In the 19th century, Western knowledge of China was still minimal, but growing. Most common

people in countries like England knew little to nothing about the Chinese and their way of life. Any

knowledge they had of the faraway land came from written accounts of other Westerners who, for one

reason or another, had the opportunity to travel to that side of Eurasia. Merchants, missionaries, and

others made up the group of people who would write these accounts. These written accounts could be

as concise or as extensive as one would want. This had been going on for centuries, as Marco Polo was

the first Westerner to write a well-circulated writing on China in the 13th century.

These Western writings on China and its people covered an extremely wide variety of topics.

Anything from religion to politics to farming techniques to filial piety could all be discussed in the

same piece of work. During the 19th century, the 'honeymoon' era of Western praise of China as being a

great people with supreme natural morality had come to a halt. For centuries prior, China had been

hailed by many Western writers as a place of natural morality and good people. It was a land where

they revered their ancestors and invaded none of its surrounding nations. In the 19th century, however,

most Western writers loved to point out the many different ways that this same Chinese culture and

society was inferior to that of Europe. A great deal of these writers were from England. One theme

that reoccurs in almost every English account of China in the 19th century is that of the Chinese

treatment of females. Specifically, things like Chinese husbands beating their wives and parents

murdering their female infants were discussed at length. Ironically, these same things were happening

in England at the same time, yet these writers gave the impression that they were appalled by such

behavior. Wife-beating, infanticide, and other harsh treatments towards females were not only

occurring in England at this time, they were a serious issue. We will look at possible reasons for the

predominance of English written attention on the issue of females in China while their own English

women are facing quite similar situations back home.

There have been many scholarly writings on both the treatment of females in China and

England during the 19th century. Most scholars focus on just one of these areas during this time. Some

have compared individual aspects of both countries, such as infanticide. One such scholarly work is

the Drowning Daughters: A Cultural History of Female Infanticide in Late Nineteenth Century China

dissertation by Michelle Tien King. She compares the problem of infanticide in China and Britain

during the 19th century. This is a very interesting and inspiring dissertation. However, to my

knowledge, this paper is the first comprehensive account of the treatment of females in China and

England in the 19th century and the first to offer an explanation for why the English portrayed the

conditions in China to be as harsh as they did. It is the first to attempt to explain the reasoning behind

why these Western, particularly English, writers focused so much on problems in China that were

perhaps larger problems in England at the time.

To start off my discussion, we will look at two quotes; one from an English man on Chinese

women, one from an English woman on English women. Thomas Thornville Cooper declares that,

“Women in China have no legal status; they cannot give evidence in a court, and are the absolute slaves

of the men. The father may sell his daughter, and the husband his wife, which latter transfer is

executed in a somewhat curious manner.”i Similarly, Frances Power Cobbe tells of her fellow English

women that, “By the common law of England a married woman has not legal existence, so far as

property is concerned, independently of her husband. The husband and wife are assumed to be one

person, and that person is the husband.”ii If our sources can be trusted, then neither Chinese nor

English women had legal status in the 19th century. This notion appears to ring true in both cases,

however, the English writers appear to magnify the problems of the female sex in China. Englishmen

hardly seem like authorities on such matters while similar circumstances can be found in their

homeland at this time. Why do these English writers make such a concentrated effort to criticize this

aspect of Chinese life? Could they be indirectly telling their own females that this kind of behavior

2

happens everywhere, so deal with it? Could they be trying to paint a grim picture of females across the

world so that English women will settle for the fact that they don't have it that bad?; at least they're not

Chinese women. Could another reason for this clear effort to write on Chinese females be to make

English women appreciate what they have and stop complaining about their hardships? I believe the

answer to all of these questions is “yes.” The Women’s Rights movement was picking up speed in

England during the 19th century. Women were demanding and gaining freedoms they had never before

enjoyed. This was likely unacceptable to the majority of men in England at the time, and they were

desperate to find a way to slow down, or even bring to a halt, the demands of their women. By making

China’s treatment of females seem worse than it actually was, they hoped to make England seem more

desirable for their women and ease their demands.

