-Tuesday [June 3rd].…The
Rev. Mr. Woo began the Service, the Rev. Mr. Wong took the Lesson and the Rev. Mr. Thomson said the collects. Mr. Yen made the address which was chiefly historical, and I read the list of contents. The covering stone was then laid with cement and tapped by the three senior Priests, Mr. Thomson, Mr. Wong and myself in the Triune Name….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1884
Planting and Watering.
…An extraordinary interest is felt to-day in the spiritual welfare of China. That country has, according to the Anglo-Chinese Kalendar, nearly four hundred million inhabitants. They speak a language perhaps the most remarkable amongst mankind. It is monosyllabic. There are eighty thousand alphabetic symbols, each standing for a word. Idols are worshipped and idolatrous rites are practiced. There are thousands of deities. Yet the Gospel has won triumphs there. Robert Morrison, at Canton, translated the Bible into Chinese. William Milne added his labors. Le Aug A Fa contributed his toil. Bishop Schereschewsky, later on, translated the whole Word of God out of the original tongues into Mandarin—the official language of one-third of the earth's population. Charles Gutzlaff, Herman Rottger, the two Boones, Dr. Bunn, Hoong Neok Woo and a host of others have each added his especial work.
Just here we come to a beautiful illustration of planting and watering—a division, yet a unity, of labor. Dr. Albert C. Bunn was providentially called away from his great labors in China to return to his native land, where he afterward entered upon the Ministry. He had planted; another was called to water. Dr. Bunn’s work went on in his successor, Dr. Deas. Again, Dr. Fong, who graduated after two and one-half years of study under Dr. Bunn, at Wuchang, and three years’ study at St. John’s College and in St. Luke’s Hospital under Dr. Boone, now resides at St. John’s and conducts the dispensary at that place, and also another at Tsung Zu. He sees large numbers of patients and is actively employed.
Dr. Henry W. Boone, in his report of June 30th, 1884, says that the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo has rendered most valuable service to the work. He has brought to Dr. Boone many patients, and has fostered the interest of his countrymen in Mission work, gaining their support and sympathy, and their liberal donations toward the current expenses of the Hospital and Dispensary. Last May Mr. Woo performed an amputation of the thigh, very skilfully and successfully, in the presence of the surgeons of the United States, French and Italian men-of-war then in port, and of several Chinese gentlemen.
Thus does the labor in one department aid that in another, all working to the one end. So, in the divine economy, he that planteth and he that watereth rejoice together, and each alike receives his reward.
Charles Howard Malcom.
From Report of the Rev. E. H. Thomson.
St. John’s College,
July 5th, 1884.
…I have endeavored always to be at one or another of the different churches or chapels each Sunday, having only been twice on Sunday at the Service in the College Chapel since my arrival. In visiting the churches I always preach and also take part in the Service unless Mr. Wong or Mr. Woo is present. I have taken part or had the whole of twenty-six Services, and have preached on some forty-two occasions between March 20th and July 1st. I do not know and have not an exact account of the number of times I have actually spoken at Services and lectures. It was quite often.
Report of the Medical Work in Shanghai.
St. John’s College, june 30th, 1884.
To the Rev. E.H. Thomson, President of the Standing Committee of the Missionary Jurisdiction of Shanghai.
Rev. and dear Sir:
I beg to submit the following report of the Medical Mission at this place for the past year.
Our work in this department has gone on very quietly. At the out-stations under the charge of the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, and of the Rev. Zu Soong Yen, a large number of patients have received relief. Vaccination has been carried on at all the stations, and we are trying to spread a knowledge of this valuable prophylactic in a country where the small-pox every year claims its victims by the thousands. One has to live in China and see the numbers who, though they did not fall victims to this disease, yet carry its marks for life, to know what a blessing vaccination is to the human race. Everywhere one sees people scarred and pitted by this disease….
Number of Patients.
…The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo has rendered the most valuable service to the work. He has brought to us many patients, and has fostered the interest of his countrymen in our work; gaining their support and sympathy, and their liberal donations toward the current expenses of the hospital and dispensary. Last May Mr. Woo performed an amputation of the thigh, very skilfully and successfully, in the presence of the surgeons of the United States, French and Italian men-of-war then in port, and of several Chinese gentlemen….
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1884
Report of the Foreign Committee.
China.
Missionary Staff.—Resigned Bishop, 1 (absent); Presbyters (foreign, including Bishop-elect, 5, native 8), 8; Deacons (foreign 2, native 8), 10; Candidates for Holy Orders (of whom 6 also act as Teachers and Lay-readers), 10; Missionary Physicians (foreign), 2; Missionary Teachers (foreign),* 12; Trained Nurse (foreign), 1; Medical Students, 5; Catechists and Assistants (native), 6; Teachers (native), 37; Bible-readers (native), 6.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel I. J. Schereschewsky, d.d. (Absent).
The Rev. Elliot H. Thomson, Shanghai.
The Rev. Kong Chai Wong, Shanghai.
The Rev. William J. Boone (Bishop-elect), Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Kiung Yen M.A., Shanghai.
The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Kia Ding.
The Rev. Wm. S. Sayres, Shanghai.
The Rev. Sung Lu Chun, Nan Ziang.
The Rev. Zu Soong Yen, Kong Wan.
The Rev. Frederick R. Graves, Wuchang.
The Rev. Herbert Sowerby, Wuchang.
The Rev. Ching Chang Wu, Shanghai.
The Rev. Ssz Chia Hwa, Tsung Zu.
The Rev. Yuin Yu Sih, Nan Kong.
The Rev. Yu Tang Chu, Da Tsong.
The Rev. Arthur H. Locke, Wuchang.
The Rev. Ching Pang Hsia, Wuchang.
The Rev. Shian Heng Yang, Hankow.
The Rev. Sidney C. Partridge (In the U.S.).
Henry W. Boone, M.D., Missionary Physician, Shanghai.
William A. Deas, M.D., Missionary Physician, Wuchang.
Mrs. Schereschewsky (Absent).
Mrs. Thomson (In the U.S.).
Mrs. W. J. Boone, Shanghai.
Mrs. Sayres, Shanghai.
Mrs. Graves, Wuchang.
Mrs. Sowerby, Wuchang.
Mrs. Locke, Wuchang.
Mrs. Kate J. Sayers, Trained Nurse, Wuchang.
Miss Martha Bruce, (In the U.S.).
Miss Sara E. Lawson, Shanghai.
Miss Esther A. Spencer, Teacher of English, Shanghai.
Miss Jessie A. Purple, Shanghai.
Miss Wong, Shanghai.
_____
*Including wives of Missionaries.
Shanghai.
…The
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo has been assisted in his work at Kia Ding by three candidates for Orders and one catechist. Services have been held at four places. The total number of Services was sis hundred and forty-three. Four day-schools have been carried on and considerable dispensary work. There has been one baptism, and the number of communicants is fourteen. This is one of the newer stations….
Pastoral and Evangelistic Work.—
…Mr. Woo of the city of Kia-Ding is one of the most forcible and earnest of preachers, and this is what he says: “Our street chapels are doing their good work widely. These preachings give good chances to the people to know the love of our Jesus for the whole world. Only His religion can save the souls of men. Though we get very few fruits from this work, yet we spread the Name of Jesus and His teachings wonderfully broad and wide in the country.” “Improving in every way, but slowly,” is his statement in regard to the condition of his field….
Annual Report of the China Mission.
For the year ending June 30th, 1884.
Medical Work.
The Medical School, under S. S. Sung and Dr. Boone, has kept the few students diligently employed who are as yet prepared to benefit by its studies and clinics. The need of an assistant physician to learn Chinese well enough to be a professor and to help the growing work at the Hospital has already been urged, and is here reiterated.
St. Luke’s Hospital and its outlying work at Kia Ding, Kong Wan, Da Dzang, Nan Ziang, St. John's and Tseng Zu and in many places casually visited by the Rev. Mr. Woo and others, ever enlarges its usefulness and influence. The late appointment, at Dr. Boone's earnest request, of the Rev. Y. T. Chu as resident chaplain, under the Rev. K. C. Wong, will, it is believed, bring home the blessed truths and consolations of our Holy Religion to the inmates of the wards, and perhaps follow some to their homes with loving influences and prayers.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1885
Report on St. Mary’s Hall, Shanghai.
St. John’s College, August 18th, 1884.
…On the “Mrs. Frances C. Henderson” scholarship is placed the daughter of the Rev. Zu Soong Yen, and a graduate of the Bridgman Memorial School, also a sister of
Mr. Woo. There is a little doubt of her being with us when the school reopens if China and France have not settled their dispute by that time. If she should not come we will place Mr. Ting’s other little girl on the scholarship, and the supporters may feel that their beneficiary is one who really needs their support. We trust, however, no change need be made. On the “Bertha Leffingwell” scholarship we have placed the Rev. Mr. Woo’s daughter, and have written fully to St. Mary’s School of their beneficiary….
The Spirit of Missions
February 1885
China.
Letter from Bishop Boone.
Ordinations, and Consecration of St. John’s Memorial Church.
St. John’s College, Shanghai, November 5, 1884.
Some account of our recent Services will doubtless be of interest, and as it fell to Mr. Thomson to send by last mail news of my consecration, it may fall to me now to tell of the consecration of our new church, and the Ordinations and Confirmation following closely upon it. The first of November will always be a red-letter day for the “Collegiate Memorial Church of St. John,” as on that day it was set apart for the service and to the glory of Almighty God, and it was my first public act as Bishop, and the Ordination to the Priesthood followed. Morning Prayer was said earlier in the old chapel, and at 10 A.M., the surpliced line proceeded from the Bishop's house to the main door and up the aisle, while Psalm xxiv., was chanted. The church is beautiful in itself, and many plants about the steps of the choir added a festive touch to show our joy in coming into the use of this pious gift of the late Miss Lavinia Clarkson. The line of Clergy was the Rev. Deacons Chu, Sih, Hwa, Wu, and Chun; candidates for Priest’s Orders Z. S. Yen and Herbert Sowerby;
Rev. Priests Woo, Yen, Wong, Thomson and Archdeacon Moule (the invited preacher), and the Bishop. The Consecration Service was said, and the letter read in English and Chinese for the benefit of the bi-lingual congregation.
…Sunday, November 2d, the Services took place in Hongkew (the American concession) at the Church of Our Saviour. At 10 A.M., the same Clergy as on the 1st (except Archdeacon Moule), and the four candidates for the Diaconate, formed the line in the end, nine Deacons and six Priests, of whom but two were foreigners, and one of them not of this station, so largely is our work now done by native agency. We must, however, have help for Mr. Thomson, who cannot possibly alone and for long oversee the work of our more recently ordained assistants in the Diaconate. Morning Prayer was said by Rev. Mr. Woo, the brothers Yen and the Rev. Mr. Sowerby. Mr. Thomson preached the Ordination sermon. Mr. Wong began the Communion Office, the rest being prescribed for the Bishop….
Substance of the Report to June 30th, 1884, of the
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo,
In charge of work at Kin Ding and three other places.
1 am glad to be able to write you again to-day after so long a silence. We were quite surprised to see Messrs. Thomson and Boone, accompanied by Mrs. Boone and little Elliott, in our place on the 10th inst. Their welcome visit aroused our quiet neighbors, as some had never seen an American lady or child. Mrs. Boone and Elliott were, therefore, quite an attraction. Our people rushed into the room where the party were eating their breakfast. The knives, forks, and plates were as great a curiosity to them as the Chinese, with their chop-sticks and bowl of rice, are to foreigners. Mrs. Li and I went with Messrs. Thomson and Boone to our Kwag-ka Bridge Chapel. We then went to the West Gate, where Deacon Zah and Mr. Tsang’s family live. There we all, six in number, went to the West Gate Chapel. Mr. Thomson preached at both chapels. The congregations were unusually good and quiet. The young workers and I also took part. In the West Gate Chapel the Services lasted two hours. The people would have been glad to have us remain still longer.
On the 15th of May we started for the large town of So- Du. We passed through Naz-Kong, Kok-Loong Tsung and the city of Tac-Chong, where I met with opposition two years before. While the boatmen rested we went ashore and preached.
So-Du is a large and prosperous town, through which runs a creek dividing the place into two portions, the southern being devoted to residences, the northern to business purposes. In the last named division there is but one unoccupied lot, of about 200 x 375 feet. Deacon Zah and I like it much, and think that if we could get it for our church now it would admirably serve the purpose in the future. Near this lot is a bridge bearing the inscription “See-Tse-Men,” which means “the gate to gain the money.” On the right and left of this bridge is the central market or business part of the town. From this town to the great river eastward is thirty miles. Ten miles to the west lies Zah-ba, another large town. Ten miles to the south is Soon-Vong, about three-quarters of a mile long. Near these is Dzar Dong, about a quarter of a mile in length, a clean place and well situated on a large creek, like So Du.
Street Preaching.
