China Mission by Audrey Ronning Topping

Author:Audrey Ronning Topping
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: LSU Press
Published: 2013-03-17T04:00:00+00:00

Mountain Retreat

The mission was expanding in all fields when the summer heat and humidity brought the dreaded illnesses on again. Typhoid fever, malaria, and cholera infested Fancheng. Evangelist Huang caught typhoid. He collapsed in a schoolroom and died three days later. Halvor was compelled to close the schools and place the mission under quarantine. Halvor to Nils: We shall miss Evangelist Huang terribly. He was the man that from a human point of view we could not afford to lose. He was the first adult baptized here and did fine work in the absence of the missionaries during the Boxer Rebellion.

Hannah was expecting another baby. The Ronnings and Himle took their families to their cool mountain retreat in Hai Shan, but there seemed to be no escape. On July 29, 1902, Hannah wrote her mother: One step between us and death. Last night was exceedingly warm and sultry yet Papa and the children managed to sleep but I could not find rest till about three o’clock when my good husband woke up and fanned me with a large palm leaf until I fell into a calm sweet sleep… About six, the Chinese workers arrived to continue work on our cellar. Himle joined them and noticed they had forgotten to place supporting pillars under the roof on which they had already piled all the tiles (we do not have shingles here, remember). Halvor, shouting “the roof will fall,” hurried into the cellar with some men to put up the pillars. They were too late. I was horrified to see the roof crash—the whole roof was down in a second—burying Halvor and the workers alive. Himle escaped because he was on top. I ran to the scene with the others to help. We dug frantically with anything we could find, praying all the while. You can imagine my relief when my dear husband miraculously emerged, covered with dirt but with a thankful smile on his face. He had been saved by the same beam he was putting up at the time. Others were not so fortunate. Two were killed and Dr. Himle is treating six others for injuries. It was no wonder that the twins, Hazel and Harold, were born three weeks early.

Halvor: September 13, 1902. This afternoon twins were born, a boy and a girl. Mother and twins doing fine. The other children are wild with joy, especially Almah, who finally has a sister. We named them Harold Gerhard and Hazel Marion. The twins grew strong on the milk of a Chinese wet nurse, but Hannah became weaker. They carried her down the mountain on a litter to the mission hospital, where Dr. Himle treated her for puerperal fever, an often fatal infection appearing after childbirth.

October 13. Hannah has been very sick. I took the four children to her bedside and we knelt in prayer. It seemed to me that the Lord must hear the small children. Hannah improved amazingly fast and was soon strong enough to resume her mission work. Halvor and the children were convinced that their prayers had been answered.

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