Welsh Journals

An early port of call was Paengnyong and on hearing of the arrival of a foreign vessel, the local magistrate ordered the garrison to attack it. But Thomas, wishing to give the Scriptures to the people on shore, came out and distributed them not only among the people but also among the soldiers! The next port they stopped at was Tot-sum. Here Thomas met the Chinese sailor, Yu-Wen-Tai, who had taken him to Korea the previous year and he asked him to guide the vessel up the Taedong river to P'yongyang, which he agreed to do. On reaching the next port Thomas again distributed food and Bibles but the recipients had to throw them away because of threats from the soldiers. On proceeding further the crew became fearful and refused to obey Yu-Wen- Tai's instructions so he left the ship and returned to Chefoo. The presence of a western vessel was reported to the central government. Dr Goh writes: 'The Korean government sent an official inspector to ask the General Sherman the reasons why they were sailing inland. They welcomed the Korean inspector and greeted him by shaking hands. One of the westerners was known to understand a little Korean, and he probably introduced himself, but the inspector had difficulty in understanding his incoherent Korean. They reproached him for the murder of the French Catholic priests and decided to sail towards the city. They then took the inspector into the vessel and there he saw lots of long rifles which had four or six muzzles each of 1.5 meter length'. This was on 16 August when the ship entered a different province and different inspectors visited the ship and reported the presence of cannons, guns and swords. But the crew insisted that it was not a military vessel but a commercial one. The inspectors warned the men that they were in forbidden waters. 'However they insisted on sailing towards P'yonyang and asked for some food, rice and firewood. The local governor, Chong Tae-sik, accepted their offer two bags of rice, thirty pounds of beef, two hundred and sixty eggs, twenty bunches of vegetables and twenty bundles of firewood were consequently exchanged. After the exchange the schooner sailed from the port towards P'yongyang'. Goh continues: 'It was alarming to the Koreans that a strange western vessel had been sailing on the Taednong river toward P'yongyang.. The people who were living along the river came to the river side to see the vessel'. At the next port thousands came to see and some visited the ship where they received cakes and books. (Months later, on September 23rd, nine of these were arrested for having contacted the foreigners and two of them were beheaded in January 1867.). On 21 August another Korean inspector visited the ship and the conversation with Thomas was recorded as follows: Korean: Why do you come into my country? Thomas: We came to see the governor of P'yongyang.