We have had street-preaching and talks in the above towns twice. The people seemed very quiet and attentive to our wholesome counsels. We met with no unpleasant opposition in these towns.
Ning Hang was the smallest town we visited. We did nothing here, but went back, passing through Dzar-Dong-Vong. From here, after preaching, we went to Tar- Chong. Messrs. Zah, Dzang, and Wong walked through the city while I, remaining in the boat, was rowed through a very narrow creek. In one place we were obliged to carry the boat a short distance—no light task. Passing through Kok-Loong we reached Naz-Kong at daylight, and the mission residence at 6 A.M.
At Wong-doo we have no chapel as Mr. Wong is the only communicant. I first knew him in 1866 when but. fifteen years old. He desired Baptism and learned the catechism. A few years later he went into business for himself, and for a while was quite successful. But, three times robbed, an expensive lawsuit, sickness—these added to the failure of the cotton crop for several years in succession, brought upon him troubles which only served to draw him nearer to God. Last November I baptized him with Mr. Dzang’s grandson in our Nan-ziang chapel. He has been very earnest in endeavoring to bring about the conversion of his wife, her mother, and the whole family.
The Kia Ding Dispensary.
Is becoming widely known and draws the people to us. Thus through their sickness the gates are being thrown open for the entrance of the Gospel in this neighborhood. General Wong, a Sz-Chuen man, fifty-three years of age, whose official residence is on the same street with us, was suffering with chills and fever for more than four months. As the native physicians were unable to relieve him, I was sent for, at the solicitation of his nephew. The third time I visited him I found him well, and as you may suppose, very happy. I was in consequence invited to see his brother-in-law, the prefect of this city and the Kia Ding district. I was also called to see some of the prominent families of the city. But I am sorry to say that the patients were in the last stages of consumption. Only one is improving.
The patients on entering the dispensary and registering their names, pay a fee of fifty-six cash—about five cents. They then take their turn for examination, and if able pay for the medicines. If poor, no charge is made. An extra fee, according to their ability, is charged for visits at their houses. I never lose the opportunity, on these occasions, of teaching them the folly and sin of idolatry. I find that they are more ready to receive our kind advice under these circumstances than at the chapel—especially when they are relieved or cured by us. I believe that in time the fees will enable us to pay the expenses of the dispensary.
During the past three months we have vaccinated fifty-seven children in the dispensary and six at their homes. Some of these were from prominent families. We have relieved and cured 132 persons in the dispensary and sixteen persons in their homes; one of these was a mandarin. Received as register fees 8,956 copper cash, equal to $8.07; doctors’ fees and for medicines, $40.05. Total. $48.12. This seems small for three months, but I have strong hopes that by God’s help we shall do greater things in the future for their bodies, and also for their immortal souls. For all this I most heartily thank our friends in America for their valuable drugs, etc. Especially am I grateful to Mr. and Mrs, Thomson for their exertions among their Philadelphia friends and the drug-store keepers; to all the medical gentlemen from the beginning of St. Luke’s Hospital to the present date; to Dr. Alexander Jamieson and Dr. Boone.
Our fathers and brethren of the Church in the United States will be gratified to know that Deacon Zah and Messrs. Li and Chang, candidates for Deacon’s Orders, are doing well in the work entrusted to them. Two are from Duane Hall and one is from Baird Hall. They are all zealous and faithful workers, as are also the teachers in the day-schools. Two have come to us from other Christian bodies, and now commune with us.
Our street chapels are doing a good and extensive work. Though we gather but little fruit, yet the Name and the doctrines of Jesus are thus spread far and wide in this country.
But a work which to me seems much more important than this is the Christian teaching of the young. This remark applies particularly to our boarding school children and those of Chinese Christians. Properly trained by good Christian teachers they will be the right people to help the Church in the future. Let us hope and pray that the Church will do the best she can to help those already in the boarding-schools, and their brothers and sisters. Not much is to be hoped of the heathen children who have all the heathen influence over them in their homes. It is not as it was ten and twenty years ago when there were no Christian families at all.
A Sick Widow.
A few days ago I visited for the fourth time a widow who had been very near her death. She is now, by the blessing of God , able to take her natural food and sleep. After some pleasant conversation, she said: “Mr. Woo, my kitchen god recommended you to be my physician. The other physicians were of no benefit because my kitchen god did not approve of them.” I replied, “How is this? I am no friend of kitchen gods, for I always speak evil of them and I preach to the people not to honor them nor sacrifice to them, for they are but common sheets of paper. I don’t think your kitchen god will recommend an enemy!” Of course all present joined in the laugh. I then asked her how she discovered that I was approved by her kitchen god. She said that her son prayed and made an offering before the bamboo sticks; stick No. 1, which was for me was good, while the sticks for the other physicians were not good. Of course I made this the occasion of a little sermon to those in the room. As I left the house I was met by some female neighbors who wanted to know more of the kitchen god subject. I did not lose so favorable an opportunity to give them another short demonstration of the uselessness of a piece of paper for a god, and at the same time advised them to trust their lives in the hands of their Heavenly Father who is the God of the whole universe, and has the power of life and death. I invited them to attend our Sunday Services so that they could be more fully instructed. Pray the LORD that He may move their hearts to renounce their old and foolish ways and draw them near to us that they may become the children of God.
A Good Melodeon
would be a most important accompaniment in our Sunday Services. I trust some good people in America will provide us with one. One like that used by the Shanghai ladies in their weekly meetings will answer for the present.
The Rev. Yuin Yu Sih.
I regret that this young man is soon to to leave my field for Dah Dzong, lately vacated. I trust the Lord will bless him in the work be is about to take in charge at that place.
From the Report f the Rev. Zu Soong Yen,
For the year ending June 30th, 1884.
Kong Wan, July 11th, 1884.
Day-Schools.
There are altogether eight day-schools connected with my work in Kong Wan and its vicinity. The girls’ school is very flourishing this year; it never had so many scholars since the school commenced. The whole number of the above named schools is one hundred and sixty-six. At the end of last year I received from the pupils’ parents the sum of seventeen dollars and ten cents, which will be used to pay for part of their tuition and for Lent offerings. i have made this new rule for all the schools except the girls’ school. The school at San Ting Kur had been closed this year, because we could not get any scholars. I intend to transfer it to Yang Kong, a town about two miles northwest of San Ting Kur. Rev. Mr. Woo and I can visit there once or twice a week.
The Spirit of Missions
April 1885
China.
Notes of the Mission.
At last accounts the Missionary Bishop was making his first visitation of the up-river stations, Wuchang and Hankow, the scene of his own early labors as Deacon and Priest, beginning in 1870 and continuing for about nine years.
On the Sunday after Christmas, December 28th, he confirmed four men, two women, and the young daughter of the Rev. H. N. Woo, who preached on the occasion, in the Church of our Saviour, Hong Kew, Shanghai. On the following Sunday, at St. Paul’s Chapel, Hankow, he confirmed eleven men and four women, and later in the day, in the same place, baptized the infant daughter of the Rev. and Mrs. A. H. Locke, and at the Chapel of the Nativity, Wuchang, attended the monthly children’s Service….
Ordination in Shanghai.
In the March number we announced the ordination of the Diaconate of Mr. Mei Peng Kwei. Since then we have received the following account of the Services and abstract of the sermon:
On Sunday, December 7th, Mr. Mei Peng Kwei was ordained to the Diaconate in the Church of Christ, by the Rt. Rev. William J. Boone, D.D., Missionary Bishop of Shanghai. The ceremony took place in the recently completed Collegiate Memorial Church of St. John in the presence of a large number of persons (native and foreign).
The day was all that could be desired—clear and cold—but not such cold as we know in New England on the same date, for the grass was, much of it, still green and many flowers had hardly been touched by the frost….
…The Clergy robed in the Bishop's private study and walked in procession to the main hymn. There were present in the chancel the Bishop; the Rev. E. H. Thomson, senior foreign Missionary; the Rev. K. C. Wong, senior native Missionary; Messrs. Woo, Yen, Partridge and Hwa. Morning Prayer having been said at the early Service, immediately after the hymn Rev. Mr. Yen ascended the pulpit and preached a powerful and impressive sermon. Several of our Missionaries having but recently arrived in China, were unable to follow the reverend gentleman, as he spoke rapidly in the local dialect, but his earnestness and zeal secured the attention of one and all, both American and Chinese….
The Spirit of Missions
June 1885
China.
From Letter of the Rev. S. C. Partridge.
St. John’s College, Shanghai,
March 4th, 1885.
Last night I went to Shanghai, with a party from our compound, to listen to an address on Miracles, delivered in the large hall in Shanghai by the Rev. Y. K. Yen….
…I hold that one such man as Mr. Yen and one such woman as Mrs. Yen are worth twenty years of labor here, nay more, fifty. And what shall I say of Mr. and Mrs. Woo, and the Wongs? I can only say that the earth is hardly worthy of such people; they have given all they have, at a cost that we know little of, for Christ and His Church!…
I continue my daily toil at the language, and on two days in the week instruct a small class in Physics (in English) which I find very pleasant work….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1885
Number of Patients.
…The in-patients were persons admitted to the wards of the hospital for medical and surgical treatment. There were 119 surgical operations performed in the wards of the hospital during the year; of this number a good many were grave and important cases. In the out-patient department 517 surgical operations were performed by the senior assistant, the senior medical students, and myself. We use the most thorough and systematic cleanliness, and the full antiseptic system, and our results continue to be very favorable. The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo has charge of the medical work at Kia Ding and the neighboring stations. Mr. Woo still brings us many interesting cases and does much to help the medical work along. Dr. Jamieson still continues his self-imposed labors, for which he has no other reward than the gratitude of those whom he relieves….
From the Report of H.N. Woo*
Kia-Ding, June 25th, 1885.
Our Church work in and out of this city is slowly increasing. We are making daily friends and acquaintances through my dispensary work.
On Easter Sunday morning I baptized three adults and four children; three of the latter were from our schools. These were from two families—three adults and two children of one family, and two boys of another. Those of the first family had been candidates for Baptism over two years, be- cause the man had been intemperate for part of his life. He only reformed after we got a station in the town of Nar-Kong some three years ago. He was well tried by me, because I considered the first fruits of a new Mission district to be very important. His wife and children were quite bright and good. I hope the Lord will bless them with the Holy Spirit, and that they may be real good examples as the good Christians for their relations and neighbors. The man’s parents are still quite active, and are engaged in business with their younger son, in another town. The old man has heard of the Christian doctrine over twenty-five years, while they lived in the town of Dah-Dzong. Since his family moved to this neighborhood, he had no chance to hear the Word of Jesus, until we came to this city. He is a very sensible old man. I hope the Lord will make me the instrument to convert him and his wife, as well as his younger son and future daughter-in-law.
The two brothers of another family lost their mother two years ago. Their father is engaged in business in one of the Customs of Canton. He was very well instructed in the Christian doctrine years ago, when in our Mission employ. I hope he will some day in the future follow his sons’ steps, and join our Church too.
The Largest Congregations.
On the twelfth of May we preached ten sermons to about one thousand people in our Nar-Kong Chapel, Messrs. Tsang, Lee, Tsu, Dzang and myself. It took us from 11 A.M. to 3 P.M., in turns, one after the other. It was the greatest day of the year for Nar-Kong. About ten thousand people were present from the country and other cities and towns. Mrs. Lee, the Bible-woman, did her best, with Mrs. Wong and her family, for their neighbors and visitors. I also had the pleasure of assisting Mrs. Lee for half an hour in talking to the people. This day was the celebration of an ancient general, who was very honest and brave. He died for his country (twelve hundred years ago). Consequently the people made an idol to represent him, and they celebrate his birthday by procession, etc., every year. May God bless our preaching on that day. Our words may be as good seeds sown in good ground, that may grow and bring forth good fruit in the future.
Kia-Ding Dispensary.
Besides our regular preaching and the Services in our street chapels at several stations which I mentioned on the blank the Secretary sent me, I am glad to add a few lines about my small dispensary in this city. During the past sixteen months—or from the beginning of this dispensary—I have attended or relieved 1,261 registered patients. More than two-thirds of this number paid for their medicines, besides their small register fees. About 250 very poor patients were taken free of any charges. In several cases I was obliged to give them little help besides my services and the medicines. About sixty private patients from families in and out of this city, have also been attended with great satisfaction. It pleased me more that I had such good opportunities to speak to them all the words of Jesus and of His Church.
There are two very interesting cases in my charge at present; one a young man, the only son of a commission merchant of the west gate of this city, and the other one the head of a well-known family in the town of Tsang-Poo, who is also a commission merchant They were both very serious cases. The Chinese doctors had given them up. Poor fellows, they had both suffered over two months before they came to see me. They thought their lives were in danger at one time. But now, by God’s mercy, after my treatment for three weeks, they are both out of danger. Pray that the Lord will bless me that they may both be cured. The old man is in my dispensary-room now, for I have no separate room for him. He is a very sensible old man, and if God spares his life for a few more years, and enables me to cure him, he will surely become a Christian. His eldest son, a very good young man, is a school-teacher. May the blessings of God be upon this family, that they may be converted. I have great hope in the future for our Church work in this new district and in the neighboring districts and countries.