According to English writers, the hardships for females in China start at birth. In fact, it has

been said that their “very birth is commonly regarded as a humiliation and a disgrace to the family—an

evident sign of the malediction of Heaven.”iii Most would say that these newborn females are lucky to

not be immediately disposed of; this topic of infanticide will be discussed later. According to Pan-

houi-pan, a popular (female) Chinese writer, there was an ancient custom where a newborn female

would be left on a pile of rags on the ground for three days by itself before accepting the child into the

family. She says that this ancient custom served “to prepare woman for the proper feeling of her

inferiority.”iv Western writers used this ancient, irrelevant source, as proof to their claims. The

common Western portrayal of life for young girls in China does not portray a very charming image.

i Cooper, Thomas Thornville, Travels of a Pioneer of Commerce in Pigtail and Petticoats,

(London: John Murray, 1871), 154.

ii Cobbe, Frances Power, “Criminals, Idiots, Women, and Minors”, Fraser’s Magazine, Vol. 78,

(London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1868), 779.

3

The young Chinese girl is apparently able to leave the house under very few circumstances. She most

likely does not go to school; “ her whole education consists in knowing how to use her needle; she

neither learns to read nor to write; there exists for her neither school nor house of education.”v Her

main duties are housekeeping-related. She cooks, cleans, and makes the men of the home comfortable.

One Western author called this servitude of girls the “cornerstone of Chinese society.”vi

Meanwhile, in London, many young English girls are under different, perhaps worse,

conditions. Western writers are quick to point out the solitude and tedious lives of young Chinese girls,

yet many of their own young girls are hard at work, manufacturing such things as dresses. Many of

these girls would start work around the age of fourteen. A substantial number of these girls in the

workplace not only worked but also actually were boarded and lodged at their place of employment.

Most came from poor families in the countryside. The busy seasons for these young dressmakers were

from April to August and from October to Christmas. These conditions don't seem so bad at first

glance. They may even seem better than that of the Chinese girl locked away in her house, cleaning

and cooking. However, many of the young girls making dresses in London worked an average of

eighteen hours per day; eighteen hours. It was not an uncommon occurrence for them to have to work

even longer if they were busy or behind. The workplace was also usually not a very comfortable

environment. At times, fifty girls would be packed into a small, poorly ventilated room. The sleeping

quarters could be just as cramped, sometimes with up to five girls sharing a single bed. They would

sometimes be fed stimulants to keep them awake so they could work.vii These conditions are far worse

than those going on in China at the time. The Chinese girls had it bad, but these young ladies in

London had it much worse, working outrageous hours to make dresses for the upper class women in

Victorian England. English writers in China must have been aware of these things happening in their

iii Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans,

1855), 248.

4

home countries. They likely were not proud of these conditions of their young girls, perhaps their own

daughters. Writing about the servitude of Chinese girls perhaps helped them alleviate their concerns

over these kinds of occurrences. When factory owners and other middle to upper class citizens in

England read these accounts of the dire straits of the young Chinese girl, they did not feel so bad about

working their own girls so hard. This is a very common theme throughout the history of travel

literature. It could almost be viewed as a form of escapism. While undesirable things are happening in

your country, bad things are happening in other countries as well, in this case China. This let the

English man put the focus on the immoral acts of the heathen barbarians across the world. The reasons

for this magnification and exaggeration of conditions in China are, I believe, the growing Women’s

Rights Movement in England during the 19th century. This belief will later be discussed in further

detail.

Perhaps, once married, the women of China and England will live better, more comfortable

lives. Unfortunately this is not the case. Western writers tell us that Chinese newly-married women go

from a bad situation to a worse one. Their old living situations were bad, but at least they were living

with (and being subservient to) their own families. Chinese women in this time, when they would

marry, would move into their husbands' family's home. They now had to deal with a whole new group

of people who would have no problem using them for anything. It has been said that the “the newly-

married wife should be but a shadow and an echo in the house.”viii They were not allowed to eat meals

with their husbands or his male children. They would wait on them and refill their drinks until they

were finished, and only then could they eat by themselves.ix It should be clear that the majority of

Chinese marriages at this time were arranged. Most of the time a woman did not meet the man she was

to marry until the day of her wedding. Often times, if she came from a poor family, she was to be sold

to the husband whose family had the greatest amount of wealth. This, I believe, explains a great deal of

why there are so many accounts of unhappy Chinese marriages during this time. Assuming we can

5

trust our sources, this really does not seem that miserable of an existence, and in some cases, not

extremely different from some women in our own society today. However, there are plenty of accounts

of Chinese women being punished violently by their husbands for misbehaving.

