Summary of the November 22 (Wed) Lecture
"Hannah Riddell: An Englishwoman in Japan", by Lady
Julia Boyd
The November meeting was a gala occasion, when members were invited to the
residence of the British ambassador, Sir John Boyd, and Lady Boyd for a
fascinating talk by Lady Boyd (Julia Boyd), accompanied by historic slides.
Sir John had another engagement, so Lady Boyd hosted the evening herself,
providing drinks and canapes both before and after the meeting.
In his introduction, which also included tributes to past British ambassadors
who had been notable presidents of the ASJ, our president, H.E. Ambassador
George Sioris, explained that Lady Boyd's talk had sprung from a book she
had found time to write while she was in Japan; the book, of the same title,
would be published by Tuttle in a few weeks, but the Japanese translation,
published by Nihon Keizai Shinbunsha, had already appeared.
Lady Boyd said she had first heard of Hannah Riddell when she was invited
to memorial ceremonies in Kumamoto. Hannah was a strong woman, six foot
tall, and in character might be described as a combination of Florence Nightingale
and Margaret Thatcher. She came from a working-class background. Her father
was an army private in India and China, and her mother (her father's second
wife) was the daughter of a farm labourer. Hannah was born in a barracks
in Barnet, north London, and despite her humble origins evidently had a
good education. When she was 15 her half-brother died at the age of 28,
leaving two children, Samuel and Ada Wright. Ada came to live with her grandparents
when she was two, and became like a daughter to Hannah. Hannah's father
retired from the militia, and they moved to Oystermouth, near Swansea in
South Wales, and Hannah leased a house and ran a boarding-school for twelve
years. Then her father died and they lost his pension; together with this
a rival school opened up nearby, and Hannah went bankrupt. She found herself
a temporary job with the YWCA in Liverpool, and then joined the Church Missionary
Society (CMS), who must have found her an ideal candidate.
The CMS sent her to Japan in 1890, the second woman to be sent there (one
other had gone in 1888). The voyage to Kobe took two months, and she then
spent time there learning Japanese and being trained in a missionary academy.
In 1891 she was sent to Kumamoto with another lady, Grace Nott, to teach
English at the Fifth Higher School. There was an English missionary there,
the Rev. John Brandram, but otherwise they were on their own, though later
Lafcadio Hearn and Natsume Soseki came to teach at that school. The students
were intrigued to see a large English lady, like a man.
Soon after her arrival Hannah went to the Hommyoji temple, the burial place
of Kato Kiyomasa (the builder of Kumamoto Castle), which stands at the top
of a long flight of steps. On the steps she saw lepers in wretched condition,
separated from their families, and decided that this was her calling; God
had brought her to Japan to look after these people. She wrote to London
asking for help, but got a lukewarm response. In the 1870s the missionaries
had started out with the idea that Japan would be a fertile field for evangelization,
but by the 1890s hopes had waned, and the people in London felt that work
for the lepers would divert the energies needed for evangelizing. But Hannah
was determined to go ahead, and she formed a committee and raised money;
one of her great supporters was a Dr. Haga, who had been in Germany when
Roentgen discovered X-rays, and had brought a machine back to Japan. Together
with Grace Nott, she opened a leper hospital, the Kaishun Byoin, on November
11th, 1895 (and Lady Boyd had just attended the very moving centenary ceremonies).
The hospital took the form of two Japanese-style houses, segregated by sexes,
in which the patients were generally grouped in fours with varying disabilities,
so that they could help each other. In 1896 they were joined by Ada, who
had long wanted to come but had been slow in graduating from the CMS college;
she had a two-month voyage on the S.S. Australia.