*Written in English by himself with slight corrections made at his request.
The Spirit of Missions
November and December 1885
Report of the Foreign Committee.
China.
Missionary Staff.—Bishop, 1; Resigned Bishop (absent), 1; Presbyters (foreign, 5—1 absent—native 4), 9; Deacons (foreign 1, native 12), 13—Total, 24. Candidates for Holy Orders, 4, and Postulants, 6–10; Missionary Physicians (foreign), 3; Missionary Teachers, foreign (including wives of Missionaries, 10), 13; Medical Students, 7; Catechists and Assistants (native), 9; Teachers in College and Day Schools, 42*; Bible Readers and Colporteurs (native), 8.
The Rt. Rev. William J. Boone, D.D., Missionary Bishop, Shanghai.
The Rt. Rev. Samuel I. J. Schereschewsky, D.D. (Absent).
The Rev. Elliot H. Thomson, Shanghai.
The Rev. Kong Chai Wong, Shanghai.
The Rev. Yung Kiung Yen M.A., Shanghai.
The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Kia Ding.
The Rev. Wm. S. Sayres, Shanghai.
The Rev. Zu Soong Yen, Kong Wan.
The Rev. Sung Lu Chun, Nan Ziang.
The Rev. Frederick R. Graves, Wuchang.
The Rev. Herbert Sowerby, Wuchang.
The Rev. Ching Chang Wu, Shanghai.
The Rev. Ssz Chia Hwa, Tsung Zu.
The Rev. Yuin Yu Sih, Nan Kong.
The Rev. Yu Tang Chu, Da Tsang.
The Rev. Arthur H. Locke, Hankow.
The Rev. Ching Pang Hsia, Wuchang.
The Rev. Shian Heng Yang, Hankow.
The Rev. Sidney C. Partridge Shanghai.
The Rev. Chih Jen Chang, Shanghai.
The Rev. Kai Ching Li, Kia Ding.
The Rev. Ts Ming Chang, Kia Ding.
The Rev. Chun Lin Ku, Shanghai.
The Rev. Mei-peng Kwei, Ching K’iang.
Henry W. Boone, M.D., Missionary Physician, Shanghai.
William A. Deas, M.D., Missionary Physician, Wuchang.
Sung-Kwei Fong, Physician, Shanghai.
Mrs. Schereschewsky (Absent).
Mrs. Thomson, Shanghai.
Mrs. W. J. Boone, Shanghai.
Mrs. Sayres, (In the U.S.).
Mrs. Graves, Wuchang.
Mrs. Sowerby, Wuchang.
Mrs. Locke, Hankow.
Mrs. Kate J. Sayers, Shanghai.
Mrs. H.W. Boone, Shanghai.
Mrs. Partridge, Shanghai.
Mrs. Griffith, Shanghai.
Miss Esther A. Spencer, Teacher of English, Shanghai.
Miss Jessie A. Purple, Shanghai.
Miss Wong, Shanghai.
_____
*The Bishop says that these native teachers are “mostly Christians,” i.e., a few who teach only the Chinese language and literature are not converts.—[Sec.
Shanghai.
Evangelistic and Pastoral Work.—
…The Rev. Hong Neok Woo, the third in seniority among the Chinese clergymen, has sent a full account of his work among his countrymen centring at Kia Ding, which is in type for the October number of the Board’s magazine. It tells of labors abundant, of baptisms not a few, and of visits many to the dispensary under his charge….
Foreign Missionaries of the Board.
China.
Native Clergymen.
Rev. Hoong Neok Woo, Deacon. 1873. Presbyter, 1880
Evangelistic Work.
…Kia Ding, at its several chapels, and Nah-kong, under the
Rev. Mr. Woo and Deacons Li and T. M. Chang and the catechists, is a field where much active work is done, both by preaching and healing, that, by God’s blessing, must tell in future years….
Statistics China Mission.
China Mission.
Shanghai District.
Kia Ding, House Chapel; Bridge Chapel; West Gate Chapel; Nah Kong Chapel. Reported by
Rev. H. N. Woo.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1886
p19: China.
Ordination of the Rev. Mr. Partridge.
Bishop Boone writes, under date of October 3d, 1885, that on the feast of St. Michael and All Angels, September 29th, in St. John’s Collegiate Memorial Church, he advanced to the Priesthood the Rev. Sidney C. Partridge, Deacon. The Bishop was assisted in the laying-on of hands by the Rev. Messrs. E. H. Thomson and K. C. Wong, and the Rev. F. R. Smith, chaplain of the English cathedral in Shanghai. Mr. Smith said Morning Prayer, Mr. Y. K. Yen and
Mr. Woo reading the Lessons. The Rev. Messrs. Z. S. Yen and Chun were also present.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1886
Historical sketch of Our Medical Missions.
In China.
…Meanwhile, in Shanghai the medical work had been going on. In June 1880, Henry. W. Boone, M.D., the eldest son of the late Bishop, and born in Shanghai, was appointed missionary physician. In the Bishop’s report for that year, he made special mention of the great need for a medical department in St. John’s College, Shanghai, so Dr. Boone’s arrival was most opportune. Soon after Dr. Boone car, a temporary dispensary was established at St. John’s College, and in December a new hospital building was opened in Hong Kew under the name of St. Luke’s Hospital. In 1882, Dr. Boone reported that 156 patients had been admitted to St. Luke’s Hospital and 105 foreigners had received treatment, while at the dispensary 14,157 out-patients had been attended, and at St John’s College dispensary 2,793 patients had received advice and medicine. The
Rev. Mr. Woo supervised the work at the out-stations, where many patients had obtained relief, and large numbers were vaccinated.
In 1883, St. Luke’s Hospital, Hong Kew, had been greatly enlarged by the erection of new buildings of the most substantial description and a lot had been purchased on which was erected a building for a medical school and a residence for the medical pupils. The Rev. Mr. Woo had been very successful in raising funds for St. Luke’s Hospital. About $5,000 were contributed by a Chinese gentleman. About this time the sum of $6,000 was sent to St. John’s College Medical School by a few members of the Church of the Holy Trinity, Philadelphia, to be used for the education of native physicians and surgeons, and the training of native nurses. In 1884, there were two men and one woman under, instruction in this school. In the Rev. Mr. Thompson’s report of medical work in Shanghai in 1884, he says, "Many of the most serious cases in the wards of St. Luke’s Hospital are patients sent from our out-stations. These patients live in the wards, receive care and treatment, learn that the institution is established and supported by persons of a foreign country and religion, simply because that religion teaches love to all mankind. They hear the Gospel preached and when they return to their native towns or villages with renewed health and strength, they carry with them the remembrance of that religion, which knows no difference of country or language, but offers to all mankind the blessings of Gospel light and truth. Who can tell to how many homes this medical work has been the first glimpse of something higher and nobler than the dark heathen superstition in which they have been groping all their lives….
China.
Ordination of a Native Deacon.
A brief announcement was made in January of the admission to the Diaconate, by Bishop Boone, of Mr. Tsz Shin Chu. The ordination took place in St. Paul’s Church, Kong Wan, on SS. Simon and Jude’s Day, October 28th, in the presence of a number of the native clergy and laity. In the chancel, with the Bishop, were the Rev. Messrs. Thompson, Wong, Y. K. Yen, Woo, Z. S. Yen, and Partridge, Priests, and seven native Deacons. The Rev. Z. S. Yen, the rector of the parish, delivered the sermon and charge to the candidate, from the text: “How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of Him that bringeth good tidings, that publisheth peace.”…
The Spirit of Missions
March 1886
China.
Late News of the Mission.
…On the following Sunday the Bishop was at Kia Ding, eighteen miles from St. John’s College by boat, where he was assisted in a Church service by the
Rev. Mr. Woo and the Rev. Messrs. Li and Chang. Here four men and two women were confirmed and made their first communion. A week later, at the Church of Our Saviour, Hong Kew, the Bishop confirmed five men and seven women, presented by the Rev. K. C. Wong….
An Appointment to St. Luke’s Hospital.
Under date of December 14th last, the Bishop writes that it is proposed to appoint the Rev. Hong Neok Woo to the chaplaincy of St. Luke’s Hospital, Hong Kew. In itself this is a large field for work. It is confidently believed that Mr. Woo can greatly promote its interests in many ways. It was he who secured the gift of nearly $5,000 for the hospital from a Chinese gentleman two or three years ago. Dr. Boone has been very anxious that more attention should be given than has been possible under previous arrangements to bringing the spiritual side of the hospital work prominently before the thousands who come seeking relief for their maladies. Mr. Woo will be free for Sunday work. Sundays he will devote to the aid of the Rev. Mr. Wong, who by reason of age and infirmity is not equal to much strain. We regret to say that the Rev. Mr. Chu, heretofore connected with the hospital, has been obliged to retire because of illness. It is supposed that the Rev. Mr. Thomson will visit Kia Ding every other Sunday to aid the two Deacons who are stationed there.
The Spirit of Missions
November 1886
China.
Mr. Thomson’s Report to Bishop Boone.
There have been no special events to note in the outside work. I have visited all the churches and stations from time to time, as my duties at the college and other work would allow; celebrating the Holy Communion, and thus assisting the native clergy to meet the requirements of the work under their charge. This has been the case with the Rev. Mr. Wong, in taking the service for him at the city church, at the Church of Our Saviour in Hong-Kew, and at the Ing-ziang-kong chapel. For the Rev. Mr. Zu Soong Yen I have taken the service at Kong wa, or at San-ting-kur, from time to time, and at Kia-ding and Nan-ziang for the Rev. Mr. Woo. I have visited all the day-schools except one, under Miss Purple’s charge. Thus I have been able, with this visiting and examining the day-schools and preach- ing at the smaller stations, to keep up a tolerably fair knowledge of the manner of the working of the different stations. I look forward to the time when I shall be freed from college duties and able to do more regularly and, I hope, more extensively the work in the field covered by our present out-stations, and also to extend this work to new points not yet reached.
In the tabular form, which I send with this, I give you a few statistics of my own work. The statistics of the stations are all covered by the reports of the native clergy herewith sent. I am glad to report the native clergy have all kept steadily at their work, and have all been in fairly good health, with the exception of our venerable pastor, the Rev. Mr. Wong, who has suffered much from dyspepsia; but he is a good deal better, and is now able to take morning service and preach, also to attend some of the day-schools under his charge. Deacon Yu Tang Chu has been out of health with cough and weakness of the lungs, but he is better, and is at work under Mr. Wong. There is much cause for thankfulness in the change of feeling among the people toward us and our work. In Kia ding, where there was a good deal of feeling against us, I noticed a marked improvement at my last visits. Our work at Kia ding will greatly miss the Rev. Mr. Woo. We feel, however, that he is much needed at St Luke’s Hospital, and he is doing a good work there. He is the best man we have for pioneer work, and we can but hope the day may soon come when he can take the front again….
The Spirit of Missions
March 1887
Chinamen Send Help to Charleston.
The consul-general of the United States at Shanghai reports that $1,200 has been contributed by Chinese in that city for the sufferers by the earthquake in Charleston. The Rev. Hoong Neok Woo of our mission was active in gathering this contribution from the natives. Such an instance of practical sympathy and help from the Chinese should quicken our interest in communicating to them spiritual gifts. “A friend who calls our attention to this striking incident,” says the Church, of Philadelphia, “and who knows whereof he speaks, assures us that the Rev. Hoong Neok Woo is one of the ‘most real’ Christians living, and in this respect he is simply a type of many Chinese associated with our mission: men who put to shame the unreal Christians whom we meet in such numbers in our own country. Such a fact, certified to us by a respectable witness, deserves to be made prominent, for too many are under the conviction that out of the heathen you can get only a heathenish and degraded type of Christianity. That prejudice may yield to the statement that here is a man of faith, of intelligence, of devoutness and of practical human sympathy; a [?] who has had centuries of heathenism back of that personal life of purity [?] godliness and brotherly kindness which he is now living through the power of Christ. The Foreign Missions of the Church have not been without res[?]. There are marked instances of their success; instances which, if pondered, [?] strengthen the faith and stimulate the zeal of the Church.”
The Spirit of Missions
April 1887
Robert C. Woo, a Chinese student in Kenyon College, has just won great credit by a successful oratorical effort on the subject “An International Crime.” Bishop Bedell, in writing of him to the Standard of the Cross, says: “It is not the first time at Kenyon that a young Chinaman has stood among the first in mastery of English composition and oratorical delivery. Many old Kenyon students will recall, among other pleasant reminiscences, that Yung Kiung Yen, now missionary professor in St. John’s College, Shanghai, took the valedictory in his class at Kenyon, and by the applause which his speech called forth established his right to the honor which he carried off.” The Bishop adds: “One reason, not the least, why we are glad is that it will gladden the heart of his devoted father, our missionary, Rev. Hong Neok Woo, of Kia Ding, China, whose praise is in all the churches; and next, because it gives promise that we are preparing, by God’s blessing and through his own fidelity in study and hard work, a worthy adjutant for the corps that is fighting the battles of the Cross among the terrestrial Celestials.”
