H. A. Tupper

Henry Allen Tupper served as pastor of the Washington church from June 24, 1853 to February 1872. During the year 1853 of this pastorate the church was completely renovated, the form of the cupola was altered, and a baptismal pool was evidently put in the building. The next year two small rooms were built at the rear of the church for the use of the baptismal candidates. In 1857 seventy-five white members of the congregation gave $1,150.00 to the association. In 1864 money was repaid to the church in Confederate billls and invested by the treasurer, by order of the church, in Confederate bonds. At the end of the year the treasury was down to $5.00. In 1866 the deacons were to assess the members quarterly and the assessments were then read aloud to the church.

In 1869, for the first time, weekly collections were suggested. The church voted to adopt the envelope plan. All indebtedness on the church was liquidated at this time, and the church assumed its proportionate part of gifts for the Foreign and Domestic Mission Boards. In 1871 the church voted to discontinue monthly collections and to urge the people to give weekly. In 1872 Dr. Tupper resigned as pastor to accept employment with the Foreign Mission Board. He had accepted a salary only one year, 1866, the first year after the Civil War. He served the church nineteen years.

Biography of H. A. Tupper

TUPPER, Henry Allen, clergyman, born in Charleston, South Carolina, 29 February, 1828. His father, Tristram, a merchant of Charleston, was at one time president of the South Carolina Railroad.

Of the subject of the fourth tablet, the same " Historical Sketch " of the church, published by the City of Charleston, makes this record:

" For many years, Tristram Tupper, Esq., was the worthy and efficient President of the Corporation, and was always the firm and unfailing friend of the church. His time and his purse were both at the service of the church. While on a visit to St. Thomas, on business, he selected the beautiful mahogany out of which the present pulpit was made. His son, the Rev. H. A. Tupper, D.D., of Richmond, Va., is an honored minister of the gospel, while another son, the late James Tupper, Esq., was a faithful deacon in the First Baptist Church, and a man of fine gifts, both as a speaker and writer; while a large number of his descendants, both in Charleston and elsewhere, have become shining ornaments of society and devoted members of the church." The tablet is inscribed with these words:

"THIS TABLET

Is dedicated to the memory of

An upright man,

A devoted husband,

An affectionate parent;

TRISTRAM TUPPER,

Born at Dresden, Maine, isth Oct. 1789 ;

Died in Charleston, S. C., 2Oth May, 1865.

More than a half century

An esteemed and successful merchant of this city,

His munificence and energy promoted works of public utility.

Prominent among the projectors of the South Carolina Railroad

And six successive years its president,

Wisdom, firmness and fidelity marked his administration,

And he bore into retirement

Grateful testimony to his official services.

Habitually benevolent,

He laboured, always, regardless of self

To relieve the suffering and the afflicted

In seasons of general sickness and calamity.

Largely instrumental in the organization of this church,

He was one of the committee on construction,

Many years its president,

And worshipped here from its dedication to his death.

Purity, integrity, usefulness of life

With habitual submission to the divine will,

Blessed him with serenity in old age,

And composure in contemplation of death."

" His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal;

Nor numbers, nor example with him wrought

To swerve from Truth, or change his constant mind."

 Eliza Yoer was born Aug. 5, 1800. In 1816 she was married to Mr. Tristram Tupper, a gentleman long known in mercantile connections as a thorough business man, of unquestioned integrity. He was one of the building committee, to whose hands was committed the erection of the building, long known as the Baptist church, on Church street.\

Mrs. Tupper's pastor at the time of death in 1887 wrote of her: "Of some who were members of the church at the time of my pastorate it may not be inappropriate to speak specially.

Mrs. Eliza Yoer Tupper was indeed a " mother in Israel." She was the preachers' friend. It was the privilege of the writer to call her " Mother Tupper," and she always spoke of him as "my boy." At the time I first met her she was a woman of commanding presence, of noble character, of keen judgment, great versatility of character and intense devotion to the cause of Christ. She kept her sorrows, of which she had many, within her bosom, while she had nought but smiles and words of cheer for others. And yet it was touching to see how quietly upon a week day she would go around to the church-yard and moisten with tears of affection the graves which contained her treasures of love. At seventy she possessed the vigor of mind and body of her earlier years—her life was for her church and her God. She has gone to her reward, but her honored and useful children and grandchildren rise up and call her blessed.

Nor was it in her own children only Mrs. Tupper found matter for satisfaction and unceasing gratitude to God. Two of her grandsons preaching the glorious gospel of the blessed God,— Revs. Kerr Boyce and Henry A., Jr.,—and an accomplished and pious grand-daughter bearing part in a work crowned in its very beginning with phenomenal success, and giving promise that the women of Mexico will be lifted speedily to the full enjoyment of the blessings of Protestant Christianity,—these were among the ingredients in her daily cup of thanksgiving.

The Three Events.

The following is from the pen of an intelligent and pious young member of the First Church of Charleston:

The history of the Church after the year 1860 was marked by three events,—the war, the cyclone and the earthquake,—any one of which, humanly speaking, might have seriously impaired its life and growth. A special Providence, however, watched over the sacred walls and extended the arm of protection around the old mother church.

