JUDSON
1088
JUEL
teacher," and, as his missionary prospects seemed favora- ble, though lie went to Rangoon temporarily, he returned to Ava to prosecute his work. AVar brealiing out be- tween the British-India and the Burmese governments, all the foreigners at Ava came under suspicion as spies, and Mr. Judson, with others, was imprisoned. The hor- rible experiences of that incarceration cannot readily be described. On March 25, 18-2G, Jlr. Judson himself %vrotc, '• Through the kind interposition of our heavenly rather, our lives have been preserved in the most immi- nent danger from the hand of the executioner, and in repeated instances of most alarming illness during my protracted imprisonment of one year and five months ; nine months in three pairs of fetters, two months in five, six moijths in one, and two months a prisoner at large." After his release he rendered most important service to the British government in the formation of the treaty at Yandabo, and later in a commercial treaty. While absent with the government embassy as interpreter, his first wife, one of the noblest of women, died. Mr. Jud- son shortly after (1827) returned from Ava and settled at Amherst, but subsequently removed to jMaulmain, as events had made it a much more important post. From this time to 1834 he was variously employed in his mission-work at Maulmain, Rangoon, Prome, and other places, and became interested in the Karens (q. v.), among whom he made several missionary tours. In ]834: he married Mrs. Sarah Boardman, and completed his translation of the whole Bible into Burmese, in the revising and perfecting of which, however, he spent six- teen years more. This was the great work of his life, and " the best judges venture to hazard the opinion that three centuries hence Judson's Bible will be the Bible of the Christian Church of Burmah" {Calcutta Beview, xiv, 434). He also compiled a short Burmese and Eng- lish dictionary. With a larger work of this kind he was occupied at the time of his death. In 1839-40 his health failed, and he was obliged to take several voy- ages for its recovery. In 1845, in consequence of the failing health of Mrs. Judson, he left for America. IMrs. Jutbon died at St. Helena, and Mr. Judson, continuing his voyage, reached Boston on October 15. He was re- ceived in America " with affectionate and enthusiastic veneration that knew no bounds. His eminent position as the founder and pioneer of the mission ; his long and successful labors in the East ; his romantic and eventful life, associated with all that is most beautiful and lofty in human nature; his world-wide fame, and his recent afflictions, encircled him in the people's mind Avith the halo of an apostle." But Mr. Judson's heart was in Burmah. After marrying Miss Emily Chubbuck in June, 184G, he again set sail for India, and arrived at Rangoon on Nov. 30 of that year. His health, however, again declined, and he was obliged once more to resort to the sea for relief, but died on his way to the Isle of Bourbon, April 12, 1850, and was buried at sea. (J. T. G.)
Judson, Ann Hasseltine, was bom at Brad- ford, Jlass., Oct. 22, 1789. She was married to Adoni- ram Judson on Feb. 5, 1812, and was the first American woman to devote herself to foreign mission service. She became "intimately associated with her husband in all his plans of benevolence, and l)()rc an important part in their accomplishment" (Wayland's./»f/.s-oj!,i,414). In 1S24. in consequence of protracted ill health, leaving her husband in Burmah, she proceeded alone to Amer- ica, wlicrc she remained, adding, however, much to the interest and advancement of missions by the publication of a very interesting account of the /liiitnri/ af the Bur- man Mission in a series of letters to IMr.'Buttcnvorth, a member of Parliament, whose hospitality she enjoved while in England, till 1823, when she rejoined her hus- band at Rangoon, and proceeded with him to Ava. It was during the trying scenes of tiie succeeding two years that her " devoted love, consummate tact, and he- roic resolution were so manifest. Her whole time, with the exception of twenty days when she was confined by
" '■■-'■ ■ ' ' ^■' • ; iievoted to the alleviation of
the birtli of her child.
the sorrows of her husband and his fellow-priso;iers." She was perfectly familiar with the Burmese language, and possessed of a " presence which commanded respect even from savage barbarians, and encircled her with a moral atmosphere in which she walked unharmed in the midst of a hostile city with no earthly protector" (Way- land, i, 329). Her influence was acknowledged as con- tributing largely to the submission to the English terms of peace by the Burmese government. Slie died at Amherst on Oct. 24, 1820, during the absence of her husband, of disease which her sufferings and prostration at Ava had rendered her constitution incapable of resist- ing. " To great clearness of intellect, large powers of comprehension, and intuitive female sagacity, ripened by the constant necessity of independent action, she added that heroic disinterestedness which naturally loses all consciousness of self in the prosecution of a great ob- ject. These elements were, however, all held in reserve, and were hidden from public viev/ by a veil of unusual feminine delicacy." (J. T. G.)