ContentsScope and Contents of the Collection
letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, England 1907 May 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 June 3 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 1 letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 2 letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 10-23 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 29-Aug. 1 letter to Madeline Hall, S.S. Baghdad off the Greek coast 1907 Aug. 28-Sept. 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1907 Nov. 1-4 letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 Feb. letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 April 24 letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 May 3 letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 June 24 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 July 3 letter to Madeline Hall, Bern Switzerland 1908 Aug. 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Harpoot, Turkey 1908 Sept. 9 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1908 Oct. 26 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1908 Nov. 25 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Jan. 8 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Jan. 28-Feb. 22 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Mar. 10 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 April 16 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 May 3 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 May 30 letter to Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Oct. 14 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Oct. 21 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Nov. 9 letter to Madeline Hall, Ponasang [Foochow], China 1909 Nov. 15 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Nov. 17 letter to Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Dec. 1 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Jan. 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Feb. 20 letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1910 April 9 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 12 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 28 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 June 16 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Oct. 5 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall 1911 Jan. 11 letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1911 Feb. 10 letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1911 July letter to Madeline Hall, Tientsin, China 1911 Oct. 8 letter to Home people, Beirut, Syria 1912 Jan. 6 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1912 July 2 letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 July 14 letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 Aug. 25 letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 Aug. 26 letter to Madeline Hall, Tientsin, China 1912 Sept. 5 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1912 Dec. 27 letter to ones at home, Beirut, Syria 1912 Dec. 30 letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1913 Jan. 7 letter to "New Miss Hall," Tientsin(?), China 1913 Mar. 17 letter to home people, Beirut, Syria 1913 April 28 letter to friends, Beirut, Syria 1913 May 8-10 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1913 May 21 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Shanghai, China 1913 Sept. 22 letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1913 Sept. 28 letter to Madeline Hall, en route to Beirut, Syria 1913 Sept. 29 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1913 Dec. 9 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Jan. 7 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Jan. 9 letter to Madeline Hall, Bridgeman School, Shanghai, China 1914 Jan. 11 letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Feb. 14 letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Syria 1914 July 2 letter to Aunt Alice, China 1914 Dec. 20 letter to Madeline Hall, S.l. Undated letter to Madeline Hall, Longmeadow, Mass. Undated letter to Lillian and Lincoln Adams and Ralph Haywood, Bergen, Norway 1957 Sept. 11 |
Madeline and Winthrop Goddard Hall PapersFinding AidFinding aid prepared by Adam Dupont.2009
Administrative InformationGift of Margot Culley. Processed by Adam Dupont, April 2009. Preferred CitationCite as: Madeline and Winthrop Goddard Hall Papers (MS 603). Special Collections and University Archives, W.E.B. Du Bois Library, University of Massachusetts Amherst. The collection is open for research. Return to the Table of Contents Historical NoteShortly after their marriage in Longmeadow, Mass., on May 2, 1907, Charlotte (nee Allen) and Edwin St. John Ward set off together as missionaries with the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. For seven years on the cusp of World War I, the couple lived in the Ottoman Empire, raising a family in a succession of cities in present day Turkey and Lebanon. Given the scope of the Wards' activities, the term "missionaries" might be somewhat misleading. A medical doctor, Edwin (b. 1880) worked in ABCFM hospitals and universities, and he eventually left the Board to focus on medicine. While in the Levant, Edwin lectured at Aintab College (Turkey) and Syrian Protestant College (Beirut) -- the latter of which became the American University in 1920. While at Aintab, he and his wife struck up a friendship with the college president, Fred D. Shepard, who gained a measure of fame when his biography, Shepard of Aintab, appeared in 1920. The book, by Alice Shepard Riggs, was intended to give Sunday School students a positive role model, but since its republication in 2001, it has become a resource for those interested in exploring missionary life in the Middle East during the 20th century. In Beirut, the Wards became acquainted with Howard Bliss, the second president of Syrian Protestant College, and the son of the college's founder, Daniel Bliss. Established in 1866, Syrian Protestant College became an important intellectual hub and center of newspapers and scientific publication, and it played a prominent role in bringing Beirut into the 19th century Arab Renaissance, al-Nahda. Most of the scholarship on Protestant missionaries in the Middle East centers on the time of Daniel Bliss, with comparatively little addressing the 20th century. The efforts of the 19th century missionaries to bridge cultural gaps between the West and the East, however, clearly affected the second generation of missionaries, of which Charlotte and Edwin were a part. At the conclusion of World War I, when the Ottoman Empire disintegrated and much of the Arab world looked to America for support in rejecting European colonialist expansion, it was Howard Bliss who suggested to Woodrow Wilson to convene a commission to plumb Arab opinion regarding the building of states in the Middle East. The King-Crane Commission determined that there should be a single Arab state comprised of Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, and Jordan, however its conclusions were completely ignored in Europe. The Wards appear to have left the Ottoman Empire at the start of the First World War. In her final letters, Charlotte discusses the sight of