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Here's a letter to newly-minted missionary Sibyl from Miss Jamieson, the General Secretary of the Canada Congregational Woman's Board of Missions. Miss Jamieson will play a larger role in Sibyl's life in a couple of years. I'm not impressed with Miss Jamieson, but you may form your own opinion.
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Toronto, Ontario, July 13th, 1925
Miss Sibyl G. Hosking,
Missao Evangelica,
Bie, Angola……Africa.
My dear Miss Hosking :
Every day I have been expecting a letter from you to state that you had gone on to Angola and wonder if it is gone astray, or what is wrong, for I hardly thought you would sail away from Lisbon without notifying the Board. I hope, however, that you have gone and the reason you did not write was because you were too busy, because I should be concerned, indeed, if you had been detained in Portugal all this time. I had thought of dropping a note to your father to ask if they had news of you because we understood you were to sail in June, and here it is July 13th, but I shall be hoping that the letter, when it comes, is from Angola. We felt the necessity for you remaining to serve Mrs. Hastings and yet the delay there has added very considerable to the expense of your language study and we do hope that she did not keep you waiting too long. I know these events do not always come off when expected, but if it detained you too many weeks, then I feel that it was unreasonable to expect that our Board would detain a worker for so long a period even though we wish to be sisterly and charitable. However, it may be that your letters, as I say, have miscarried and that you got away to Angola after all in good time and are now settled in your language study.
I am enclosing a copy of the circular letter written just at the time of the meetings of the United Church. I was waiting to hear from you for one thing and for another thing, I have been extremely busy. We had certainly wonderful meetings in Ottawa, had hardly believed it possible for our small Board to have anything quite so excellent. Everybody was asking about you and very interested to hear that you were now ready to go on to the Field and will, I know, be looking for a message from you, because first impressions are always very interesting. And that reminds me that I want you, if you have not already done so, to write me immediately a letter for publication in the “Leaflet”, for the reason that we are going to publish our four papers for the remaining months of the year under one cover, and these will be mailed to all the subscribers of all the uniting churches, and it is a great opportunity to make our work known. Please tell something about the medical work, even as you have seen it, and send all the material you can. I may not be able to use it all but I do want our share of the new magazine to be of a most excellent character.
Here and there all the time I meet people who know you or of you, last week I was down to the Normandale Summer School at Ryerson Beach and that is in the Hamilton Conference which takes in Guelph, and so was able to tell them of you, as you are a missionary from their district, and there were some who knew you or or knew some of your family. The Wilson brothers, who are sailing this August, come from near Delhi and they came down to the Summer School for one day to meet the young people, and gave very nice little addresses, indeed, at the noon-hour period.
The new missionaries, and Miss Read, sailed from Montreal on July 1st. They had a lovely party for them at Emmanuel Church the night before, with fine gifts and warm messages, and the Misses Melville and Miss Miatt were there too on their way to the sea, and Mr. Steed and Mr. Collins, so they had seven missionaries present and that made it a thrilling occasion. Even though it was warm summer weather, they said that the Emmanual parlors were crowded to suffocation, and a great deal of interest and enthusiasm prevailed. You will be interested to know that Jean Gurd swept the McGill records clean when she graduated this year, she won everything in sight, was valedictorian, and received an appointment as Assistant-Professor on the staff of McGill University. She is so brilliant that no one else came anywhere near her, and as she is such a dear girl as well, we are surely proud of her record. Mrs. Gurd gave us a very fine address at our Ottawa meeting on “The Vision and Task of the United Woman’s Boards.”
I go for my holiday in August and expect to have a very happy time. My youngest sister, Olive, is going out to Japan for a year to teach music at the Canadian Academy at Kobe, and we have to see her away, and then we are going away to a lovely old place in the country on the shores of Lake Simcoe.
I shall be very interested to hear what your impressions are when you reach the Field, and how it all strikes you, and hope that your letter is already on the way.
With warm love and every good wish as you take up your real task as a missionary, believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
Effie A. Jamieson
EAJ/P.
Enclosure.
Miss Sibyl G. Hosking,
Missao Evangelica,
Bie, Angola……Africa.
My dear Miss Hosking :
Every day I have been expecting a letter from you to state that you had gone on to Angola and wonder if it is gone astray, or what is wrong, for I hardly thought you would sail away from Lisbon without notifying the Board. I hope, however, that you have gone and the reason you did not write was because you were too busy, because I should be concerned, indeed, if you had been detained in Portugal all this time. I had thought of dropping a note to your father to ask if they had news of you because we understood you were to sail in June, and here it is July 13th, but I shall be hoping that the letter, when it comes, is from Angola. We felt the necessity for you remaining to serve Mrs. Hastings and yet the delay there has added very considerable to the expense of your language study and we do hope that she did not keep you waiting too long. I know these events do not always come off when expected, but if it detained you too many weeks, then I feel that it was unreasonable to expect that our Board would detain a worker for so long a period even though we wish to be sisterly and charitable. However, it may be that your letters, as I say, have miscarried and that you got away to Angola after all in good time and are now settled in your language study.
