- 著者
-
石原 千里
- 出版者
- Historical Society of English Studies in Japan
- 雑誌
- 英学史研究 (ISSN:03869490)
- 巻号頁・発行日
- no.33, pp.13-27, 2000
Based on the extracts of 4 letters in the <I>Spirit of Missions</I> quoted from the <I>New York Journal of Commerce</I>, the author has already reported on the teaching of English by Henry Wood, and pointed out his great contribution to the history of both Christianity and English studies in Japan.<BR>The present paper deals mainly with the study of 3 out of the 4 letters in the <I>New York Journal of Commerce</I>, for which Henry Wood acted as a correspondent during his service on the U. S. Ship Powhatan. He also sent many letters on other subjects. The 3 letters concerned here contained important information unquoted in the <I>Spirit of Missions</I>. Some examples are as follows. Each of the 3 letters was headed "MY SCHOOL AND (MY) SCHOLARS IN JAPAN." With no knowledge of Dutch or Japanese, Wood utilized some English-Dutch dictionaries and one or two Dutch-Japanese dictionaries, and also used the primitive language-the language of signs-to define particular words. He was confident that the Japanese were hopeful for Christianity, and that the method of conducting them to Christianity, under its prohibition, would be by teaching them English.<BR>Henry Wood was born on April 10, 1796, in Louden, NH. He received a Master of Arts degree from Dartmouth College in 1822, and was a tutor at Dartmouth College in 1822-23. After studying divinity at Princeton Theological Seminary for about one year in 1823-24, he was a senior tutor of Latin and Greek at Hampden-Sydney College in 1824-25. He was ordained in the Congregational Church in 1826 and in the Presbyterian Church before 1856. He was U. S. Consul at Beirut, Syria from 1853-56. He was commissioned Chaplain of U. S. Navy on September 11, 1856. He was on the U. S. Ship Powhatan in the Chinese and Japanese seas in 1858-60. In 1858 he sent two letters to the authority of the Reformed Dutch Church of the United States, appealing to establish its mission at Nagasaki. He taught English to the Japanese at Nagasaki in 1858 and on the Powhatan in 1860. He was stationed at the Naval Asylum in Philadelphia in 1863. He died in Philadelphia on October 9, 1873.