Modern Asian Studies http://journals.cambridge.org/ASS Additional services for Modern Asian Studies: Email alerts: Click here Subscriptions: Click here Commercial reprints: Click here Terms of use : Click here A Neglected Story: Christian missionaries, Chinese New Villagers, and Communists in the Battle for the ‘hearts and minds’ in Malaya, 1948– 1960 LEE KAM HING Modern Asian Studies / Volume 47 / Issue 06 / November 2013, pp 1977 - 2006 DOI: 10.1017/S0026749X12000741, Published online: 22 April 2013 Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0026749X12000741 How to cite this article: LEE KAM HING (2013). A Neglected Story: Christian missionaries, Chinese New Villagers, and Communists in the Battle for the ‘hearts and minds’ in Malaya, 1948–1960. Modern Asian Studies, 47, pp 1977-2006 doi:10.1017/ S0026749X12000741 Request Permissions : Click here Downloaded from http://journals.cambridge.org/ASS, IP address: 175.140.90.215 on 21 Aug 2014
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Modern Asian Studieshttp://journals.cambridge.org/ASS
Additional services for Modern Asian Studies:
Email alerts: Click hereSubscriptions: Click hereCommercial reprints: Click hereTerms of use : Click here
A Neglected Story: Christian missionaries,Chinese New Villagers, and Communists in theBattle for the ‘hearts and minds’ in Malaya, 1948–1960
LEE KAM HING
Modern Asian Studies / Volume 47 / Issue 06 / November 2013, pp 1977 - 2006DOI: 10.1017/S0026749X12000741, Published online: 22 April 2013
Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0026749X12000741
How to cite this article:LEE KAM HING (2013). A Neglected Story: Christian missionaries, Chinese NewVillagers, and Communists in the Battle for the ‘hearts and minds’ in Malaya,1948–1960. Modern Asian Studies, 47, pp 1977-2006 doi:10.1017/S0026749X12000741
Request Permissions : Click here
Downloaded from http://journals.cambridge.org/ASS, IP address: 175.140.90.215 on 21 Aug 2014
During the Malayan Emergency (1948–1960), the colonial authorities resettledan estimated half a million rural dwellers, mainly Chinese, from the fringe ofthe jungle, to cut them off from contact with armed members of the MalayanCommunist Party. The re-location led to political alienation among manyresettled in the nearly 500 New Villages. Winning their support against theinsurgency therefore was urgent. At this juncture, foreign missionaries wereforced to leave China following the communist takeover in October 1949. Many ofthese missionaries were Chinese-speaking with medical or teaching experience.The High Commissioner of Malaya, Sir Henry Gurney, and his successor, SirGerald Templer, invited these and other missionaries to serve in the New Villages.This paper looks at colonial initiatives and mission response amidst the dynamicsof domestic politics and a changing international balance of power in the region.
Introduction
After resettling nearly 500,000 squatters in a strategic move againsta communist-led insurgency that broke out in 1948, the Malayanauthorities then enlisted hundreds of overseas Christian missionariesto serve in the new villages they created. It was an enterprise ofconsiderable significance in the war against the insurgents as wellas on the Church’s overall evangelical efforts. Over 400 missionariesfrom more than a dozen mission boards came during the Emergencyperiod to serve an estimated 333 New Villages accessible to them.Never before or since then has the government in Malaya (Malaysia)
1977
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funded, partially at least, so many missionaries to serve in the country.The missionaries opened up the mission field by providing medical,education, and other welfare programmes to an estimated one-thirdof the Chinese in the country or 10 per cent of the total population.It laid the foundation for greater local Christian participation and amore vigorous Chinese Church in the rural expanse of Malaya.
This paper, in examining colonial initiatives, mission response,Malay reaction, and the work and impact of missionaries in the NewVillages, discusses a subject that has been largely neglected in thelarger studies of this period. This neglect could be explained byscholars’ preoccupation with the military aspects of the Emergencyand hence they missed the missionaries’ important role in the socialwelfare area. It was Anthony Short in his study, The CommunistInsurrection in Malaya, who briefly drew attention to the efforts ofmissionaries in the New Villages. Short wrote of the missionary effortsin New Villages:
Most of them specified in their reports that their work was evangelistic aswell as medical or educational and although this may possibly be consideredan ulterior motive it is hard to avoid the conclusion that without the work ofthese voluntary associations the New Villages would have rotted away.1
Richard Stubbs’ study on the ‘battle for hearts and mind’ brieflymentioned an ex-China missionary successfully bringing ‘a small butsteady stream of missionary workers’.2 But the stream of missionaryworkers, as this study shows, was not small. John Cloakes’ biographyof Sir Gerald Templer did not dwell at length on the general’s roleeven though, as High Commissioner, Templer had encouraged largenumbers of missionaries into Malaya. Cloake wrote of the initialdifficulties of recruiting missionaries and of Templer having personallyto appeal to the Vatican, the Conference of Missionary Societies, andthe Methodist Church in the United States. Likewise, on the otherside, Chin Peng, the leader of the Malayan Communist Party, madeno mention of missionaries in his memoirs or in the dialogue he hadwith C. C. Chin and Karl Hack either because he knew little of it or
1 Anthony Short, The communist insurrection in Malaya, Frederick Muller Ltd, London,1975, p. 400.
2 Richard Stubbs, Hearts and Minds in Guerilla Warfare: The Malayan Emergency, 1948–1960, Oxford University Press, Singapore, 1989, p. 161; Heng Pek Koon, Chinesepolitics in Malaysia: History of the Malaysian Chinese Association, Oxford University Press,Singapore, 1988, pp. 79–80, 101–104.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1979
he did not consider them important.3 On the New Villages, Chin Pengacknowledged that the resettlement had disrupted the Party’s overallstrategy.4 It is only recently that Tim Harper drew the missionaries’role closer to the centre of the Emergency discourse when he describedthe resettlement as the greatest developmental project of any colonialstate in his book, The End of Empire and the making of Malaya.5
Mention must be made of several published accounts by missionarieswho had served in the New Villages and who wrote of their experiencesand their work. Most of these publications, however, focused onevangelical and social efforts. These include G. D. James, a Malaysianevangelist as well as China Inland Mission missionaries such asKathleen Carpenter, Dorothy MacIntosh and Alan Cole.6 Morescholarly efforts among these are works by Ray Nyce, a Lutheranmissionary and a sociologist, who worked among the Chinese in thenew settlements and George Hood who was with the Presbyterianchurch in Singapore during the Emergency period. Nyce described theChurch as an emerging part of New Village community life whilstHood set the deployment of missionaries against the context of thewithdrawal of Christian missions from China.
The narrative of the Emergency in Malaya shows how mission andsecular history have overlooked the complexities of the intersectionof missions and empire because each approach is primarily interestedin its respective concerns. Yet Andrew Porter, in his study Religionversus Empire, has reminded us that there is a connectedness of missionenterprises, colonial expansion, and emerging local consciousness andthis needs to be recognized and re-interpreted afresh.7 This maynot be easy but it is particularly important in a study of Malaysia,a Muslim-majority nation where Christians form 9.2 per cent of a28.3 million-strong population, and where the Christian Church has
3 Chin Peng, My side of history,Singapore: Media Masters Ltd, 2003, pp. 268–272.4 C. C. Chin and Karl Hack (eds), Dialogues with Chin Peng: New light on the Malayan
Communist Party, Singapore, Singapore University Press, 2004, pp. 153–155.5 T. N. Harper, The end of empire and the making of Malaya, Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press, 1999, p. 8.6 Kathleen Carpenter, The Password is Love: In the New Villages of Malaya, London,
Highway Press 1955; R. Alan Cole, Emerging Pattern: CIM work within the Diocese ofSingapore and Malaya. London, China Inland Mission, 1961; G. D. James, MissionaryTours in Malaya, Malaya Evangelistic Fellowship, Singapore, 1962; Amy McIntosh,Journey into Malaya, London, China Inland Mission, 1956.