The Spirit of Missions
December 1887
Dr. Boone’s Vacation Work.
…I began work at Shanghai somewhat more than seven years ago. The hospital was small and soon became insufficient for our work. The Rev. H. N. Woo, now the chaplain of the hospital, interested his fellow-countrymen. They came to me, and asked how they could help our work. I said, “We own one corner of this city block; buy the whole block for this work.” They hesitated at this rather large proposal; but Mr. Li Chu Bing, the leader, said, ‘“Don’t tell any one or the price of the land will rise.”
The Spirit of Missions
February 1890
China.
A Letter from Miss Carter.
…“We arrived in Shanghai, China, September 30th, late in the evening, and found Bishop Boone and his wife, Dr. Boone, the
Rev. Messrs. Woo and Yen all at the water’s edge to meet us. The Rev. Mr. Partridge had been a month in Japan and had returned with us. We had with us also Miss Carrie Boone, eldest daughter of Bishop Boone, who has finished her education and was returning from a six years’ stay in America.
The Spirit of Missions
December 1890
China.
Ordinations at St. John’s College, Shanghai.
The Rev. F. L. Hawks Pott writes from Shanghai, September 4th last, as follows: “I write you a short account of the ordination services that have taken place to-day at St. John’s. It has been a larger ordination than we have had for a considerable time. Two Deacons, Messrs. Wo and Tsu, were advanced to the Priesthood, and three of the divinity-students who completed their course in theology two years ago, Messrs. Pae, Woo, and Dong, have been ordained to the Diaconate….
…The Rev. Mr. Yen presented those to be ordained to the Priesthood, and I presented those who were to be ordained to the Diaconate. The
Rev. Mr. Woo said the Litany, and the Rev. Mr. Yen the Ante-communion service….
The Spirit of Missions
April 1891
A Man Among Men.
…The Rev. Mr. Yen officiates in the native city, and is most active in evangelistic work, always ready to assist his brethren. He has in the
Rev. Mr. Woo, another Christian missionary of our Church, an efficient helper. —James Pott.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1891
…“It was greatly regretted that the
Rev. H. N. Woo was absent, he being called away to the deathbed of his niece, who departed this life full of faith and with beautiful words of prayer on her lips….”
The Spirit of Missions
March 1892
China.
Resolutions on Bishop Boone’s Death.
Following are the resolutions on the death of Bishop Boone adopted by the clergy and laity of the China mission:
Whereas: It has pleased our Heavenly Father, “whose never-failing Providence ordereth all things in Heaven and in earth,” to take away from us our beloved shepherd and Bishop, William Jones Boone, be it
Resolved: That we, the clergy and laity of the mission in China, do hereby declare our high esteem and love for our Bishop, our sincere appreciation of his constant kindness to all, of his faithfulness in his work and conscientiousness in the performance of all the duties of his high office.
Resolved: That we express our deep sense of our personal loss and the loss to the mission in the death of our Bishop, especially at this time when the political affairs of this nation and the work of missions are in so disturbed a state; the judiciousness with which he carried on the transactions so far during the crisis leading us to feel that all would, as far as lay in his power, have been guided by him to the best possible results.
Resolved: That we tender to his beloved wife and family our deepest sympathy, praying that the Divine Comforter may grant to them that consolation in full measure which is the blessed portion of those who grieve for them that “sleep in Jesus.”
Resolved: That a copy of these resolutions be sent to the family, and also for publication in the Church papers in America.
[Signed],
E. H. Thomson, Y. K. Yen. Arthur H. Locke, P. R. Graves, Herbert Sowerby, H. N. Woo, F. L. Hawks Pott, Y. T. Chu, Robert K. Massie, James Addison Ingle, Marie Haslep, 8. E. Smalley, Percy Mathews, Edward M. Merrins, Stepha L. Dodson.
A Report from the Rev. Mr. Thomson.
…We reached Ta-tsong that night, and preached inside and outside of the city, and met with no opposition or rude treatment. This place has always been bitterly opposed to any missionary, native or foreign, coming to reside among them. It was from this place the Rev. H. N. Woo was driven out. The Methodists have tried long, but have been unable, to get a hold so as to have a resident worker….
The Spirit of Missions
May 1892
Foreign Missions.
Bishop Hare’s Visit to Japan and China.
…“The next day (Sunday) he came in to the Holy Communion, and gave the absolution and benediction and an address at the Church of Our Saviour, Hongkew, Shanghai. Soon after luncheon at Mr. Yen’s, I took the Bishop in a carriage to Kong-Wan. There we had a large number present. The Bishop spoke and the Rev. H. N. Woo interpreted. We returned to St. John’s College, and the Bishop delivered an address to the foreign missionaries….
The Spirit of Missions
September 1892
Foreign Missions.
Report of Bishop Hare on the China Mission.
Shanghai.
…The same high praise is deserved by another Chinese Presbyter, the Rev. Mr. Woo, a cordial man whom one likes to recall. I shall not soon forget these two brethren and my intercourse with them….
The Spirit of Missions
June 1893
Foreign Missions.
Semi-annual Examinations at St. John’s College and Preparatory Schools, Shanghai.
…The Rev. Mr. Woo was present during the examination of the St. John’s boys in the New Testament in Wen-li, and also in the Wen-li Commentary on the Apostle’s Creed (by the Rev. Mr. Pott), and expressed his pleasure in the following terms: “I noted thirty-five boys who are studying the Commentary on the Apostle’s Creed, and forty boys studying the New Testament. They all seem to be well drilled both in the recitations and explanations; only a few who were not well up in their studies….I judge every young man in St. John’s College must have been studying the Bible and other Christian books. Certainly our St. John's College has done much in spreading the Name of Jesus Christ and His doctrine amongst the middle class of people through the large number of young men who are educated yearly in the college. Although the numbers are small of those who join the Church during their school-days, yet I think more of them will join the Church of Christ in future….The boarding and day-schools of our Church certainly do a good share in spreading the Gospel of Christ; perhaps even more effectively than our preachings in the street chapels to the passers-by. May God bless all the teachers for their patient work for these young Chinese I Some day the Church will reap a good harvest from their faithful service.”
The Spirit of Missions
July 1893
The Woman’s Auxiliary.
A Missionary Journey.
In a private letter written from Shanghai on the first of May, Mrs Twing writes:
I am writing at Mr. Yen’s, with whom I have been all the morning seeing sights, while waiting for Mrs. Rein to come to take me back to St. John’s. I spent the night here, after driving all day by carriage and riding on wheelbarrows, with Miss Dodson and
Mr. Woo, to chapels at the out stations, thirty miles….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1893
Foreign Missions.
The Rev. Mr. Woo’s Annual Report.
With the blessing of our dear Saviour, the work of the past year in the district I have charge of has suffered no interruption whatever, unlike our brother workers in other parts of this benighted country. We have been able to perform our duties without meeting with any opposition from the riotous element, who have been a great hindrance to the missionary work in the interior.
Since the anti-foreigner riots of 1891, we frequently hear accounts of the persecutions of Christians and missionaries in different places. Not a fortnight ago, two poor Swedish missionaries were most barbarously massacred by a mob of ignorant heathens at Sung-pu, a town 100 miles distant from Hankow. It appears that the victims of this atrocious crime had for the past year established themselves in that town, for the purpose of preaching to the people the tidings of peace and the doctrine of the salvation of the soul. On the 30th of June last, the very people whom they came to save, having been incited by incendiary and groundless reports of their doings, set upon them and murdered them in cold blood.
I have nothing of special interest to report beyond the fact that the work has been going on as usual, and has on the whole been satisfactory. During the year under review twelve names have been added to our church lists; of these eight are grown persons and four children…I am happy to say that the Deacons, Bible-women and day-school teachers in my charge have acquitted themselves in the best way they know how in their various kinds of work. As usual, we held last year, besides the regular Sunday services in the St. Paul’s and St. Stephen’s churches, and several branch stations, the prayer meetings, twice weekly at the homes of the different members of our churches in Kong Wan and San Ting Ko. The attendance at two of our day-schools for boys has been quite good; but the other boys’ schools are rather too small in numbers. I am glad to mention that the girls' school at Kong Wan has shown much improvement.
In addition to the Sunday and week day services, we open our church at Kong Wan during the heathen festivals, in order to preach to a class of people who seldom visit the town. During the spring festival, which occurred in April, something like 10,000 people from the surrounding country visited this town, and on that occasion we had the pleasure of preaching to vast crowds of them. During the two days the festival lasted, we had St. Paul’s Church open and on both days the church was crowded to its utmost limit, so much so that there was no standing room left. With the assistance of my three Deacons and the Rev. Mr. Chong of Ying Ziang Koag, who kindly helped us, we were able to talk of the Name of Jesus and His doctrine continuously for six hours on the first day to hundreds of farmers. A large number of tracts and Church calendars were sold and distributed to those who could read. Again during the Feast of the Dragon Boats in June, we also preached to large audiences, and I hope our words have reached the hearts of some of our hearers and ultimately will lead them to Christ.
As regards my dispensary work, I think some good has also been done. During the year I was able to attend to quite a number of persons afflicted with troublesome and dangerous diseases. I take this opportunity to express my hearty thanks to Miss Caroline Farr of Philadelphia and her Chinese Sunday-school pupils for tin generous and frequent assistance they have rendered me by sending me every year large quantities of valuable drugs. With these I have been able to supply most of the drugs used in my Kong Wan dispensary, and the dispensary at Kia Ding, where I was stationed several years ago. It is gratifying to me to report the dispensary at the latter place, in charge of my former assistant, also also doing good work. The Rev. Mr. Hwa who is in charge of that district has always spoken well of Mr. Chong. Further, I must add that the Christians and near neighbors at several stations also receive benefit from the medicines I received from Miss Farr. I give also my sincere thanks to our faithful brothers in New York for sending the drugs out every year to me.
In closing, I hope I have the prayers of all those interested in my work, so that greater good may be accomplished in years to come by the blessing of God.
H.N. Woo
Shanghai, July 13th, 1893.
The Spirit of Missions
May 1894
Foreign Missions.
Chinese Contribution.
“Since my return I have also endeavored to start a Chinese subscription fund to the new college. The vice-consul of the United States and the Rev. Mr. Woo of our mission have both lent their assistance in the matter. The former interviewed some of the Chinese officials for us, and the latter has busied himself taking the subscription book about. We hope that not only the officials but also wealthy and philanthropic Chinese merchants, and old graduates of the school will make contributions. Thus far $750 Mexican has been donated, chiefly by the officials of Shanghai. We must confess to feeling very much elated over the result of this effort, for it goes to prove that, at least from the utilitarian standpoint, the more enlightened of the Chinese begin to see that our Work is of value to their nation.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1896
A Letter from Bishop Graves.
St. John’s College, Shanghai, January 21st, 1896.
…On the Second Sunday after the Epiphany I visited Kong Wan and confirmed a class of six for the
Rev. H. N. Woo. There was a good congregation and a hearty service.
The Spirit of Missions
April 1896
Notes on the China Mission.
…“On the Second Sunday after the Epiphany I visited Kongwan and confirmed a class of six, presented by
Rev. H. N. Woo. The church was clean and bright, and the services most hearty. The music was especially good for a country congregation, owing to the organist, Miss Yen (a daughter of the former Priest at Kongwan, Rev. Z. S. Yen), and the wives of some of the congregation, who are also old St. Mary's girls, as she is.
The Spirit of Missions
May 1896
The Church Music.
Seeing that there are now in this church six young organists, I have arranged to have them take turns on the instrument. Five are young ladies who were graduated from St. Mary’s Hall, and the sixth is my youngest son. Miss Woo, daughter of the Rev. Mr. Woo, had been doing this duty for some years past, and it was as much to lighten her burden as to enlist the activity of others that the new scheme was undertaken. Of course Miss Woo remains a member of this organ committee. There is no pretension to artistic singing in this church, for without a boarding-school a choir is impossible. Day-scholars are too fleeting.
The Spirit of Missions
February 1897
The Rev. Mr. Yen’s Work.
…“Of the four boys’ schools the most prosperous is that under Mr. Woo, the nephew of the Rev. H.N. Woo…”
The Spirit of Missions
July 1897
Foreign Missions.
Bishop Graves’s Report of the China Mission for 1896–97.
Shanghai.
Outwork.—The outwork under Archdeacon Thomson and the Rev. Messrs. Yen and Woo has gone on much as usual. Mr. Yen has, in addition to his duties as pastor of the Church of our Saviour, and the teaching in the training-school, and translation work, continued to act as chaplain of St. Luke’s Hospital.
