Chapter V

. It was decided in answer to the appeal of Rhenius that _John Christian Frederick Heyer_ should go to India as the first missionary of the General Synod. When it appeared probable that difficulties would arise on account of the connection with the inter-denominational American Board under whose direction Heyer was to go, he resigned, and in 1841 was sent by the Pennsylvania Synod which had withdrawn from the General Synod after the first meeting. The death of Rhenius and the return of his followers to the English mission made it possible for the Americans to select a wholly new field.

[Sidenote: The First American Lutheran Missionary.] In April, 1842, a hundred years after the arrival of Muhlenberg in America, Mr. Heyer became the first fruit of his missionary hopes. Heyer was of German birth and had come to America when he was fourteen years old. From 1817 till 1841 he had been a home missionary, laboring in difficult and widely divided fields in Pennsylvania and Maryland, Indiana and Kentucky, Illinois and Missouri. Travelling from settlement to settlement often amid the greatest hardships, he had established churches and Sunday schools.

[Sidenote: No Longer a Young Man.] When he accepted the call to India, he was almost fifty years old. A younger man might well have hesitated to meet the dangers of the sea, the menace of a foreign climate, the loneliness of exile. But Heyer knew neither fear nor hesitation. That he realized that dangers existed is shown by his own words: “I feel calm and cheerful, having taken this step after serious and prayerful consideration, and the approbation of the churches has encouraged me thus far. But I am aware that ere long, amidst a tribe of men whose language will be strange to me, I shall behold those smiles only in remembrance, and hear the voice of encouragement only in dying whispers across the ocean, and then nothing but the grace of God, nothing but a thorough conviction of being in the path of duty, nothing but the approving smile of Heaven can keep me from despondency.”

[Sidenote: Eager to Begin.] It was thought best that Mr. Heyer should begin his work in the Telugu country north of Madras. It was the beginning of the hot season when he arrived and he was advised to remain in Madras and commence the study of the language. But his impatient spirit would not let him rest. In spite of the intense heat, he travelled to Nellore and thence to Guntur, where, invited and welcomed by a godly Englishman, Henry Stokes, who was collector of the district and who had earnestly wished for a missionary, he made an end of his long journey. On the first Sunday of August 1842, he held a service with the aid of an interpreter. [Sidenote: Reinforcements.] At once, according to the sound method of the Lutheran missionary, he set about the establishing of schools. He began a school for beggars and another for a scarcely less despised class--Hindu girls. This was the first Hindu girls’ school. Within the first year he was able to report three adult baptisms. In two years two missionaries came to his aid, a German, the _Rev. L. P. Valett_ who came to start a mission of the North German Society at Rajahmundry and the _Rev. Walter Gunn_, who was sent out by the General Synod.

[Sidenote: A Visit Home.] In 1846 failing health compelled Father Heyer, as he is affectionately called, to return to America. Two years later he returned to Guntur, the visitation among the churches of the home land having been denied him. During the two years, however, he had studied medicine, in Baltimore, receiving his degree at the age of fifty-four.

[Sidenote: “Oh Grave, Where is thy Victory.”] In India he discovered that in his absence little new work had been accomplished on account of the feeble health of Mr. Gunn. Now, however, began a period of rapid advance. Father Heyer made missionary journeys into the Palnad district, and soon, encouraged by many conversions, he built in Gurzala, its chief town, a mission house, the money for which was furnished by Collector Stokes. Heyer’s courage is shown by an incident of his life in Gurzala. The climate of this section is deadly, and on reaching there Heyer had his grave and coffin prepared so that his body might be buried and not burned. But he did not contract the fever and when he left the field he burned the coffin and repeated at the grave the words of Saint Paul, “O grave, where is thy victory?”

In 1850 the mission station of the North German or Bremen Society at Rajahmundry was taken over.

[Sidenote: Back to the Home Mission Field.] In 1857 Father Heyer returned once more to America, not to rest but to devote twelve years to home mission work in the distant fields of Minnesota. In the meantime discord arose at home. The disruption brought about in all elements and institutions of American society by the Civil War had its sad effect upon the Church. Support and missionaries for the foreign work failed, and the Rajahmundry station was about to pass from the hands of its founders into those of the Church Missionary Society of England. Father Heyer was in Germany at the time, but hearing of the danger threatening his beloved work, he set sail for America, and appeared suddenly at the meeting of the Pennsylvania Ministerium at Reading to plead that the mission be retained. He would go to India at once, he said, and in August 1869 he turned his face for the third time across the sea. He remained in Rajahmundry a little over a year. Then handing over his work to a successor, the _Rev. H. C. Schmidt_, he returned to America where he died in November 1873.