7 Andrew Porter, Religion verses empire: British Protestant missionaries and overseasexpansion, 1700–1914, Manchester and New York, Manchester University Press, 2004,p. 4.
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been an integral part of education and nation-building through muchof its modern history.
This paper, drawing upon archival records including missionarysources, deals with an episode when colonial interest intersected withChristian mission in Malaya as the state turned to the Christianmissionaries to counter communist influence in the New Villages.Such connectedness is not new as the colonial government had alwaysrelied on Christian missions’ educational and welfare programmes toensure social improvement and stability. Still, colonial governmentswere always vigilant towards activities of missionaries, less overzealousevangelism could provoke hostile reaction from indigenous non-Christian communities. The British in Malaya were careful about localsensitivities towards the Christian mission and this was expressed inthe 1874 treaty with Malay rulers which had provisions safeguardingthe position of Islam and Malay culture.8 There existed, therefore,an ambiguity in relations between the colonial state and Christianmissions.
The Emergency and the creation of New Villages
In June 1948, the Malayan government declared a state of emergencythroughout the country following the killing of three British planters inPerak by members of the Malayan Communist Party. The Party whichhad fought the Japanese during the war with the support of Alliedforces had sought, unsuccessfully, a political role in post-war Malaya.Following the emergency declaration, three to four thousand armedMalayan Communist Party members, mainly Chinese, went into thejungle. The insurgents targeted rubber estates and tin mines forattacks, hoping to paralyze the economy and through this to defeat theBritish. The communists also laid ambushes along roads and railways.In 1948 alone 315 civilians and 149 security personnel were killed. In1949, 334 civilians and 229 security personnel died. And up to 1952there were 100 European civilians killed, of whom 82 were planters.
8 John Roxborogh, ‘Christianity in Southeast Asia’, in Hugh McLeod (ed.), WorldChristianities, Cambridge History of Christianity, vol. 9, Cambridge, CambridgeUniversity Press, 2006, pp. 436–449; John Gascoigne, ‘Introduction: Religion andEmpire, an Historiographical Perspective’, Journal of Religious History, Vol. 32, No. 2,June 2008, pp. 159–178; Andrew Porter, ‘Evangelical visions and Colonial Realities’,The Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, Vol. 38, No. 1, March 2010, pp. 145–155.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1981
This figure represented almost six per cent of the total number ofEuropean planters in the country. On the Malayan Communist Partyside, 374 were killed in 1948 and 619 in 1949.9
During the Emergency, many Chinese in rural areas were suspectedof supplying food and information to the communists, either outof sympathy or because of intimidation. In June 1950, GeneralHarold Briggs, the new Director of Operations in the war againstthe communists, forcibly resettled thousands of rural squatters andplaced them behind protective fences in New Villages to cut themoff from contact with the insurgents. Over a period of time, around500,000 rural Chinese squatters were re-located to nearly 500 NewVillages.10 There was great resentment among the villagers as manylost their homes and others saw their rubber or vegetable plotsthey had been working for years destroyed. Even though they weregiven new land, the villagers had to start all over again on smallerplots. They were placed in a new environment where social amenitieswere lacking. Consequently, even where villagers were not supportersor sympathizers of the Malayan Communist Party, they becamepolitically alienated from the authorities. Furthermore, intelligencereports claimed that insurgents had infiltrated into many of theresettled areas. Criminal elements of secret societies had also movedin to take advantage of weak law enforcement. With the war againstthe communists not progressing well, the colonial government soonbecame anxious over the situation in the New Villages (see Table 1).11
Some welfare projects were undertaken by the government toimprove conditions in the New Villages but much of the efforts wereleft to volunteer organizations. The most important of these was theMalayan Chinese Association formed in 1949 and which saw the NewVillages as an important political constituency. But the Association’sefforts were hampered by the lack of trained personnel and it wasdependent on running a lottery, which was withdrawn in 1953, forfunds. Its efforts were also seen as politically-driven and Association
9 Richard Stubbs estimated that there were 1,500 European planters in Malayaduring the Emergency period. R. Stubbs, Hearts and Minds in Guerrilla Warfare, p. 85;A. Short, The Communist Insurrection, p. 507.
10 Report of committee appointed by His Excellency the High Commissioner to investigate thesquatter problem, Council paper no. 3 of 1949, Kuala Lumpur, Government Printers;The squatter problem in the Federation of Malaya in 1950, Council paper no.14 of 1950,Kuala Lumpur, Government Printer.
11 Anthony Short, The communist insurrection in Malaya, pp. 173–205, 231–253.
A: Supposedly permanent.B: Intermediate.C: Supposedly impermanent and likely to disappear with theEmergency.Source: A general survey of New Villages Report to His Excellency Sir DonaldMacgillivray, 1954. Ref: 2006/007909, National Archives, KualaLumpur.
members in the New Villages and other rural regions were targetedfor assassination by insurgents.12
At this point, the departure of several thousand Christianmissionaries from China gave Sir Henry Gurney, the HighCommissioner, the idea of where he could source for help in this‘battle of the hearts and minds’ of the resettled villagers. In October1949 the Chinese Communist Party gained power in China andWestern Christian missionaries were forced to leave the country.13
The new regime allowed some missionaries to stay on until 1952 andby November of that year, an estimated 3,500 foreign missionaries hadleft the country.14 The new Beijing government wanted the Church,both Catholic and Protestant, to be led by the Chinese themselves.15
12 G. Means, Malayan Politics, University of London Press, London, 1970, p. 121;Heng Pek Koon, Chinese politics in Malaysia, pp. 109–113.
13 Frank T. Cartwright, ‘Protestant missions in Communist China’, Far EasternSurvey, vol. 18, no. 26, 28 December 28, 1949, pp. 301–305; Nancy B. Tucker, ‘Anunlikely peace: American missionaries and the Chinese Communists, 1948–1950’,Pacific Historical Review, vol. 45, no.1, February 1976, pp. 97–116.
14 Creighton Lacy, ‘The Missionary exodus from China’, Pacific Affairs, vol. 28, no.4, December 1955, pp. 301–314.
15 Daniel H. Bays, ‘From Foreign Mission to Chinese Church’, Christian Historyand Biography, no. 98, Spring 2008, pp. 6–13; Joseph R. Levenson, ‘The changing
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1983
On learning about the evacuation of Christian missionaries fromChina, the colonial government in Kuala Lumpur wrote in August1950 to the Conference of Missionaries Societies in Great Britain.Then later that year when Sir Henry visited London on official businesshe offered to talk to mission societies.16
The recruitment move was unprecedented. The colonial authoritiespreviously only gave assistance known as grants-in-aid to teachers inmissionary schools. But now the government recruited and partiallypaid missionaries for welfare work in the New Villages and permittedthem to evangelize. Sir Henry believed that the expelled missionarieswith their years of long service in China and possession of language andmedical skills could bring welfare improvements to the New Villages.He likened one missionary as equivalent to a brigade of troops in thissocial offensive against the communists.17
Sir Gerald Templer, succeeding Gurney who was assassinated in acommunist ambush, personally pushed for the recruitment of formerChina missionaries. He wrote directly to mission boards as well ascalling on contacts to ask for missionaries from reluctant institutionsincluding the Vatican. His forceful personality prevailed over thosewho had doubts about the programme. To him these missionaries,because of their China experience, were familiar with a politicalideology that the colonial authorities were then battling in the NewVillages. Some British officials were even keen to place these ex-Chinamissionaries as Resettlement Officers. In fact, a few were taken intogovernment service. Templer set up and attended the first meeting ofthe committee to coordinate the New Village welfare programmes.
Nevertheless within official circles, some officials warned ofMuslim sensitivities to the government’s recruitment of Christianmissionaries. The arrival of Western missionaries from China andpossibly Chinese Christians could cause unease among the Malays whoheld various fears—of expanding Christian influence, the continuingcommunist threat, and the demographic implications with possibleentry of Chinese Christians.
character of Chinese opposition to Christianity’, in Jessie G. Lutz, (ed.), Christianmissions in China: Evangelists of what?, Boston, D. C. Heath and Company, 1966, pp.90–94.
