[KS] Roman Catholic Troubles in the North

Tue Oct 22 14:26:07 EDT 2013

Dear All:

This is an add-on note to the early September thread that related to 
Father Joseph Wilhelm (alias Hong Sŏk-ku 洪錫九, 1860-1938), a 
missionary of the Paris based French Société des Missions Étrangè
res, and the most successful missionary (when it coms to the the number 
of converts) in Korea in the decades before and after 1900--also well 
known as the family missionary of the An Chung-gŭn family, his father, 
and the wider family.

There were a couple of very recent publications, good ones to be sure, 
like those by Franklin Rausch, putting Father Wilhelm in a wider 
historic context that go far beyond biographic issues of the man 
himself. The little footnote I wanted to add here is just this one:

When Brother Anthony made the below quoted note in early September I 
replied on more or less *circumstantial* evidence, saying that 
nationality makes little sense for Wilhelm, because he comes from 
Elsass-Lothringen (in French Alsace-Lorraine), an area where people 
understand their identity more in a local than a national sense, as the 
area went back and forth between Germany and France, most people are 
perfectly bilingual, etc. But now I have a whole bunch of (unpublished) 
documents from 1914 and 1915 from the War Ministry -- NOT directly 
about Father Wilhelm, but some by him and some related to him. And now 
I can say with great confidence that (a) he was a German citizen 
(whatever that is good for, given he was from Alsace-Lorraine), (c) 
that his family members were fighting on the German side in WW I, (c) 
that he and his family was considered to be "politisch durchaus 
zuverlässig" (politically quite reliable; 07/01/1915, county director) 
by the German authorities during the war.

As I said, it is just a footnote: but still, it is of some importance 
when looking at the wider picture of the relationship (a) between 
Wilhelm and his own French order, and (b) the relationship of Catholic 
missionary churches in Korea and Korean independence movement 
activities of the 1900s to 1940s, where--as far as I see it now--the 
French order was very concerned about staying non-political, while the 
German Benedictines that Wilhelm over the years really worked with 
after 1909 or 1910, completely ignoring his official affiliation, was 
(to me at least) amazingly "intuitive" in finding ways to help the 
independence movement, and Wilhelm was one of the most inventive and he 
did not ever seem to have cared about authorities, other than his own ;)

BELOW is a snippet from a letter by Archabbot Nobert Weber (St. 
Ottilien) of September 9, 1914, clarifying to the Royal Ministry of War 
that Wilhelm is a citizen of the German Reich.
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Thanks.
Frank

On Thu, 4 Sep 2013 Brother Anthony wrote:
> Would a French priest (Fr. Wilhelm was a member of the Paris Foreign 
> Mission) have sent a Korean to Germany to study? Alsace had been 
> German territority since the 1870s, although the French never 
> accepted that, of course, and took the region back at the end of the 
> First World War.
> Is this Father Joseph Wilhelm the same priest as the Hong Sin-bu at 
> the center of the Catholic - Protestant conflicts so vividly 
> documented in the 1903 Korea Review?
> 
> Brother Anthony
> Sogang University etc

-----

On Thu, 5 Sep 2013 15:32:45 -0400, Franklin  Rausch wrote:
> Dear Korean Studies List Members,
> 
> I appreciate Frank's kind comments about my work.  In response to 
> questions about the fate of Father Wilhelm, it's my understanding 
> that he agreed to depart from Hwanghae Province for a time as a 
> result of the Haeso Incident, but was back by late 1903.  While he 
> was gone, a large number of Hwanghae Province Catholics either left 
> the faith or ceased to actively practice it.  While the Korean 
> government might not have been particularly fond of Wilhelm, he did 
> help the Japanese colonial state by convincing "Righteous Army" 
> soldiers to lay down their arms.  It's probably for that reason that 
> the Kwantung Government General was willing to allow Wilhelm to meet 
> An Chunggun while the latter was awaiting execution for the killing 
> of Ito Hirobumi.  I examine this issue somehwat in my article "The 
> Bishop's Dilemma," which is published in the April 2013 issue of The 
> Journal of Korean Religions.  Jo Hyeonbeom of the (Catholic) Korean 
> Church History Institute has done some excellent work on Wilhelm, as 
> seen in this article:
> Cho Hyŏnbŏm.  “An Chunggŭn ŭisa wa Pillem sinbu: kijon saryo ŭi 
> chaekŏmt’o rŭl chungsim-
> ŭro [An Chunggŭn and Father Wilhelm: a reexamination of the basic 
> sources].”  In An Chunggŭn yŏn’gu ŭi sŏnggwa wa kwaje [Issues in the 
> Study of An Chunggŭn], edited by An Chunggŭn Ŭisa Kinyŏm Saŏphoe, 
> 350-378.  Seoul: Ch’aeryun, 2010.
> 
> I don't have his article in front of me, but I believe that Cho looks 
> more at Father Wilhelm's life after his departure from Korea after 
> the annexation (which I believe was mostly the result of him 
> alienating his fellow Catholic missionaries).
> 
> Yours truly,
> Franklin Rausch
> 
> --
> Dr. Franklin D. Rausch
> Assistant Professor of History
> Department of History & Philosophy
> Lander University
> Office:  LC 352
> 320 Stanley Avenue
> Greenwood, SC 29649-2099
> 
> ________________________________
> From: Koreanstudies [koreanstudies-bounces at koreanstudies.com] On 
> Behalf Of Brother Anthony [ansonjae at sogang.ac.kr]
> Sent: Wednesday, September 04, 2013 9:33 PM
> To: Frank Hoffmann; Korean Studies Discussion List
> Subject: [KS] Roman Catholic Troubles in the North
> 
> The outrageous 1903 conflict between Catholics (apparently encouraged 
> by Fr Wilhelm) and Protestants is documented in great detail in the 
> Review (for obvious reasons, since Hulbert was the editor). The index 
> lists a number of pages: "Roman Catholic troubles in the north 22, 
> 22r, 25, 73, 77, 115, 121" and the whole year's issues can be read in 
> a single PDF file at 
> http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/KoreaReviewFulltextVolume3.pdf  or 
> by monthly issues through 
> http://hompi.sogang.ac.kr/anthony/KoreaReview/index.html All sorts of 
> fascinating stuff there, including the idea that Catholic converts 
> enjoyed extra-territoriality and were not subject to Korean law. 
> There was some question of Korea demanding the departure of Fr 
> Wilhelm, so I always wondered what happened to him.
> 
> Br Anthony
> 
> 

--------------------------------------
Frank Hoffmann
http://koreanstudies.com