In this series
Hudson Taylor
1807 Englishman Robert Morrison, first Protestant missionary to China at Canton
1830 Elijah Coleman Bridgman, first American missionary to China, arrives at Canton
1832 May 21: Hudson Taylor born
1840’s Karl Gรtzlaff works in China
1843-1860 American and British Methodists, Presbyterians, Baptists, and Episcopalians send missionaries to China treaty ports
1850 Taylor declares China hopes
1853 September: Taylor departs for China
1854 March: Taylor lands at Shanghai; December: first inland journey
1857 Taylor proposes to Maria Dyer; resigns from Chinese Evangelization Society; Ningpo mission started
1858 Taylor and Maria marry
1861 An exhausted Taylor and his family depart for rest in England
1862 Taylor qualifies as midwife
1865 Taylor resolves to lead China Inland Mission (cim); writes China: Its Spiritual Need and Claims
1866 Lammermuir sails with Taylor, his family, and 16 cim missionaries
1868 Lewis Nicol dismissed from CIM; anti-foreign riot in Yangchow injures several missionaries
1869 House of Lords debates value of missions to China
1870 Maria Taylor dies
1871 Taylor marries Jennie Faulding
1875 Taylor appeals for 18 pioneers to go to nine interior provinces; April: recovers from paralysis; July: China’s Millions Vol. 1, No. 1, published
1876-1880 18 CIM missionaries penetrate nine interior provinces
1885 “Cambridge Seven” depart for China
1886 Taylor appeals for 100 new missionaries
1887 CIM committees in London and China clash over control of the mission; 100 new missionaries accepted
1900 Boxer Rebellion-58 cim missionaries and 21 children among those murdered; Taylor in Switzerland recuperating from illness
1903 D. E. Hoste appointed general director of cim upon Taylor’s retirement
1904 Jennie Faulding dies
1905 Hudson Taylor dies; abolition of old examination system opens way for mission schools
1910 World Missionary Conference, Edinburgh
1926-27 Nearly all 8,000 Protestant missionaries flee during chaos of Northern Expedition
1934 CIM missionaries John and Betty Stam executed
1941-1946 Most missionaries interred or evacuated but return to China after WWII
1951-52 Wholesale evacuation of missionaries; last of CIM leaves July 20, 1953
Other China Events
1839-42 First Opium War ends with Treaty of Nanking: five treaty ports open to foreigners; Hong Kong ceded to British
1851-1864 Taiping Rebellion
1858-1860 Tientsin and Peking treaties end Opium Wars: more rights granted to foreigners, including right to travel anywhere inland
1877-78 Worst of the great Shantung-Shansi famine
1883-85 War with France over Annam (Vietnam)
1894-95 Sino-Japanese War: China loses Taiwan to Japan and Korea to independence
1897-98 Various provinces ceded to Britain, France, Germany, and Russia
1898 Failure of radical reform
1900 Boxer Rebellion
1911-1912 Revolution; Republic of China established; Kuomintang Party (KMT) inaugurated
1919 May 4th Student Movement
1921 Chinese Communist Party (CCP) founded
1926-1927 Chiang Kai-shek launches Northern Expedition to unite China under KMT, and purges CCP from its ranks
1934 Long March: CCP forces under Mao Tse-tung retreat from KMT
1937 Open war with Japan begins; KMT and CCP fight Japan together
1946 KMT and CCP resume civil war
1949 October: People’s Democratic Republic of China declared
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