For the Triumph of the Cross: A Survey of the British Missionary Movement in Japan, 1869–1945

This survey concerns the many hundreds of British men and women missionaries of different denominations who were a continuous presence in Japan from 1869 until the end of the Second World War and beyond.2 It assesses the contribution of a voluntary movement of Britons abroad supported by contributions of hundreds of thousands of British people from every walk and station of life. The activities of the missionary movement expanded as the onward march of British power generated the spread of British civilization. Its decline as the twentieth century progressed can be taken as an early harbinger of the declining national resources and flagging energy underpinning Britain’s overseas endeavours in East Asia. In a limited space, however, it is difficult to do full justice to a complex phenomenon which touched upon an impressively broad range of different aspects of Japanese culture and society. Indeed, the importance of the British missionary movement to Japan as a subject of academic study lies precisely in the breadth of its contact with Japan. For those interested in Anglo-Japanese cultural relations, the history of British missionary relations with the Japanese is a particularly rich and fascinating field of study because it is not only marked by reciprocal misinterpretations and misunderstandings across cultural boundaries, but also by genuine efforts to bridge cultural differences.