Then matters took a turn for the worse. John Brandram was a spiritual man
but lacked Hannah's fire, and her strong character and independent ways
antagonized him. The Bishop of Kyushu also wrote vitriolic letters to London
saying how Hannah was upsetting everyone, and matters came to a head. While
on leave in England in 1899 Hannah was summoned to explain herself, and
was told she would not be sent to Kumamoto again. Thereupon she resigned
and made her own way to Kumamoto, a very brave act, as she had no financial
support. Mr. Brandram now suffered a mental breakdown, and was sent to Hong
Kong but died on the way, and Hannah was blamed for this. Grace Nott also
gave up, and Ada could no longer work for the CMS, as she had failed to
pass the language exams, so she went to work for an American mission in
Mito, leaving Hannah with no support in 1901. It was a constant struggle
to finance the hospital, and the Hong Kong-Shanghai Bank were always writing
to her about her overdraft. But it is indicative of Hannah's strength of
character that she always maintained a high life style, renting a good house,
dressing well and spending the summer in Karuizawa. Her excuse for this
was that she needed to live on the same level as the people she approached
for support, and she could meet people by going to Karuizawa. The turning-point
in her fortunes came when she approached Count Shigenobu Okuma for help,
and he responded and also enlisted Viscount Eiichi Shibusawa, who was a
protege of his; Shibusawa was an advocate of state welfare, and had known
lepers as a boy, so he was keen to help. The two of them organized a meeting
of 25 leading figures at the Bankers' Club; Hannah addressed them and they
were so impressed that they took action, which led to a bill concerning
the care of lepers being passed through the Diet in 1907, leading to the
building of five public leper homes. Public recognition came to Hannah in
1906 when she was awarded the Blue Ribbon Medal. The Empress Teimei (the
Taisho Empress) also supported her for many years and in 1916 donated 6,000
yen to the hospital.
Hannah bossed her patients, but she took great care to keep her hospital
clean and tidy, and make life as pleasant as possible for the patients,
with a beautiful garden and entertainment and Christmas festivities. In
those days they did not understand how leprosy was caught, and Hannah always
kept the sexes strictly segregated, supposing that it could be genetically
transmitted (if a couple fell in love and married they had to leave, though
she would still continue to ask how they were doing). For thirty years she
had with her a Dr. Miyake, who would adopt a more lenient attitude if he
discovered them breaking the regulations by, for example, cooking in their
rooms. In 1917 Hannah set up a laboratory under a Dr. Miyazaki, and she
also built a church for the hospital in the style of a Japanese house, with
a ramp, which was unfortunately destroyed in the war. She travelled around
the world, both to Europe and America, to raise support, with contributors
from almost every state in the U.S. (Lady Boyd was delighted to find some
of her own forbears on the lists of contributors in Liverpool). But most
of her support came from the Japanese, from people of all walks of life,
including the local station master and the police, who were her students.
She could feel that her work was finally vindicated with the church authorities
in London when the Bishop of London, who was the President of the hospital,
came out and baptized eight of her converts.
Hannah died in 1932, but this was not the end of her work. Ada had rejoined
her in 1923, and was now running the hospital, and managed to keep things
going, though she was small and frail. But the 1930s were difficult days
for foreigners. Contributions dwindled, and the police were watching them
and ransacking the hospital, suspecting Ada of being a spy. But she still
had devoted Japanese supporters, notably a Professor Sawa, who had only
just recently died this year; he used always to join Ada for Sunday lunch.
Finally the hospital was closed down in 1941, and the patients transferred
to a state hospital, the Keifuen (where some of them still live), with a
distraught Ada clinging to the trucks taking them away, and having to be
pried off. Ada left Japan for Western Australia, but as she left she received
a telegram from Empress Teimei saying how sorry she was, and this earned
her the respect of the ship's crew, who treated her kindly. She always thought
of returning, but was repeatedly turned down until finally, in 1948, she
was allowed to come, at the age of 78. Arriving in Kobe in June, she went
straight to Kumamoto, where she was met by Dr. Miyazaki. The old hospital
had been destroyed (there is now an old people's home on the site), and
all that remained was the doctor's house and the mausoleum for the ashes
of past patients. Ada lived in this house, and was given enough money to
live on, until she died in 1950. Just before she died she made a broadcast
over NHK from her bed, in which she said goodbye to her beloved lepers and
said she hoped to see them again in Heaven.
Hannah Riddell is a person who deserves to be remembered in Japan because,
through her determination, she was able to focus attention on leprosy and
succeeded in getting the government to take notice. She was a difficult
person, but still she was a great lady.
Lady Boyd answered several questions posed by members, and then H.E. Ambassador
Sioris closed the meeting with words of thanks, wryly observing that perhaps
Margaret Thatcher would not have been flattered by the comparison, and that
we could have done with Hannah now in our Society, to help raise funds.
Prof. Masahira Anesaki made a tape of the meeting, and has kindly left it
in the Society's office, in case others would like to have a copy.
Adapted
from "The Asiatic Society of Japan Bulletin No. 1", January 1996,
compiled by Hugh Wilkinson.
return to Asiatic Society Home
Page, 1995 Lectures