The First Baptist Church was spared the trial of being used, during the war, as many others were, as a hospital, or as the temporary dwellingplace of the soldiers. It did suffer materially, however; for a shell exploding in the organ injured it so severely that it was unfit for use. Other shells thrown into the church broke the tablet erected by the side of the pulpit to the memory of Dr. Richard Furman, and also shattered the marble slab near the vestry door, marking the burial spot of the venerable pastor.

The lecture-room also suffered from these deadly instruments, the ceiling being broken and damaged badly. Many of the members were away when the war closed, but by the year 1867, most of them had returned, and with commendable energy worked for the church. The men soon realized the sum of $862, by which the needed repairs were done. The tablet in the church was replaced through the earnest efforts of one of the female members, who had long sat under the ministry of Dr. Furman. The slab in the yard was contributed by another as her loving tribute to an honored and beloved pastor.

The ladies helped especially with the lectureroom, forming themselves into a society, and many were the sacrifices made and loving labors rendered, thus attesting the interest taken in the good work. Pieces of silver and valued articles were contributed to be sold for the purpose of assisting with the building fund ; the young people of the congregation were gathered together to aid with their work, and soon the room was put in complete order and regular services held.

The church sustained greater injuries from the cyclone which occurred August 25, 1885. The walls were broken by the force of the wind, the building was almost entirely unroofed, the rain pouring into the church from the pulpit to the vestibule, destroying the books, cushions and carpets. By the vigorous efforts of the male members the church was rendered fit for service. Among themselves they raised $800, and all necessary repairs were made.

Hardly had the church recovered from the effects of the cyclone, when it was called upon to pass through the same ordeal, for the next year, August 31,1886, it was shaken by the earthquake. The walls were rent, the plastering fell in every direction, the floors were strewn with the broken fragments, so that no one could enter the building with safety. The ceiling of the porch was shaken down, as can be seen from the photograph giving the side view, and everywhere was a scene of desolation and destruction. The lecture-room was dreadfully shattered ; a temporary cloth supplied the place of the ceiling. The people, not being able to accomplish the work of repairing by themselves, requested aid from the sympathizing' friends through the country. Generous responses were made to these urgent appeals, for the contributions so liberally and kindly given enabled the church to begin the work of repairs. This was done at the cost of $3,000.

Owing to the kindness of friends, the Sundayschool kept up its services, first in the Circular Church building, and then in the rooms of the Young Men's Christian Association. After a time the school returned to its own building, the outer walls of which had been made tolerably secure by propping them up with strong beams

The congregation united with the Citadel Square Church in worshiping in their Sunday-school room while the repairs were going on. After many months of waiting the church was again ready for service, and the hearts of the people were filled with gratitude and praise to God who had preserved them through the war, the cyclone and the earthquake. The church at present (1889) is in thorough repair, and is in a fine condition.

On the 14th of November, 1847, H. Allen Tupper and James P. Boyce were licensed to preach by the church in Charleston.

The son was educated in part at Charleston College, and was graduated at Madison University, New York, in 1848, and at its theological seminary in 1850. Having entered the ministry, he became, after three years' service in Graniteville, South Carolina, pastor of the Baptist church at Washington, Georgia, in which relation he continued for nearly twenty years.

John Boyce, the father of Ker Boyce, was of the ScotchIrish stock. Alexander, his brother, was a captain, and fell at the siege of Savannah, at the head of his company. John Boyce was in the battles of Blackstock's, King's Mountain, Cowpens and Eutaw. On his return to his family, after one of these battles, he had scarcely sainted his wife and children when he was startled by the sound of approaching horses. He sprang to the cabin door and saw a party of Tories, headed by William Cunningham and a man of less note, McCombs, immediately before him. Four of the horses were already abreast of his door. He threw his hat in the face of the horses, which made them open right and left. He sprang through the opening and ran for the woods about seventy-five yards before him. Cunningham was alongside, and, striking a furious blow, it took effect on his raised hand as he avoided the charge, nearly sundering three of his fingers. Before the blow could be repeated he was in the thick brush of a wood impenetrable to the cavalry. He watched the retreat, hurried to his house, had his wounded hand bound up, was in the saddle on the way to his commander, Casey, and before night Casey, with a party of fifteen, was in pursuit, and on the Enoree, near the mouth of Duncan's Creek, captured eleven or twelve of the party, among whom was McCombs. These were conveyed to a place where the Charleston road crosses the old Ninety-Six road, (now Whitmire's) and there " a short shrift," a strong rope and a stooping hickory applied speedy justice to them all. A common grave at the root of the tree is their resting place for all time. On another occasion Mr. Boyce was captured and tied in his own barn, while a bed cord was sought for to hang him; his negro man (long afterward known as old S.indy) being hid in the straw, and knowing the necessity of speedy relief while his captors were absent on their fell purpose, came to his rescue and untying him, both made good their escape. John Boyce lived long after the war. He died in April. 1806. He was a Presbyterian and an elder in McClintock's church. Gilder's Creek. (Then Indian Creek, to which Gilder's Creek has succeeded.) In the graveyard there rest his remains.

