Following the events of the Boxer Uprising, several foreign missionaries living in China went on to collect and publish firsthand accounts of the massacres provided by both fellow missionaries and Chinese converts. While many of these accounts focused on the massacres of foreign missionaries at the hands of the Boxers, there were also a handful of accounts collected that focus on the martyrdom of Chinese converts. This study will look at the purposes of portraying Chinese Converts as Martyrs, specifically how these portrayals contributed to the optimism of the missionary movement in China in the wake of the Boxer Uprising. To support my claim, I will be looking at ways in which the authors of these memorials described Chinese converts compared to the descriptions of Boxers, looking specifically at descriptions of Yuxian, the governor of Shanxi during the Boxer Uprising. I will also be looking at the implications of martyrdom, and the impact of martyrdom and experience of martyrs and missionaries through memorialization of the Boxer Uprising. This analysis will provide a better understanding of how these memorials imposed Christian traditions and ideas on the retelling of events to advocate the vitality of the missionary movement.

Success of the Missionary Movement in China: Memorialization in the Wake of the Boxer Movement