British warships off the coast of Beirut becoming a common sight, and she mentions that she and Edwin were supposed to take a furlough. Return to the Table of Contents Scope and Contents of the CollectionThe Madeline and Winthrop Goddard Hall collection contains 67 letters addressed to the Halls by Protestant missionaries in the Levant and China during the years immediately prior to the First World War. The majority of these letters (39) were written by Charlotte Ward to Madeline (Taber) Hall, with the remainder from Charlotte's husband, Edwin St. John Ward, to Madeline's husband, Winthrop Goddard Hall (1881-1977). The letters are arranged chronologically. During their years in missionary work, the Wards kept a regular correspondence with their friends at home. Even before arriving in Turkey in late 1907, they wrote 10 letters while traveling on their honeymoon through England (from Leeds, Stratford, and Chester) and Paris, and while cruising off the Greek coast aboard the SS Bagdad. The first stops on their mission were at Aintab and Harpoot, both in central Turkey (now known as Gaziantep and Elazig, respectively), from which Charlotte and Edwin discuss the missionary community, Edwin's work at Aintab College, and their acquaintance with the president of the College, Fred Shepard. Late in 1908, the Wards moved to Diarbekir (also Diyarbakir), Turkey, another ABCFM missionary and educational center. During the three or four years there (there is a 16 month gap between the last letter from Diarbekir and first from Beirut), the Wards wrote 21 letters, and had two children. Much of their efforts during this period revolved around Edwin's oversight of the construction of a hospital, however the letters touch on a range of subjects, including helping Edwin deliver a baby, and abortion among Turkish women. From July 1912 to July 1914, the Wards worked in Beirut and the near-by city of Aleih. Edwin worked long hours at a hospital -- Charlotte discusses how he is gone for days at a time -- but during this time, the couple found enough time together to have a third child. In her letters, Charlotte mentions attending the funeral of Samuel Jessup, one of the last survivors of the first generation of American missionaries in the Levant; taking in a baseball game that Americans in Beirut played on July 4; and British warships off the coast of Beirut. The remainder of the collection consists of 13 letters from Margaret (probably Margaret Hall), Gertrude (Blanchard?), and Ruth P. (Ward) Beach, missionaries in China. Written from Ponsang Women's College, Foochow [Fouzhou], Shanghai, and Tientsin [Tianjin], China, 1911-1914, the letters are primarily personal in nature, discussing family and friends within the missionary community, but provide some perspective on life in China after the Revolution of 1911. Return to the Table of Contents Search TermsReturn to the Table of Contents letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, England 1907 May 16letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 June 3letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 1letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 2letter to Madeline Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 10-23letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Paris, France 1907 July 29-Aug. 1letter to Madeline Hall, S.S. Baghdad off the Greek coast 1907 Aug. 28-Sept. 16letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1907 Nov. 1-4letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 Feb.letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 April 24letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 May 3letter to Madeline Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 June 24Letter undated, but postmarked June 24, 1908 letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Aintab, Turkey 1908 July 3letter to Madeline Hall, Bern Switzerland 1908 Aug. 16letter to Madeline Hall, Harpoot, Turkey 1908 Sept. 9letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1908 Oct. 26letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1908 Nov. 25letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Jan. 8letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Jan. 28-Feb. 22letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Mar. 10letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 April 16letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 May 3letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 May 30letter to Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Oct. 14letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Oct. 21letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Nov. 9letter to Madeline Hall, Ponasang [Foochow], China 1909 Nov. 15letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Nov. 17letter to Winthrop Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1909 Dec. 1letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Jan. 16letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Feb. 20letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1910 April 9letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 12letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 16letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 May 28letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 June 16letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1910 Oct. 5letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall 1911 Jan. 11letter to Madeline Hall, Diarbekir, Turkey 1911 Feb. 10letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1911 Julyletter to Madeline Hall, Tientsin, China 1911 Oct. 8letter to Home people, Beirut, Syria 1912 Jan. 6letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1912 July 2letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 July 14letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 Aug. 25letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Lebanon 1912 Aug. 26letter to Madeline Hall, Tientsin, China 1912 Sept. 5letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1912 Dec. 27letter to ones at home, Beirut, Syria 1912 Dec. 30letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1913 Jan. 7letter to "New Miss Hall," Tientsin(?), China 1913 Mar. 17letter to home people, Beirut, Syria 1913 April 28letter to friends, Beirut, Syria 1913 May 8-10letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1913 May 21letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Shanghai, China 1913 Sept. 22letter to Madeline Hall, Foochow, China 1913 Sept. 28letter to Madeline Hall, en route to Beirut, Syria 1913 Sept. 29letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1913 Dec. 9letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Jan. 7letter to Madeline and Winthrop Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Jan. 9letter to Madeline Hall, Bridgeman School, Shanghai, China 1914 Jan. 11letter to Madeline Hall, Beirut, Syria 1914 Feb. 14letter to Madeline Hall, Aleih, Syria 1914 July 2letter to Aunt Alice, China 1914 Dec. 20letter to Madeline Hall, S.l. Undatedletter to Madeline Hall, Longmeadow, Mass. Undatedletter to Lillian and Lincoln Adams and Ralph Haywood, Bergen, Norway 1957 Sept. 11 |
||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||