The Wolfe Sisters of Foochow, China

Abstract

In the late nineteenth century after schooling in England, three sisters returned to their birthplace, Fuzhou, China to become CMS missionaries. They were the daughters of the “Fukien Moses,” Archdeacon J. R. Wolfe and his wife Mary, and cousins of the author’s maternal grandfather. Letters written by Minnie, Annie and Amy Wolfe to CMS Headquarters in London, for the first time, tell the story of the scope and nature of their interaction with Chinese women and girls in a significant cultural exchange. This particularly occurred through CMS schools, which, using Fujian dialects, provided grounding in Christianity, reading and writing. In addition, the sisters acknowledge their personal dependence upon, and valuing of Chinese Christian women with whom they worked. Born to evangelise, Annie once wrote “In spite of anxieties and disappointments this is the happiest work anyone could wish for.”