Rudolf Alfred Bosshardt

Furlough and Return

While in Switzerland with Rose’s family, and then in England, where Bosshardt’s family lived, they had many invitations to speak in churches and other venues about their experiences in China. In 1939, they sailed to America, where again they addressed churches, describing both their missionary labors and the ways that God sustained them during the long captivity. In September, 1940, they sailed from the United States to China, eager to resume work among the people they loved. While in Shanghai, Bosshardt visited prisons to comfort inmates with the gospel. Because of the Japanese invasion, they had to travel back into inland China by way of the Burma Road.

Arriving in Panxian (Panhsien), Guizhou, they plunged immediately into the task of building an indigenous church from a base of only four members. In addition to preaching and teaching, they sold Bibles and Christian literature, held family prayers in their home, and engaged in personal witness. Soon, the meeting hall was overflowing, so the believers prayed for resources to rent a larger space. A businessman offered them the use of the second story over his medicine shop, which was dedicated as a chapel.

In 1943, Rose and Aflred gained permission to visit the women’s and men’s prisons, where the conditions were awful. Seeing the emaciated faces of the prisoners, Bosshardt asked to be given rice water that was normally thrown away, and took that to the inmates. They later also distributed glutinous rice that American soldiers were going to discard because they didn’t know how to cook it.

As the years passed, their team grew, so they were able to travel to neighboring villages and towns to evangelize the inhabitants. Bosshardt served for a while as chaplain to the American soldiers camped nearby. Rose continued to help women in childbirth.

After a short furlough in 1947, they returned to Panxian in 1948. Soon, the Communists army’s advance neared their area, and the CIM told its workers that any who wanted to leave China could do so. Despite their earlier ordeal, the Bosshardts chose to remain with their Chinese friends.

Under the Communists Once Again

At first, the Communists allowed the missionaries and Chinese Christians to continue all their usual activities, even while landlords were being first impoverished and then executed. Then they were told that they were not to preach the gospel outside the chapel, thus ending outside meetings and home visitation. Next, the school was closed. The Communists rounded up beggars, gave them food and new clothes, and set them to spying on residents, including Christians. Terror swept the city as false accusations of all sorts brought innocent folk before harsh tribunals. “Executions became commonplace.” Christians were told to recant, but only one out of seventy members of their church gave in. A full registration of all believers in the town showed that two hundred had declared themselves Christians.

They conducted two baptismal services without hindrance, but Bosshardt and co-worker were arrested after a third service. From then on, the Communists’ previous courtesy changed to hostility, accusations, and threats. Finally, in January, 1951, CIM headquarters told them to apply for permission to leave China as soon as possible. Their safety could not be guaranteed, and even the local Christians agreed that the foreigners had become a liability to them.

New Opportunities

After a brief stay in Hong Kong, where they sought guidance for future ministry, they sailed for Laos, settling in Pakse, a town with many Mandarin-speaking Chinese. For fifteen happy years they worked there, teaching French and English, gaining subscribers for Tengta (Lighthouse, the Chinese-language magazine published by the CIM, which had been renamed Overseas Missionary Fellowship), visiting in homes, and preaching and teaching in the chapel. Fifty children attended daily meetings, thirty adults came to Sunday worship, and about a dozen showed up for Bible study on Wednesday night.

They went on their last furlough in 1963. Though they had reached retirement age, they requested, and received, permission to return to their ministry in Pakse. Rose became critically ill and passed away two years later, the day before they were to leave for home, doctors having decided that they were now too old for continued life in tropical conditions.

Final Years of Service among Chinese

Bosshardt was surprised to find that many Chinese had moved to Manchester, England, since his last visit. Though limited in strength because of liver illness, he entered into ministry among them, saying, “They are my people.” He worked with the Chinese church until 1990, when paralysis caused him to rest completely. He died in 1993, at the age of 94.

“Bosshardt’s book describing his captivity, The Restraining Hand (the title indicating the divine restraint on his captors), was reprinted several times. Three decades later with the help of ghost writers, he retold the story as The Guiding Hand, in the wider context of his life. A Chinese version bears a commendatory foreword by the Communist commander, Xiao Ke, the last surviving leader of the Long March, whom Bosshardt met again, in friendship, in the 1980s.” (Walls, Biographical Dictionary of Christian Missions). “Devoid of rancour, The Restraining Hand is a timeless classic of missionary literature to be read and re-read” (Broomhall, 554).