Timothy Richard

Who was Timothy Richard?

Timothy Richard was a Welsh Baptist missionary to China, who influenced the modernisation of China and the rise of the Chinese Republic.

Richard was born on 10 October 1845 in Camarthenshire in south Wales, the son of Timothy and Eleanor Richard, a devout Baptist farming family. Inspired by the Second Evangelical Awakening to become a missionary, Richard left teaching to enter Haverfordwest Theological College in 1865. There he dedicated himself to China, where he had an active role in relief operations during the Northern Chinese Famine of 1876–1879, and was instrumental in promoting anti-foot binding and sexual equality in China.

Richard applied to the newly formed China Inland Mission, but Hudson Taylor considered that he would be of better service to the denominational Baptist missions. In 1869 the Baptist Missionary Society accepted Richard's application, and assigned him to Yantai, Shandong Province.

In 1897 Richard undertook a journey to India to discover the conditions of the Christian mission there. Travelling with a young missionary, Arthur Gostick Shorrock, they visited Sri Lanka, Madras, Agra, Benares, Delhi, Kolkata and finally Bombay.