[Sidenote: To India Once More.] Of him his biographer, the Rev. Dr. L. B. Wolf says: “He needs no eulogy. His work at home and abroad makes him the most cosmopolitan character of his time. He had a world-vision, and his soul was restless unless it was in touch with the whole world. He saw what few in his day were able to see, that the Church stands for one supreme work which must be performed in the whole world and for all men. He will live in his Church when men of his day of much larger influence and more commanding place shall have been forgotten, all because he permitted no bounds to be set to the sphere of his work, except those which he recognized as set by his Savior and Lord.”

[Sidenote: Other Laborers.] Beside Father Heyer there labored in the early days of the Lutheran mission the _Rev. Walter Gunn_, who died after seven years of devoted service; the _Rev. Christian William Grönning_, a missionary of the North German Society, who entered the service of the American Lutheran Church when Rajahmundry was transferred; the _Rev. A. F. Heise_, who was compelled by ill health to resign after eleven years of work; the _Rev. W. E. Snyder_, who died in 1859; the _Rev. W. I. Cutter_, who was compelled to return on account of the health of his wife after a short term; and the _Rev. A. Long_, who died of smallpox after eight years of faithful service.

[Sidenote: The Field Divided.] In 1869 the mission field in India was permanently divided, the Gunter station and the surrounding district becoming the charge of the General Synod, the Rajahmundry station becoming the charge of the General Council of which the Ministerium of Pennsylvania was now a part. Between the two missions there have been always the most cordial and helpful of relations. In spirit they have been one.

[Sidenote: At Work Alone.] We shall consider first the work of the _General Synod_. At the time of the division of the mission field the _Rev. E. Unangst_ was the only representative of the American Lutheran Church in India. For three years he had had no helper. He had seen since his arrival in 1858 seven missionaries die or depart; nevertheless his heart did not fail. For thirty-seven years he labored almost without interruption and happily participated not only in the sowing but in the reaping of the harvest.

[Sidenote: A Civil War Veteran.] The _Rev. Dr. J. H. Harpster_, a veteran of the Civil War, served his first term as a missionary from 1872 till 1876. Returning for a second term in 1893 he was nine years later allowed by the General Synod to assume temporary charge of the Rajahmundry mission, then passing through a period of confusion. In the service of the Rajahmundry mission he continued until his death. To him his fellow workers paid this tribute: “As a missionary he was indefatigable, as a preacher eloquent and inspiring. He labored in season and out to inculcate self-support. Altogether this was a man to love.” His work at Rajahmundry accomplished all that had been most hopefully expected, for in place of the discord and disorganization which he found he left peace and order and the promise of a great future.

[Sidenote: Almost Fifty Years of Service.] In 1873 the _Rev. Dr. L. L. Uhl_ was sent to Guntur, and there (in 1917) he is still laboring, vigorous, optimistic and in the words which Dr. Harpster applied to his own mental condition, “immensely content.” Laborers younger than he have fallen, a few have become discouraged, but Dr. Uhl is still at work.

[Sidenote: The Children’s Missionary.] In 1872, when a farewell meeting was held in Harrisburg for Dr. Uhl, there was in his audience _Adam D. Rowe_, who determined then to devote himself to missionary work. Conceiving the plan of collecting from the children of the Church the means for his support, he sailed for India. Worn out by his active labors, he died in 1882. Similarly there fell while at work, the _Rev. John Nichols_ and the _Rev. Samuel Kinsinger_.

A missionary who has been spared for many years of service is _Dr. Anna S. Kugler_, who went to India in 1883. Beginning in a humble way by caring for a few afflicted women, Dr. Kugler has stimulated and directed the founding of a large and finely equipped woman’s hospital. Capable, enthusiastic and deeply consecrated, she has been rewarded for years of unceasing labor by the realization of many of her hopes. The importance of Christian medical work is illustrated by an experience of Dr. Kugler. A neighboring rajah, various members of whose family had been cured in the hospital, expressed his gratitude not only by a large gift, but also by the making of a metrical translation of the Gospels into Telugu.

To-day the Guntur Mission has in its service thirty-nine missionaries and twelve Anglo-Indian assistants. In addition it has eight hundred and sixty-one native workers, who include Bible women, colporteurs and catechists. It has a baptized native membership of about fifty thousand. It possesses twenty-one church buildings and school buildings, one hundred and ninety-six schoolhouses and prayer houses, two hospitals, three dispensaries and two college and high school buildings. Its college is the only Lutheran college in India. Its last biennium has been extraordinarily blessed and unceasingly does it call like all other missionary enterprises for more workers, larger sums of money, and more fervent prayers.

