Edward George Horder

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Edward George Horder (1852-Nov 22, 1908) was an English medical missionary to China notable for his work with leprosy patients.[1] As a member of the Church Missionary Society (C.M.S.), Horder spent 25 years in the city of Pakhoi–now Beihai–building and operating the first mission hospital in the Guangdong province.[1][2] In addition to becoming the second-largest C.M.S. mission hospital in China,[3] Horder's Pakhoi mission station was the first institution in the region to treat leprosy patients.[4] Even after Horder's departure, the hospital remained a health center in Beihai and was the site of service for a generation of new missionaries.[5] Although the leper wing closed in 1936, the hospital itself still survives as the Beihai People Hospital.[6][7]

Personal life[edit]

Early life and education[edit]

Born in 1852 in Surrey, England, Horder spent his childhood in Wandsworth.[8] He then moved to Edinburgh to train as a physician and surgeon, boarding in the household of John Lowe for the duration of his education.[8] Before becoming a missionary, Horder practiced medicine in Clifton, England.[9]

Marriage and family[edit]

In 1889, Horder married Caroline Stubbs,[10] a fellow missionary and the niece of Bishop Burdon. Stubbs contributed heavily to the operation of the Pakhoi Mission[11] and ran the hospital during Horder's departure to Japan in 1894.[12] The couple had one son.[10]

Missionary service[edit]

Horder's missionary service began in 1883, where he was sent to Beihai at the behest of senior missionary Bishop John Burdon[2] who had raised funds himself to build a station in Beihai.[13] However, with the outbreak of the Sino-French War, the C.M.S. instead sent Horder to the Haihow mission on the island of Hainan.[2][14] After serving at Haihow for a year, Horder relocated to the Hong Kong mission, assisting Reverent J.B. Ost in instructing medical students and operating a dispensary.[15]

In April 1886, Horder returned to Beihai to direct the mission station.[2] Assisted by his future wife Caroline Stubbs and missionary Edward Barnard Beauchamp,[3] Horder raised funds to construct a mission hospital by penning letters asking for donations.[16] Construction was completed in July 1887, and the hospital opened shortly thereafter to receive patients–some of the first of which were opium smokers.[2] Within the first six months of operation, the hospital received patients from 300 towns–some as far as 330 miles (530 km) away.[17]  

Despite weathering a smallpox epidemic and subsequent bubonic plague outbreak in 1894, the Pakhoi hospital became the largest C.M.S. mission hospital (in terms of patients received) in South China.[3] It also expanded to include a girls' school[18] and leper asylum.[3] Horder later wrote of his service that he wanted to build a hospital where "the manifold and terrible diseases which afflict the people of these parts shall receive skilled and scientific treatment."[16]

Health reasons compelled Horder to leave the Pakhoi hospital multiple times. In 1888, Horder returned to England because of a breakdown resulting from overwork, leaving hospital operations to his wife and a Chinese doctor trained in local traditional medicine.[13] He then returned to Beihai, but left for Japan due to medical reasons in 1894.[12][10] He departed for Beihai in 1897, where he remained until his final return to England in 1906.[10]

Leper asylum[edit]

Horder established the Leper Asylum at the Pakhoi Hospital to aid the nearly 300,000 lepers[16] in the Guangdong province who suffered from intense local prejudice.[18] After Horder performed the first successful cataract surgery on a patient with leprosy, other people with leprosy quickly filtered in to receive care.[16]

To accommodate the new patients–who could not be housed inside the hospital itself for fear of infection–Horder initially built bamboo huts outside the city outskirts.[16] In 1890, he erected a temporary ward for leper patients, which was expanded into a leper asylum.[19] By 1894, three additional buildings were constructed to enlarge the asylum.[3]

Because the asylum suffered from a staff shortage, female patients could not be treated in the newly constructed wards and were instead housed in huts outside the asylum.[3] Other patients were also housed in a small colony of huts a quarter mile from the mission hospital when asylum capacity was reached.[16]

Since leprosy was incurable when Horder operated the asylum, Horder instead worked to improve his patients' quality of life.[19] He and his wife pioneered occupational therapy for their patients, teaching them crafts that ranged from basket-weaving to broom-making.[16] The huts outside the Mission Hospital became a leper village with a variety of trades–including sandal weaving, basket-weaving, broom-making, printing and saw-manufacturing.[20] Even after Horder's departure, the Pakhoi hospital would treat patients with the awareness that "the kind of life [the patient] lives" was a key determinant of a patient's prognosis.[21]

Legacy[edit]

The Leper Asylum was commended by the C.M.S. for the "remarkable" work it performed with leper patients,[1] and it remained the largest leper refuge in China for decades after Horder's death.[22] When Horder's wife visited the hospital in 1926 for the 40th anniversary of its founding,[4] she was greeted by crowds of hospital leper patients who remembered Horder's contributions.[23]