[Of some interest is that on the same date Henry Allen Tupper became pastor of Washington Baptist Church, June 24, 1853, his father-in-law, Ker Boyce of Charleston and Graniteville, SC, purchased the house just east of the church, now known as the Tupper-Barnett House, for $2800.00+, and gave it to Henry Allen Tupper, who sold the house in 1872 for $5,000+.]

On March 19, 1854, occurred the death, at Columbia, of Mr. Ker Boyce. He had for some years made his homeat Kalmia, not far from Aiken and Graniteville, where he had a delightful residence, shared with him by Mr. and Mrs. H. A. Tupper, until they removed, in 1853, to Washington, Ga. Going to Columbia on a visit to James, he was taken ill with heart-troubles, and after lingering ten days he died on a Sunday at midnight. His children had all gathered, and it is said that they 'confidently expected his recovery; but he was persuaded of his approaching death, and in view thereof he spoke calmly and with resignation, expressing his hope and trust in the mercy of Christ." Dr. Tupper says that during their residence together at Kalmia he showed great love of the Bible, and special interest in the family worship. Numerous letters to the Tuppers during 1850-1854 have been preserved, and not only abound in the warmest expressions of fatherly interest and affection, but often speak in a distinctly religious tone.

The following Baptist ministers were at some time connected with the Sunday school of First Baptist, Charleston, either as scholars or teachers: Rev. Drs. James C. Furman, Basil Manly, Jr., Jno. J. Brantly,* Wm. Royall, J. L. Reynolds, Jas. P. Boyce, H. Allen Tupper*, Wm. J. Hard, H. H. Tucker (possibly C. W. D. Bridgman and J. T. Zealy), Revs. Isaac Nichols, I. M. Springer,* Thos. Symonds, R. Misseldine, J. K. Mendenhall, Thos. W. Mellichampe, B. W. Whilden* (went to China in 1848), R. F. Whilden, Isaac Edward H. Seymour, Jas. Tupper (licentiate), R. W. Seymour, Jr., M. R. Suares, O . F. Gregory, Jas. Du Pre, Kerr B. Tupper and H. Allen Tupper, Jr., twenty-seven in all.

* These were later pastors of First Baptist, Washington, GA.

What a galaxy of glory awaits, for instance Chas. H. Lanneau, the man who so faithfully taught the class, which included among its members James P. Boyce, honored and useful as president of the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary; Basil Manly, a professor in the same institution, men who were to do so much in the grand work of giving to the Baptists of the South an educated ministry; Wm. Royall, long a professor of Wake Forest College, N. C., who has done much in moulding the Baptists of North Carolina, by imprinting his own Christlike character upon the future ministers of his adopted State; and T. W. Mellichampe, a faithful minister of the Word, in South Carolina. Time would fail me to even sketch the careers of usefulness of those who were once Sundayschool boys here; to tell of how much has been done for Christ and his cause by Jas. C. Furman, a name honored and beloved, and J. L. Reynolds, H. H. Tucker, J. J. Brantly and W. J. Hard, as educators and as preachers of the gospel; by H. Allen Tupper, Sr., the faithful corresponding secretary of the Foreign Mission Board, Southern Baptist Convention, not only in preaching the gospel at home, but in sending it into the regions beyond; by Thos. Symonds and B. W. Whilden, who went down into the darkness of heathendom in Burmah and China; and of others who have lived and wrought for Christ in our own native land.

The influence of Furman, and Manly, and Brantly, and Boyce, and Winkler, on the history of the Baptists of South Carolina, can never be overestimated..

On October 25, 1825, Ker Boyce formed a second marriage, with his previous wife's younger sister, Amanda Jane Caroline Johnston, born Dec. 3, 1806. Her children were five; namely, James Pettigru Boyce, Nancy (Mrs. H. A. Tupper), Rebecca (Mrs. Burckmyer), Ker (or Kerr), Elizabeth (Mrs. Lawrence).

This young wife, the mother of James and Nancy, is described as singularly attractive and admirable. Dr. H. A. Tupper says: ''A more gentle and lovelier Christian woman never lived. Her person had the frail beauty of the lily; her character, the rich fragrance of the rose. The writer, as a little boy, knew her well and admired her greatly. Tristram Shandy says a man's history begins before his birth. The almostwomanly gentleness and amiability of James P. Boyce may be clearly traced to his mother, — just as his hard common-sense, great executive ability, and deep vein of humor may be with equal readiness traced to his father and his paternal grandfather."

During his pastorate the church gave support to Mary Caulfield Reid in May 1857 to assist her as a missionary to Central Africa. When she died a year later the church sent a tombstone to mark her grave.