Unchastity and unfaithfulness to husbands in China were some of the worst possible offenses

that a young bride commit. For a man to discover on the night of his wedding that his wife was not a

virgin was the worst scenario for a young bride. Most of the time, the husband was the judge and jury,

and he could act on mere suspicion of his wife's unfaithfulness. One instance was recorded by Gray:

“This monster of cruelty resided in a street of the western suburb of Canton, named Shat-sam-poo. It

appeared from inquiries which I made on the spot, that the poor woman had gone from home for two or

three hours during the evening in question, to witness a religious festival. On her return her husband

accused her of unfaithfulness, and, binding her hand and foot, deliberately flogged her to death.”x This

sad tale ended by the husband being arrested, and eventually discharged with no punishment. Another

account tells of a Western writer coming onto a scene of the house of newlyweds. Upon entering the

home they “found a numerous party assembled round a young woman, who appeared on the point of

iv Ibid, 249.

v Ibid, 249.

vi Ibid, 249.

vii Hamilton, Susan, Criminals, Idiots, Women, & Minors, (Toronto: Broadview Press, 2004), 22.

viii Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans,

1855), 250.

ix Ibid, 250-1.

x Gray, John Henry, China: A History of the Laws, Manners, and Customs of the People,

(London: Macmillan and Co.,1878), 223.

6

yielding her last breath. A few days before she had been the very image of health, but now she was

scarcely recognizable, her face was so bruised and covered with blood.”xi While stories similar to this

appear in English accounts of China from time to time, they do not appear so frequently to render the

amount of criticism that the Chinese receive from English writers. Many of these writers take any

opportunity they find to reaffirm the West's superiority over China because of their treatment of

females: “Universal ignorance on the part of women, universal subordination, the existence of

polygamy and concubinage—these are not good preparations for that respect for womanhood which is

one of the fairest characteristics of Western civilization.”xii

There are many Western accounts of Chinese women resorting to suicide to escape or even to

simply avoid marriage. Perhaps the best way to document a small selection of these sources is to

provide small quotes. One writer says of the matter that “ the state of perpetual humiliation and

wretchedness to which the women of China are reduced does sometimes drive them to frightful

extremities.”xiii Another account states that “during the reign of Taou-kwang, fifteen virgins whom their

parents had affianced, met together upon learning the fact, and resolved to commit suicide.”xiv Yet

another account states that “at a village near Whampoa called Siu-tong-ki, in July, 1873, eight young

girls, who had been affianced, drowned themselves in order to avoid marriage.”xv Quite interesting to

xi Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans),

1855, 233.

xii Smith, Arthur H., Chinese Characteristics, (London: Fleming H. Revelle Co., 1894), 245.

xiii Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans)

1855, 251.

xiv Gray, John Henry, China: A History of the Laws, Manners, and Customs of the People,

(London: Macmillan and Co., 1878), 185.

7

me is that fact that both of these writers, after writing about these girls committing suicide to avoid

their miserable lives, admit that suicide is much more common in China than in any other place in the

world. One of the same writers later in the same work states that “the extreme readiness with which the

Chinese are induced to kill themselves, is almost inconceivable; some mere trifle, a word almost, is

sufficient to cause them to hang themselves, or throw themselves to the bottom of a well; the two

favorite modes of suicide,”xvi while another English writer who condemned the Chinese for making

their girls resort to suicide writes, “the Chinese are perhaps more prone to commit suicide than the

people of any other country in the world.”xvii These writers, while trying their best to belittle the

Chinese, contradict themselves and invalidate their arguments. It seems quite plausible that in a

country where suicide is such a common phenomenon, that some of its victims will indeed by young

girls who may happen to be engaged to be married. If what these writers say is true about Chinese

readiness for suicide, then how are they to know that the reason these girls murdered themselves was

because of an upcoming marriage? There is no way to be sure. Chinese and Western cultures couldn't

be more different, and perhaps suicide is not as much of a taboo there as it is to us in the West. This

quite seems to be the case. This was a clear attempt to make China seem much worse than it was, so

that conditions in England would be more desirable. It was a way of the English telling their wives,

“the women have it so bad in China that they’d rather just kill themselves.” They probably hoped and

believed this would make women in England more appreciative of their living situation even though it

was very similar to that in China. They hoped it would stop some of the increasing demands of their

women.

