1900 - The Widow Li

July 1900

The Widow Li

Beijing

Missionaries engaged in the defence of the British Legation in 1900.

Of all the stories emanating from the Boxer attacks in China, some of the most remarkable related to the survival of thousands of Christians holed up inside the various foreign legations and mission compounds throughout Beijing. With bloodthirsty Boxers and hate-filled soldiers joining forces in a bid to massacre as many Christians as possible, the fact that so many survived for weeks can only be described as miraculous.[I] Later, a group of Boxers were asked why they had not rushed the walls of the legations, but had strangely preferred to shoot from a distance. They replied, “We were so much afraid of the white figures which peopled the walls and roof, for the more we fired at them the more they multiplied.”[II]

One hero from these days was a widow named Li, who had been educated at the London Missionary Society School in Beijing. She had five children and a blind mother dependent on her. During the Boxer onslaught she was holed up inside the palace of Prince Su, along with at least 2,000 other refugees. It looked like the Japanese troops defending the palace could not hold out much longer. Just a wall separated the believers from those eager to butcher them. The Japanese Colonel Shiba needed to call for reinforcements, but had no way to get a message out for help. He offered one hundred taels as a reward for anyone willing to carry his letter out.

No men volunteered, as to leave the palace meant certain death at the hands of the Boxers who surrounded the facility on every side. Nevertheless, “Mrs. Li came forward and said, with a quiet, calm face, as if she were offering nothing remarkable, ‘It is better that one should die, rather than all these thousands perish. I will take your letter!’”[III] The widow Li was given detailed instructions where to go, and was dressed in beggar’s rags with the letter cleverly concealed in her clothing. She bravely left the palace and walked calmly through the line of soldiers and murderers, none of whom paid any attention to her. She successfully delivered the letter, and a great number of Christians were saved when a foreign army marched into Beijing and liberated them.

Widow Li, however, was unable to come back into the palace because in the haste to send her out they had forgotten to give her a paper allowing her to come back in afterwards! Not knowing what to do, Widow Li decided to return to her home, about six miles (10 km) away. The next day a neighbour betrayed her to the Boxers. Within minutes a brood of bloodthirsty men arrived at her home, and enthusiastically cut her into pieces. Among all the tributes in the aftermath of the successful defence, the contribution of this elderly widow was not forgotten. One reported noted,

“She was a large-hearted kindly woman, always ready to do anybody a good turn…. All the world has heard of Colonel Shiba’s heroic defence, and the brave part he played in warding off a general massacre. But the noble act of this lowly Christian woman is known to comparatively few. She was truly a follower of Jesus and in some small way she gave her life a ransom for many.”[IV]

I Numerous books and articles were written specifically about the experiences of the Beijing siege of 1900. Some of the better ones include Mateer, Siege Days; A. H. Tuttle, Mary Porter Gamewell and Her Story of the Siege in Peking (New York, 1907); Roland Allen, The Siege of the Peking Legations (London, 1901); Peter Fleming, The Siege at Peking: The Boxer Rebellion (New York: Harper, 1959); W. A. P. Martin, The Siege in Peking: China Against the World (New York, 1900); and Bishop A. Favier, The Heart of Pekin: Bishop A. Favier’s Diary of the Siege, May-August, 1900 (Edited by J. Freri, Boston, 1901).
II Bryson, Cross and Crown, 94.
III Bryson, Cross and Crown, 96.
IV Bryson, Cross and Crown, 97.