The sea coast echo., 1909-09-11
ELSIE sHELS CASE NOT WORST" SAYS W0MlH MISSIONARY
Depths Of Chinatown Degradation Revealed BY Experienced
Women Workers.


With Captain Nj. j. CALVIN, OF the
Elizabeth street police station, as es-
cort, and with Detective Brickley's
courteous guidance when tht Captain
was forced to return to the station,
was taken about Chinatown, New York
City, for the purpose. of seeing with
my own eyes the conditions under
which the missionary work among the
Chinese is conducted
Much has been written seemingly
too impossible to believe, TOO unspeak-
able to tell, of the lives led by white
women in the Chinese quarter, and IL
was not until | had actually visited two
houses where white women are living
as the wives of Cinnamon, had talked
with these women, and others as well,
that | could credit the truth of WIZ
ten statements from ministers and 9TH
ers as to what the life down in that
strangely isolated section of Manhattan
really means.
A talk with free lance" mission
ary worker, who requested that her
name be withheld, but whose work
among the white women of Chinatown
is known by every white and Chinese
in the entire section, convinced me the
missionary work of women with the
Chinese is without results, exctpt dis
astrous ones to the women themselves.
This conclusion was further
strengthened by talk with Miss Hell
Ell Clark, director of the Helen +.
Clark Mission, No 1875 Worth street.
he went so far as to say, CLOSE the
doors Of every mission where women
are employed to Chinese men. The
picture | have seen of young, foolish,
frivolous-minded white women del1ber-
ately egging the Chinese Bible students
on to dangerous fiirtations makes me
shudder over the results"
Fashionable Women's Mission Work.
Deliver me-" said the other mission
worker, from the women that come
here from fashionable uptown districts
from the Riverside Drive and else
where-who come here with Bibles in
one hand and the other stretched ou.
in cOquetry to these young Cinnamon
This very mission upstairs she SAID.
lis filled with women missionaries
who come from their home with their
Bibles and a desire to convert the Chi
nese. Yet if their husbands knew one
quarter Of what | could tell them
things | havt seen these men do, the
places they have gone with these
would be Christian converts-the di-
vorce courts would do a lively business
for some time to come.
Il VIII tell you plainly that the
Chinese do not need the conversion so
much as the white women of China
town need it, and many of the women
missionaries need it more than the
circles of Chintse young men whom
they fawn upon as they teach from
the word of God. The only work for
white women to do in Chinatown is
with white women. The Chinese men
do nc. need it and nobody knows 1t
better than the would-be missionaries.
Hypocrites they are, almost IN every
instance, | would say
Tell me-" the missionary worker
was asked, how 40 these affiliations
between Chinese and white women
begin?"
In two ways. The Elsie Eigel way
is one. And let me tell you hers is by
no means an isolated case but the mis-
sions here are teeming with such cases
and worse things. The other way IS
through the Summing tours. Women
and young girls say: Come in jolly
party to see the sights of Chinatown.
Their curiosity IS aroused; the scene
has a certain fascination and allure
nrent, the very opium in the air assists
in a measure to give Chinatown pc
culiar charm.
The day after or the day after that,
perhaps, a couple of the girls in the
party will decide to make a. visit by
themselves to the quarter. They wan
der about and maybe they will be gaz-
ing into a window or examining things
in the stores, and they will get into
conversation with the Chinese men
who are not averse to such advances
from pretty girls, and perhaps they
will offer to take the girls about the
QlSITlCL duu SnOW tlCui SOhhC 6ASAeS
that they could not otherwise see.
"Three Women Who Were Vassar
Girls Are Here"
'It all sounds we'll enough. and in
the spirit of lark they will accept
the escart They may visit an opium
den and watch the effect of the drug on
some others. They are induced to
try a puff or two, and before they
know it they wake up in an opium
den, stupefied from the effects of the
drug. They are willing to take more
to get away from the awful reality
and-then it is the old story.
"Why, know right here in Mott street
three women who were Vassar girls
who came here just in that way, and
they are here still, forever ruined and
without caste One has been smoking
opium for nine years. They become SO
used to their surroundings that they
have no ambition to leave. Some
Chinaman takes care of them, and
when he is tired he introduces his
friends and-there is the end of the
chapter.
Now, in the missions it is different.
Most of the missionary women who
become infatuated with Chinese live
i'm resnectable homes uptown. they