The 1860 US Census record of his family showed his family to include himself, age 32; his wife Nancy Boyce, age 31; daughter Amanda, age 9; sons Furman, age 7; Ker Boyce, age 6; Tristram, age 4; H. Allen, Jr., age 3; and Paul Yoder, age 2; and daughter Ann Eliza, age 1. During the civil war he was chaplain of the 9th Georgia Regiment of the Confederate army.

 In 1872 he was made corresponding secretary of the Foreign Missionary Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, with his residence in Richmond, Virginia He still (1889) holds this office, and is a trustee of Richmond College, but resigned from the Foreign Missionary Board in 1893.

 In 1870 Madison University conferred on him the degree of D.D. Besides various published sermons and addresses, Dr. Tupper is the author of " The First Century of the First Baptist Church of Richmond, Virginia" (Philadelphia, 1880), "Foreign Missions of the Southern Baptist Convention (1880); and "Truth in Romance" (Baltimore, 1887).

International Mission Board Timeline

May 10, 1845 – The Southern Baptist Convention established the Board of Foreign Missions and established its headquarters in Richmond, Virginia.

May 20, 1845 – Jeremiah Bell Jeter called the first meeting of the Board of Managers.  The members gathered in the library of Second Baptist Church, Richmond, Virginia.  Their primary concern was to secure a permanent Corresponding Secretary.

June 30, 1845 – China was chosen as the first mission field.

September 1, 1845 – The board appointed the first missionary, Samuel C. Clopton.

January 5, 1846 -- James B. Taylor (1846-1871) was appointed the first Corresponding Secretary of Foreign Mission Board.

September 7, 1846 – The board appointed two African-Americans to serve in Liberia.  Brother John Day occupied a mission station at Grand Bassa and Brother A. L. Jones at Cape Palmas on the west coast of Africa.

November 16, 1846 – The board appointed the first medical missionary, Dr. J. Sexton James, to serve in China.

June 10, 1846 – The monthly publication, Southern Baptist Missionary Journal, began.

January 15, 1849 – The board began publication of The Commission.  Monthlycirculation of the periodical reached 7,000 by April 1850.

March 5, 1849 – The board’s first single woman, Miss Harriet A. Baker of Powhatan County, Virginia, was appointed to China.

October 6, 1861 – Tai Ping rebels in Yentai, Shantung Province, China, murdered Missionary J. Landrum Holmes.

1861-1865 – Throughout the Civil War the Foreign Mission Board continued limited operations in China and Africa.  Most missionaries were self-supporting.

April 3, 1865 – The Foreign Mission Board had no available funds so the Treasurer was authorized to charge to profit and loss the Confederate bonds so as to balance his books.

December 23, 1871 – James B. Taylor died.

January 16, 1872 –Henry A. Tupper (1872-1892) was elected the second Corresponding Secretary by a unanimous vote of the Board.

July 7, 1873 – The board appointed Charlotte D. “Lottie” Moon to China.

The Offering Begins

By John Allen Moore

Lottie Moon’s return to China after accompanying her sister Eddie (Edmonia) back home to Virginia was not nearly as quick as she wanted. H.A. Tupper, corresponding secretary of the Foreign Mission Board, recruited her to travel to church and mission societies to bolster mission support. Tupper also corresponded with her about mission business. When Richmond Baptist women authorized use of part of the funds raised for the Moon house to send Lottie back and also promised to provide her support, Lottie returned to China.

During a stopover in Japan, Lottie wrote Tupper, "I believe that I like China best and that I like the Chinese people best,t.” Famine raged in north China as Lottie arrived in December 1877. She and other missionaries gave to relief programs and shared personally as they could to relieve the suffering.

Early in 1878 Lottie opened a girls’ boarding school for higher-class Chinese. Her purpose was evangelistic: She knew the school would help her enter pupils’ homes, since the exclusive citizens of Tengchow wanted little to do with “foreign devils” otherwise. Finding pupils would be hard, for females generally were judged incapable of education. Some Christian missions paidparents to send their children—especially girls—to school; Baptists did not do so but did provide instruction and materials free. Lottie’s school soon had 13 pupils, but all from poor families. They studied arithmetic, reading and geography and learned from Martha (Mrs. T.P.) Crawford’s catechism and a book of Bible stories Sallie Holmes had prepared. Lottie taught singing, accompanying with an organ Eddie had ordered and paid for. Lottie wrote to women’s societies to suggest that each adopt a girl to support for $15 a year. She promised to report on each girl’s progres

She managed to save about a third of her pupils from the practice of binding girls’ feet. The custom usually began about the time a girl would be entering school. The four small toes were bent under and bandaged and drawn toward the heel until bones broke. The suffering young women wound up with a three-inch foot and a pointed big toe. Often infection, illness and sometimes even death resulted.

She kept trying to buy the mission house where she lived or other property—in vain because of Chinese opposition to selling land to foreigners. T.P. Crawford, with Lottie’s support, persuaded the older Baptist church in northern Tengchow to move outside the city; this united work by Southern Baptists around the other congregation, renamed Tengchow Baptist Church.

