Mrs. Lillias Horton Underwood (1851-1921)

Mrs. Lillias Horton Underwood (1851-1921)

My father became Christian in his high school years through a friend. Growing up, my father used to tell me numerous stories of how his friend persuaded him to go to church with him. After many unsuccessful attempts, my father gave in and promised that he would attend their Friday night worship service. However, my father completely forgot about the promise so late at night, he ran to his friend’s house to apologize and there he found his friend praying for my dad. From that day my father became a Christian, and he has been the most influential person and a true Christian role model for me. Through the course, I came to realize how the history of Christianity in Korea and its establishment was built similarly like my father’s story. It was through the dedication of missionaries and followers of Christ despite many of their unsuccessful attempts and hardships.

Mr. & Mrs. Underwood

Before heading to the Northern interior for mission trip

Lillias Horton Underwood was one of the most prominent women missionaries in Korea.  In 1888, Lillias Horton entered Korea as a medical missionary. Shortly after arriving in Korea, she married Rev. Horace G. Underwood in 1889. Together, they continued their missionary work in Korea even becoming the first foreign couple to make a mission trip above Seoul toward the northern interior. From medical missional work,  her missional work expanded to seeking gender justice for women, developing women’s ministry through evangelization, and establishing institutions for higher education for young Koreans during Japanese colonialism.

Stimson Building Ceremony of Laying the Cornerstone

Although opening a new private institution for quality higher education based on the Christian spirit seemed like an impossibility, Lillias Horton Underwood was able to gain some help in establishing the institution from high ranking Japanese officers who were Christians. Watanabe Toworu, who later became Horace Underwood’s successor on the Chosen Christian College Board, prepared the college constitution in such a way as to highlight its distinctive character as a Christian institution of higher learning.

Despite the resistance and the struggles, the charter for Chosen Christian College (known today as Yonsei University) was approved in 1914 and the school was opened in 1915 with 60 students at the center of Seoul. Lillias Horton Underwood’s work in higher education was not done. Under the strict regulation from the Japanese colonial government, there were still numerous needs to be met for Chosen Christian College. Lillas kept the work for the college through various kind of fundraisings and other avenues. When her husband became too ill to travel, Lillias took the task of meeting with Dr. John Franklin Goucher (Methodist leader in the Board of Methodist Foreign Mission) to discuss the matter of supporting Chosen Christian College. This eventually led to the laying of the cornerstone for the building construction of Stimson Hall in Yonsei University in 1919.

The Underwoods' graves in Yanghwajin Foreigners' Cemetery in Seoul

Underwood was convinced of the potential of the Korean nation. The role she played was to encourage the people of Korea, who were suffering under colonialism, and help them to prepare for the future through education based on the Christian spirit. Her multidimensional contributions led not only the transfer of Western science and culture to Korea, but also laid a foundation for a strong self-supporting nation.