16 ‘Recruitment of Chinese-speaking officers for Malaya: Extract from LordMunster’s [Under Secretary of State for the Colonies] Brief for House of Lord’sDebate, 27 February 1952’, Colonial Office 717/209/4, henceforth referred to as CO.National Archives, London.
17 Sir Henry Gurney to Higham, Colonial Office, 13 March 1951, CO 537/7270.
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There was also the international relations dimension. Some colonialofficials were unsure how the new Chinese authorities in Beijing mightreact to the deployment of ex-China missionaries in programmes inMalaya against the Malayan Communist Party which had fraternallinks with the Chinese Communist Party. The recruitment of themissionaries took place at what was probably a most tricky point inSino-British relations. Here was Malaya engaged in a war against theMalayan Communist Party whilst in China, the Communist Party hadgained power and London had just recognized the new government.In the meantime, as claimed by the colonial government in KualaLumpur, China was supporting the Malayan armed communists.18
Discussions to recruit ex-China missionaries involved the highestofficial levels. The initiatives came from the High Commissioner’soffice.19 These were supported by senior civil and military officers inthe Federation of Malaya government, including the Chief Secretaryto the government. Templer kept the British Prime Minister, SirWinston Churchill, the Foreign Office in London, the Secretary ofState for the Colonies, and the Commissioner-general for SoutheastAsia, Malcolm MacDonald, regularly informed of progress on themissionary project.20 The Foreign Office of the United Kingdom tookthe responsibility of communicating with the Holy See in Rome.Also involved in the discussions, largely through correspondence,were the governors of Hong Kong, Sarawak, Singapore, and NorthBorneo.
Templer, in his review to Malcolm MacDonald of the recruitmentscheme, on 21 April 1953, explained that under the programme,the Malayan Government would pay recruited missionaries half thesalary and allowances that serving public servants with equivalentqualifications and experience were then entitled to. However, thegovernment would not provide air fares and other travel expenses.Missionaries were recruited primarily to serve in the medical,educational and welfare fields. They were to devote a substantial partof their time to the responsibilities assigned them but were allowedto undertake missionary work. Recruitment was made through thevarious mission organizations which submitted applications of those
18 George Hood, Neither Bang nor whimper: The end of a missionary era in China,Singapore, The Presbyterian Church in Singapore, Singapore, 1991, p. 151.
19 John Cloake, Templer: Tiger of Malaya, London, Harrap Ltd, 1985, pp. 274–277.20 Commissioner-General for Southeast Asia, Malcolm MacDonald, to Secretary of
State for the Colonies, 28 August 1950, CO 717/203/3.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1985
wanting to enter Malaya.21 On 27 September 1952 Templer reportedthat the Anglicans and the Methodists had responded positively to thegovernment’s request.22
Response of Mission Boards
Christian mission boards generally welcomed the colonialgovernment’s invitation to work in the New Villages. The resettlementprogramme had brought squatters, previously widely dispersed andinaccessible to mission efforts, into settlements that were now withineasy reach. Chinese villagers were a group with which Christianmissions had made very little progress, and following the government’soffer and the availability of ex-China missionaries that task nowappeared to be easier. Indeed, even before the government’s offer,mission boards had already seen opportunities in the settlements. Asit turned out, interest in the programme among mission boards wasnot confined to those with missionaries who had served in China.23
Anglicans, Presbyterians, and Methodists were the first to respondto the government’s request for missionaries. They were soonjoined by American Lutherans, Southern Baptists, and the inter-denominational China Inland Mission. The Presbyterian Church ofEngland and the London Missionary Society soon formed the JointMalaya Group for this New Village mission effort and in April 1952the group wrote to S. H. Dixon, secretary of the Conference of MissionSocieties in Britain:
The Group has had under discussion the possibility of appointing missionariesto work in resettled areas. This consideration has arisen quite apart fromthe High Commissioner’s approach. It springs from the recognition of theChurch’s evangelistic and pastoral responsibility towards the people amongstwhom it is at work in Malaya, including those living in resettled areas.24
21 Sir Gerald Templer, High Commissioner of Federation of Malaya, toCommissioner-General for Southeast Asia, Malcolm MacDonald, 2 April 1953,CO1022/379.
22 Sir Gerald Templer to Secretary of State for Colonies, 27 September 1952, CO1022/379.
23 Alan Cole who recorded the work of the China Inland Mission in Malaya taughtfor a year in Sydney after completing his studies in Dublin. From there he sailed toSingapore to join the mission work in Malaya. Alan Cole, Emerging Pattern: CIM workwithin the Diocese of Singapore and Malaya.
24 Secretary, Joint Malaya Group to Reverend S. H. Dixon, Secretary, Conferenceof Missionary Societies, London, 3 April 1952, CBMS Archives, London (H-6095)
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Some mission groups saw work in the New Village also throughpolitical lenses and supported the colonial government’s battle againstthe insurgency. The secretary of the Church Missionary Society who,when writing to the Colonial Office in London, therefore referredto mission work as the Church’s effort in combating Communistagents’ influence: ‘I am quite certain that there are many Communistagents working amongst overseas Chinese, and it would be regrettablewere the Christian Church to be less energetic.’25 Others cast themissionaries’ work in the New Villages as a battle of the gospel versusthe evil of communism. They believed that more than just creating abetter society through improving the living conditions of those in theNew Villages the gospel would bring deliverance of villagers fromspiritual death and darkness. Alongside such thinking was also anineteenth century echo that the Church was part of the Westerncivilizing mission overseas.26
Nevertheless, there remained reservations among some Christianmissions who were worried that serving under a government schemecould compromise the church in the eyes of the wider community. TheChurch risked being accused of collaborating with the government ina politically driven agenda. Missionaries familiar with Malaya furthercautioned that Chinese villagers, irrespective of whether they weresympathetic to the communists or not, had always been wary ofWesterners including missionaries. The deployment of missionarieswho had been forced to leave China, and now recruited by a colonialregime, would only heighten villagers’ suspicion of motives, and thatthis could seriously hinder gospel efforts.27
There was also concern among mission boards, and even withincolonial circles, about negative reaction from the new Chinesegovernment and possible repercussions. Collaboration of Christianmissionaries with the Malayan authorities in the New Villages againstthe Malayan Communist Party would only lend weight to accusationsthat Christian missionaries were agents of Western imperialism.28 In
Box 461 E/T Malaya 3, Malaya (7–8), Asia Committee (no 26) National ArchivesSingapore 00015.
25 Secretary, Church Missionary Society to Colonial Office, 4 September 1950, CO717/209/3.
26 George Hood, Neither Bang nor whimper: The end of a missionary era in China, pp.145–153.
27 Ibid., [2]28 Colonial Office, London, to Governor of Singapore, 19 March 1951, CO
717/209/4.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1987
May 1953 the Governor in Hong Kong wrote to the Secretary of Statefor the Colonies in London warning that colonial links with ChineseChristians or missionaries could endanger Christians in China.
It is possible that such a development might even affect adversely theposition both of these foreign missionaries who are still in China and alsoof the Chinese Christian communities who still enjoy a limited degree oftolerance.29
Meanwhile, the recruitment of Catholic personnel for New Villagework was taken up by the Colonial Office which exchangedcorrespondence with the Apostolic Delegate in London whilst theBritish legation in Rome held discussions with the Holy See.30
British officials from Malaya also made efforts to call on theVatican. Eventually, J. F. Hogan, Attorney-General of the MalayanGovernment, managed to meet the Cardinal Prefect of the MissionaryDepartment of the Holy See.
The Congregation de Propaganda Fide in charge of Vatican’soverseas mission was supportive of the Malayan request. It informedBritish officials that the Paris Foreign Mission (Missions Étrangèresde Paris, or MEP) could make available 40 ex-China missionaries aswell as a number of Chinese seminarians from Penang. It pointedout, however, that the work of Roman Catholic missions in SoutheastAsia came under different jurisdictions such as the Jesuit Brothers,De la Salle Brothers, the Mary-Knoll Society, the Missionary Societyof St Columban, and the Franciscan Mission of Mary.31 The Vaticanadded that the Jesuits and the De la Salle Brothers, whose focus wason education and youth efforts in urban centres, might not be of muchuse in rural settings such as the New Villages.