Mrs. Holmes and Miss Moon devoted most of their time to village visits. When invited into a home, one would take the children into the yard to tell Bible stories and teach the catechism and songs. Lottie, if she were the one staying inside to teach the women, sat cross-legged on the kang, using her bedroll for a backrest. A kang, a brick bed about 5-by-10 feet and 3 feet high, was found in every home. It was heated from fire built inside it through an opening from an adjoining room. People sat, ate and slept on the kang, the only heated place in the house. At night, Lottie unrolled her bedding there.

In the morning neighbors usually crowded around to stare at the foreigners as they ate breakfast. Once Mrs. Holmes remarked, “Miss Moon, please note that we are being observed by 30 people; I’ve counted them.” Two were in the doorway; others peeped from behind. Fourboys stood on a table for a better view. “Now look,” said Lottie. “Some boys are tearing holes in the window [made of paper]. We are a wonderful sight, I suppose.” Later she wrote Tupper, “Have you ever felt the torture of human eyes bearing upon you, scanning every feature, every look, every gesture? I feel it keenly.”

She spoke from early morning to late evening, from the kang, on the street, in the yard of dirty homes, traveling in shentzes or riding donkeys, in the heat and dust of summer or wintry rain and snow. She was constantly in contact with the people, continually at risk of exposure to smallpox and other diseases. Yet she suppressed her craving for cultured life and conversation and her Southern tastes—all for the cause of Christ. “As I wander from village to village,” she said, “I feel it is no idle fancy that the Master walks beside me, and I hear His voice saying gently, ‘I am with you always, even unto the end.’” She found strength in prayer and Bible reading and in devotional classics. She often wrote quotations from spiritual writings in the margin of her Bible or devotional books. One favorite was from Francis de Sales: “Go on joyously as much as you can, and if you do not always go on joyously, at best go on courageously and confidently.”

Lottie suggested to Tupper that the board follow the pattern of some other mission groups and provide for a year of furlough after 10 years on the field. The board eventually adopted such a policy, but not until several missionaries in China died prematurely and others returned home in broken health.

“Mission life takes the strength and energy out of us before we know it,” she wrote. “We have to learn to be watchful and not overwork lest the time come too soon when we can work no more.” Becoming more careful of her health, she cultivated her garden and took walks for exercise. She read extensively and kept up with mission thought in her own and other denominations.

Loneliness became her great enemy. “I am bored to death with living alone,” she wrote Tupper. “I don't find my own society either agreeable or edifying.”

She bombarded the board with requests for recruits, including single women. Tupper tried, but with small success. “I estimate,” he said in one speech, “a single woman in China is worth two married men.”

Lottie continued correspondence with Crawford Toy, through the years the only man in her life. In addition to seminary teaching, he was president of the American Philological Society, which promoted phonetic spelling. Lottie used it for a short time, even in letters to Tupper, who believed she and Toy were considering marriage.

In 1879 Toy, accused of teaching a liberal view of biblical interpretation, had to resign from the Louisville seminary faculty. He became a professor at Harvard University, but the controversy continued in Southern Baptist papers between heresy hunters and some of Toy’s former students. Tupper wrote Miss Moon in some defense of Toy; she replied, “What you say of our mutual friend is very pleasing to me. You are right in supposing that I think very highly of him (this is not to go in The Journal!)”

Martha Crawford, visiting in Richmond, reported Lottie would go to Harvard as Mrs. Toy. Lottie apparently wrote family members to prepare for a wedding in early 1882.

Besides her loneliness, Lottie felt abandoned in the mission. For extended periods she was the only Southern Baptist missionary in north China. One side of her responded to the prospect of cultured life in a community of scholars such as at Harvard. But her deep commitment to missions and China won out. A niece asked her years later if she ever had been in love. “Yes, ”Lottie replied, “but God had first claim on my life, and since the two conflicted, there could be no question about the result.”

An article by Lottie in Women’s Work in China brought protests from conservative Southern Baptists. She listed three classes of single women missionaries regarding decision making in a mission: (1) those greatly dissatisfied and wanting changes; (2) those content to work under current restrictions and exercise influence indirectly; (3) those who enjoy full rights but wish these extended to others. The board’s committee on women’s work quoted from the article in a report in The Foreign Mission Journal, noting, “This is not endorsed by the committee but is reproduced to show what some others think.”

When Lottie saw this, she protested to Tupper: “I wrote the article for deep and intense sympathy for my suffering sisters. I have belonged heretofore to the third class who are free. It seems to be the purpose of the committee to relegate me henceforth to the first class. I distinctly decline from being so relegated. Will you be so kind as to request the Board to  appropriate the proper sum, say $550, to pay my return passage to Virginia? On arrival, I will send in my resignation in due form.”

Tupper assured her the board considered her a full partner in determining policy. Sheresponded calmly that single women missionaries in all missions should have equal voice—as in her own mission—but again threatened to resign. She declared she was unable to understand why the China committee “do not endorse my position.”

Sallie Holmes, after long service in China, had left in 1881, so Lottie took over her compound,“Little Crossroads,” and made that her home for the rest of her life. She conducted both her school and Sallie’s, but soon was devoting full time to city visiting and country work.

