Welcome back to part 2 of our fascinating interview with English missionary, Hudson Taylor. If you are just joining us, you may want to back up and read the first part of our interview to find out why this young doctor left his home in England and moved to China. And now, let’s pick up where we left off and find out what happens next.
Hudson Taylor about 1885
courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Q: As mentioned in part 1 of our interview, there were no airplanes in the 1800’s. So how did you get to China and what kind of challenges did you face on your voyage?
A: I think a better question might be, what kind of challenges didn’t I face! I prepared to go to China for 5 years and then I finally boarded a ship called the Dumfries on Sept. 19, 1853. It was a cargo ship so I was the only passenger on board except for the captain and crew. You will have to read the book that will be mentioned at the end of this interview to get all the details, but only 4 days into our journey we ran into a fierce storm and were nearly shipwrecked on the rocks of the Welsh coast.
Then if you can believe it, after almost 5 1/2 months at sea and nearing our destination Shanghai, we were almost shipwrecked again, but for the opposite reason. There wasn’t enough wind! With seemingly no hope of avoiding disaster, I asked 4 crew members, along with myself, to go to their rooms to pray for wind. And though no one took me seriously, after praying hard for a few minutes, I returned to the deck and asked an officer to hurry and let down the mainsail. The officer was not amused but soon a big gust of wind blew and we resumed sailing through the Pacific Ocean.
When we finally did arrive in China it was so foggy that I couldn’t even see the new land that I had waited so long to get to! So I took a bit of time to return to my cabin and write the following, “What peculiar feelings arise at the prospect of soon landing in an unknown country, in the midst of strangers – a country now to be my home and sphere of labor.” p.88
Q: Finally, now that you actually made it to China, tell me a bit about this country. What language(s) is/are spoken in China? What city did you live in? What kind of food did you eat and what kind of clothes did you wear?
A: When I arrived there were many Chinese dialects, meaning there were several major language differences within the Chinese language itself depending upon what region a person lived in. Taking the advice of a fellow missionary doctor I learned to speak Mandarin. Mandarins are government appointed officials. They live throughout China to oversee provinces. Each Mandarin official must speak Mandarin so all of the leaders can communicate. It was beneficial for me to learn Mandarin because no matter where I lived in China, someone would be able to speak Mandarin.
When I arrived in China I lived in a large city called Shanghai. I really wanted to move to inland China, which was unknown to foreigners at that time, and eventually I was able to do so. As for food, sometimes I ate typical English food because that is what was served in some homes I was invited to. At other times, I ate typical Chinese food. During that time period, rice or noodles stir fried with vegetables, and maybe a little meat, was most common. Rice was commonly eaten several times a day. I also drank a lot of tea which was served in cups without handles.*
Early on I grew tired of sticking out among the Chinese because I was dressed like an Englishman. Chinese people were afraid of me when I wore English style clothing. So again taking the advice of Dr. Medhurst, I decided to dress like the Chinese even though it bothered many other English missionaries.
I went to a barber who cut off my blond curls and shaved the front half of my head. He dyed the rest of my hair black and braided a long piece of hair called a false queue into my new black hair.
Then I bought Chinese clothing which was one size fits all. I wore enormous baggy pants which were held up by a belt and scratchy socks without elastic. The pant legs were stuffed into my socks. I wore a white cotton shirt with an embroidered tunic over it which reached down to my feet. The tunic sleeves were really long and hung below my fingertips. My shoes, however, were the trickiest part of the whole outfit. They were made of cloth and I had to maneuver them over my socks. The toes of the shoes curled up and I kept getting the curl stuck on the bottom of my tunic. Before I knew it, I was a blue eyed China man. It was wonderful! No one stared at me anymore.
China Inland Mission Missionaries (the organization Taylor founded) in Traditional Chinese Clothing courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Q: Hudson, you have led an extraordinary life! And we have only scratched the surface. As I understand it, you worked as a doctor while in China, made your way to inland China where few, if any, foreigners had been before, bore some extremely difficult family hardships and started your own missionary organization, all because of your love and devotion to God, China and its people. How can we find out more about you and your life?
It has been an extraordinary life. When we obey God, knowing that he has a plan for our lives and trusting that he will guide us and care for us even though part of that plan might involve hardships, the outcome often is extraordinary. There are several articles and books you can read to find out more about me. They will be listed below. Thank you so much for the interview. I enjoyed it and hope you did too.
This interview is based upon the book Hudson Taylor Deep in the Heart of China by Janet & Geoff Benge. It is part of the Christian Heroes: Then & Now series, copyright 1998 YWAM publishing.
I have listed articles, from Wikipedia and OMF International, along with several books that you can read to discover more about Hudson Taylor’s fascinating life. To purchase any these books from Amazon just click below on the image of the book you want. Some of the books, including Could somebody pass the salt? are geared towards young readers.
* The food Taylor ate in China is conjecture based upon information I found on a website called foodbycountry.com at this link.