[Sidenote: A Man of Practical Ability.] The record of the Mission of the _General Council_ is a brave one. When Father Heyer returned to Rajahmundry after his appeal to the Ministerium of Pennsylvania that the station be not given over to the Church of England, he was followed in a few months by the _Rev. F. J. Becker_, who had scarcely more than begun his preparation for active service when he died. In a few months his successor, the _Rev. H. C. Schmidt_, arrived, and subsequently the _Rev. Iver K. Poulsen_. For a short time, until the final return of Father Heyer to America, there were three missionaries on the field. Beside his fine service as a preacher and teacher, Doctor Schmidt is especially remembered for his wise care of the property of the mission. He is the third of a trio of workers in the Rajahmundry mission who have stood in the eyes of their Church above their fellow men, the others being Father Heyer and Doctor Harpster. At the time of Doctor Schmidt’s retirement, Doctor Harpster became the director of the mission. Of him we have given above a brief account.

[Illustration: MAIN STATION AT MUHLENBERG, LIBERIA, AFRICA.]

[Sidenote: A Sad Toll.] The Rev. Poulsen withdrew in 1888 after seventeen years of active service in the Rajahmundry mission, and, coming to the United States, died at the age of sixty-seven in the

## active pastorate. Within a few years two promising young men, _A. B.

Carlson_ and _H. G. B. Artman_, both trained in the Philadelphia Theological Seminary, arrived, took up the work which so urgently needed them and in a short time died. Two others, the _Rev. Franklin S. Dietrich_ and the _Rev. William Grönning_ also laid down their lives, the former after seven, the latter after four years of service. Grönning, a son of C. W. Grönning, was a brilliant scholar, an eloquent preacher and a trained musician. His parentage and his early training had bred in him a deep love for missions and his loss was irreparable.

Not the least heavy of the blows which the mission suffered was the death of the _Rev. F. W. Weiskotten_, who was sent to India to inspect and report on the affairs of the mission. Accompanying his daughter to the field, he died on the homeward journey and was buried at sea off the coast of France in December 1900.

To-day the Rajahmundry mission reports over twenty-four thousand members, about thirteen thousand of whom are communicants. Its missionaries number eighteen and the total number of all its workers is about five hundred and fifty. It owns valuable property and conducts a widely useful medical work.

The first money which was given toward the Rajahmundry hospital was contributed by the children in the surgical ward of the German Hospital in Philadelphia.

[Sidenote: A Touching Story.] The first medical missionary, Doctor Lydia Woerner, describes in an incident of her day’s work the misery of India and its great hope.

“Early one bright sunshiny morning, during the monsoon season, I came through a side street in our town, passing a long, high, gray wall. Above the wall I saw palm, banana, mangoe and tamarind trees, which almost hid the roofs of several houses.

“As I looked I noticed a little green door in the wall. When I asked my helpers about the place, they all knew it by the little green door, which they told me was always locked on the inside. It had several small holes through which the secluded women peeped without being seen. Our Bible woman had tried many times to gain entrance, but was told by voices from behind the little green door that her presence would pollute the place. One of the helpers suggested that we pray to God to open that little green door for us.

“A few nights later, during a terrific storm and a pouring rain, two native officials came with an urgent call to take me to the house of another official. I did not know him nor where he lived, but they told me his wife had been suffering intensely for several days, so my helper and I picked up the emergency bag and started off with them. On the way we were told that every native midwife available had tried to relieve the patient, but had failed. Large offerings had been made to the gods in their favorite temple. Even the river goddess had been implored to give help, by sacrifices thrown into her waters. As a last resort, they had come to seek help from the missionary doctor.

“We were drenched and stiff, as we crawled out of the oxcart. It was very dark. The streets were flooded, but a flash of lightning revealed to us that we were in front of the little green door--and _it was open_. Outside, under umbrellas and blankets, were groups of men--friends of the husband--who had come to sympathize with him because his wife was giving him so much trouble. The sympathy was all for the husband. Probably, after all the trouble his wife was making, she would give him only a girl child! Inside was bedlam! A crowd of women were shrieking and crying. Little fires had been placed in pots all over the veranda. Smoking censers were swinging at windows and doorways, to prevent the evil spirits from entering the house.

“The husband came to meet me with a lantern. He was much distressed, and besought me in beautiful English to grant him help in his great calamity. This was his third wife. The gods were against him. He had no _child_--only three daughters! Not one word of anxiety or sympathy did he have for his suffering wife.