Early in 1882 missionaries N. Weston Halcomb and C.W. Pruitt reached the field, the first new personnel since Lottie’s arrival almost 10 years earlier. Two years later, a single woman missionary arrived and soon married Halcomb. Next came two couples—the E.E. Devaults and James M. Joiners. Some new arrivals soon died; others went home as invalids. Lottie respected Halcomb as an effective missionary and a man of integrity. However, he resigned after concluding his views on biblical inspiration and interpretation were inconsistent with mainline Southern Baptist teaching. Pruitt remained the only man active in the work.

Meanwhile, T.P. Crawford always seemed less involved in missions than in his businessventures, attacking the board and trying to force on others his ideas of full self-support. After a few years, he left the board and formed his own Gospel Mission. He took many Southern Baptist missionaries with him as he opened interior stations.

Lottie Moon nurtured a dream, shared by some colleagues, of establishing a chain of mission stations toward the interior. Hwanghsien, 20 miles from Tengchow, was the first, led by Halcomb, Devault and Joiner. But since those workers were soon ill or gone, Lottie had to serve there for a time.

She saw as the next stop Pingtu, the world’s 12th largest population center, 100 miles further inland. Lottie, the first Southern Baptist woman to open a new mission outpost, made a survey trip to Pingtu in late 1885, spending three nights in miserable Chinese inns on the way. A month in Pingtu convinced her a mission station must be started. The people seemed curious and open, even in religion. She returned to Tengchow and gathered a supply of warm clothing, medicines, staple foods and reading material. The U.S. North China consul opposed her going, since there was no consular protection for foreigners in the interior (Pingtu had no resident foreigners), but the few other Southern Baptist missionaries on the field supported her plan.

She reached Pingtu in December 1885. Aided by a Chinese couple from Tengchow, she rented a four-room, dirt-floor house for $24 a year, planning to stay until summer. She ate and lived as the Chinese did. No one she knew spoke English.

She first wanted to be accepted as neighbor and friend. It was easy to attract a friendly curious crowd, and she quickly adapted to the local dialect. She began visiting surrounding villages and within a few months had made 122 trips to 33 different places.

She returned to Tengchow in June 1886 and after catching up on her work there she felt sheneeded to nurse seriously ill new missionaries in Hwanghsien for the winter and care for the local church. It was April 1887 before she could return to Pingtu, where she met a warm welcome.

Lottie knew she was wearing herself out. She had had no co-worker since Sallie Holmes left six years earlier. Lottie wrote Tupper to ask for a furlough and also requested missionary recruits. She said of the people, especially those in Pingtu: “We must go out and live among them, manifesting the spirit of our Lord. We need to make friends before we can hope to make converts.”

At the same time she wrote to encourage Southern Baptist women to organize, convention wide, to study and support missions. They were planning to act on the idea at their usual informal gathering along with the Southern Baptist Convention in 1888. Lottie's article in The Foreign Mission Journal told of the example Methodist women had set: “They give freely and cheerfully. Now the painful question arises, ‘What is the matter, that we Baptists give so little? Whose is the fault? Is it a fact that our women are lacking in the enthusiasm, the organizing power, and the executive ability that so conspicuously distinguishes our Methodist sisters?’”

Her letter that was to become famous appeared in the Journal for December 1887. For several years the women’s society in Cartersville, Ga., had taken a Christmas offering to help Lottie’s work. Now she learned that Methodist women that year were to observe the week before Christmas as a time of prayer and giving for missions. She urged Southern Baptist women to follow their example:

Need it be said why the week before Christmas is chosen? Is not the festive season, when families and friends exchange gifts in memory of The Gift laid on the altar of the world for the redemption of the human race, the most appropriate time to consecrate a portion from abounding riches and scant poverty to send forth the good tidings of great joy into all the earth?

She wanted it clear that she was not trying to separate women’s work from other mission work:

In seeking organization we do not need to adopt plans or methods unsuitable to the view orrepugnant to the tastes of our brethren. What we want is not power, but simply combination in order to elicit the largest possible giving. Power of appointing and disbursing funds should be left, as heretofore, in the hands of the Foreign Mission Board. Separate organization is undesirable, and would do harm, but organizing in subordination to the Board is the imperative need of the hour.

She opposed raising funds by entertainments or gimmicks. She wrote:

I wonder how many of us really believe that it is more blessed to give than to receive. A woman who accepts that statement of our Lord Jesus Christ as a fact and not as “impractical idealism,” will make giving a principle of her life. She will lay aside sacredly not less than one-tenth of her income or her earnings as the Lord’s money, which should would no more dare touch for personal use than she would steal. How many there are among our women, alas, who imagine that because “Jesus paid it all,” they need pay nothing, forgetting that the prime object of their salvation was that they should follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ!