Mr. Woo reports for Kong-wan. Archdeacon Thomson has been endeavoring to secure a site in Sinza for a chapel, but so far without success. We are trying hard to get this site and expect to do so in a few months. That it has not been done long ago is, of course, due to the fact that the price of land has risen so enormously, as we have mentioned at the beginning of this report….
Announcements.
Extension of the Shanghai Country Work.
Bishop Graves send to the Board, in connection with his annual report for 1896–97, the following memorandum prepared and signed by himself as Bishop:
“The Bishop having consulted with the foreign clergy of the Shanghai District, and with the Rev. Y. K. Yen and the Rev. H. N. Woo, two of his Chinese clergymen, has become convinced that it is the mind of all that a special effort must now be made to extend our work in the vicinity of Shanghai and develop more fully the evangelistic and itinerant work in this neighborhood. A committee was first appointed to take this matter into consideration, and after they had reported, the whole subject was dis- cussed by the clergy and the Bishop, and a definite scheme was agreed upon. This scheme is embodied in the following rules, which are hereby set forth by the Bishop for the regulation of this branch of the work:
The Spirit of Missions
August 1897
Woman’s Auxiliary.
Fourth Annual Meeting of the China Branch of the Woman’s Auxiliary.
The China branches of the Woman’s Auxiliary held its fourth annual meeting on Thursday, May 13th. The attendance was very good indeed. A business meeting was held at 11 a.m. in St. Mary’s Chapel. Every local branch sent a delegate, who read a written report. After the meeting, lunch was served in St. Mary’s. At 2:30 there was a service in St. John’s Chapel. Addresses were made by the Rev. Messrs. Rees and Woo, and Mr. Pott also said a few words. The offering amounted to eighty-four dollars and some cents. It was decided to keep one-half of this for the United Offering of 1898, the other half to be used to help supply needs in the country stations under Archdeacon Thomson. Miss Crummer was appointed secretary for the coming year, and accepted the office.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1897
…The missionaries in the Foreign field are feeling particularly bereaved. Information is at hand that a suitable general letter is in preparation in China to be signed by all the workers, but the Rev. Messrs. Partridge, Pott, Woo, and others have also written individually. They express profound sense of loss and sorrow, and offer sympathy to all the staff at the Church Missions House. Mr. Partridge, by anticipation, joins in the prayer suggested in the form of Intercession printed in the last number of The Spirit of Missions and in this….
The Spirit of Missions
October 1897
Our Church and Its Work in China.
Medical Missions at Shanghai.
St. Luke’s Hospital for Women and Children, under the charge of Dr. Mary Jamieson Gates, is doing a fine work in Shanghai. Across the street from the women’s hospital we find St. Luke’s Hospital for Men, under the charge of Dr. H. W. Boone, which has for twenty-eight years given relief to all applicants. Under the Rev. Mr. Woo, dispensary work is carried on at Kong Wan and San-ting Ko. There is a well equipped dispensary at St. John’s College, and one at Kia Ding. From this we see that our mission, under the guiding care of its Bishop, is actively engaged in carrying on work at many centres, and that, while sadly in need of more clergymen and lay workers, it is making progress at all points.
The Spirit of Missions
June 1899
The
Rev. Hoong Niok Woo, Senior Chinese Presbyter.
The Rev. Hoong Niok Woo,*
Hoong Niok Woo was connected with our mission boarding-school in 1850, and was among the twenty boys whom Bishop Boone placed in charge of Miss Fay upon her arrival in the mission. For several years he remained under her instruction, and was considered a patient, studious pupil In the course of time a change was made in the administration of the school, and a new teacher was placed in charge. Some of the more advanced boys were promoted into a higher grade under the new teacher. Among the number promoted was Hoong Nick, as he was then called. This change, however, proved disastrous, as one boy after another took refuge in running away. Miss Fay, upon going to her class-room one morning, saw a slate lying upon her desk, on which was written: “Now, dear Miss Fay, I run away like other boys. Superintendent says I am dunce. I think I stupid. I go. Your affectionate Hoong Niok.”
For several years he kept away from the school, and did not return until a change occurred in the management. The superintendent resigned and returned to America, and the charge of the school reverted again to the ladies. This fact becoming known, several of the boys who had run away came back, among them Hoong Niok, and asked that they might be received again into the school; but Bishop Boone refused to admit them, not thinking it expedient. Some of the boys then sought employment in the city, which they easily found, because of their knowledge of the English language. Others secured positions as stewards upon an American man-of-war then lying in the harbor and about to leave for America. Hoong Niok was among the number who sailed with the ship.
We have made a special effort to learn about Mr Woo’s life in this country, and, at considerable pains the Rev. Percy J. Robottom, rector of St. James’s Parish, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, has gathered the following information for us: The late John S. Messersmith, M.D. (who afterward became Medical Director of the United States Navy) when attached to the U. S. man-of-war “Mississippi,” under Captain Buchanan, with the expedition of Commodore Perry to Japan, took “Hoong” with him to his home in Lancaster and apprenticed him to a local paper, The Examiner. In this position he served faithfully or seven years. Bishop Bowman, then rector, was wonderfully interested in him, and he was a most devout member of St. James’s Parish and a very regular attendant upon the services. He became a naturalized citizen and during the Civil War joined an emergency regiment, the 50th Pennsylvania Militia, in which he served three months. Mrs Messersmith, the widow of the surgeon, speaks very enthusiastically of “Hoong,” laying stress on his “unique ability, sterling honesty, and his appreciative qualities.”
In a private letter written to a friend in Lancaster at the close of last year Mr. Woo says:
“I am the only naturalized Chinese citizen in Lancaster. There were two Chinese in the army in the Civil War, one serving in the Southern army and myself in the Northern; now both of us are serving in the greatest and noblest army of Christ, fighting for the last twenty-five years or more against Satan and the darkness of superstition and the greatest heathenism on the globe.”
After eight years’ residence in this country, Hoong Niok longed to return to his native land. He set sail and arrived in Shanghai just after the death of Bishop Boone. The Rev. E. H. Thomson, who was in the mission, and who was well known to Hoong Niok, was sought and applied to for work. Not having the means to pay him, Mr. Thomson was obliged to let him go, much to his regret. So Hoong Niok engaged himself as an interpreter in an English establishment where Chinese workmen were employed. In the meantime he attended regularly the Sunday services of the mission, and under the guidance of the Holy Spirit was led to seek for Orders. He at once began a course of studies under Mr. Thomson, to which he devoted himself with great zeal and earnestness. On March 1st, 1866, he joined the mission and devoted his whole time to its interests.
He developed a strong liking for the theory and practice of medicine, nursing and caring for the sick When Mr. Thomson projected the plan of establishing a hospital in Shanghai in 1868, Hoong Niok was at once interested. Dr. McGowan, an American physician then living in Shanghai, took a great fancy to him, and cheerfully gave him instruction in medicine, loaned him books to study, and often took him upon visits to patients. In this way he became after a while so expert in the names and uses of drugs, and in treating the ordinary diseases of the people, that Dr. McGowan often trusted him to administer medicine to them during his absence. This was the beginning of our present hospital work in Shanghai. So efficient did Hoong Niok become that he often assisted in difficult surgical operations and performed simpler ones himself. Under Bishop Williams, he was admitted candidate for Holy Orders in 1868. and studied zealously under the Rev. Mr. Thomson, and afterward under the Rev. Dr. Nelson and the Bishop. He devoted much time to the native mission schools that were under his charge, and made addresses several times a week at the different preaching stations. On May 1st, 1873, the Feast of St. Philip and St. James, Hoong Niok Niok Woo was admitted to the Order of Deacons. Mr. Woo had been a candidate for five years. For three years before his ordination he was thoroughly examined in the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Prayer Book, and the Articles of Religion, by the Bishop and the Rev. Messrs. Thomson, Nelson, and Wong. The Rev. Mr. Woo was placed in charge of St. Paul’s Chapel at Kong wan, then a town of 30,000 inhabitants, four miles from Shanghai. For seven years Mr. Woo labored at this station with great zeal and enthusiasm. A new church edifice was erected soon after his entering upon the work, and many persons were baptized and confirmed.
On May 25th, 1880, he was advanced to the Priesthood, in the temporary chapel of St. John’s College, by the Right Rev. Dr. Schereschewsky, then Missionary Bishop of Shanghai. Mr. Woo still continued his charge of St. Paul’s at Kong-wan, but kept extending the sphere of his labors until work was established at seven out-stations, which he constantly supervised, with the aid he received from Deacons and catechists associated with him. During the building of St. Luke’s Hospital in 1883, Mr. Woo was especially active in eliciting large contributions from the Chinese with which to carry on the work. In 1885 he was appointed chaplain of St. Luke’s. He has also been successful in establishing dispensaries in several places, a work which his ripe experience particularly qualified him for. In every department of missionary work—in building and equipping churches, chapels, schools, hospitals and dispensaries, in preaching the Gospel, or teaching the young, or caring for the sick and the dying—this noble servant of God has been faithful, in season and out of season, ever holding forth the blessed Gospel of Jesus Christ to the people of his own country, many of whom, with him, are to-day rejoicing in the liberty of the children of God.
Mr. Woo is still in charge of St. Paul’s, Kong wan, with seven other places. He is assisted by two Deacons, the Rev. T. M. Chang and the Rev. T. L. Wu.
•See frontispiece.
The American Church Almanac and Year Book for 1899
Missions in Foreign Countries.
In China.
Shanghai and the Lower Yang Tze Valley.
Mission: Kong Wan
Churches and Communications: St. Paul’s Church
Clergy: Hoong Neok Woo
The Age-Herald
(Birmingham, Alabama)
June 15, 1900
List of Southern Missionaries in China
At Kiang Wan.—H.N. Woo...
The Wilmington Messenger
(North Carolina)
June 22, 1900
Missionaries in China
Episcopal—…At Kiang Wan, H.N. Woo, …
The State
(Columbia, South Carolina)
June 25, 1900
Missionaries in China
Names of Those Who Represent the South in the Celestial Empire
Episcopal—At Kiang Wan, H.N. Woo…
The Spirit of Missions
August 1900
Bishop Graves and clergy at the Ordination of Rev. F. E. Lund and Rev. C. F. Lindstrom
group photograph includes Rev. H. N. Woo
The Spirit of Missions
January 1901
All Saints’ Day in Shanghai
By the Reverend Benjamin L. Ancell
…It were too long to give a list of those the Rev. H. N. Woo; and here, perhaps even more than at the other places, we saw afar off the true Communion of All Saints, when a multitude, which no man could number, of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, shall stand before the throne and before the Lamb, and shall cry, “Salvation to our God which sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb.”
The National Tribune
(Washington, D.C.)
May 16, 1901
Veteran Missionary
Rev. Hong Neok Woo, a soldier of the Civil War.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1901
The Kiang-su Church Conference
An important event in the China Mission was the first meeting of the Church Conference of Kiang-su Province, held at Shanghai, June 11th and 12th. The foreign delegates were the Revs. E. H. Thomson, F. L. H. Pott, D.D., J. L. Rees, G. F. Mosher, and H. W. Boone, M.D., C. F. S. Lincoln, M.D., Mr. S. E. Smalley, and Mr. F. C. Cooper. The Chinese delegates were the Revs. H. N. Woo, S. C. Hwa, Y. T. Chu, T. H. Tai, T. L. Wu, T. M. Chang, P. N. Tsu, C. L. Ku, and Mr. F. K. Wu and Mr. T. D. Wong, Lay. Bishop Graves was chairman. All the proceedings were in Chinese. The conference opened with the celebration of the Holy Communion in the Pro-Cathedral, and held its business sessions in the college library. Among the questions discussed were: “Can we establish definite rules for marriage and burial customs?” “Shall we attempt to establish an industrial chool?” “The relation of the native Christians to the civil authorities”; “What shall be done in the case of a man who wishes to join the Church, but who has two wives?” This conference is of special importance, because it is the first attempt in the mission to establish a representative assembly in which foreigners and Chinese shall meet together on equal terms, to discuss matters relating to the welfare of the work of the mission. It is another evidence of the care being taken to develop a native Church.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1904
Shanghai
Information has been received that on May 28th the Rev. C. Y. Tang was ordained to the priesthood. The sermon was preached by the Rev. J. L. Rees and the candidate was presented by the Ven. Archdeacon Thomson. The Rev. Dr. Pott, the Rev. Messrs. McRae, Nichols, Mann, Woo, Tsu, Tai and Ku, of the Shanghai mission, and the Rev. Mr. Dzung, of the Church Missionary Society, were present in the chancel.
The East of Asia Magazine
Volume 3, 1904
C.K. Marshall, of the Methodist Church; the Rev. H.N. Woo, of the American Church Mission; and the Rev. Cheong Heong, MA, of Melbourne, are names which stand for deep religious lives and valuable services in the ministry.