The Vatican also informed the British Foreign Office that its ex-China missionaries might not have the appropriate language abilityrequired in Malaya. Only two groups of ex-China missionaries spokeEnglish and these were from Ireland and Canada. Furthermore, theCanadian group of missionaries had served in Tianjin and did notknow the southern dialects spoken by the Chinese in the Malayan New
29 A. Grantham, Governor of Hong Kong, to Malcolm MacDonald, Commissioner-General of Southeast Asia, 11 May 1953. CO 1022/379.
30 Apostolic Delegate to Colonial Office, 11 December 1950, CO 717/209/3.31 Sir G. Templer to Secretary of State for Colonies, 4 November 1952, CO
1022/379; College of Propaganda to send 40 missionaries; Holy See to Foreign office,London, 27 October 1952, CO 1022/379; G. Etherington Smith, British Legation, toHoly See, 9 February 1953, CO 1022/379.
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Villages. Only those from Ireland based in Hong Kong were likely tospeak Cantonese, a dialect widely used in Malaya.32 Protestant missionboards had likewise pointed out that many of their missionaries hadworked in northern China where conditions and dialects there weredifferent from those in New Villages in Malaya, and also that theChinese in the New Villages were not homogenous in dialect use.33
The Kuala Lumpur authorities expressed frustration that theCatholic Church was slow in taking up the New Village scheme.34 Butin fact the Vatican had also to meet pressing requests for missionariesfrom other countries in Southeast Asia. Other dioceses in SoutheastAsia also wanted missionaries. But the Kuala Lumpur authoritiesinsisted that the situation they faced was more urgent because of anongoing military conflict. Finally, in April 1953, Bishop Charles vanMelcheke, who had served as Vicar Apostolic of Ningxia in Chinawas sent by the Vatican to ascertain the kind of assistance needed inthe New Villages.35 The visit was, however, not entirely welcomedby the Bishop of Malacca who was unhappy that he was left outin the discussions between the colonial authorities and Rome ondeployment of missionaries in Malaya. For his part, the Vatican’sspecial envoy maintained a low profile during his visit to Malaya. Hepolitely turned down Templer’s invitation to stay at King’s House,the High Commissioner’s residence, and also did not want any publiccontact with government officials.36
The sentiments of the Bishop of Malacca reflected the misgivings ofsome local Church leaders over the government’s direct dealing withoverseas mission boards in recruiting missionaries. The independentChristian groups resented the fact that the established churches hada more dominant say including membership in the Chief Secretary’scommittee set up to coordinate the New Village work. On the otherhand, the more established churches, as Tim Harper noted, wereuncomfortable with the evangelical and fundamentalist groups who
32 ‘Record of conversation between Father O’Brin and Mr Etherington Smith on10 July 1953’, CO 1022/379 (Father O’Brin was responsible in the Vatican for re-locating ex-China missionaries).
33 Asia Secretary, the Church of Scotland, Foreign Mission Committee andWomen’s Foreign Mission, to Colonial Office, 31 August 1950, CO 717/209/3.
34 Sir Gerald Templer to Commissioner-General for the United Kingdm inSoutheast Asia, 21 April 1953, CO 1022/379.
35 Secretary of State for Colonies to Sir Gerald Templer, 11 April 1953, CO1022/379.
36 Holy See to Foreign Office, 8 July 1953, CO 1022/379.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1989
went their own way in village work.37 The inter-denominational ChinaInland Mission, for instance, did not associate itself with the NewVillage programme of the Malayan Christian Council.
The Malayan Government had also turned to the Crown Agent inLondon to recruit ex-China missionaries. Here, the Crown Agent wasnot successful and the Malayan authorities then tried sending officersto Britain to attract missionaries. In January 1952 the Colonial Officein London asked Dr J. Cameron of the Malayan Health Service, whilston a visit to the United Kingdom, to address a small conference of theChina Inland Mission. F. Mitchell, the Home Director of the Mission,welcomed the visit as he believed that this would help the recruitmenteffort if conference participants were briefed by a senior officer fromMalaya about living conditions and mission needs in Malaya. Cameron,however, declined citing a busy schedule.38
Meanwhile, other sectors in Malaya such as the plantations werealso seeking ex-Chinese-speaking missionaries. Ray Dawson, a Baptistmissionary who had served in pre-war China had independently joinedthe Malayan Government service as a Resettlement Officer, andhe was sent to Britain to encourage former colleagues to work inMalaya.39 Dawson’s trip in December 1950 was organized followinga memorandum from the Planters’ Association of Negeri Sembilanforwarded through M. C. Sheppard, the British Resident, in which itexpressed deep concern about the security situation and communistinfluence in the state. There was a shortage of Chinese-speakingBritish officials, and Sheppard in his accompanying commentssuggested placing ex-China missionaries as Labour Departmentofficers and inspectors of Chinese schools. To him, the deploymentof such officers was urgently needed to counter the influence of thecommunists.40
Despite new evangelical opportunities opened up by the Malayangovernment, response, especially from expelled China missionaries,was mixed. There are no reliable figures of the number of Western
37 Tim Harper, The End of Empire and the Making of Malaya, p. 186.38 Dr J. Cameron to R. J. Minnitt, Colonial Office, 14 January 1952, CO 1022/378.39 Ray Dawson from the Baptist Missionary Society studied Chinese in the London
School of Oriental Studies and served in north China from 1936 to 1941. He wasunable to return to China after the war because of the uncertain political conditionsthere. R. Dawson to Colonial Office, 5 September 1950, R. Dawson to Secretary,Conference of Missionary Societies of Great Britain and Ireland, 31 December 1950,CO 717/209/3.
40 R. J. Minnitt, Colonial Office, to Dr J. Cameron, 11 January 1952, CO 1022/378.
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missionaries who left China during this period. In 1949 before thedeparture, there were an estimated 2,500 Protestant missionariesin China. Of Catholics, the Vatican gave a figure of 2,000 priestswho returned to Europe. But many of the returning missionarieswere reportedly in poor health and a number were recuperating inHong Kong. Some of them were not ready or willing to return to themission field so soon or at all. A number were elderly and chose toretire.41
Of those whom mission boards could re-deploy, Malaya was notoften the preferred destination. A number of ex-China missionarieshad taken on new pastoral assignments at home. Of those willingto return to Asia, there were mission opportunities elsewhere.Several missionaries went, for instance, to Thailand and a number toSingapore. A few ex-China missionaries including Chinese Christianworkers had gone to Sarawak which had a strong Chinese Christiancommunity, mainly Fuzhou, whose history went back to the beginningof the twentieth century. The Governor of Sarawak welcomed the newarrivals to Sibu where they were engaged in youth, education andmedical fields. The Governor was so impressed by their work that hesent his Deputy Director of Education to Britain to seek out moreex-China missionaries.42 Then there were the missionaries who hadgone to secular jobs. A few came to Malaya to become ResettlementOfficers in the New Villages scheme (see Table 2).
Nevertheless, of the 1,298 ex-China missionaries of British missionboards listed in December 1952, 119 went to Malaya. This was byfar the biggest group from those who went back to the mission field,almost double those who proceeded to India or to Africa. Of those whocame to Malaya, 53, or half, of those from British mission boards werefrom the China Inland Mission, being the largest and most active ofthe mission groups involved in New Village work. It was a missionenterprise started by James Hudson Taylor in 1864 with a focus onChina where it had sent large numbers of missionaries. In November1951 the Mission reported that some 1,600 of its missionaries hadbeen withdrawn from China.
41 Secretary, Conference of Missionary Societies of Great Britain, to ColonialOffice, 26 September 1950; Secretary, Society for the Propagation of the Gospelin Foreign Parts, to Colonial Office, 9 October 1950, CO 717/209/3.
