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| "The Revd. Chas Gutzlaff : the Chinese missionary in the dress of a Fokien sailor" by George Chinnery, drawn on stone by R. J. Lane and printed by C. Hullmandel |
Alias Charles Gützlaff. Name variations: in Chinese 郭實臘.
Publications: Journal of Three Voyages along the Coast of China in 1831, 1832 and 1833, with notices of Siam, Corea, and the Loo-Choo Islands. A Sketch of Chinese History, Ancient and Modern. China Opened Life of Tao Kwang.
[Gützlaff learned Chinese when he was in Java in 1826, sent there by the Netherlands Missionary Society. Before landing in China, he was in Singapore and Siam. Incidentally, he was the first Christian Protestant missionary to have worked in Siam.]
[Cooperating with Walter Henry Medhurst, Elijah Coleman Bridgman, and John Robert Morrison, Gützlaff set out to translate the Bible into Chinese in 1840. The translation of the Hebrew part was done mostly by Gützlaff , with the exception that the Pentateuch and the book of Joshua were done by the group collectively. This translation, completed seven years later, is quite remarkable due to its adoption by the revolutionary peasant leader Hong Xiuquan (洪秀全) of the Taiping Rebellion (太平天國) as some of the reputed early doctrines of the organization.]
[Gützlaff was appointed to a commission in 1844 to consider and recommend compensation to villages whose ancestral burying ground were to be relocated to facilitate a major drainage improvement project for Happy Valley. Gützlaff did most of the work interviewing the villages and attempting to ascertain current values.]
[Gützlaff founded the Chinese Evangelization Society (中國傳教會) for the purpose of sending religious workers to China. In 1853, Hudson Taylor (戴德生), from England became the first missionary to be sent to China by the Society. The society was disbanded in 1865. Gützlaff was honored the name "The Apostle of China".]
Selected Bibliography: Hong Kong's First [online]. Tarrent, William, The Hong Kong Almanack and Directory for the Year 1846, 1848, 1850, Hong Kong: China Mail, resp. 1846,1848 and 1850.
The following is what I wrote about Gützlaff on one of my other blogs, Hong Kong's First, back in May 2010. Some updates have been made since the story was published.
"Son of a tailor and originally trained to become a saddle-maker, Karl Frederick August Gützlaff (b.1803, Pyritz, Pomerania – d.1851, Hong Kong) was a Prussian born missionary sent to Indonesia by the Netherlands Missionary Society who went to China on his own account because of his keen interest in the country. He was the real life “Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” - a man who lived in total confusion with respect to his true identity. He was a Prussian who anglicized himself as Charles Gützlaff, who authored books in the English language, but dressed himself like a Chinese always (particularly in the look of boat people). As a gifted linguist, he translated the Bible into the Chinese language. As a gifted linguist, he helped William Jardine sold opium to Chinese by interpreting for the latter’s trafficking operation up and down the China coast, enthusiastically and took money for his service.
As a Christian clergy whose objective was missionary work in China, Gützlaff played an undisputed role in the First Opium War by spying for the British arm forces[1], by interpreting for the British superintendency, and by actively involved in the possession of Chinese territories fallen into British forces[2].
In 1843, Gützlaff succeed John Robert Morrison, who died in office, as the second Chinese Secretary of the Hong Kong Government. Here is a further example of how mixed up Gützlaff was: as a government official, he spent two hours each day in the morning and provided a private service to foreign residents in Hong Kong who wished to enquire into the character of local watchmen they intended to hire and issued his certificate in respect of those he believed to be honest. He charged a fee for his service.
Gützlaff had three wives, all English women. He married a wealthy missionary Maria Newell (b.ca.1794-d.1831) on November 26, 1829 in Siam. Newell was sent to Malacca as the first unmarried female missionary by the London Missionary Society in 1827 to work as a teacher in a school for girls. Newell died from child birth in February 1831; Gützlaff inherited considerable resources from her. In 1834, he married Mary Wanstall (b.1799-d.1849) who ran a school and a home for blinds in Macau. Wanstall was a cousin of Gützlaff’s colleague, a translator for Henry Pottenger by the name of Harry Parkes, who would later became the Biritsh Minister in Peking. The two had no children but adopted two blind Chinese girls, one of whom was educated in England and returned to teach blind girls in a Ningbo school. Wanstall died in 1849. He married Dorothy Gabriel in England on September 17, 1850 while touring Europe giving lectures about China. He died a year later. There were also reports that pointed to two Chinese concubines he kept in Ningbo; their names were unknown.
Gützlaff died in Hong Kong in 1851 leaving behind quite a sizable estate and a questionable legacy, but keeping with him a secret he hided about the "Chinese Union", an evangelistic organ he established in Hong Kong in 1844. It was revealed years after his death that a good number of Chinese evangelists he trained, under the auspices of Chinese Union, and sent to China were unconverted opium-smokers and criminals who had duped him by selling the evangelistic literature to the printer, who then resold it to him. Gützlaff was buried at the Hong Kong Cemetery in Happy Valley. The Gutzlaff Street 吉士笠街 in Central was named after him. Additional reading: "Drug Money to Fund Printing of Bible"
[1] Gützlaff worked directly for the British Foreign Office long before the onset of the armed conflict between Britain and Qing China. His controlling officer was Major, later Lieutenant–Colonel, George A. Malcolm whose official position was "Secretary of Legation" of the trade Mission led by Pottinger. Gützlaff also ran a network of Chinese spies, sometime took on the identities as his assistants. Here are the names of some of the known agents: Liu Fu-kuei, Yu Te-chang, Ku Pao-lin, Pu Ting-pang, Pao Peng and Chen Ping-chiin.
[2] Gützlaff was one of the three interpreters[a] during the negotiations of the Treaty of Nanking. He was appointed magistrate of Chusan (Zhoushan) 舟山 following the British occupation of the island in 1841, and of Ningbo 寧波 in the same year and of Zhenjiang 鎮江 in the following year. He was the Superintendent of Trade at Dinghai 定海 (a district inside Zhoushan City on Zhoushan Island) from November 1842 till the autumn of 1843."
[2] Gützlaff was one of the three interpreters[a] during the negotiations of the Treaty of Nanking. He was appointed magistrate of Chusan (Zhoushan) 舟山 following the British occupation of the island in 1841, and of Ningbo 寧波 in the same year and of Zhenjiang 鎮江 in the following year. He was the Superintendent of Trade at Dinghai 定海 (a district inside Zhoushan City on Zhoushan Island) from November 1842 till the autumn of 1843."
[a] The other two were J. Robert Morrison and Rober Thom. Thom (b.1807-d.1846) had worked for Jardine, Matheson & Co. in Canton. His Chinese education was sponsored by William Jardine, James Matheson and Henry Wright. Thom, appointed Britsh Consul at Ningpo (Ningbo) 寧波市 in 1843 formally opened Ningbo as a Treaty Port on January 1, 1844.
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