1898 - William Fleming

November 4, 1898

Qingping, Guizhou

William Fleming in Chinese dress.

Protestant missionaries first entered Guizhou Province in southern China in 1877, almost 300 years after the Catholic Church had arrived. The Catholics had suffered numerous martyrdoms before the first Protestant worker tasted death for the sake of the gospel in Guizhou.

In 1896 the China Inland Mission started to reach out to the many non-Chinese minority tribes living in the province. Mr. and Mrs. F. B. Webb were able to rent a house in an Hmu village near Panghai. The Chinese were bemused as to why a foreigner would choose to live among the Hmu, whom the Chinese considered lower than dogs. After gentle persuasion to make the missionaries leave failed, the leading Chinese official of Panghai resorted to force and threats, sending a mob of 150 men to try to intimidate Webb and his colleagues, saying, “If you don’t go away, we are going to beat you, pull down the house, and carry off your things.”[1] The missionaries refused to move.

The threat seemed to subside for a while until October 1898, when William S. Fleming arrived in Panghai to oversee the work for a few months while the resident missionaries had a period of rest on the coast. Fleming was a native of Broughty Ferry, near the Scottish town of Dundee. At the age of 17 he became a sailor, and travelled the seas for six years before his life changed dramatically while in Australia. He wrote home, telling his family that he had given his life to Jesus Christ, had left the navy, and was studying at Belair Lodge, Adelaide, with a view to becoming a missionary. After three years Fleming was accepted by the China Inland Mission and departed for the Orient in 1885.

With a local Christian, Pan Xiushan, acting as his interpreter, Fleming travelled widely among the Hmu villages for three weeks, preaching the gospel. While they were away from Panghai, the Hmu burned down 300 houses in the Chinese part of the village, in protest over which day of the week the market should be held on. The atmosphere was tense, so Fleming decided to make his way to Guiyang and wait for the trouble to blow over. He never made it.

On November 4, 1898, Fleming left for Guiyang accompanied by Pan Xiushan, an evangelist named Pan Xiyin, and a man hired to carry their luggage. After travelling about 15 miles (24 km) they stopped for lunch at Chong’anjiang village, in the Qingping District. They crossed the river on a hand-pulled raft, accompanied by three men, one of them with a long sword. These men had been appointed by the headman of Chong’anjiang to kill Fleming. As they stepped onto the bank on the other side of the river,

“the people of the town streamed out along a road on the town side of the river to see the devoted foreigner done to death…. Just as they reached the bend where the road began to lead up the hill, the man with the cavalry sword came behind the unsuspecting Pan Xiushan and struck him down, killing him almost instantly. He uttered a cry, and Mr. Fleming, turning around, saw what had happened…. Mr. Fleming struggled for some time with his assailants, but was finally done to death with many wounds.”[2]

The two other men, Pan Xiyin and the coolie, quickly fled up the hill and made their escape. The murderers pursued them for some time before giving up the chase. Several days later the evangelist reached Guiyang and reported how Fleming and Pan Xiushan had been killed. Two missionaries, with an official escort, immediately left to recover the bodies of the two slain Christians. They found them left unburied on the side of the road.

It was later revealed that Fleming and Pan’s deaths were planned because of a rumour going around that the missionaries were importing weapons and ammunition to help the Hmu tribesmen overthrow the Chinese. The burning of homes by the Hmu in Panghai had strengthened this belief. After the two innocent Christians were butchered, a crowd immediately attempted to find the evidence to support their claims, “but when they searched his luggage, and ransacked his house, they found no arms, nothing but good books; he was certainly a good man and it was a mistake to kill him.”[3]

Several of Fleming’s fellow missionaries paid tribute to him. One wrote, “Mr. Fleming was a very willing helper, truly zealous in his Master’s cause. In studies he was exceedingly persevering, and he always wore a smiling, happy face, and was respected by all. He has been counted worthy to suffer.”[4] William Fleming was the first ever martyr of the China Inland Mission. God had protected their many workers for 33 years since Hudson Taylor founded the mission.

1. Samuel R. Clarke, Among the Tribes in South-West China (London: Morgan & Scott, 1911), 144.
2. Clarke, Among the Tribes in South-West China, 156-157.
3. Clarke, Among the Tribes in South-West China, 159.
4. “Particulars of Mr. Fleming’s Death,” China’s Millions (February 1899), 22.