So just how much better off were wives in the West, particularly in England? Was violence

between husbands and wives a problem there in the 19th century? It was enough of a problem that in

June of 1853, an act was passed entitled “An Act for the Better Prevention and Punishment of

Aggravated Assaults upon Women and Children, and for Preventing Delay and Expense in the

8

Administration of the Criminal Law.”xviii The fact is, it was a very big problem, much more publicized

than wife-beating in China at the time. I'm inclined to believe that it was happening on a much larger

scale than in China and not usually for reasons such as unfaithfulness. While violence against one's

wife was not unheard of in the upper classes, it was much more rampant in the working classes of

England in the 19th century.xix Liverpool was apparently the worst part of England to live in for a wife.

This was predominately the most violent area. There was even an area in Liverpool that English

legislators referred to as the “kicking district.”xx This legislator said that living in this area for a wife

was “simply a duration of suffering and subjection to injury and savage treatment, far worse than that

to which the wives of mere savages are used.”xxi The most violent areas were those of mercantile and

manufacturing populations. To further show how this is the case, Cobbe presents the following data:

“In London the largest return for one year (in the Parliamentary Report of Brutal Assaults) on women

was 351. In Lancashire, with a population of almost two millions and a half, the largest number was

194. In Stafford, with a population of three-quarters of a million, there were 113 cases. In the West

Riding, with a million and a half, 152; and in Durham, with 508,666, no less than 267. Thus, roughly

speaking, there are nearly five times as many wife-beaters of the more brutal kind, in proportion to the

population, in Durham as in London.”xxii Not only is it clear that violent abuse against wives is an

actual problem in England at this time, but there is actual data to prove it unlike any kind of data

English writers could provide for such claims in China at the time. We know that much of the violence

in China was a result of such things as unfaithfulness, jealousy, and mere suspicion. What, then, are the

causes of this violence in England at the time?

9

One of the most considerable reasons for violence against wives in England must be alcohol.

Alcohol was not much of a problem in China at this time, however, it was very popular in England,

especially in the working classes. Perhaps instead of mere alcohol, this reason should actually be

attributed to drunkenness. Drunkenness still accounts for domestic violence throughout the world

today, so it should come as no surprise that it was likely a leading factor in domestic abuse in 19th

century England. Another possible reason for violence among the working classes that Cobbe presents

is “friction.” She says that people of the upper classes, when in a dispute, can avoid each other by

retreating to opposite ends of their homes. Couples that fall into the working classes, however, have

much smaller homes and cannot escape one another so easily. Therefore, without being able to get

away from one another, violence breaks out as the dispute continues to boil.xxiii Other possible reasons

for this violence could be the familiar themes of jealousy and unfaithfulness.

The public of England did not seem to much sympathize with their battered women. A reverend

writes into his local newspaper in 1878 and said that, “if I ever should turn into a wife, I shall choose to

be beaten by my husband to any extent (short of being slain outright), rather than it should ever be said

a stranger came between us.”xxiv It was also popular to state that women in the time loved to be treated

badly by their husbands; that the “more they beat them, the more they love you.”xxv There is even an

account of known wife-beaters in English villages having the whole village parade in front of his house

and sing songs and make loud music.xxvi Wife-beating in England became somewhat of a joke, and it

was generally accepted that the woman usually deserved whatever beating she should receive.xxvii If

these are all true, then who really is the barbaric society, China or England? Perhaps neither, but it

absolutely makes English society look far less civilized than many of its writers claim it to be.

xxiii Ibid, 66.

10

While wife abuse was a documented problem in China, it was nowhere the level of the problem

in England at the time. Wives were getting beaten, it was being reported (and joked about) in the

media, and no one seemed to give much thought to it. Even the few legislators who recognized the

seriousness of the problem could not move their fellow politicians to make legal changes to protect the

women sufficiently. In both countries this issue was seemingly most common in the lower classes.

The struggle of every day life when living in poor conditions likely contributed to the scale of wife

abuse in England and China. Women in England were fed up with this treatment and began demanding

for protection and rights. The pressure for Women’s Rights was slowly growing.

Another Chinese custom that many Western writers were sure to point out was foot-binding.