42 Governor of Sarawak to High Commission, Federation of Malaya, 16 May 1953,CO 1022/379.
A N E G L E C T E D S T O R Y 1991
Table 2Ex-China missionaries of British Mission Boards serving in Malaya and elsewhere,
December 1952
Men Wives Single women Total
Approx number of China missionaries,April 1948
460 390 448 1298
Hong Kong 24 19 26 69Taiwan 10 8 13 31Superannuated 42 43 74 159Deceased 9 5 6 20Married 20 20In home Church 159 116 50 325In missionary posts in United Kingdom 32 33 37 102In non-Church post in United Kingdom 46 46 75 167In non-Church posts overseas 17 13 7 37Malaya/Spore 32 28 58 119Japan 12 12 7 31Philippines 5 5 5 15Indonesia 4 4 1 9Thailand 12 12 9 33Burma 1 1 3 5India/Pakistan/Ceylon 22 18 19 59Africa 16 13 25 54West Indies 2 1 4 7In other fields 6 6 1 13In other work 9 6 8 23Total 460 390 448 1298
Source: George Hood, Neither Bang Nor Whimper: The end of a missionary era in China,Singapore: Presbyterian Church in Singapore, 1991, p. 156.
Work of the Mission
At least 15 Protestant missionary groups and the Catholic Churchwere directly involved in the New Villages. The main Protestantchurches participated and these included the Anglican Church, theMethodists, the Presbyterians, and the Lutherans.43 The Methodistsconcentrated their work in the New Villages in Perak and in Selangor.In 1952 the Methodist Mission of Malaya did a survey of New Villageneeds in seven states. In May that year, Reverend Harry Haines,chairman of the survey committee, reported that the Methodistmission was engaged in welfare work in 42 New Villages and thatappeals had been made to the United States for more missionaries.
43 Daniel Ho, ‘Malaysia’, A Dictionary of Asian Christianity, in Scott W. Sunquist (ed.),Grand Rapids, Michigan, Wm B. Eerdmans Publishing Co, 2001, pp. 512–514.
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The large Chinese Methodist Church in Sitiawan, Perak, played a keysupporting role.44
The China Inland Mission, having evacuated from China, nowshifted its regional headquarters to Singapore and re-named itsmission as the Overseas Mission Fellowship. It divided its workin Malaya into the North Malaya section based in Kuala Lumpurand South Malaya section based in Singapore. In reporting this toR. J. Minnett of the Colonial Office in March 1952, F. Mitchell,the Mission’s Home Director, also informed that several of theirmissionaries had recently left for Malaya. A regional director inSingapore, P. Moore, was later appointed to oversee its Malayan work.The Mission, at the start, sent 50 missionaries to 25 New Villages ofwhom seven were in Selangor and nine each in Johor and Perak. Atits height, the Mission had an estimated 200 missionaries at any onetime in the New Villages.45 According to Alan Cole, one of the firstChina Inland missionaries to arrive in Malaya, many of the ex-Chinamissionaries had served in east Sichuan in China.46 The New Villageeffort was the first of the Mission’s Malaya mission and this laid thefoundation for its subsequent work in other parts of the country (seeTables 3, 4 and 5).
The Malayan Christian Council, in one of its first reports in 1955,listed in that year 96 Western missionaries and 55 Asian missionariesassigned to 92 New Villages. There were another 150 part-timevoluntary workers.47 In its report of 1958 the Council stated that ofthe 410 New Villages accessible to Christian missionaries, missionwork was carried out in 333 of them, or more than three-fifthsthe total number of villages. New Villages that were predominantlyMalay, of which there were a few, were off-limit to the missionarieswhilst other villages were not accessible because of security reasons.Perak, Johor and Selangor with a very high incidence of insurgencyactivities had the largest number of New Villages and these three
44 ‘U.S. told: Send missionaries to help in new villages. Methodist tour of Malayaends’, The Straits Times, 14 May 1952, p. 3.
45 Home Director, China Inland Mission, to S. H. Dixon, Conference of MissionarySocieties, Britain, 4 April 1952, CBMS Archives, London (H-6095) Box 461 E/TMalaya 3, Malaya (7–8), Asia Committee (no 26) National Archives Singapore 00015.
46 R. Alan Cole, Emerging Pattern: CIM work with the diocese of Singapore and Malaya,pp. 24–27.
47 Malayan Christian Council Progress Report No 7, Minutes of the 22ndMeeting of the Federal Co-ordinating Committee for Work in New Villages, Ref:1967/,0000435, National Archives, Kuala Lumpur.
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Table 3Ex-China missionaries of British Mission Boards in Malaya, December 1952
Men Wives Single women Total
China Inland Mission/Overseas MissionFellowship
12 11 30 53
Church Missionary Society 5 4 10 19Church of England Zenana Missionary
Society4 4
Society for the Propagation of theGospel
1 1 2
Presbyterian Church of England 3 3 3 9London Missionary Society 2 2 4 8Presbyterian Church in Ireland 2 1 1 4Church of Scotland 1 1 2Christian Brethren 3 3 2 8Baptist Missionary Society 1 1 2Total 30 27 54 111
Source: George Hood, Neither Bang Nor Whimper: The end of a missionary era in China,Singapore: Presbyterian Church in Singapore, 1991, p. 152.
states received most attention from mission boards.48 There wasmission work in 81 of the 107 accessible New Villages in Perak.In Johor there was Protestant work in 56 of the 105 New Villagesaccessible whilst the Catholics were in 22 New Villages. In somevillages, a Church was set up or had a missionary stationed therewhereas other places were served by visiting missionaries who coveredseveral villages within their jurisdiction. About half the 333 NewVillages had a resident Christian worker. Protestant missions had anunwritten understanding of geographically dividing New Village workamongst themselves but in many places there was overlap. There waseven more overlap of Protestant and Catholic mission work.
The missionaries were expected to improve the education, medical,and social lives of the villagers, and the provision of medicalservices was considered to be the most important part of their work.Government clinics or mobile medical units were insufficient in manyNew Villages, particularly in Perak and Pahang. According to a
48 Malayan Christian Council: The New Villages in Malaya: A survey of needs andopportunities, November 1957, International Missionary Council Archives, Geneva(H-10, 016) Box 26.5.116, Malaysia, Country Files No. 5, NAF 00182, NationalArchives Singapore; Malayan Christian Council: The New Villages in Malaya: Asurvey of needs and opportunities, August 1958, International Missionary CouncilArchives, Geneva (H-10, 016) Box 26.5.116, Malaysia, Country Files No. 5, NAF00179–18, National Archives Singapore.
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Table 4Churches involved in New Village work which are members of the Malayan Christian Council
New Village Co-ordinating Council
The Anglican Church in Malaysia (including the work of Church Mission Society)The Methodist Church in MalayaThe Malayan Synod of the Chinese Christian Church (Chinese Presbyterian Church
in Malaya)The Overseas Missionary Fellowship (China Inland Mission)The Overseas Missionary Fellowship (Anglican)The Presbyterian Church in Malaya (English Presbyterian)The United Lutheran Mission in MalayaThe Salvation ArmyThe Chinese Native Evangelistic Crusade
Source: International Missionary Council Archives, Geneva (H-10, 016) Box 26.5.116,Malaysia, Country Files No. 9, NAF 00183-1, National Archives, Singapore.
Table 5Churches involved in New Village work which are not
members of the Malayan Christian Council New VillageCo-ordinating Council
The Life (Bible Presbyterian) ChurchThe Church of ChristThe Independent Church of Tai HongThe Cha’ah Christian ChurchThe Evangelise China FellowshipThe Honolulu Church Mission
Source: International Missionary Council Archives,Geneva (H-10, 016) Box 26.5.116, Malaysia, Coun-try Files No. 9, NAF 00183-1, National Archives,Singapore.