Buffalo Express
(New York)
June 8, 1905
Chinamen in the Civil War
Chinese Y.M.C.A. Worker says his Father fought under General Lee.
Another Wore the Blue
The Latter, H. N. Woo, still lives. Americans have wrong impression of China.
The father of S.K. Dzau, the native Chinese Y.M.C.A. worker who is in this town on a visit, fought in the American Civil War. He was with the Southern troops, serving under General Robert E. Lee. This surprising bit of information was conveyed to Secretary A. H. Whitford of the Buffalo Y.M.C.A. by Mr. Dzau in the course of a casual conversation yesterday.
“Why, I didn’t know there were any Chinese in the Civil War,” said Mr. Whitford.
“Yes, my father was in the war for a year,” said Mr. Dzau. “There was another Chinaman in the war. He was a friend of my father and he was on the Northern side. I guess they were the only Chinamen in that war. I often remember hearing my father speak about his horse. He was in the cavalry. He had a black horse with a white spot on it. He thought a great deal of it. My father’s name was T.Z. Dzau. His American name was
C.K. Marshall. He was one of the first Chinamen brought over to this country to be educated by the missionaries. He came in 1857 or 1858. He was only fourteen years old. Dr. Walter Lambuth’s old home was in Georgia. My father lived near Macon, Ga., while he was studying. He made his home with some Southern family, as Dr. Lambuth had to return to China. After the war had been in progress a couple of years there was a call for reserves. The family with whom my father was staying had no one to send. The head of it asked him if he would go and my father said he would. He served in the Southern army for a year or so, being in one of the regiments under General Lee. He was in several fights, but was never shot. He had part of his hand crushed once, by an artillery wheel. My father remained in this country for fourteen years. Years afterward he made a second visit to attend Methodist conference in Nashville, Tenn. He died in China three years ago. My father’s friend who fought on the Northern side is still alive. He is the Reverend H.N. Woo. Although he is very old, he is still active in church work in Shanghai.”
Mr. Dzau will leave this city next Monday. He will go to Youngstown, O., for a few days. From there he will go to Cleveland, then to Chicago and then to Lake Geneva, Wis. He will sail for China from the Pacific Coast on July 29th.
Mr. Dzau, who speaks English as well as any educated American, has made many friends here. He is a very interesting talker, as various little clubs and church organizations have found out within the last week or so. He has gained much valuable information during his tour of the Y.M.C.A. organizations of this country and expects to put his information into practical use when he gets back to the Chinese Y.M.C.A. at Shanghai, of which he is the secretary.
“I find that wherever I go people have a misconception of our life in China,” he said yesterday. “I think this is due to the information brought back here by missionaries. Until very recently the missionaries had access only to the lowest classes in China. That's one reason, I think, that there is such an impression in America that we all live in little bamboo houses. We have many brick and stone dwellings in China; had them many, many years before the Western invasion. The people whom the missionaries used to reach were of the same type as those who live in log huts down South in this country. All nations have poor people as well as rich. You may enter many fine Chinese houses of either brick or stone and find them luxuriously furnished with paintings, carvings, beautiful furniture and all the other accessories that you find in American mansions. The bamboo huts are in the minority, for they are the homes of the very poorest. Some of the richer type of houses in our land cover many acres and are surrounded by beautiful gardens. By and by, the pictures of Chinese scenes that are sent over here will be changing and then American people will get a better idea of our life over there.”
The Missionary Review of the World
November 1905
The American Episcopal Church in China
Annette B. Richmond
The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America, 1907
…Mr. Thomson went itinerating through the country round about Shanghai, accompanied by a young man named
Woo Hoong-nyok, who had charge of the day schools….
…A hospital, opened in a small way the year before by Mr. Thomson, with
Mr. Woo’s assistance, was a very hopeful feature of the work, more than 15,000 persons having received treatment during the year….
…Two English doctors kindly gave gratuitous assistance, and
Mr. Woo was proving himself a valuable helper, both in the medical and the religious part of the work….
…The story of Mr. Li may be told in the words of the
Rev. H. N. Woo, so long Mr. Thomson’s assistant in the hospital work and now the senior Chinese priest of the Shanghai staff….
…The
Rev. H. N. Woo, so long Mr. Thomson’s faithful helper, was in charge of this station, and also carried on dispensaries and supervised day schools in many villages around Shanghai….
List of Chinese Clergy
H. N. Woo
1873.
May 1. H. N. Woo ordained deacon.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1907
The Fruit of a Mission Hospital
…“I have been fortunate enough to find a young man who has been in the Chinese Telegraph Office for twelve years. He is an old St. John’s boy and one I taught myself in my early days here. He was the first communicant in Kiukiang when Mr. Ridgely opened up that station. His great grandfather was one of the first Christians in San-ting-kur, a station now attached to the Kong-wan group. The young man’s name is Yang Yoong-kiung. How Mr. Yang’s great grandfather became a Christian is an interesting story. A man from a village near Kong-wan was bitten by a dog and was taken for treatment to St. Luke’s Hospital, where he remained for some time and learned that the foreigner was not the “devil” he had supposed. This man after his return home must have meditated on the kindness he had received at the hospital, and came to the conclusion that there was something in the new religion that he would like to know about. So he wrote to Archdeacon Thomson, who was then, as now, chaplain at the hospital, asking that somebody should be sent to his village to teach him, his family and his friends. The Rev. H. N. Woo was sent and his visit resulted in the man and his family and old Mr. Yang becoming Christians.”
News and Notes
The Rev. Dr. Correll writes as follows from Sakurai, Japan:
The most interesting Church service ever held in the famous and historic Yamato region, Kyoto district, took place on October 21st, when Nakamura Gen was ordained to the diaconate. The service was held in our temporary chapel in Sakurai, and never did we realize the inadaptability of such buildings and rooms for proper Church services more than on that day. The weather was very unfavorable, and the usual darkness of the room—it being impossible to light it properly—was greatly deepened, but with all these untoward circumstances we had a very interesting service. The rain prevented a number of persons who wished to come from a distance. However, a goodly company from the neighboring churches and chapels was in attendance. We were also favored with the presence of the Rev. H. N. Woo, of Shanghai, who accompanied Bishop Partridge. This priest from China is doing missionary work amongst his young countrymen in Tokyo, who are attending the schools there….
The Spirit of Missions
November 1907
The Woman’s Auxiliary to the Board of Missions
The Annual Meeting of the Shanghai Branch
Most of the Christian women look forward to our annual meeting as the great event of the year. They talk about it for weeks beforehand, and many come long distances on wheelbarrows or on foot to attend it. This year it was held on May 30th, just at the end of a very encouraging and helpful conference of Bible-women. We hoped for an equally satisfactory Auxiliary meeting, and were not disappointed. It was a beautiful day, clear and bright, with a gentle breeze to temper the heat. As always, we began with the celebration of the Holy Communion, at 9:30, in St. John’s Pro-Cathedral, the church being well filled, though many of the women had to leave home very early in order to he on time.
…At half-past two we all gathered in the church for the afternoon service. Evening Prayer was read, and addresses were made by Dr. Pott, and by our senior Chinese priest, the Rev. H. N. Woo. Tea was served on the lawn in front of the Training-school, and as the women sat around the tables Mr. Cooper took photo- graphs. A little later the women said good-by, and another annual meeting was over….
The Spirit of Missions
February 1909
The Travelling Secretary
No. VI. Four Weeks in Shanghai
…For thirty years and more the Church has ministered in these places.
Mr. Woo, who took us there, is one of the last remaining of the early Chinese clergy, and at San-tung Ko we saw Christians of a family in which five generations have been Christians….
The Spirit of Missions
April 1909
The Evolution of a Hospital
By the Venerable Eliot H. Thomson, Archdeacon of Shanghai
During the year 1866, it had been on my mind to open a hospital for the many hundreds, even thousands, of sick and suffering Chinese in Shanghai. Some time in June or July of that year I received from Mrs. Elizabeth Shields, of Philadelphia, the sum of $84 (Mex.). At that time it took $150 United States currency to lay down that amount here. Mr. H. N. Woo, who was my right hand man and without whom the work could not have been done, rented the house at the corner of what is now Boone Road and Broadway, for five dollars per month. In the old building we had all absolutely necessary shelves put in and the medicines arranged, but we had no doctor. Although Mr. Woo was a born doctor, yet he had not then the experience which he acquired later from practical instruction and work.
Our next-door neighbor was Dr. J. Macgowan, a man whose name was well known in these parts. Owing to his practical assistance we were able to open our dispensary and make a beginning. We had cards, printed in Chinese, posted far and wide. Now the patients began to come in crowds. We put a notice in the local paper and asked for aid, and soon received 700 taels, which went much further in those days than in these. The women and children came, or were brought, in great numbers. A man with two baskets swinging across his shoulders, and a sick child in each, as a coolie might carry two chests of tea, was a common sight.
But this was only the initial work. With our vast sum of 700 taels in hand, we purchased thirteen houses for tea taels each and put up a hospital ward, waiting room, dark room, surgical room, and in a year or two a good, north light, airy operating room was added.
Our income from Chinese and foreigners went up to $1,500. Then Mr. Woo was the life and soul of the institution. As the years passed on, other medical men came to our aid, Drs. Jamieson, Henderson, McLeod, Duncan Reid and others. Mr. Woo tells how, one summer's day, he had five hundred patients, working from 11 A.M. till 7 P.M. He was naturally exhausted and could hardly stand when he arrived home. Seventeen boat-loads of patients were seen to cross the river on their way to the hospital at one time, and this was only one approach.
But about this time came our first great trial. Our hospital was on mission property which was needed for other work, so we were told to move on. We pulled down our dear little old building. Fortunately, we had foreseen that there might be need of a building fund, and every year, by care and economy, had laid by a certain sum for that purpose. I had also written to Mrs. Shields, the original giver of the sum we had started with, that we were in great need. She promptly sent the required amount, and with her gift and the building fund reserve, the present site was purchased, with the buildings on it, these being altered and adapted to the uses of a hospital.
At this juncture Dr. H. W. Boone, eldest son of the first Bishop Boone, joined the Mission as its first medical member. This was about 1880. After this Mr. Li Ohu Bing, a wealthy Chinese gentleman, at, I believe, Mr. H. N. Woo’s suggestion, gave handsome amounts and undertook to raise the sum of $10,000 to buy the land and build the two large wards on the north side of our first purchase. In these were included the doctor’s office, a new operating room, etc. Since then Dr. Boone, by care and economy in reserving for a building fund each year, has added other buildings, those now used as the out-patient department, the students’ quarters, etc. The last and the greatest is the superb main building erected by Mr. Charles P. B. Jefferys, of Philadelphia, under the direction of his son, Dr. Jefferys. This new building is completely fitted with all the latest appliances for a first-class hospital.
Here, then, we have the evolution of a hospital, and who is he, that is not blind, who cannot see God’s hand behind all and in all evolution. To His name be the glory and the praise!
The Spirit of Missions
June 1912
II. Some Striking Aspects of the Wuhu Consecration
By the Reverend Edmund Lee Woodward, M.D.
[photograph caption]
The latter part of the procession. The two men leading are Archdeacon Thomson and the Rev. Mr. Woo
…Leading the second part of the procession were two missionary veterans whose presence carried the mind back through more than half a century of faithful labor for the Church in China. They were the venerable Archdeacon Thomson, now in the seventy-ninth year of his age and the fifty-fourth of his mission service, and his somewhat junior colleague, the Rev. H. N. Woo. The peculiar debt of the China Mission to the archdeacon should never be forgotten. In 1865 the Civil War in America and the death of Bishop Boone in China, had reduced the mission to its lowest ebb. After twenty years of heroic sacrifice the continuity of the mission work in Central China would have been completely broken but for the unwavering devotion of the Rev. Mr. Thomson, assisted by the late Rev. Mr. Wong and by Mr. Woo—then a young catechist. It should be remembered, too, that to the archdeacon’s foresight, back in the eighties, was due the first permanent foothold of the Church in the present Wuhu District. It was he who acquired for the mission the first piece of land at Wuhu. This was situated on Lion Hill in a most strategic location, and furnished the nucleus, which has grown under the Rev. Mr. Lund into the present splendid compound of nearly twenty acres. The presence of these two venerable men on this occasion was a benediction and an inspiration to all their younger brethren, who are reaping where they have sown.
The Story of the Church in China
Arthur R. Gray and Arthur M. Sherman
The Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society, 1913
Chapter III
Changing Attitudes Towards Foreigners
1881–1884
Introduction of English in the Higher Schools.
A better feeling toward foreigners made the outlook brighter to the missionaries in the early 80’s. It was still impossible to enter many places, such as Tai Tsang in the Shanghai district which had been selected as one of the new centers of dispensary and evangelistic work under the
Rev. Mr. Woo. Land had been purchased there but the literati and others raised such a disturbance over the advent of the Church that the Mission was obliged to yield up that land and retire....
