1895 - Hessie Newcombe

August 1, 1895

Gutian, Fujian

Hessie Newcombe.

Hessie Newcombe was one of the single women, along with Lucy Stewart and Elsie Marshall, who had not yet risen from bed when the Vegetarians staged their early morning attack. The violent mob

“…surrounded the house and watched them through the windows. They all gathered in Flora Stewart’s bedroom, and finding escape through the windows impossible, as the spear-men were guarding them, they quietly knelt in prayer, Miss Hessie Newcombe leading.”[1]

The men entered the room and carried off all the plunder they were able to. The women ran out of the door at the back of the house, only to find themselves surrounded by dozens of armed murderers. As the four frightened women huddled closely together,

“Miss Codrington called out to the others not to be afraid: ‘Sisters, never mind, we are all going Home together!’ Acting on the advice she gave the others, to fall at the first blow, and to lie still, in hope of being left for dead, she fell, terribly wounded in face and neck, arm and thigh. The other three who fell with her were Miss Elsie Marshall,—clinging to her Bible to the very end, though the hand with which she grasped it was nearly severed,—Miss Gordon, and Miss Stewart, whose deaths must have been instantaneous, and all but painless. Miss Hessie Newcombe had left the group, in her intense anxiety to get to Mrs. Stewart, and her body was found at the foot of a neighbouring embankment of earth.”[2]

Five days later at the large funeral service in Fuzhou, the inscription on Hessie Newcombe’s coffin read: “Miss Hessie Newcombe, whose leading characteristic had been spirituality of mind, and whose principal theme of conversation was the Lord’s return,—‘The Master is come, and calleth for thee.’”