This custom had been going on for centuries in China, and it was still present in the 19th century. Little

girls in some areas of China would have their feet wrapped with long cotton bandages at around the age

of six years old.xxviii The goal was to make the feet smaller. Foot-binding was a painful process with

constant pain for the first year, and it wasn’t unheard of that the girls would lose a toe at some point.

However, they believed it was well worth the pain to have small feet.xxix It appears that this custom was

very popular among the lower classes, probably trying to imitate the wealthy classes. Milne states that

while he was residing in Chusan and Ninpo for eighteen months, he could “scarcely recall a single

instance of a natural-sized foot among the women, even the maid-servants.”xxx He goes on to say that

even the female beggars who had no material possessions, too, had tightly bound feet.xxxi Western

writers that had the opportunity to see unbound feet (which had previously been bound), were appalled

at what they saw. They used such phrases as a “mass of distorted or broken bones”xxxii and a “most

unpleasant object to look at.”xxxiii The origins of this custom cannot be absolutely traced, nor can the

reasons for it be traced. There is much guesswork done for both of these questions, but it need not be

further examined here. While not the same thing as foot-binding, England had its own harmful custom

11

involving ladies fashion. Corsets were popular in 19th century England. These were tightly-laced

articles of clothing that women wore on the upper part of their bodies. They were like a tight-fitting

blouse or shirt. Corsets created the image of a smaller waist, and the English ladies loved this idea.

The tightly-laced corsets that created this image, however, also caused internal harm to the ladies

fashioning them. They could decrease a woman’s lung capacity and cause her to faint. They also could

cause damage to the ribcage by pushing it inward. By the ribcage being pushed inward, the internal

organs inside, such as the lungs, could also be damaged.xxxiv

So while Chinese women were damaging their feet, English women were damaging their vital

organs. Neither of these conditions is ideal, but many English writers portrayed the picture that only in

such a backward and barbaric land like China, would women willingly cause bodily harm to

themselves; and not only that, but the men gladly allow it. While foot-binding certainly is not a

desirable or acceptable custom for women to engage in, it is no more harmful than wearing corsets. In

fact, it is much less harmful than wearing corsets. The feet are important, but the internal organs are

vital for survival. Why anyone would willingly harm these organs is beyond my comprehension.

Perhaps Western writers should have showed more sympathy toward their own women before quickly

condemning the Chinese for similar habits in fashion. This is one of many instances of English writers

criticizing the conditions of females in China when they are just as bad, or in many cases, worse than

those in China. It is quite remarkable to me that these writers could feign sympathy towards Chinese

females for their feet being bound, while their own women were binding (literally) their entire torsos,

causing much more serious injuries.

A final familiar theme in 19th century Western accounts of China is the practice of infanticide.

According to our Western sources, the victims of this practice in China were predominantly female.

English writers portrayed the occurrences of female infanticide as widespread and routine. It has been

12

called the “most unnatural crime that prevails among ferocious savages and cannibals,” and it was

allegedly “perpetrated among them a degree almost beyond belief.”xxxv At times when reading these

sources it seems that nearly half of the females that are born in China are immediately disposed of.

One writer claims that the “suffocation and drowning of infants,” is “innumerable, more common,

unquestionably, that in any other place in the world.”xxxvi Numerous Western writers portray a picture

that one could rarely walk down a rural road or a city street without stumbling upon a deceased infant:

“It has frequently been stated, that it is common in China to see the bodies of infants floating on the

waters of the lakes and rivers, or lying on the road, and becoming the prey of unclean animals.”xxxvii

The bodies of infants were said to be “seen any day in a pond at Amoy, or in a creek adjoining the city

at Shanghai.”xxxviii One more account from a doctor even states that he witnessed “one infant under the

paws of a dog, and another between the teeth of a hog.”xxxix Clearly the English writers wanted to

portray an image of lifeless Chinese children everywhere one could look. It is portrayed almost as an

epidemic. What was the reason that these Chinese parents were apparently murdering their daughters

at alarming rates? What drove them to such dire straights?