...The funds for enlargement were largely from the Chinese raised especially through the energetic assistance of the
Rev. Mr. Woo. With this aid and the gift of their property to the Mission by the Trustees of the Gutzlaff Hospital in Shanghai, the triangular block containing a good dwelling house which became the Hospital was purchased and an additional ward erected....
...Outstation Medical Work. The native workers availed themselves of every opportunity to reach their countrymen. Some of them, such as the
Rev. Mr. Woo, possessed hospital experience and were able to dispense remedies. In one of these outstations lived a widow who became seriously ill. After Mr. Woo’s treatment she recovered. One day she said to him, “Mr. Woo, my kitchen god recommended you to be my physician. The other physicians were of no benefit because my kitchen god did not approve of them.” Mr. Woo replied...
...And what shall I say of
Mr. and Mrs. Woo, and the Wongs?...
...The slender thread would have been broken had it not been for the unwearying devotion of Mr. Thomson assisted by the
Rev. Wong and Mr. Woo. He had witnessed and had part in practically every great enterprise in which the Church had engaged. Among other things he started St. Luke’s Hospital....
1873. May 1.
H. N. Woo ordained deacon.
The Spirit of Missions
April 1913
Settlement Work in China
A Venture in Social Christianity by the Students of St. John’s University
…At the formal opening of the hall the University fife and drum corps gave their valuable service in playing in the open air in front of the hall, gathering a very large crowd for us. We had short addresses from Dr. Pott, Messrs. Jui, Wei, Yuan, Poo and Woo, telling the people our aim and the program of work to be undertaken. Gradually we hope to add to our work and make the hall the center of the social and religious life of the village….
The Spirit of Missions
September 1913
Commencement at St. John’s University, Shanghai
By Right Reverend F. R. Graves, D.D., Bishop of Shanghai
(may not be H.N. Woo)
Mr. and Mrs. Woo have donated a lot of land to which sometime or other we can move the Kiangwan chapel. The new lot is on the outskirts of the town, is nearer to the railroad, and is higher than most of the surrounding land, so that it will make an excellent site in future.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1914
Reminiscences of Medical Work in Shanghai
By Henry W. Boone, M.D.
…One of our first patients was a Chinese gentleman, very poor, suffering from a chronic disease. After some months he regained his health. Soon after I got word that a Mr. Li, a Chinese multi-millionaire, wished me to call on him that he might thank me for curing his relative. I asked my friend the
Rev. Mr. Hoong Neok Woo, the great friend of St. Luke’s and of our sick folk, to go with me. Mr. Li met us at the front gate of his great house, led us to the reception hall, and made his only son kneel to me to show his respect for the doctor; we then had tea and cake. Mr. Li said that he had visited his relative at St. Luke’s and found it the cleanest place he ever saw. That the doctor, nurse and catechist made no distinction between rich and poor; it was first come, first served, and all were treated alike. He said that he asked the catechist why a man who could make a good living by his skill in his own country should come to China, when his charges could hardly pay the expenses of running the institution. The answer was that the Christian religion teaches us that all men are brothers, and that in humble imitation of our Divine Master we seek to do good to all men. Mr. Li said that “In China we help our relatives, but feel no obligation to help those outside of our own immediate set.” He was most grateful for the care of his relative, and asked what he could do to aid our work. We told him that we needed land and buildings before we could do anything of real value….
Under the date of June 19th, Bishop Graves writes:
The Reverend H. N. Woo celebrates his eightieth birthday this summer, and yesterday the foreign members of the Mission at Shanghai united in presenting to Mr. Woo a very comfortable sofa and easy chair as a slight token of their regard. There was an afternoon tea, too, on the lawn at St. John’s and afterward the bishop spoke a few words on behalf of those who had made this gift, expressing the respect and affection which we all felt for Mr. Woo, and recalling the fact that he has served in the ranks of the Clergy from the earliest days of the Mission under the five bishops who have presided over the Diocese from the days of the first Bishop Boone to the present day. Mr. Woo replied in a very sincere and earnest little speech telling something of his fifty years service and mentioning the very interesting fact that the work which he did in starting the present St. Luke’s Hospital, the dispensaries at Kiading and Kiangwan had its origin in the fact that in the early days when he was severely sick with fever for five months, Miss Jones visited him in his sickness and saw that provision was made for his comfort.
The Spirit of Missions
November 1914
Meeting of the Board of Missions
…It having been brought to the attention of the Board that the
Rev. Hoong Nook Woo, of the missionary District of Shanghai, had just celebrated his eightieth birthday and completed fifty years in the missionary work, the following resolution was passed:
Whereas, This Board has had its attention called to the fact that the Rev. Hoong Niok Woo, the senior Chinese clergyman of the missionary district of Shanghai, has just celebrated his eightieth birthday and completed fifty years of service under the auspices of this Board; it desires to take this opportunity to convey to him its heartiest congratulations on reaching the advanced age of four-score years, and on having been permitted, by God’s grace, to spend more than half-a-century in the noble and divine work of carrying the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the people of his native land, and of ministering so long and faithfully to their physical as well as to their spiritual needs.
It prays for the continued divine bless- ing to rest upon him and his family, and upon all the work which he is still permitted to do for his Blessed Master’s cause.
The Spirit of Missions
January 1916
Writing under date of September 6th, Bishop Graves of Shanghai says:
I am sending you an interesting photograph of the
Rev. H. N. Woo and Mr. Lo Fu-ting. The latter has been a catechist in the employ of the Mission since 1866, and of late years has been at Wuhu. He is older than Mr. Woo, who is past eighty himself, and is still in vigorous health. I thought the picture might be of use to you in some way.
April 1916
Our Letter Box
The following letter was written to Bishop Graves shortly after Christmas by Rev. H. M. Woo, one of our veteran native priests in China. In his quaint foreign way he relates his experiences in holding the first Christmas services in the new mission at Lin-Hang. In sending the letter, Bishop Graves says: “It ought to make people think, to find a Chinese clergyman in his eighty-second year going on with his work with so much vigor and enthusiasm.”
I left home at 9 a.m. on last Friday. Arrived Lin-Hang at 3:30 p. m. In company on the boat from Woo Sung Creek Station were the head police from Lin-Hang, returning to his station from Shanghai (Mr. Mo). He is Nanking man. His religion is the Mohammedan, a polite, friendly man towards our Church works in the district of Lin-Hang. He kindly paid my boat fare. When got to Lin-Hang, he helps me to get on the shore, and helps in every way he see I needed. Mr. Mo also attending our church services every times I go there. I have some hope he may join our church in the future.
I have decided our church services at Lin-Hang at 2 p. m., because most of the newly Baptist members are from country around over a mile or two from town. So they come out attend the services after their middle meal. Town folks, seems in every towns got to attend their morning market hours from 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 o’clock. Then they have chance to take their first meal and take their rest with their leisure hours. All the shopkeepers dost that. Private, well-doing people the same everywhere, their meal times, 7 or 8 a. m. the first meal, 12 or 1 p. m. second meal, 6, 7 p. m. their third meals. So we can easily make the hours suited the people’s time, come to attend the services, which will be most beneficial for them to get the knowledge of the Christian’s duties to do towards our God and Lord Jesus Christ, and the duties towards man.
I have had a very large congregation, about 150 or more men, women and school children attended our first Christmas services in our chapel. It was so crowded we can’t kneel, got stand up to our prayers for have no room. Even our small front yard were full people can’t sit on the benches got to stand up all the time. In an hour’s time to look on what we are doing, as well as patiently hear my preaching.
Amongst the congregation were the Russian Minister’s lady and sister’s families and other near neighbors around and passer-by, besides our newly Baptist members. If we have a friend there who can take a photograph of the time it will be very interesting to the readers of The Spirit of Missions.
Another pleasing acts done by the above schoolmaster, Mr. Tsang, played the melodian for all our hymns of our services; because none of our Christian able to play. If Mr. Tsang and his dozen boys not singing the hymns with our four Christians, we will have had singing in our services. Very likely the heathen neighbors and the passer-by will not keep so quietly and interestingly during our whole services. Everything in connection with our first Christmas celebration in Lin-Hang Chapel is as most merry and pleasant I could not have more enjoyable one than that.
Chinese Recorder
December 1916
…It was not till November of the following year that the Home was opened. A Chinese house in an alley-way off Seward Road, the property of
Mr. Woo Hoong Niok,—who proved very like a father to Miss Bonnell—was rented, and a Chinese Bible-woman and servant secured.
The Spirit of Missions
June 1918
by Bishop Graves
…Another reason why we have been able to grow is the care that has been taken in the training of Chinese clergy. This training had been a fundamental principle of the mission under its earlier leaders, and it had been successful in producing able and faithful clergy of the type of K. C. Wong, H. N. Woo and Y. K. Yen. A second generation of clergy was just about to be ordained when I came to China, and Bishop Boone soon after established the Divinity School in Wuchang in which I taught for a good many years. The mission in improving and extending this work of the preparation of Chinese clergy was following on the safe and sure road marked out from the beginning of our work in China. I can remember that other missions used to criticise our method, holding that more speedy results could be reached by street preaching by evangelists who had not been so thoroughly prepared, but the progress which the mission made as soon as a sufficient force of well trained Chinese clergy got to work has been a conclusive answer to all talk of that sort. The Chinese clergy in the three dioceses of the China Mission are the very crown of our work and its complete justification….
Arizona Republican
(Phoenix, Arizona)
April 23, 1919
Rev. Woo Is Oldest of Chinese in Red Cross
Rev. H. N. Woo has the honor of being the oldest living Chinese member of the American Red Cross.
Rev. Woo, of Shanghai, who is now 84 years old, was educated in the United States, and fought as a private in the civil war on the northern side. His experience as a soldier gained Mr. Woo his first appreciation of Red Cross work. When the Shanghai Chapter was organized Mr. Woo took out a life membership, stating that it was one of the happiest moments of his life to thus become actively associated in American Red Cross work in China.
Mr. Woo is still hale and hearty and preaches in a native church in Shanghai every Sunday.
The Times-Picayune
(New Orleans, Louisiana)
May 1, 1919
Rev. H.N. Woo has the honor of being the oldest living Chinese member of the American Red Cross. Rev. Woo, of Shanghai, who is now 84 years old, was educated in the United States and fought as a private in the Civil war on the Northern side.
The Emporia Daily Gazette
(Kansas)
May 29, 1919
A Civil War Veteran
Rev. H.N. Woo, Shanghai, China, has the honor of being the oldest living Chinese member of the American Red Cross.
Mr. Woo, who is 84 years old, was educated in the United States, and fought as a private in the Civil War on the Northern side. His experience as a soldier gained Mr. Woo his first appreciation of Red Cross work. When the Shanghai Chapter was organized Mr. Woo took out a life membership, saying it was one of the happiest moments of his life to thus become actively associated in American Red Cross wok in China.
Mr. Woo is still hale and hearty and preaches in Shanghai every Sunday.
Millard’s Review of the Far East
Volume 11, 1919
The death occurred of the Rev. H. N. Woo of the American Church Mission at his residence 890-c East Yuhang Road, Shanghai, on Wednesday, December 18. Rev. Woo was 86 years old. Funeral services took place on Saturday, December 20, at the Church of our Saviour, Dixwell Road.
The Spirit of Missions
March 1920
Few readers of The Spirit of Missions will recall the early incidents mentioned in the brief account given of the life and work of the late H. N. Woo, the Chinese priest who died a few months ago. But every reader will agree that the simple recital of facts as Dr. Pott has assembled them is fascinating in its interest.
[photograph caption]
Two Veterans of the China Mission
Mr. Woo sits at the left. At the right is Mr. Lo Fu-Ting, a catechist who has been in the employ of the mission for over fifty years. He is older than Mt. Woo was but is still in vigorous health
The Late Reverend H. N. Woo
By the Reverend F. L. H. Pott, D.D.
The late Reverend H. N. Woo, who died on Thursday, December eighteenth, in his eighty-sixth year, was in many ways a remarkable man. The American Church Mission was established in Shanghai in the year 1845 by the elder Bishop Boone. Inasmuch as Mr. Woo entered the boys’ school in Shanghai in the year 1848, his connection with the mission dated back to the day of small beginnings.
He was born near Changchow in the year 1834. His father was a farmer, who heard of the school on one of his visits to Shanghai and determined to send his son to it to prepare for working in a foreign hong. At the age of fifteen Mr. Woo was baptized by Bishop Boone and thus belonged to the first generation of Christians.
When Commodore Perry made his expedition to Japan in 1852–1854, for the purpose of concluding a treaty of commerce with that country, some of his ships came over to Shanghai. Young Woo was anxious to go to America and applied to be taken on board the Susquchanna as a cabin boy. After a voyage of eight months he landed in Philadelphia and then was taken to Lancaster, Pennsylvania, by Dr. Messersmith, the ship’s surgeon. He resided there for nine years and learned to be a printer.
