Ellison and Lottie Hildreth Papers

The Hildreth Papers provide valuable documentation of the work of the American Baptist South China mission, complementing the Foster Family Papers and Campbell Family Papers also located at YDSL. Ellison and Lottie Hildreth were well-educated and intelligent New Englanders whose experiences are representative of many American missionaries to China in the early part of this century.

Substantive correspondence with family members and fellow missionaries documents their striving to reach the mission field, their initial impressions of China, family life in China (including the death in infancy of their first two children), daily educational and evangelistic work. and the political unrest rampant in South China during their tenure. Extensive correspondence from Ellison to Lottie during the six years prior to their marriage deals primarily with events of daily life but provides glimpses of the difficulties encountered in coordinating family expectations with early plans to go to China. In letters from China to their parents, Ellison and Lottie give detailed descriptions of events and surroundings. In April of 1916. for example, Ellison wrote to his mother about the revolution taking place around them: "Swatow has gracefully gone to the rebels. The chief magistrate fled on board a Chinese warship and left the harbor. We hear that Chaoyang, Kityang, Unkung, Thenghai and Kaying have all sided with the rebels. That means that the power and the soldiers are all in the hands of the revolutionary party, and we can expect as good protection as we have had or better." (ESH to mother 1916 Apr 1 (Box 3, Folder 34))

During this period of unrest, Ellison and some fellow missionaries were involved in negotiations between warring factions. (A rubbing of the granite stone memorializing this involvement is in OVERSIZE material. Photograph and translation available in Box 11, Folder 148.)The intense anti-Christian movement in the mid 1920s is well documented. A letter from Ellison to William Ashmore and others dated 1925 Dec 28, for example, provides detailed description of anti-Christian demonstrations occurring at Christmas in Chaochaofu.

Substantive documentation of the situation in South China is also available following the Hildreths' final return to the U.S. in 1927 through letters of fellow missionaries, particularly those of Ben and Alice Baker, the Hildreth's American Baptist colleagues at Chaochaofu.

The Notes and Writings of Series II deal primarily with the China experiences of the Hildreths. Included are many notes for talks about China given after their return to the United States. Of particular interest among the writings about China collected by the Hildreths is a typescript document by Emanuel H. Giedt entitled "Early Mission History of the Swatow Region Brought Down to the Present for the American Baptist Mission" (1946).

The Personal Items and Memorabilia of Series III shed light on the context of the Hildreths' China years. Family background is provided through newspaper clippings and an autobiographical sketch of Ellison's early years. A notebook-diary from the China years details daily events. A few written musings of Lottie provide insight into her personal feelings and beliefs. Photographs of the Hildreths' surroundings and colleagues in China are well identified.