ADONIRAM

JUDSON (1788-1850)  , American missionary, was born at Malden, Massachusetts, on the 9th of August 1788, the son of a Congregational minister . He graduated at Brown University in 1807, was successively a school teacher and an actor, completed a course at the Andover Theological Seminary in September 181o, and was at once licensed to preach as a Congregational clergyman . In the summer of 1810 he with several of his fellows students at Andover had petitioned the general association of ministers to be sent to Asiatic missionary fields . This application resulted in the establishment of the American board of commissioners for foreign missions, which sent Judson to England to secure, if possible, the co-operation of the London Missionary Society . His ship fell into the hands of a French privateer and he was for some time a prisoner in France, but finally proceeded to London, where his proposal was considered without anything being decided . He then returned to America, where he found the board ready to act independently . His appointment to Burma followed, and in 1812, accompanied by his wife, Ann Hasseltine Judson (1789-1826), he went to Calcutta . On the voyage both became advocates of baptism by immersion, and being thus cut off from Congregationalism, they began independent work . In 1814 they began to receive support from the American Baptist missionary union, which had been founded with the primary object of keeping them in the field . After a few months at Madras, they settled at Rangoon . There Judson mastered Burmese, into which he translated part of the Gospels with his wife's help . In 1824 he removed to Ava, where during the war between the East India Company and Burma he was imprisoned for almost two years .

After

peace hadbeen brought about (largely, it is said, through his exertions) Mrs Judson died . In 1827 Judson removed his headquarters to Maulmain, where school buildings and a church were erected, and where in 1834 he married Sarah Hall Boardman (1803-1845) . In 1833 he completed his translation of the Bible; in succeeding years he compiled a Burmese grammar, a Burmese dictionary, and a Pali dictionary . In 1845 his wife's failing health decided Judson to return to America, but she died during the voyage, and was buried at St Helena . In the United States Judson married Emily Chubbuck (1817-1854), well-known as a poet and novelist under the name of " Fanny Forrester," who was one of the earliest advocates in America of the higher education of women . She returned with him in 1846 to Burma, where the rest of his life was devoted largely to the rewriting of his Burmese dictionary . He died at sea on the 12th of April 185o, while on his way to Martinique, in search of health . Judson was perhaps the greatest, as he was practically the first, of the many missionaries sent from the United States into foreign fields; his fervour, his devotion to duty, and his fortitude in the face of danger mark him as the prototype of the American missionary . The Judson Memorial, an institutional church, was erected on Washington Square South, New York City, largely through the exertions of his son, Rev . Edward Judson (b . 1844), who became its pastor and director, and who prepared a life of Dr Judson (1883; new ed . 1898) .

Another

biography is by Francis Wayland (2 vols., 1854) . See also Robert T . Middleditch's Life of Adoniram Judson, Burmah's Great Missionary (New York, 1859) . For the three Mrs . Judsons, see Knowles, Life of Ann Hasseltine Judson (1829); Emily C . Judson, Life of Sarah Hall Boardman Judson (1849); Asahel C . Kendrick, Life and Letters of Emily Chubbuck Judson (1861) .