Wright, Elizabeth Curtis, 1887-1974.

American Elizabeth Curtis Wright was a Presbyterian missionary in China, primarily Tianjin, Anhui Province, and Beijing, from the early 1920s through the 1950s. From 1941 to 1943, Wright was interned by the Japanese as a prisoner of war in Wei Xian, Shandong Sheng, China. She retired from missionary work in the early 1950s.

From the description of Elizabeth Curtis Wright papers [microform], 1919-1973. (Harvard University, Divinity School Library). WorldCat record id: 229668321

From the description of Elizabeth Curtis Wright papers, 1919-1973. (University of Oregon Libraries). WorldCat record id: 67840458

Born in Connecticut in 1887, Elizabeth Curtis Wright began missionary work in 1919 and was assigned to the Y.W.C.A. in Tientsin in northern China. Wright joined the Presbyterian Foreign Mission in 1926 and moved to Nanhsuhou, Anhui Province, where she taught at a mission school. Wright also taught in Pyengyang (Korea) during the late 1920s after the Presbytery removed missionaries from Anhui Province due to civil war in China. Wright remained in Nanhsuhou until 1931 when she was reassigned to a mission school in Beijing. In 1941, the Japanese interned her as a prisoner of war in Weihsien, Shantung Province. (NOTE: For more on this prisoner of war camp, see the collection of Barbara Kelman Hayes (A 296) in Special Collections & University Archives, University of Oregon). Wright was repatriated in 1943; she returned to Beijing in 1946 along with hundreds of other missionaries and resumed her teaching duties at the missionary school. Communist successes precipitated her evacuation to the U.S. late in 1948. Wright spent the remaining three years of her missionary service in the Tennessee mountains at Sunset Gap Mission. She retired from missionary work in the early 1950s. She published her memoirs in 1973 and died in Tennessee in 1974.

From the guide to the Elizabeth Curtis Wright papers, 1919-1973, (Special Collections and University Archives, University of Oregon Libraries)