After 10 months in Pingtu as the only Southern Baptist missionary within a hundred miles, Lottie Moon returned to Little Crossroads in Tengchow in July 1888. Looking over her accumulated mail, she learned that women of the South had formed a convention-wide organization at their spring meeting in Richmond. Miss Annie Armstrong served as corresponding secretary for the Woman’s Missionary Union, auxiliary to the Southern Baptist Convention; headquarters were in Baltimore, Md.  Lottie’s request for furlough had been granted, but reluctantly, for Tupper feared for the North China mission without her. Despite failing health, Lottie also was unwilling to leave until new women missionaries had arrived and been introduced to the work. She returned to Pingtu with Martha Crawford. Most promising outpost was in Sha-ling, 10 miles away. A church was formed there in the fall of 1889, the fourth church related to Southern Baptist missions in all of north China.

The success of the first Christmas-season mission offering among Southern Baptists, in 1888, resulted chiefly from Lottie’s suggestion, Tupper’s strong support and Annie Armstrong’s extensive letter writing and publicity. It had been designated in advance to send women missionaries to help Lottie in China. The goal: $2,000. The result: $3,315.26, enough to send three single missionaries.

During these years Lottie lived mostly in Pingtu but managed to get to Tengchow to give orientation to new single women missionaries. She regarded July as her time for semi-relaxation and catching up on Tengchow work.

Persecution broke out in Sha-ling in 1890. Relatives of one of the first inquirers, Dan Ho-bang, tied him to a pole and beat him, but he refused to worship at ancestral tablets. A young convert, Li Show-ting, was beaten by his brothers, who tore out his hair; still, he remained steadfast in his faith. He was to become the great evangelist of north China, baptizing more than 10,000 believers.

Lottie rushed to Sha-ling and told the persecution leaders, “If you attempt to destroy his church, you will have to kill me first. Jesus gave Himself for us Christians. Now I am ready to die for Him.” One of the mob prepared to kill her but was restrained. Lottie calmed the terrified believers and remained with them until persecution waned. When the believers did not retaliate with the usual legal action, the Chinese turned with more respect to hear of the new faith. The church became the strongest in north China; its members evangelized in nearby villages.

“I am trying honestly to do the work that could fill the hands of three or four women,” Lottie wrote in an open letter published in the Religious Herald, “and in addition must do much work that ought to be done by young men … Our dilemma-to do men’s work or to sit silent at religious services conducted by men just emerging from heathenism.” Letters against women speaking in public where men were present or taking the lead in general work continued in Baptist papers; nothing on the other side was printed from American readers.

Finally came furlough—Lottie’s first trip to America in 14 years. The last family property at Viewmont had been sold. Eddie Moon, still sickly, though she taught school at times, had bought a small house near Scottsville, Va., and awaited Lottie there. To recover her health and strength, Lottie declined speaking invitations for six months. Tupper, at her invitation, visited her in Scottsville to talk about mission work. Pruitt, then on furlough but leaning toward Crawford, also came to talk to Lottie and became a loyal supporter of the board. All Southern Baptist missionaries in north China at the time joined Crawford and his Gospel Mission, except William and Effie Sears and Laura Barton. The board reappointed J.B. Hartwell.

Refreshed, Lottie at her own expense visited church and women’s societies in several states.

She attended WMU meetings in connection with the SBC, in Atlanta, admitted to convention sessions as an “observer.” At the 1893 convention in Nashville, the WMU meeting honored Lottie, and she supported a plan to use the Christmas offering that year for mission advance.

October 10, 1881 – The board appointed the first female physician, Dr. Ruth McCowan, to serve in Shanghai, China.

May 11, 1888 – The Woman’s Missionary Union (auxiliary to the Southern Baptist Convention) is organized in Richmond, Virginia.

July 23, 1893 –Robert Josiah Willingham (1893-1913) was elected the third Corresponding Secretary of the Foreign Mission Board.

July 23, 1893 – The Board of Managers authorized the purchase of the board’s first typewriter.

May 12, 1899 – The South China Mission established the Chinese Baptist Publication Society with Dr. R. H. Graves as president and R. E. Chambers as its corresponding secretary.

March 13, 1900 – The Bell Telephone Company offered to install a phone in the Foreign Mission Board office at a reduced rate and the Board of Managers directed the Corresponding Secretary to accept their offer.

August 5, 1901 – The board appointed the first nurse, Jessie L. Pettigrew, to work in Hwanghien, China, with Dr. Thomas W. Ayers.

March 27, 1902 – Henry A. Tupper died.

DEATH OF DR. BOYCE.