There were a few writers that offered rational, at least as rational as possible, explanations for

these horrible acts against children. One offered that this age-old practice, going on since the first

millennium, occurred because it “enabled parents to terminate the survivorship of their children more

easily than they could prolong it.”xl There were a few others that agreed with this idea that the child’s

parents could not afford to sustain another life and felt like this was the only way to correct the

problem. Most writers, however, assumed that it was just a result of the cruelness and evilness of the

Chinese people. Barrow states that this custom only proves the “insensible and incompassionate

character of the Chinese,” and that infanticide was “’tolerated by custom and encouraged by the

government.”xli Another writer says that this custom is so common among the Chinese people that “it is

perpetrated without any feeling, and even in a laughing mood.”xlii While most writers assumed or at

13

least portrayed that the practice was widespread throughout the Chinese Empire, at least one admitted

that it seemed to “flourish most in the maritime provinces of the south.”xliii So while some Westerners

realize that desperate times call for desperate (yet not acceptable) measures, others attempt to paint that

picture that the Chinese are blood-thirsty heathens that kill their daughters for fun. The word

“cannibal” is even thrown out there like it is nothing. I have yet to come across any evidence at all for

this heinous claim. These Western writers exaggerate the practice of infanticide, its reasons, and its

popularity. They also fail to mention the fact that this practice is going on in several other places in the

world during this time. Even when discussing the foundling hospitals that the Chinese established to

save children of poor parents from infanticide, they usually have nothing constructive or positive to

say. One writer offers that these Chinese foundling hospitals “afford a very poor resource, and can by

no means remedy so extensive an evil.”xliv Another, when visiting a foundling hospital, states that he

has “rarely witnessed such a collection of filthy, unwashen, ragged brats.”xlv It appears that even when

the Chinese attempt to correct their problems, they are still the bad guys. They cannot do anything

right. The British writers continually condemn every move of the Chinese. So what about back in

England? Surely these horrible practices could not be happening there as well. That would surely be

an absurd assumption.

Ironically, infanticide was a problem in England as well. In fact, it was stated at one point that

the rate of mortality in England “out-Herods Herod.”xlvi It appears that China was not the only country

during the 19th century where poor mothers resorted to murdering their children because they could not

afford to keep them up. An article in The Lancet from April of 1858 states that “there are thousands of

little children die each year in this civilized land,” and that “it is only of late years that the awful

mortality amongst children in this country has attracted much attention.”xlvii This practice appeared to

be much more common in towns than in the bustling English cities. We have data from Manchester

where “the mortality amongst young children during one year amounted to 55.4%; the corresponding

14

figures for London being 40.2, for Leeds 52, and for Birmingham 50%, in the same year.”xlviii The

stories of Westerners walking down Chinese streets and stumbling across dead infants does not seem

quite so atrocious when reading these English accounts of their own land. One account says that

“bundles are left lying about the streets, which people will not touch, lest the too familiar object—a

dead body—should be revealed, perchance with a pitch-plaster over its mouth, or a woman’s garter

round its throat.”xlix There are plenty of English accounts of dead infants floating in rivers and ponds in

China. This horrendous sight surely did not exist in the West. Henry Humble writes that “the

metropolitan canal boats are impeded, as they are tracked along, by the number of drowned infants with

which they come in contact.”l The accounts of entirely different places on different ends of the world

seem eerily similar. It appears that this horrible practice of infanticide that English writers strongly

condemned in China was not only happening in England as well, but it was happening at an alarming

rate. A Dr. Lankester tells us that “there are 12,000 women in London to whom the crime of child-

murder may be attributed. In other words, that one in every thirty women is a murderess.”li While this

number is already quite shocking, we must remembering that this was in London, and that the practice

on infanticide was much more common outside cities. Therefore, the number was much higher in other

towns throughout the country. This is quite disturbing, especially when remembering the horrid

accounts of China and the same problem. There was even a widely-distributed, anonymously written

pamphlet advocating the gassing out newborn children in order to limit the population.lii The problem

was serious enough that in 1872 the first Infant Life Protection Act was passed. However, while it had

good intentions, the enforcement was left in the hands of the local authorities, who were “notoriously

erratic in putting the measure into practice.”liii

The practice of infanticide was clearly just as substantial a problem in England as in China in

the 19th century, if not even greater. The portrayal by the Western writers that such a practice could

only happen in a place like China is completely absurd. These writers exaggerated this problem along

15

with many other issues in China regarding females while very similar issues were occurring at similar

rates in England. This is hypocrisy at its finest. What is the reason for this exaggeration and this

hypocrisy? I believe it can all be traced to the growing Women’s Rights movement in England during

the end of the 18th century on into the 19th century, where it was gaining momentum.