The occupational therapy practiced in the Leper Asylum was adopted as a treatment regimen by C.M.S. missionaries; at the leprosy settlement in Purulia, missionaries encouraged leper patients to learn agriculture, carpentry, bricklaying, and even dressmaking to promote their recovery.[24] A generation of new missionaries, including Leopold G. Hill[5] and Hubert Gordon Thompson, also served at the Pakhoi hospital.[25]

In 1936, the Leper Asylum closed after 50 years of operation due to a lack of sufficient space to treat an influx of new patients.[16] Pressure from the local government, which was concerned that the proximity of leper patients to the city would present a "menace to public health and safety", also forced the closure.[21] Instead, patients from the asylum were moved to a new leper settlement four miles (6.4 km) south-west of Pakhoi.[21]

The remainder of the hospital, which remained intact, acquired the Mandarin name Poyan–or Puren–Hospital, or the "Hospital of Universal Love", reflecting its work in treating the local people.[26] In 1952, this name was changed to "Beihai People Hospital".[7]

Return to England and later life[edit]

In August 1906, Horder and his wife returned to England because of their failing health,[27] leaving the hospital under the direction of missionary doctor Neville Bradley.[28] Though they meant to depart for the Pakhoi mission station upon their recovery, they decided to remain in England after being advised that Beihai's tropical climate would damage their health.[27]  

After resigning from the C.M.S. "on health grounds" in February 1908, Horder was appointed the Superintendent of the Boys' Home at Farningham.[27] He died in November of that year.[29]

After Horder's death, Stubbs remained active in the CMS, organizing exhibitions and training missionary assistants.[30]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c "Pioneers of C.M. S. Medical Missions". The Church Missionary Review: 269. May 1915 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  2. ^ a b c d e "Editorial Notes". The Church Missionary Gleaner: 149. October 1890 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  3. ^ a b c d e f "Pakhoi Mission Hospital and Leper Asylum". Medical Mission Quarterly: 43. April 1815 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  4. ^ a b "China". The Mission Hospital: 212. August 1926 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  5. ^ a b "In Memoriam". The Mission Hospital: 287. December 1922 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  6. ^ "Editorial Notes". The Mission Hospital: 81. April 1937 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  7. ^ a b "WELCOME TO BEIHAI..." xxgk.beihai.gov.cn. Retrieved 2021-12-20.
  8. ^ a b Ancestry Library Edition[verification needed]
  9. ^ "China". The Mission Hospital: 241. September 1937 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  10. ^ a b c d "Clerical and Lay Missionaries". Register of Missionaries: 203 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  11. ^ "Proceedings of Committee". The C.M.S. Home Gazette: 94. March 1908 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  12. ^ a b "Pakhoi Medical Mission". Medical Mission Quarterly: 13–15. October 1894 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  13. ^ a b Horder, Edward (September 1889). "Pakhoi Mission, South China". The Church Missionary Intelligencer and Record: 547 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  14. ^ "The Month". The Church Missionary Intelligencer and Record: 309. May 1883 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  15. ^ Ost, J.B. (June 1885). "Extracts from the Annual Letters". The Church Missionary Intelligencer and Record: 498 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  16. ^ a b c d e f g h Russell, G.L. (October 1938). "The Leper Finds Fellowship". The Mission Hospital: 268 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  17. ^ "C.M.S. Medical Missions". Medical Mission Quarterly: 7. October 1893 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  18. ^ a b "Overcoming Obstacles in China". Mercy and Truth: 143. June 1900 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  19. ^ a b Horder, Caroline (September 1891). "Extract from Refuge of Pakhoi Medical Mission". The Church Missionary Gleaner: 139 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  20. ^ Horder, Edward (December 1895). "Leper Trades in South China". C.M.S. Awake!: 139 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  21. ^ a b c Russell, G.L. (January 1938). "Pakhoi leper hospital and the new leper centre". The Mission Hospital: 17–19 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  22. ^ "C.M.S. Leper Work". The Mission Hospital: 15–16. January 1927 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  23. ^ "Mrs. Horder in Pakhoi". The Mission Hospital: 108–110. May 1926 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  24. ^ "Editorial Notes". The Mission Hospital: 30. February 1936 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  25. ^ "Things to Be Noted". Mercy and Truth: 289. October 1906 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  26. ^ "South China". The Mission Hospital: 211. August 1932 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  27. ^ a b c "Things to be Noted". Mercy and Truth: 66. March 1908 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  28. ^ "South China Mission". Mercy and Truth: 334. October 1907 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  29. ^ "In Memoriam: Active and Retired Workers". The Church Missionary Gleaner: 18. February 1909 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
  30. ^ "Women's Work". The CMS Home Gazette: 142. May 1913 – via Church Missionary Society Periodicals.
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