In 1860 he was naturalized as an American citizen. During the Civil War, when Pennsylvania was invaded by the Confederate army under General Lee, he responded to the call for vounteers [sic] issued by the governor of the State and became a private in the Union army.
In 1864 he worked his passage back to China on the Steamship Kiukiang, which was sent out for navigation on the Yangtsze.
Shortly after arriving in Shanghai he became connected with the mission as an assistant to Archdeacon Thomson. In 1866, during his first period of work, he helped in establishing the first dispensary of the mission on the corner of Broadway and Boone Road. This was known as Tung Jen E Chu—The Co-operative Benevolent Dispensary—and out of it developed the present Saint Luke’s Hospital.
In 1873 he was ordained deacon by Bishop Williams and took up work at Kiangwan in charge of Saint Paul's Chapel. He negotiated the purchase of the land and oversaw the erection of the building. While stationed at Kiangwan he began work in neighboring towns and villages.
It will be remembered that the first railroad built in China in 1876 by Jardine, Matheson & Company was purchased by the Chinese Government and torn up. Mr. Woo conceived the idea of purchasing one of the railroad stations in order to get material for a church building. He succeeded in carrying out the plan and used the material in the building of the church which now stands at San-Ting-keu.
In 1880 he was advanced to the priesthood by Bishop Schereschewsky, and was put in charge of the work at Kiading, where he opened a school and a dispensary. He attempted to open work at Taitsang, but the conservative literati made strenuous opposition. On a visit to that city he was seized and taken to the yamen and severely beaten. In order to save his life he had to promise to withdraw from the city.
At this period of his work he was instrumental in securing liberal contributions for Saint Luke’s Hospital. It was through his influence that Mr. Li Chiu-bing raised a sum of $10,700 for the erection of the Li Chiu-bing ward.
In 1890 he was again put in charge of the church at Kiangwan, and divided his time between the oversight of that station and the work of chaplain at Saint Luke’s.
At the age of seventy-two he began a vigorous campaign for raising money for the establishment of an industrial Home for Poor Widows at Kiangwan. He was able to raise a sum of $17,000, with which land was purchased and buildings were erected. This home will stand as a memorial of his philanthropy.
He was very widely known and was honored by Christians and non-Christians alike. All respected him for his earnestness, integrity and benevolent spirit. His life and work furnish a striking proof of the value of Christian missions in this land.
The Telegraph
(Nashua, New Hampshire)
March 11, 1920
Chinaman Was Civil War Vet.
Shanghai, March 11. Rev. H.N. Woo, whose death has just occurred here, voted for President Lincoln and fought with the Union forces in America’s Civil war. He was 86 years old.
He had acquired a smattering of English when Perry came to the Far East in 1854 to negotiate the treaty between the United States and Japan and when Perry’s fleet returned the Rev. Mr. Woo went with it aboard the sloop of war Plymouth as a cabin boy. He saw three years of service in the war and returned to China in 1863 when the Taiping rebellion was at its height.
Soon thereafter he became associated with the American Church mission at Shanghai and in 1866 he had a large part in establishing what was known as the tung Jen E. Chu, a free dispensary, from which has grown the St. Luke’s hospital of today in Shanghai. He was ordained in 1880 and devoted the rest of his life to the work of Christianity.
Evening Times-Republican
(Marshalltown, Iowa)
March 11, 1920
Chinese Leader Dead
(see The Telegraph)
Grand Forks Herald
(North Dakota)
March 11, 1920
Voted for Lincoln.
(see The Telegraph)
Twin Falls News
(Idaho)
March 11, 1920
Chinese Veteran Cast His Vote for Lincoln
(see The Telegraph)
Bisbee Daily Review
(Arizona)
March 14, 1920
Chinese Who Saw Service in Civil War Dies at Home
(see The Telegraph)
Great Falls Daily Tribune
(Montana)
March 14, 1920
Chinaman Who Voted for Lincoln, Dies in Shanghai, at 86
(see The Telegraph)
The Lexington Herald
(Kentucky)
March 15, 1920
Chinese Veteran of Civil War Dead in Shanghai
(see The Telegraph)
The Capital Journal
(Salem, Oregon)
March 17, 1920
Chinese Veteran and Church Leader Dies at Shanghai
(see The Telegraph)
The Bismarck Tribune
(North Dakota)
March 20, 1920
Chinese Cleric Voted for Abe
Late Shanghai Minister Fought for Union During Civil War
The Evening Herald
(Klamath Falls, Oregon)
March 20, 1920
Christian Chinese Voted for Lincoln
(see The Telegraph)
The Michigan Churchman
April 1920
H. N. Woo, venerable Chinese priest of the District of Shanghai, died on December 18th, in his eighty-sixth year. Mr. Woo’s history is a remarkable one. He entered the Boys School in Shanghai in 1848. three years after the establishment of the American Church Mission in Shanghai, and was baptized by Bishop Boone in 1849. Later he came to America, was naturalized and served in the Civil War in the Union Army. He returned to China in 1864 and had been actively identified with the work of the Church as Lay Reader, Deacon and Priest since that time. He was universally beloved and respected by both native and foreign Christians and did much to extend the cause of the Church in his native land.
Harrisburg Telegraph
(Pennsylvania)
February 22, 1921
p8: The record of the Rev. Hong Neok Woo, of Shanghai, as a soldier of the United States in the Civil War has been cleared up by Jacob Stauffer, search clerk of the Adjutant General’s Department and one of the veterans of the State Government. Mr. Stauffer has been in the Department for years and years and has straightened out the records of more men than he can remember, having been the means ‘of securing’ pensions for widows, removing stains from reputations, exposing fakirs and doing plain simple justice. The story of the Rev. Hong Neok Woo is not only typical, but exceedingly interesting, because he was one of the first Chinamen naturalized by the United States and when Lee invaded Pennsylvania in 1863 became a soldiers in the Union Army and went out to fight. It happened that his later services in China were the subject of a pamphlet by an officer in Perry’s expedition to Japan, who was an authority on Oriental matters, but in some way the name of the Chinese volunteer did not accord with records. So they passed it on to Adjutant General Frank D. Beary, who summoned Stauffer. Pennsylvania had thousands and thousands of volunteers in the Civil War, but the veteran clerk started to dig. And he found that Ung Hong Neok, residing, in Lancaster, had answered the call of Governor Curtin in 1863 and had been a member of Company I, Fiftieth Emergency Volunteers, a regiment recruited entirely in Lancaster county and which was rather prompt in its response. The singularities of Chinese nomenclature had caused the confusion and in running down the record Mr. Stauffer found the Shanghai man had lived in Lancaster from 1854 to 1864 and had been naturalized in 1860. He was a real patriot even if he did drop Ung from the front end of his name and hitch on Woo after he went back to Far Cathay.
The Spirit of Missions
August 1921
June Meeting of the Department of Missions
…Bishop Graves was given authority to contribute $1,000 toward an endowment fund for the home for widows and orphans at Kiangwan, China, established by the late
Reverend H. N. Woo, the senior priest of the Church in China. A movement has been started to insure the permanence of this institution.
The Spirit of Missions
September 1922
An Industrial Home for Widows in China
By the Reverend Y. Y. Tsu
Zung Tuh Soo (House of Love) is the Chinese name of the Industrial Home for Widows at Kiang-wan. This little town is connected with Shanghai by a short railway and the journey between it and Shanghai occupies about ten minutes. The Home is situated just outside of the town and as one approaches Kiang-wan from Shanghai one can see from the railway train window its white-washed buildings and outlying fields surrounded by a bamboo fence, for it is built near the railway track a short distance from the station. There are two large buildings, two-storied, and several smaller houses in the place. After one enters the front gate, one crosses a large front yard and steps into the first building in which are the chapel of the Home, guest hall, classrooms, etc., downstairs, and sleeping quarters upstairs. The other two- storied building contains sitting rooms and work rooms downstairs and sleeping quarters upstairs. In the smaller houses are the kitchen, dining-room, nursery, store-rooms, etc. The store-rooms are generally packed full of the produce of the fields—threshed rice, soya beans, wheat, etc.—which have been raised and harvested by the inmates for their daily use. The Home has thirteen mow of farm-land and the total value of its property—buildings and land—is estimated to be $20,000. There are sixty-six inmates, young and old. One inmate is eighty-seven years old, another eighty-two, another seventy-eight, another seventy-four, and several over sixty. But the majority are younger widows and their own children. The younger children go to a primary school, and a few older children are sent to boarding schools of the Church.
Everyone in the Home is expected to do some work, excepting the very aged ones, and so when visiting the Home, one will find some elderly women spinning by hand on the native frame, some weaving, some in the kitchen steaming rice and boiling tea, while others, who are physically fit, are working in the fields. (Around Shanghai women work in the fields as well as men.) Every morning and evening family prayers are said in the chapel, and on Sunday afternoons the pastor of the little Saint Paul’s Church of Kiang-wan comes to hold Evening Prayer. There is a little harmonium in the chapel, played by the lady teacher of the school, which leads the singing.
Zung Tuh Soo was founded in 1907 by the late Reverend H. N. Woo, then in his seventy-second year. (An account of his life, written by Dr. Pott, appeared in the March, 1920, number of The Spirit of Missions.) In a conversation with the writer, some time ago, Mr. Woo said that he had had the idea of a home for the care of widows since his sixtieth year. In his parish and evangelistic visitations he found widows, old and young, who were dependent upon their families and had no means of support. Some of these belonged to poor Christian and others to heathen families. There are houses for widows established by non-Christian philanthropists, but these places, in Mr. Woo’s opinion, were not satisfactorily managed and the inmates in them were not taught the Christian religion or to support themselves. If God would give him strength and years, he decided to build a home for widows under Christian auspices and to make it an industrial home.
He talked the matter over with his friends and from the very beginning he received much favorable response and sympathetic interest. The first $1,000 was given by a Churchwoman, Mrs. Wei, who, though not wealthy, was very much impressed with Mr. Woo’s idea and so told him that she would give not only money but also her own time to the promotion of the Home's interests. Mrs. Wei has been all these years serving as one of the directors of the Home. Altogether Mr. Woo raised $17,000, with which he put up the buildings on land that had been presented by friends.
In 1919, when Mr. Woo was in his eighty-fourth year, he felt that he would not be able to manage the Home and look after its interests much longer on account of his advanced age, and so he entered in negotiation with the bishop of Shanghai, the Right Reverend F. R. Graves, D.D., with a view to inducing the Church to take over the Home and maintain it as a diocesan institution. Hitherto the Home had been an independent institution, supported by friends of Mr. Woo and managed by a committee composed of a certain number of supporters, and the diocese had been in no way responsible for it financially or otherwise. But it is a thorough Church institution. The bishop and Mr. Woo entered into an agreement whereby the Home became a diocesan institution and its property was handed over to a board of trustees composed of the standing committee of the diocese together with the bishop and the mission treasurer. The board of trustees appoints a committee of managers (Chinese) to exercise direct oversight of the institution.
This committee is composed of Church members and non-Church-members, men and women. They are going ahead with enthusiasm with a plan for the permanent endowment of the institution. The plan is to raise forty to fifty thousand dollars immediately as an endowment fund for meeting the current expenses of the Home from year to year. At this time of writing, they have already secured two large pledges from two friends: one of $10,000 from Mr. T. U. Yih, a wealthy merchant of Shanghai, in memory of his father, and the other of $5,000 from Mr. V. Y. Loh, another wealthy merchant of Shanghai. They were both admirers of Mr. Woo, but singularly enough they are both non-Christians. The Committee hopes to get a generous response for the appeal from the Church-people of the diocese and others who knew Mr. Woo.
The New York Times
June 29, 1930
To the Editor of
The New York Times
...My father, Medical Director (Commodore) John S. Messesmith [sic], was with Commodore’s Perry’s expedition to Japan, as was also my husband’s brother-in-law, Lieutenant Freeman. My father brought a small Chinese boy home to Lancaster, Pa., where he was educated as a printer and also learned some medicine.
He was, I think, the first Chinese naturalized here, and the only Chinese in the Civil War. He was baptized and confirmed in St. James’s Church, Lancaster. After the war he desired to return to China, so my father sent him back, and he became the first Chinese clergyman in the Episcopal missions there and did marvelous work.
He was the Rev. Hong Neok Woo. I saw him in Shanghai when he was 73 years old. He had become a very great man. He carried the sentiment of my father throughout his life, and named the great college which he started in Shanghai St. John’s. Likewise, he knew my father’s cousin, Dr. Muhlenberg, who started St. Luke’s Hospital in New York, and named the hospital he founded in Shanghai after that institution.
Although he had left our home more than forty years before, he received us as though we were royalty. He died only some four years ago. His son was also educated by my father at Kenyon College, in Ohio.
Anna Keys Palmer.
Ventnor, N.J., June 25, 1930.