Malayan Christian Council survey of 1957, there were clinics in 100out of the 156 New Villages in Perak in that year. Of these, 32 wererun by Protestant missions whilst 18 were run by the Catholic Churchand the other 50 by the local government. In an average missionclinic at any one session, there could be as many as 100 patientswhilst attendance of 50 or 60 was common (see Table 6). Mobileclinics operated from a New Village chapel or an area partitionedoff from the main church hall. Where there was no chapel, a shophouse or village school was used. Patients were charged a uniformfee of 20 cent (sen) a visit but sometimes they were asked to payonly for medicine prescribed. Clinics were often also entrusted withdistribution of relief supplies. Powdered milk was given to motherswhere there was evidence of malnutrition. Flour, corn meal, and foodsupplements were also given out by clinics.
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Table 6Churches involved in New Village medical work
Organizations Number No of patients per month (average)
Lutheran (just beginning, no figures available)Total 32 9,860
Source: Malayan Christian Council Progress Report No 7, Minutes of the 22ndMeeting of the Federal Co-ordinating Committee for Work in New Villages, Ref:1967/,0000435, National Archives, Kuala Lumpur.
The China Inland Mission was keen to set up a 60-bed hospital thatcould serve a number of New Villages. However, the state medicalauthorities were lukewarm to the hospital proposal. Dr H. Lester,the new Director of Medical Services, was against the setting upand running of a mission hospital requiring government funding. Ifapproved, he claimed, other mission boards would go about setting uphospitals, and the government would not only have to take up a growingbudget but have to deal with political and religious sensitivities arisingfrom such institutions in a multi-racial society.49
There was also the question of the qualifications of missionaries.Whilst the colonial government was keen to tap into the skills andexperience of missionaries, including those who had served in China,it did not relax on qualification requirements. At this time, as theDirector of Medical Services in Malaya, Dr J. Cameron, acknowledged,there were vast medical and health problems to be dealt with butthere was a serious shortage of staff. In all, Malaya then had morethan 100 vacancies for doctors and other medical personnel. However,because many of the missionaries either did not possess the requiredqualifications or their training was not recognized by the Malayanauthorities, they could not be accepted into government medicalservice.50
There was also the problem of language because most people inthe New Villages then communicated in dialects. Cole pointed out
49 Dr H. Lester to R. J. Minnitt, 14 June 1953, CO 1022/378.50 Dr J. Cameron to R. J. Minnitt, Colonial Office, 14 January 1952, CO 1022/378.
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that no village was solely of one dialect group. The China InlandMission appointed a teacher to teach Hakka to its missionariesbut subsequent arrivals were taught Cantonese which was one oftwo dominant dialects in the New Villages. Even Mandarin used inthe New Villages, according to Cole, was a southern version withtones, pronunciation and idioms different from those the ex-Chinamissionaries were familiar with.51
Literacy work was an area given emphasis in almost every villagewhere there was a resident Evangelist. Literacy was essential to carryout evangelism. But a report of the Malayan Christian Council alsonoted that given the high drop-out rate from formal schools as wellas high unemployment among the youth, what was urgently neededin the New Villages was creating jobs and providing trade and skilltraining. The Christian missions therefore proposed setting up cottageindustries, cooperatives, and crèch amenities but given the dispersednature of the New Villages, organizing such facilities and training wasdifficult.52
Women were a major component in the missionary effort in the NewVillage. Women comprised 86 of 119 missionaries sent out to Malayaby Britian mission boards, of whom 58 were single. Many took a lead inmedical or teaching work in the New Villages. Women villagers in thenew settlements were more willing to approach lady missionaries formedical or educational help. One of the first mission workers sent outby the China Inland Mission in December 1951 was Doris Maddena fully trained nurse, midwife and qualified health visitor. She hadserved in China for about 20 years and besides practical health workand midwifery could also teach health subjects.53
Despite the seemingly slow response of the Catholic Church,Templer was able to report in April 1953 that four German priestswith medical qualifications had started work in Perak. Later that year,a number of Franciscan Order priests left for Malaya. Three priests,two of whom were Chinese and with experience in China, were alsoserving in 12 New Villages and in a nearby town. Later the Catholicssent another small batch of missionaries with nursing experience and
51 R. Alan Cole, Emerging Pattern: CIM work with the diocese of Singapore and Malaya,p. 27.
52 ‘Malayan Christian Council: A survey of the New Villages in Malaya, 1958’,International Missionary Council Archives, Geneva (H-10, 016) Box 26.5.116,Malaysia, Country Files No. 5, NAF 00179–18, National Archives Singapore.
53 F. Mitchell to R. J. Minnitt, 6 March 1952 CO 1022/378.
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Table 7Catholic Medical Care in New Villages, 1954
Units Number of cases treated
Mobile clinic, Perak 139,755Kampong Simee, Ipoh 30,362Franciscan Sisters of Mary, Petaling Jaya 15,000Canossian Sisters, Kluang 4,000
Source: ‘Catholic Welfare Services Annual Report 1954, Rev Fr A.Khaw, 6 January 1955’, Minutes of the 22nd Meeting of the FederalCo-ordinating Committee for work in New villages, 21 January, 1955,Ref: 1967/,0000435, National Archives, Kuala Lumpur.
they were immediately assigned to Perak New Villages.54 By 1954there were 36 full time Catholic workers including 18 missionaries in59 villages. In addition there were 19 missionaries and lay workers whoserved part-time in 112 New Villages. By 1959 the Catholic Welfareservice reported that it had 56 workers serving 176 New Villages withits work concentrated largely in Perak, Kedah and Johor. The Catholicwork included three medical units serving Perak, Johor, and the KualaLumpur suburb of Petaling Jaya (see Table 7).55
Missionaries, as it soon turned out, related well to the local Chinesecommunity. When the Catholics, for instance, built an Old Folks Homein Kampong Simee village near Ipoh, supplies were donated by saw-millers and hardware dealers as well as cash from the Perak ChineseWelfare Association. The Home was maintained and funded by theChurch but the local community made regular financial contributions.Where there was an encouraging response to the gospel in a village,a resident worker was stationed. A piece of land would be obtainedto build a chapel and a house for the worker. Once a local churchleadership had emerged and was able to take over, mission boardswould withdraw their missionary.
Many missionaries, including ex-China missionaries, found thesituation in Malaya challenging. There was, firstly, the securitysituation. Missionaries had to travel along routes that were exposedto attack or ambush by insurgents. George Henderson, Secretary ofthe Bible Societies in Malaya, in his report of a mission tour around
54 Sir Gerald Templer to Secretary of State for the Colonies, 30 December 1952,CO 1022/379.
55 Maureen K. C. Chew, The journey of the Catholic Church. Kuala Lumpur, CatholicResearch Centre, pp. 117–119.
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the peninsula during this period gave a sense of the risky conditionsthen:
The first real terrorist ambush for over a year took place on the mainroad the day after we would have travel[l]ed that way had we not decided totake the coast road going north . . . .
A number of ‘New Villages’ mission stations were visited and also one LeperSettlement where Ian Morrison and the Society have had interesting contactsin years past.56
A number of high security risk New Villages were off limit tothem. Tight security ringed even the accessible villages. Within theNew Villages were supporters of the insurgency, some of whom hadinfiltrated amongst the earlier squatters. Then there were secretsociety elements who operated their own system of law and orderin the New Village community. The villages also lacked a communitycharacter or historical coherence. These were squatters from disparategroups who had been rounded up by security forces and placed togetherin a fenced village. Traumatized by the process they were thereforewary of strangers especially Westerners. Significantly though, therewere no reports of attacks on missionaries either by armed insurgentsor secret society members. It is likely that missionaries were nottargeted because their medical and educational services were valued.Killings were carried out against mainly members of the MalayanChinese Association or Home-guards who were seen as actively hostileto the insurgents.
