Everything about John Robert Morrison totally explained
John Robert Morrison (
Chinese: 馬儒翰;
April 17,
1814 -
August 29,
1843) was the second son from
Robert Morrison's first marriage with
Mary Morton. He was a translator, diplomat and missionary in China and the Far East, most closely associated with
Canton City and
Hong Kong. John Morrison participated in the negotiation of the
Treaty of Nanking and was appointed the first
Colonial Secretary of Hong Kong.
Early life
The year following his birth, on January 21, 1815 John Morrison was taken by his mother, along with his elder sister, aboard a ship bound for England.
They returned to Macau on August 23, 1820, but in less than two years his mother died and he was sent back to England to receive his education. During the next four years he lived near London.
When his father left for China on May 1, 1826, he took John with him. He learned the
Chinese language from his father, and attended the
Anglo-Chinese College in
Malacca in
1827 -
1830.
Career in China
He had been a translator for English merchants in the Canton City,
China from 1830. In 1832, he accompanied
Edmund Roberts, a merchant and diplomat of
United States of America, to
Siam and
Cochin China and establisted trade treaties. He compiled the Chinese Commercial Guide, which provided information on British trader in China.
John Morrison succeeded his father in 1834 and was appointed
Chinese Secretary to the
British East India Company on behalf of British government. He then involved in the diplomacy amist the
opium wars from
1839 -
1842. In the negotiations, the
Treaty of Nanking was formed.
The
Government of Hongkong formed after the treaty and he became a member of the
Legislative Council and
Executive Council, and the first
Colonial Secretary of the government under Sir
Henry Pottinger.
Missionary Work
Apart from official duties, John Morrison continued his father's work of the English Protestant Church in Canton and supported those Chinese converts persecuted by the Chinese authorities. He revised his father's translation of the Bible and appealed to the
London Missionary Society to continue the missionary work in Canton. In February 1838 he was made Recording Secretary of the
Medical Missionary Society.
Translation of the Bible
In 1840, a group of four people (
Walter Henry Medhurst,
Charles Gutzlaff,
Elijah Coleman Bridgman, and John Robert Morrison) cooperated to translate the Bible into
Chinese. The translation of the Hebrew part was done mostly by Gutzlaff from the
Netherlands Missionary Society, with the exception that the Pentateuch and the book of Joshua were done by the group collectively.
This translation, completed in 1847, after John Robert's death is very famous due to its adoption by the revolutionary peasant leader
Hong Xiuquan of the Taipingtianguo movement (
Taiping Rebellion) as some of the reputed early doctrines of the organization. This Bible translation was a version (in
High Wen-li,
Traditional Chinese: 深文理) marvelously correct and faithful to the original.
Death & Memorial
John Robert Morrison died young in the late summer of 1843 from a nine day episode of
malarial fever. This was the same outbreak in Hong Kong that took the life of fellow missionary
Samuel Dyer. He is buried in the
Old Protestant Cemetery in Macau, close to the grave of this father.
Works authored
- Some Account of Charms, Talismans, and Felicitous Appendages worn about the person, or hung up in houses, &c. used by the Chinese. London. 1833
- Companion to the Anglo-Chinese calendar. 1832.
- A Chinese Commercial Guide, consisting of a collection of details respecting foreign trade in China. Canton. 1834
Further Information
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