William Charles Milne(美魏茶 born April 22, 1815, died May 25, 1863) was a missionary to China in the 19th century. He was the son of missionary William Milne. Milne was one of twins born on a ship on voyage from Canton to Malacca. He landed in China at age 2 with his parents. At age 4 he lost his mother。 In 1822, his father died: he was sent back to England, where he studied in Marischal College in Aberdeen, he graduated with a diploma, and was accepted into

London Missionary Society The London Missionary Society was an interdenominational evangelical missionary society formed in England in 1795 at the instigation of Welsh Congregationalist minister Edward Williams. It was largely Reformed in outlook, with Congregational miss ...

and was appointed to China. On July 29, 1839, he left for China, accompanied by

James Legge James Legge (; 20 December 181529 November 1897) was a Scottish linguist, missionary, sinologist, and translator who was best known as an early translator of Classical Chinese texts into English. Legge served as a representative of the London ...

and Dr.

Benjamin Hobson Benjamin Hobson (1816–1873) (Chinese：合信) was a Protestantism in China, Protestant Medical missions in China, medical missionary who served with the London Missionary Society in imperial China during its Qing Dynasty, Qing list of Chinese dy ...

;they landed in

Macao Macau or Macao (; ; ; ), officially the Macao Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (MSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China in the western Pearl River Delta by the South China Sea. With a pop ...

on December 18. From 1842 to 1842, he visited

Ninpo , sometimes used interchangeably with the modern term , is the martial art strategy and tactics of unconventional warfare, guerrilla warfare and espionage purportedly practised by the ninja. ''Ninjutsu'' was a separate discipline in some trad ...

and

Zhoushan Zhoushan , formerly romanized as Chusan, is an urbanized archipelago with the administrative status of a prefecture-level city in the eastern Chinese province of Zhejiang. It consists of an archipelago of islands at the southern mouth of H ...

. He went to Hong Kong in August 1843, to attend the missionary conference of Hong Kong station. He also attended nearly all the Hong Kong meetings about the translation of Scripture. He with

Walter Henry Medhurst Walter Henry Medhurst (29 April 179624 January 1857), was an English Congregationalist missionary to China, born in London and educated at St Paul's School. He was one of the early translators of the Bible into Chinese-language editions. Earl ...

and J. R. Morrison set up a committee to consult on the translation of names in the Scripture. Milne returned to England to marry Frances Williamina in 1844. He went back to China with his wife in 1846 and landed in Shanghai on November 26. On the death of a delegate of Ninpo for the Bible Translation Committee, he was elected to fill the vacancy. At the completion of the translation of the

New Testament The New Testament grc, Ἡ Καινὴ Διαθήκη, transl. ; la, Novum Testamentum. (NT) is the second division of the Christian biblical canon. It discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christ ...

, he was elected to continue as delegate for translation of the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

, which was accomplished in 1852. He returned to England due to health reasons. In 1856 he went back to China as interpreter of the consulate in Fuchow. With the establishment of British Legation in Peking, Milne served as a tutor for the interpreters in the British civil service. He died of stroke on May 15, 1863; he was buried in an unconsecrated area of the Russian cemetery outside the

Andingmen Andingmen (; lit. "Gate of Stability") was a gate in Beijing's Ming-era city wall. The gate was torn down along with the city wall in the 1960s. Andingmen is now a place name. Where the gate once stood is now Andingmen Bridge, a roundabout ove ...

of Peking.

References

*This article incorporated material from 1867 book by Alexander Wylie, ''Memorials of Protestant Missionaries to the Chinese,p 122-124 1867, Shanghai'' * {{Authority control Christian missionaries in Hong Kong Congregationalist missionaries in China English Congregationalist missionaries British expatriates in China Burials in Beijing