To coordinate the work of missionaries and other voluntaryorganizations in the New Villages, Sir Gerald Templer set up acommittee chaired by the Chief Secretary to the government. Thecommittee was made up of representatives of the government,voluntary organizations, and churches and missionary bodies. Thecommittee, whilst primarily to coordinate efforts, also enabled thegovernment to allocate funding quickly to where it was most needed.Templer attended the first meeting on 29 February 1952 in KualaLumpur and the committee met monthly thereafter.57 The MalayanChinese Association, which was undertaking a share of New Village
56 ‘Report on a month’s tour in Malaya, October 1957, George Henderson,Secretary, The Bible Societies in Malaya’ BSA/D8/4/11/3, Bible Societies Collection,Cambridge University Library, Cambridge.
57 Meeting of the Chief Secretary’s Co-ordinating Committee of representativesof churches, missionary bodies and voluntary organizations, 29 February 1952, Ref:1967/,0000435, National Archives, Kuala Lumpur.
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work, was represented, as were volunteer organizations such as the StJohn’s Ambulance, the British Red Cross, the Federation of MalayaBoy Scouts Association and the Federation of Malaya Girl GuidesAssociation. The government had officials from the Chinese AffairsDepartment and the Internal Security Department. By far the mostactive and vocal in the meetings were representatives from the ChurchMissionary Society of Malaya, the Methodist Mission, the MalayanChristian Council and the Catholic Church of Malaya. As a group,they outnumbered the others. The Malayan Christian Council is anumbrella body for many of the churches in Malaya and it played asignificant role in the New Village work. It formed a committee tocoordinate the New Village work of the different mission bodies andregularly collected relevant information that were made available tomission boards as well as to the government.58
The matter of funds was frequently raised during meetings ofthe coordinating committee. Government grants-in-aid were paidto mission bodies and not to individual missionaries. Missionariesreceived half the lowest basic salary of the government serviceschemes. Some mission boards preferred to fund their own personnelrather than to rely on government grants. Others sought governmentfunding only for social work they were undertaking. Reverend J. R.Fleming, secretary of the Malayan Christian Council, pointed out tothe Chief Secretary’s committee that grants-in-aid were for personnelengaged in education, medical, and welfare work. ‘They were not usedto subsidize religious work’.59 Still, it was not easy to separate clearlythe medical service of a missionary from his pastoral responsibilitiesthat were religious in nature.
Likewise the Joint Malaya Group of the Presbyterian Church andLondon Missionary Society wrote that the Church would fund religiousactivities but:
Should it be possible, however, at any time to undertake educational ormedical services in the resettlement areas, the Group would be glad to availitself of the preferred financial assistance in respect of such work.60
58 Bobby E. K. Sng, In His Good Time: The story of the church in Singapore, 1819–1992,Singapore, Graduates’ Christian Fellowship, 1993 (Second edition), pp. 234–237.
59 Minutes of the 22nd Meeting of the Federal Co-ordinating Committee for workin New Villages, 21 January, 1955, Ref: 1967/,0000435, National Archives, KualaLumpur.
60 Secretary, Joint Malaya Group to Reverend S. H. Dixon, Secretary, Conferenceof Missionary Societies, London, 3 April 1952, CBMS Archives, London (H-6095)
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In seeking other financing, the Joint Malaya Group of thePresbyterian Church and London Missionary Society proposed thatfunds earmarked for the Nanking Theological Seminary in China bere-directed to their work in Malaya but was not sure whether the termsof the bequest was applicable for ‘Chinese outside of China’.61
The Catholic Welfare Service raised its own funds to provide foodand medicine to New Villages in Perak, Kedah, and Johor. Some ofthese supplies which included milk powder and clothing came fromthe National Catholic Welfare Conference of America. It was reportedthat in 1954 $110,000 worth of supplies were received but localCatholics had to spend $10,000 to transport the gifts from Singapore.Reverend Father A. Khaw in his annual report described that the scopeof the Catholic welfare work included:
medical and clinical attention, relief for the needy, visits to homes, free adulteducation, instructions for children, free cinema shows, scouting, needleworkand sewing classes, care of the aged and blind, religious services in the villages,care of detainees’ families, paying school fees for poor children, burial for thedead, secure jobs for the unemployed.62
Malay reaction
The colonial administration was aware of possible hostile reactionfrom the Malay community to government recruitment of Christianmissionaries. W. L. Blythe, Colonial Secretary in Singapore, writing toMalcolm Macdonald, Commissioner-general of the United Kingdomfor Southeast Asia, called for great care in the matter of ex-Chinamissionaries to avoid offending Malay and Indonesian Muslims.63
There was still anger within the Malay community over the MariaHertogh case. In December 1950 a Singapore court decision to return
Box 461 E/T Malaya 3, Malaya (7–8), Asia Committee (no 26) National ArchivesSingapore 00015.
61 Frank T. Cartwright, Associate Secretary, Board of Missions and ChurchExtension of the Methodist Church, New York, to Reverend H. B. Amstutz, presidentof the Malayan Christian Council, Singapore, 31 March 1951, CBMS Archives,London (H-6095) Box 460 E/T Malaya 2, Malaya (48), Asia Committee (no 12)National Archives Singapore 00013.
62 Catholic Welfare Services Annual Report 1954, Reverend Father A. Khaw, 6January 1955, Minutes of the 22nd Meeting of the Federal Co-ordinating Committeefor work in New Villages, 21 January, 1955, Ref: 1967/,0000435, National Archives,Kuala Lumpur.
63 W. L. Blythe to Commissioner-General, 20 April 1953, CO 1022/379.
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a Dutch girl, Maria Hertogh, to her natural parents led to riots on theisland state by Muslims. Maria had been placed in the care of a Malaycouple during the war and had subsequently converted to Islam andmarried a Malay. The riots were initially directed against Westernersand several people were killed with many seriously injured.64
Likewise, the Director of Medical Services in responding to theChina Inland Mission’s proposal to set up a 60-bed hospital warned ofpossible political and religious objections:
We feel that as there may be political or religious objections from some ofthe States, the actual siting of any Mission Hospital ought to be a matterbetween the State Authorities and the Mission.65
State authorities which were headed by a Menteri Besar or ChiefMinister refused to grant land to Christian mission bodies especiallyif the proposed use is for a hospital or church in the vicinity of Muslimareas. Matters of land as well as Islamic affairs came under statejurisdiction. Indeed, by 1957, meetings with state authorities in Johorand Perak over applications for church land for New Villages brokedown.
Without doubt there was Malay unease at the government move tobring Christian mission efforts to the New Villages. The Malays wereworried that the entry of large numbers of missionaries might lead toChristian proselytizing efforts among Muslims.66 Tim Harper pointedout that when a mobile film unit toured villages with the slogan ‘JesusChrist, son of God, Saviour’, in several languages, the Malay versionhad to be deleted.67 There was concern that missionary drive couldspill into a few of the predominantly Malay New Villages even thoughMalays had been assured by long standing practice of the authoritiesin not allowing Christian evangelical work to enter Muslim areas. In1954, it was estimated that some nine per cent of those in the NewVillages were Malays. The largest number were in New Villages inMalacca, Johor, and Kedah.
64 Syed Muhd Khairudin Aljunied, Colonialism, violence and Muslims in Southeast Asia:The Maria Hertogh controversy and its aftermath, London and New York, Routledge, 2009,pp. 1–24, Gordon Means, Malaysian Politics, p. 119.
65 Director of Medical Services, Penang, to the Colonial Office, 4 June 1952,Colonial Office 1022/378.
66 Ghazali Basri, ‘Christianity in Malaysia: Quest for greater role’, unpublishedpaper to International Conference on Islamic Da’wah in Southeast Asia: Cultural andHuman Dimensions (15–17 February 1993: Kuala Lumpur).
