Viette Brown Sprague
Viette Brown Sprague | |
|---|---|
 Viette Brown Sprague as a young woman. | |
| Born | Viette Isabel Brown February 12, 1846 Newark, Wayne County, New York |
| Died | November 2, 1923 Manchester, New York |
| Occupation(s) | Educator, Christian missionary in China |
Viette Brown Sprague (February 12, 1846 – November 2, 1923) was an American teaching missionary in Kalgan, China. She described her experiences during the Boxer Rebellion in a published memoir.
Early life[edit]
Viette Isabel Brown was born in Newark, New York, the daughter of Hiram Leicester Brown and Hester Ann Bonker Brown. She graduated from Mount Holyoke College in 1871.[1]
Career[edit]
As a young woman, Sprague was a teacher in New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania. After her mother died and her father remarried, she went to China, married at Tientsin, and became a missionary under the auspices of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions; in 1893, she began teaching at a mission girls' school in Kalgan, China (her husband had been there since 1874).[2][3] The Spragues temporarily fled to Mongolia and were rescued by Russians in the Gobi Desert in 1900,[4] during the unrest of the Boxer Rebellion.[5][6] They were included in a list of "Foreigners Who Have Probably Been Slain" on the front page of a San Francisco newspaper published in July 1900.[7] She wrote and published an account of her experiences,[8] and wrote shorter items about the Kalgan mission and about anti-footbinding efforts, for American church publications.[3][9]
The Spragues recovered from their ordeal in the United States, then returned to Kalgan in 1902, and stayed there until 1910.[1][10] While at Kalgan, she worked with fellow American missionaries Abbie Goodrich Chapin and Mary E. Andrews on their visits from Tungzhou.[11] After retiring to Shortsville, New York, she was active as a church worker and temperance lecturer.[12]
Personal life[edit]
Viette Brown married a widower, Christian missionary William Parmelee Sprague, in 1893. She was widowed when William Sprague died in 1919,[10] and she died in 1923, aged 77 years, in Manchester, New York.[13] Her papers are in the collection of Mount Holyoke College Archives and Special Collections.[14]
References[edit]
- ^ a b "Viette Brown Sprague". Mount Holyoke Historical Atlas. Retrieved 2020-11-19.
- ^ "Missionaries in China". St. Louis Globe-Democrat. 1900-06-12. p. 2. Retrieved 2020-11-19 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ a b Sprague, Mrs. Viette I. (October 1905). "Work in Kalgan". Life and Light for Woman. 35: 446–449 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ "Notes from China". The Mount Holyoke. 10: 82–83. October 1900.
- ^ "American Missionaries in Russia". The Butte Miner. 1900-09-19. p. 1. Retrieved 2020-11-19.
- ^ "List of Names". Los Angeles Herald. June 12, 1900. p. 2. Retrieved November 18, 2020 – via California Digital Newspaper Collection.
- ^ "Foreigners Who Have Probably Been Slain". San Francisco Call. July 7, 1900. p. 1. Retrieved November 18, 2020 – via California Digital Newspaper Collection.
- ^ Sprague, Vettie Brown (1900). Reminiscences Connected with the Early Uprising of the Boxers in China.
- ^ Sprague, Mrs. Viette B. (November 1898). "In Memoriam". Life and Light for Woman. 28: 523–527 – via Internet Archive.
- ^ a b Obituary Record of Graduates of Amherst College for the Academical Year Ending ... Amherst College. 1919. p. 655.
- ^ "Viette Brown Sprague teaching Chinese Women, 1903". Five College Compass - Digital Collections. Retrieved 2020-11-19.
- ^ "Shortsville W. C. T. U. to Meet". Democrat and Chronicle. 1922-01-02. p. 22. Retrieved 2020-11-19 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ "Sprague Estate". The Daily Messenger. 1923-11-23. p. 4. Retrieved 2020-11-19 – via Newspapers.com.
- ^ "Viette Brown Sprague papers". Five College Compass - Digital Collections. Retrieved 2020-11-19.
External links[edit]
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