'"The day that the First Church of Charleston "*- made the formal request (December 30, 1888) that the editor should compile the papers of its Bi-Centenary, was the very day that the electric wires flashed all over the continent the news of the death of James Petigru Boyce, LL.D., who died in Pan, France, December 28, 1888. The day after his funeral obsequies in Louisville, Ky. (January 20, 1889), the manuscript of this book was returned to the editor in that city by a friend under whose critical eye the work had been placed, It is not strange, therefore, that the thought should arise of making some memorial, in this volume, of the departed man of God, who was a Sundayschool scholar of this church, and was baptized into its fellowship and licensed to preach by it; whose father was the president of its corporation for many years, and one of its most liberal supporters ; and whose death has shocked the whole country as when some giant oak is felled in the resounding forest. And it seems meet that,

among the almost countless tributes to the memory of this great and good man which have been published over the land, the one that should record his decease in the history of his mother-church is one from the pen of his own Sunday-school teacher, Dr. H. H. Tucker, who gives vent, in the Christian Index, to the following outburst of affectionate and eloquent sentiment:

"With unspeakable grief we announce to our readers that our ever-honored and much-loved brother, James P. Boyce, departed this life on Friday last, the 28th day of December, 1888. This event of overwhelming sadness has been casting its dark shadow before it for two or three years. We all knew that our dear brother's health was failing, and that a fatal result might be expected; and for some weeks past we have been anticipating the very worst, and yet after all, when the stroke did come it came like a thunderbolt! It is a strange paradox that when we are looking with certainty for some great event, its coming still takes us by surprise, and our whole nature is jarred by the concussion of expectation with astonishment.

" The event has been a revelation to us. We never knew before how dreadful a loss the loss of Boyce would be. We never knew before how much we loved him. We have now a view of our own hearts that we never had before. Introspection shows us a great group, yea, a multitude of sentiments, respect, admiration, confidence, love, love Christian, love personal, and innumerable unnamed and unnameable emotions, but all of them reverent, and all of them tender, which seem to have sprung up suddenly since he died. True, all these have nestled in our hearts for many years past, but the past seems like a dream, and the reality is now. It takes death itself to bring us to a realization of our own subjective condition.

" Boyce is gone ! The whole Baptist brotherhood is bereaved. Every one of the mighty host has met with a loss. There was no man like Boyce. He was as a father to the whole family of us. We looked to Boyce as to none other. Oh, he was so great, and so strong, and so pure, and so true! When shall we see another like him ! God has great things in store for his people, and we know that he will not forget to be gracious, and the joy of the Lord gleams through our tears; but such men as Boyce do not come with every generation, and the hand that writes these lines will never write others on an occasion of like character and equal moment. The generation following may see another Boyce, but we never shall. To the present writer he seemed like a threefold person having the qualities, all at once, of father, brother and son. Father he was when we regarded his grand life and his heroic deeds ; brother, when we took sweet counsel together, and walked to the house of God in company; son, because he was some years younger, and because in his boyhood he belonged to a Sunday-school class taught by the writer. This was in Charleston, S. C., just fifty years ago, when Boyce was twelve years old, and the writer twenty.

" He has built his own monument. The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, although manned by officers of rare ability, and great learning, could not have survived its trials and troubles but for the immense force of character which Boyce brought to bear upon its interests. We never saw another man who could have done what he did. Not meaning to use literal terms, yet we know not how else to express ourselves, we may say that he brought something out of nothing. At any rate, he may be fairly called the founder and builder of a magnificent Institution which will endure, we doubt not, until the coming of the Lord. It is said that it has more students now in attendance than any similar Institution of any denomination on the American Continent.

" He was a man of great business capacity. He seems to have inherited the talent of his father, the Hon. Ker Boyce, who, many years ago, was the millionaire President of the Bank of Charleston, and a man of wonderful business sagacity. Oh, it was beautiful to see Boyce lay his financial talent which might have brought him millions, on the altar of the Lord! From his mother he seemed to have inherited the spirit of meekness ; and where was there ever a gentler spirit than his? But his best inheritance was that which came to him in the second birth,—a rich inheritance of grace.

" We have had men, and have them now, superior to him in one particular or in another, but where is there another such combination of forces intellectual, moral and social, that completely round out the character of a perfect man ? There are some, (not so very many), who excel him in learning, some, (a considerable number), who are more brilliant, none of better-balanced mind, or of better-balanced character, none of more trustworthy judgment, none more soundly orthodox, none of profounder convictions, none truer to their convictions, none more industrious, none more generous, none more self-sacrificing, none more genial or magnetic in personal intercourse, and not one who combines all these qualities in a character so full of power. It was his Washingtonian evenness of development, his perfect poise, and his huge motive force that made him great.

" Thank God for Boyce. After all we have not lost him. Such men are never lost. He has left us the Seminary. He has left us his record. He has left us his grand example. It will take his mantle a long time to fall from the skies, but when it does fall God will raise up some man on whom it shall fall, and who will be worthy of it.

"We have always been tin sympathy with those Jews who besought our Lord in behalf of the centurion, saying, ' For he loveth our nation, and hath built us a synagogue.' Boyce was our lover and our friend, and he built us more than a synagogue. We can pray for him no more ; let us transfer our petitions in favor of his wife and children. And let us show our appreciation of his labors by sustaining with more zeal than ever the Seminary to which he gave his noble life. Every effort in its behalf will be a chaplet on his grave.

James Petigru Boyce was born in Charleston, South Carolina, January n, 1827;
and died in Pau, France, Dec. 28, 1888. ' The memory of the just is blessed.' "

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