67 T. Harper, The end of Empire and the making of Malaya, p. 186.
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Even work among aboriginal groups known as Orang Asli hadbecome politically sensitive to Malay nationalists. Requests by missionboards to extend their work to Orang Asli regions were turned downby the Home Affairs Department. The department, then under DatoOnn Jaffar who was once President of the United Malay NationalOrganization, the main Malay political party, claimed that therewere not enough facilities to air-drop missionaries into aboriginalareas, many of which were deep in the jungles. The chairman of theCoordinating Committee for New Villages had pointed out that stategovernments which were in control of aboriginal affairs ‘will not allow,and are not willing at the moment to entertain, any interference inthis connection except through Government agencies’.68
The Malays were also unhappy because the resettlementprogramme seemed to them an appeasement to a community fromwhich most of the armed members of the Malayan Communist Partycame. When the New Village resettlement programme for Chinesesquatters was brought before the Federal Legislative Council, aMalay member, Datoh Hj Mohamed Eusoff, alleged that there werecommunist elements within the New Villages.69 He pointed out thatthose who joined the armed forces to fight the communists were Malaysand they received little in the way of reward from the government.Captain Hussein Onn, son of the Malay nationalist leader, Dato OnnJaafar, drew attention to the 83,000 Special Constables most of whomwere Malays. If squatters were getting land free of cost, ‘I do notsee any reason why similar facilities should not be given to these83,000’.70
There was also anxiety that recruitment of ex-China missionariescould lead to an influx of Chinese into Malaya. Mission boardshad floated the idea with the Malayan government of allowingChinese Christians from China to serve in the New Villages incapacities similar to Western missionaries. In fact the Governor ofSarawak reported that a number of such Christians had arrived in
68 Minutes of the 21st meeting of the Federal Co-ordinating Committee for work inthe New Villages, 26 November 1954, Ref: 1967/0000435, National Archives, KualaLumpur.
69 Dato Haji Mohamed Eusoff, Proceedings of the Federal Legislative Council (ThirdSession), 19th April 1950, p. 117, Government Printers, Kuala Lumpur.
70 Captain Hussein Onn, Proceedings of the Federal Legislative Council (Third Session),19th April 1950, p. 119, Government Printers, Kuala Lumpur.
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his state with status as missionaries or as refugees.71 The Malayangovernment, however, allowed Chinese missionaries a one-year entrypermit which could be renewed but they were expected to workunder the supervision of Western missionaries. Malay political groups,particularly Dato Onn Jaafar, feared that unchecked immigrationfrom China could upset the demographic balance in the countryleading to Malays becoming a minority. Hence, in the post-warperiod, immigration from China came to an official end. Furthermore,following the communist takeover of China, there was also the fear ofpolitical infiltration if Chinese from China were allowed to enter thecountry.72
The colonial administration took note of the Malay unease andso the government-sponsored Central Welfare Council, because ofMuslim objection, initially refused to provide direct financial grants tochurch social work and only relented when the churches maintainedthat their work was of ‘great social value and was part of the campaignagainst Communism’. It then decided that similar grants would bemade available to other religious organizations. The mission gaveassurance that social work would form the preponderant part ofactivities and that evangelism should be secondary in the use ofthe funds. Meanwhile, Templer gave an assurance to the MenteriBesars that Red Cross teams providing medical assistance wouldspend just as much time amongst the Malays as in the Chinese NewVillages.
Two other reasons kept the Christian mission and New Villagesfrom becoming a major political issue among the Malays. First, theBritish took steps to improve the Malay economic position by settingup the Rural Industrial Development Authority in 1951 with DatoOnn appointed as its head, to provide training and loans to smallMalay businessmen.73 Second, Malay leaders saw the communist-ledinsurgency as a much greater threat that had to be defeated withall resources and means possible, admittedly even with Christianmissionary support (see Table 8).74
71 Governor of Sarawak to High Commission, Federation of Malaya, 16 May 1953,CO 1022/379.
72 G. Etherington Smith, British Legation, to Holy See, 9 February 1953, CO1022/379; British Legation to the Holy See, Rome to Chief Secretary’s Office,Federation of Malaya, 16 June 1953, CO 1022/379.
73 G. Means, Malayan Politics, pp. 16–17.74 Dato Haji Mohamed Eusoff, Proceedings of the Federal Legislative Council (Third
Session), 19th April 1950, p. 117, Kuala Lumpur, Government Printers.
Source: Lim Hin Fui and Fong Tian Yong, The New Villages in Malaysia: The journeyahead, Kuala Lumpur, Institute of Strategic and Policy Research, 2005, p. 129.
Conclusion
In the last years of its rule and facing one of its most serious politicalchallenges, the colonial authorities sought out Church support in asocial offensive against a communist-led insurrection. Never beforeor since has the Church in Malaysia been drawn into supporting astate-driven political programme. The Christian missions’ role forNew Village work took place amidst momentous political events inthe country with the outbreak of the first nation-wide armed struggleby a largely non-Malay movement against colonial rule. There wasalso the rise of Malay nationalism. Malay unease saw New Villagework as appeasing a community deeply implicated in the insurrectionand feared risks of further Christian and Chinese influence. There wasan international relations dimension as the recruitment of ex-Chinamissionaries engaged the High Commissioner in Malaya, the ColonialOffice in London as well as the Vatican amidst a developing Cold Waratmosphere with China emerging as a growing influence.
For their part, the mission boards were mostly convinced thattheir work remained distinct from the government military campaignand saw the New Villages and Chinese squatters, a communitylong neglected, as primarily a social and evangelizing effort. Theresettlement brought Chinese squatters, once widely dispersed, within
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easier reach of the mission. The creation of the New Villages, bycutting off supplies to the insurgents, was a major contributingfactor to ending the Emergency. It was the improvement in livingconditions through welfare and educational work such as those carriedout by the missionaries which gradually transformed disparate andpolitically-alienated squatter groups into a community that nowheld new political hope and expectations. The medical, educational,and welfare work of the missionaries did touch the lives of villagerswhere these were most needed. The call of the New Villages forcedChristian missions to engage in areas of social work they had mostlyneglected in the past. It also pushed Christian missions to move outfrom their urban fastness into the rural New Villages and to drawlocal Christians into greater participation. Tim Harper observed thatChristian missions, consequently, carried out by far the largest andmost important voluntary work in the New Villages compared withtheir earlier efforts and those of others.75
From the Christian mission viewpoint, the Emergency work ledto tangible results. What had been achieved there became seeds forfurther mission work. A survey in 2002 listed 165 out of 300 NewVillages where missionaries had served during the Emergency ashaving a church.76 This figure represents slightly more than half theNew Villages where social and evangelical efforts had been carriedout and 36.7 per cent of the total number of New Villages. Severalchurches in New Villages, particularly those nearer to large townssuch as Jinjang, Petaling Jaya, and Cheras, expanded and in turnhave launched their own mission and social programmess. Moresignificantly, the New Village work has strengthened the Chineselanguage churches particularly those in the rural and semi-rural areas.At the same time, the New Village initiative encouraged ecumenicalcooperation and led to the entry into Malaya of new missionary groupssuch as the China Inland Mission. Churches and denominationsworked more closely through the New Village effort either in theCoordinating Committee or in the Malayan Council of Churcheswhich coordinated missionary work in the New Villages.
This paper has touched on the often ambiguous relationshipbetween Christian missions and the colonial state. On this occasion,the New Villages presented a problem to the colonial state but
75 Tim Harper, The End of Empire and the Making of Malaya, p. 186.76 Lim Hin Fui and Fong Tian Yong, The New Villages in Malaysia: The journey ahead,
Kuala Lumpur: Institute of Strategic and Policy Research, 2005, pp. 128–139.
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provided an opportunity to the mission. Consequently, both sidessaw the advantage in working together. But in doing so duringthe Emergency, on a quite unprecedented scale, they neverthelessremained sensitive to the implications as well as the reactionswhich the collaboration could have on the wider society. Thisinterconnectedness of Christian mission with the wider social andpolitical process in Malaysia has, however, not appeared in manymissionary recollections or academic accounts. This has perhaps to dowith the nature of missionary reports and government records whichhave different concerns, and therefore determining where the threadsof mission and the broader society have intertwined is not easy. Butas this study shows, an integration of two apparently separate strandsof narrative is possible if such a perspective is sought and use ofboth mission and official records made. The result would be a richernarrative of the period.