“I saw her lying on an old cot, with a coarse bamboo mat and gunny bag for bedding. She was a beautiful young Brahman girl. The cot was on the outside veranda, exposed to wind and rain. The patient had already been

## partially prepared for death. She was covered with burns and bruises,

and was very weak, but she looked at me with her beautiful eyes, and implored me not to treat her as cruelly as the others had done. It was a weird scene, with the flickering little lamps, the beautiful ill-treated patient, and the curious faces of the women peering at us out of the darkness.

“Under great protest the relatives finally allowed the patient to be moved into a small veranda room. By and by things calmed down, and the people left for their homes. All was quiet, and the patient’s confidence and strength revived. At dawn we left a smiling young mother holding her newborn son in her arms, and a father proud and happy, because now he had a _child_, an heir to his large estate.

“The little green door opened to let us out. A little child had opened it, and never since that night has it been closed to us or to the Gospel message.”

The General Council conducts a mission in the City of Rangoon in Burma. The native catechist, who has been in charge of the work for three years, writes that he has won thirty souls for his Lord. He says further:

[Sidenote: The Letter of a Native Worker.] “Though the year has been a black one, full of trials, temptations, accidents and poisonous fevers and break of work on account of the present war, such as the world has never witnessed, yet God has brought us through safe and given us the victory. And when the time shall come for the strife and toil, the tumults and wars, the tears and groans of creation to end forever, then shall come the jubilee, the grand coronation song shall be sung by the resurrected redeemed hosts of the Lord, saying, ‘Thou art worthy to take the book and to open the seals thereof; for Thou wast slain and hast redeemed us to God by Thy blood out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation; and hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign on the earth.’”

In 1894 the _Missouri Lutheran Synod_ began work in India in the Salem district of the Madras Presidency, their first station being at Krishnagiri. There the pioneer missionary the _Rev. Th. Naether_ labored until his death in 1904. In 1907 the work was extended to Travancore. The mission has eleven chief stations and fourteen missionaries.

The women’s societies of this synod are very active, their contribution including not only money but large shipments of garments for the children in the mission schools. The medical work of the mission, the retreat for missionaries in the hills, and the school for missionaries’ children are supported entirely by the women’s societies.

_The Joint Synod of Ohio_ which had taken over before the war the Kodur and Puttur stations of the Hermannsburg mission has now agreed to support the entire mission.

The _Lutheran Synod of Iowa_ sends contributions to the work of the Leipsic Society.

The Danes and Norwegians in America support the Home Mission to the Santals. The Swedes are a part of the General Council and help to support her mission.

We owe to the Rev. George Drach the closing words of our Indian story.

“To-day there are no less than twelve different missions in various parts of India, supported and controlled by societies and boards of the Lutheran Church in Europe and America, numbering according to the census of 1911, a native Christian constituency of nearly two hundred and fifty thousand. To emphasize their unity in faith and to consult concerning the best method of mission work, as well as to plan for closer co-operation, delegates were sent by the various Lutheran missions to an All India Lutheran Conference at Rajahmundry, held December 31, 1911 to January 4, 1912. This was the second conference of this character, the first having been held at Guntur four years ago.

All told, eighty European and American and twelve Indian delegates came together at Rajahmundry in order to advance by the fostering of Christian fellowship among Lutheran brethren and by practically helpful deliberation, the cause of Christ in India. They represented the Leipsic, Missouri, Swedish and Danish missions of the Tamil country, the Hermannsburg, Breklum, American General Council and American General Synod Missions of the Telugu country, and the Gossner Mission of the North. The delegates came from the South of India where the breezes have not yet spent all the spicy fragrance of which, softly blowing, they robbed Ceylon’s isle; they came from the sun-scorched plains of Central India, where great rivers roll seaward in tepid sluggishness; they came from the far north where the vast, snowy reaches of the Himalayas abruptly bound the view. It was a joy to see them, young men still in the newness of the first years of missionary service, perhaps still studying the vernacular of their fields of work; men in the prime of life who had tested their strength upon the tasks God gave them to perform amid surrounding heathendom, and who had become wise in counsel and strong in achievement; older men whose whitening hair confirmed the story, told by their battle-worn faces, of decades of service against the forces of Satan, and who yet burned at heart with the zeal of young warriors. Moreover, there was not a department of woman’s work in missions that had not its goodly complement of women present at the conference.... Could any other Church, besides the Lutheran, have gathered together in one body such a unique, diversified yet united conference of Indian missionaries and Christians?... The conference marked an epoch in the work of Lutheran missions in India, which, united, strong and zealous, will not be content until they occupy advanced ground in the movement of the army of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

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