Since the second half of the 18th century, the Women’s Rights movement in England had begun

to take off. Rights advocates such as Mary Wollstonecraft, Harriet Martineau, and John Stuart Mill

were publishing many works advocating for things such as civil rights, education, employment, wages,

suffrage, and birth control. John Stuart Mill, in his famous essay On the Subjection of Women, states

that the inequality of men and women “arose simply from the fact that from the very earliest twilight of

human society, every woman (owing to the value attached to her by men, combined with her inferiority

in muscle strength) was found in a state of bondage to some man.”liv Mill goes on to say that this

inequality is “not an original institution, taking a fresh start from considerations of justice and social

expediency—it is the primitive state of slavery lasting on.”lv These advocates and this movement was

creating a situation in England that had never before existed. Women were stepping out and

demanding rights, and they were slowly starting to gain them. Some of these achievements include the

raising of female workers at a lace factory in 1811, the Child Custody Act giving the mothers custody

to their children in 1839, and the Factory Acts of 1847 and 1850, which lowered the hours of the work

day for women and children to ten and a half hours.lvi By the second half of the 19th century, women

were demanding and gaining even more freedoms. The fight for suffrage was in full force. Laws were

being passed that better protected women against domestic abuse from their husbands. Women no

longer had no legal status. They were gaining status in places such as law firms and churches. The fact

that women were for the first time gaining influence in the church is significant because only a few

months before the New Church Order of Deaconesses was founded in 1862, Frances Power Cobbe was

painting a grim picture for women and religious matters:

16

“Men have kept women from all share in the religious progress of the age, and the deplorable result is, that women are notoriously the drags on that progress. Instead of feeling like their Teuton forefathers, that their wives were “in nearer intercourse with the divinity than men,” the Englishmen of today feel that their wives are the last persons with whom they can seek sympathy on religious matters. Half with tenderness for their good hearts, half with contempt for their weak minds, they leave them to the faith of the nursery, and seek for congenial intercourse only among men, hardheaded and honest, perhaps, in the fullest degree, yet without a woman's native spring of trust and reverence.”lvii

Thus it appears that these women’s demands were certainly paying off. Their hard work was beginning

lvii Cobbe, Frances Power. “Celibacy v. Marriage,” Fraser’s Magazine, Vol. 65, (London:

Parker, Son, and Bourn, 1862), 230-1.

xv Ibid, 185.

xvi Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and

Longmans,1855), 282.

xvii Gray, John Henry, China: A History of the Laws, Manners, and Customs of the People,

(London: Macmillan and Co., 1878), 329.

xviiiCobbe, France Power, “Wife-Torture in England,” The Contemporary Review, Vol. 32,

(London: Strahan and Co., April 1878), 76.

xix Ibid, 58.

xx National Association for the Promotion of Social Science, “What Legislation is Necessary for

the Repression of Crimes of Violence?,” Transactions of the National Association for the

Promotion of Social Science, Liverpool Meeting, (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1876),

345.

xxi Ibid.

xxii Cobbe, France Power, “Wife-Torture in England,” The Contemporary Review, Vol. 32,

(London: Strahan and Co., April 1878), 59.

xxiv “Letter by Rev. F.W. Harper”, The Spectator, (London: F.C. Westley, January 26, 1878), 118.

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to show, and this likely struck fear into the English men that had been for years holding them down.

This was a new and exciting age for women in England.

These women were slowly but surely becoming more equal to men in the English society. This

is something men for ages have dreaded. They needed to find a way to pacify this movement and ease

the demands of the women. What better way to make your own home seem more desirable than to

xxv Cobbe, France Power, “Wife-Torture in England,” The Contemporary Review, Vol. 32,

(London: Strahan and Co., April 1878), 64.

xxvi Chambers, Robert, The Book of Days: A Miscellany of Popular Antiquities, Vol. 2, (London:

W. & R. Chambers, 1864), 510.

xxvii Cobbe, France Power, “Wife-Torture in England,” The Contemporary Review, Vol. 32,

(London: Strahan and Co., April 1878), 58.

xxviii Bryson, Mary Isabella, Child Life in China, (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1900),

92.

xxix Ibid, 92-3.

xxx Milne, William Charles, Life in China, (London: G. Routledge & Co., 1857), 8.

xxxi Ibid, 10.

