Department of Finance. China Mission Records

MP-02-R0135

The Archives of the Episcopal Church

Fonds

Department of Finance. China Mission Records

• 1941-1951 (Creation)

.7 cu.ft. (2 boxes)

Communication with the China mission field, at least for the period 1941-1951, was handled by James E. Whitney, who served as an assistant treasurer from approximately 1936 to 1956. Whitney’s counterpart for the Church in China was Arthur Jones Allen, who also assumed responsibility for the treasurership of other missions and branches of missions. Allen served as the chief, if not the only, institutional contact The Episcopal Church had in China, and through him the Church, distributed money to the missionaries in China. He carried this monumental load from 1942 to 1946. After a furlough spent in the United States, Allen returned to China in 1947 first in the treasurer's office Shanghai and later to Hankow as the treasurer of the Diocese of O-Hsiang in 1949. The Communist takeover of China in 1949 began the long ordeal of removing Episcopal missionaries from China that lasted until August of 1951. Allen was among the last missionaries to leave China. Badly weakened by this experience, he never fully recovered. Mr. Allen died in 1954.

Mostly correspondence and some financial records make up this set of records, which dates from 1941 to 1951, excluding the period from January of 1947 through November of 1948. They capture an important record of the activities of the Episcopal Church in China during World War II and during the last days of its work in the early 1950s. The correspondence contains far more than a record of financial transactions, since Allen wrote detailed letters recording the events taking place in China. There is some correspondence with the Bank of China, 1941-1944.

The record group is arranged in the order that the records were received, and contains the single series of Correspondence.

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• English

Overseas Department. China Missionary Personnel Records

• World mission

• Yunnan, China
• Shanghai, China

• Allen, Arthur J. (Subject)