1900 - Emma Hurn

August 30, 1900

Xi Xian, Shanxi

Emma Hurn.

The sixth foreigner pitilessly slaughtered at Xi Xian by the Boxers was the gentle and unassuming Emma Georgiana Hurn, known to her friends as ‘Georgie.’ Born at Peckham Rye, England, on July 6, 1868, Emma experienced a second birth when she put her trust in Jesus Christ in 1890, at the age of 22. After graduating from college she entered the business world, something much more rare for women to do at the time than today. After coming to Christ she continued in her profession, but she inwardly longed for the day when she could serve Christ in a more direct capacity as a nurse or missionary.

Emma was a quiet girl. Her sister later wrote that despite her natural shyness, “her influence and power amongst those she came in contact with in business was wonderful. I think the one great point with her was, never to say ‘No’ to anything her Master wished her to do.”[1] The Holy Spirit gradually revealed his will for Emma’s life. In 1896 she entered Doric Lodge for training, which culminated in her being accepted for service with the China Inland Mission. Hurn arrived in Shanxi Province in March 1898, and was stationed at the town of Xi Xian in the mountainous western part of the province. In a letter home, dated November 3, 1898, she wrote:

“God has given me health and strength and helped me in the study of this difficult language. I am just now able to understand a little of what these dear people say, but I do long to be able to speak freely with them…so please pray I may never lose an opportunity of witnessing for my Master who has done so much for me.”[2]

For many weeks rumours abounded that the Boxers were coming to Xi Xian to kill all the missionaries. On July 10th Hurn wrote, “Heard that the Boxers had begun to practise. Things look dark.”[3] On July 21st the missionaries decided there was no point remaining in the town and they fled into the mountains where they hid in caves, delaying the inevitable. Four days later Emma Hurn wrote her final letter home:

“We are escaping for our lives…. The place we have come into to-day is a very secluded spot, where we hope to remain till all is over. If the ‘Boxers come to the hills in search of us, they may find us: but we are in the Lord’s hands to do with us as He seemeth best. One feels, for some things, that it would be nicer to be taken, and be with so many who have laid down their lives: but, for the dear ones who may read this, and for the sake of the many heathen who are still without Christ, one would like to stay for further service. The Lord is keeping one’s heart in perfect peace, during this time of trial.”[4]

At the end of August 1900 the spiteful Boxers discovered and massacred 32-year-old Emma Hurn along with Edith Dobson and four members of the Peat family. At the funeral service held in September the following year, local officials delivered a touching elegy in honour of those who died at Xi Xian. In part they said:

“Pastors Kay, Peat, and these two ladies [Dobson and Hurn]

Were wise and cultured, meek and merciful.

They all, on arriving at maturity were sent by the Lord

To continue the work of preaching the Gospel, and saving multitudes of men.

All these Pastors and their wives, these Evangelists, and two Lady Evangelists

Were worthy to be called perfect in goodness.

They had the answer of a good conscience,

And in the sight of Heaven they were without reproach.

The ‘Boxers’—reckless and oppressive—

Unjustly wounded and killed them….

How fitting that these whom men and gods loved

Should have had long life and happiness!

That all blessings should have settled on them,

That life without limit should have been theirs!

Alas! alack! we prostrate ourselves.

Would that they could descend and behold!”[5]

1. Broomhall, Martyred Missionaries of the China Inland Mission, 50.
2. Broomhall, Martyred Missionaries of the China Inland Mission, 50-51.
3. “The Pocket Text-Book of a Missionary Martyr,” China’s Millions (May 1901), 82.
4. “The Pocket Text-Book of a Missionary Martyr,” 82.
5. “Chinese Elegies on Missionary Martyrs,” China’s Millions (May 1902), 67.