xxxii Bryson, Mary Isabella, Child Life in China, (London: The Religious Tract Society, 1900), 92.

xxxiii Gordon, Charles A., China from a Medical Point of View in 1860 & 1861, (London: John

Churchill, 1863), 10.

xxxiv Victoria’s Past, “Body Modification.” Accessed Nov. 18, 2010.

http://www.victoriaspast.com/Corsets/modification.htm.

xxxv Gutzlaff, Carl F., Journal of Three Voyages along the Coast of China: in 1831, 1832 & 1833,

(London: Frederick Westley & A.H. Davis, 1834), 19.

xxxvi Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, Vol. 2, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and

18

focus on the problems of another country that is also seen as a established country? If conditions in

this other country, say China, are similar, then what better way to make England seem more desirable

than to magnify and exaggerate the problems in China? I believe this is exactly what happened. It is

very clear that females in China and England during the 19th century were receiving very similar

treatment. The conditions they lived in were almost one in the same. Western writers did their best job

of portraying the conditions of females in China as atrocious and inhumane, while the truth is the

Longmans, 1855), 347.

xxxvii Ibid, 351.

xxxviii Fishbourne, Edmund. Impressions of China, (London: Seeley, Jackson, and Halladay, 1855),

14.

xxxix Gordon, Charles Alexander. China from a Medical Point of View in 1860 and 1861, (London:

John Churchill, 1863), 101.

xl Lee, James and Wang Fee. One Quarter of Humanity: Malthusian Mythology and Chinese

Realities, 1700-2000, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999), 47.

xli Barrow, John. Travels in China, (London: A. Strahan, 1804), 167.

xlii Gutzlaff, Carl F., Journal of Three Voyages along the Coast of China: in 1831, 1832 &

1833, (London: Frederick Westley & A.H. Davis, 1834), 173.

xliii Smith, Arthur Henderson. Village Life in China: A Study in Sociology, (New York: Fleming

H. Revell Co., 1899), 259.

xliv Huc, Evariste Regis, The Chinese Empire, Vol. 2, (London: Longman, Brown, Green, and

Longmans, 1855), 355.

xlv Milne, William C., "Notes of a Seven Months' Residence in the City of Ningpo, from

December 7th, 1842 to July 7th, 1843," Part 2, Chinese Repository 13, No. 2 (Canton: February

1844), 81.

xlvi “The Murder of the Innocents”, The Lancet, (London: April 3, 1858), 346.

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conditions were just as bad in England. By making the conditions of females in China seem worse than

they were, they hoped the women in England might believe they had actually lived comfortable lives

compared to women in other parts of the world. This was their best effort at slowing down the

increasing demands of the Women’s Rights movement. Unfortunately for them it did not work, and the

women of England continued to raise their demands and obtain more rights. However, this was, I

believe, the reasoning for the exaggeration, magnification, and fabrication of the inhospitable

conditions of the female sex in China during the 19th century.

The victories of the women in England during the 19th century urged English writers to portray

China as a hell for women. They exaggerated customs and problems towards women in China that

were almost the same as those in England at the time. This was a desperate, futile attempt at slowing

down a movement that had been building for decades. It perhaps intended to create a sense of

nationalism amongst women in England in that they were better than the Chinese. It did the opposite,

however. Women in England were not pacified by these exaggerations. They and their movement

persisted throughout the century on into the 20th century. The English writers of the 19th century made

an attempt to halt the growing movement of women by portraying conditions of females in China as

worse than they actually were.

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Notes

xlvii Ibid, 345.

xlviii Ibid, 345.

xlix Humble, Henry. “Infanticide: Its Cause and Cure,” The Church and the World: Essays on

Questions of the Day, (London: Longmans, Green, Reader, and Dyer, 1866), 57.

l Ibid.

li Ibid.

lii Marcus, “An Essay on Populousness,” (London: 1838), 22.

liii Arnot, Margaret L. “Infant Death, Child Care and the State: The Baby-Farming Scandal

and the First Infant Life Protection Legislation of 1872,” Continuity and Change 9 (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press, 1994), 272.

liv Mill, John Stuart. On the Subjection of Women, (Greenwich: Fawcett Publications, 1971), 19.

lv Ibid, 20.

lvi Wojtczak, Helena. “British Women’s History Timeline.” Accessed Nov. 15, 2010.

http://www.historyofwomen.org/timeline.html.

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