I am enclosing a copy of the circular letter written just at the time of the meetings of the United Church. I was waiting to hear from you for one thing and for another thing, I have been extremely busy. We had certainly wonderful meetings in Ottawa, had hardly believed it possible for our small Board to have anything quite so excellent. Everybody was asking about you and very interested to hear that you were now ready to go on to the Field and will, I know, be looking for a message from you, because first impressions are always very interesting. And that reminds me that I want you, if you have not already done so, to write me immediately a letter for publication in the “Leaflet”, for the reason that we are going to publish our four papers for the remaining months of the year under one cover, and these will be mailed to all the subscribers of all the uniting churches, and it is a great opportunity to make our work known. Please tell something about the medical work, even as you have seen it, and send all the material you can. I may not be able to use it all but I do want our share of the new magazine to be of a most excellent character.
Here and there all the time I meet people who know you or of you, last week I was down to the Normandale Summer School at Ryerson Beach and that is in the Hamilton Conference which takes in Guelph, and so was able to tell them of you, as you are a missionary from their district, and there were some who knew you or or knew some of your family. The Wilson brothers, who are sailing this August, come from near Delhi and they came down to the Summer School for one day to meet the young people, and gave very nice little addresses, indeed, at the noon-hour period.
The new missionaries, and Miss Read, sailed from Montreal on July 1st. They had a lovely party for them at Emmanuel Church the night before, with fine gifts and warm messages, and the Misses Melville and Miss Miatt were there too on their way to the sea, and Mr. Steed and Mr. Collins, so they had seven missionaries present and that made it a thrilling occasion. Even though it was warm summer weather, they said that the Emmanual parlors were crowded to suffocation, and a great deal of interest and enthusiasm prevailed. You will be interested to know that Jean Gurd swept the McGill records clean when she graduated this year, she won everything in sight, was valedictorian, and received an appointment as Assistant-Professor on the staff of McGill University. She is so brilliant that no one else came anywhere near her, and as she is such a dear girl as well, we are surely proud of her record. Mrs. Gurd gave us a very fine address at our Ottawa meeting on “The Vision and Task of the United Woman’s Boards.”
I go for my holiday in August and expect to have a very happy time. My youngest sister, Olive, is going out to Japan for a year to teach music at the Canadian Academy at Kobe, and we have to see her away, and then we are going away to a lovely old place in the country on the shores of Lake Simcoe.
I shall be very interested to hear what your impressions are when you reach the Field, and how it all strikes you, and hope that your letter is already on the way.
With warm love and every good wish as you take up your real task as a missionary, believe me,
Yours very sincerely,
Effie A. Jamieson
EAJ/P.
Enclosure.
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1.
The first mention of Miss Jamieson was when the Canadian Presbyterian mission board referred Sibyl to the Canadian Congregational mission board.
1922-12-11 LETTER FROM CANADIAN PRESBYTERIAN MISSION BOARD TO SIBYL
Now this afternoon, in speaking with Miss McGillivray our President, and without her knowing even of your existence, she told me that she had a phone, from Miss Jamison of the Congregational Board this morning, asking if there were more nurses applying than we could use. Immediately I said to myself, "All things work together for good" etc. and I thought of you, because they want the nurse for Africa.
2.
Every day I have been expecting a letter from you to state that you had gone on to Angola
The next letter we have from Sibyl is from Angola, but I don't know if she had left yet on the 13th.
3.
The new missionaries, and Miss Read, sailed from Montreal on July 1st. They had a lovely party for them at Emmanuel Church the night before, with fine gifts and warm messages, and the Misses Melville and Miss Miatt were there too on their way to the sea, and Mr. Steed and Mr. Collins, so they had seven missionaries present and that made it a thrilling occasion.
Everybody here except for Miss Miatt is mentioned in the Non-Family Mission Folks page on this website. And I may end up adding Miss Miatt to it as well.
4.
My youngest sister, Olive, is going out to Japan for a year to teach music at the Canadian Academy at Kobe
About the Canadian Academy at Kobe, Wikipedia says:
On September 13, 1913, Canadian Methodist Academy opened with sixteen students at Aotani-cho. Under the leadership of Principal Mrs. Ethel Gould Misener, the school served children of missionary parents from grade one through high school and offered boarding facilities for students. The school changed its name to Canadian Academy in 1917. In 1920, CA held its first graduation ceremony and PTA Bazaar, predecessor of the annual Food Fair.
The rest of the article is interesting, although of course irrelevant to this website:
CA remained at the Aotani-cho campus until it closed due to World War II. The last formal graduation ceremony took place in 1942. The Japanese government seized the school to serve as internment camps for enemy aliens. Only Gloucester House and the principal's house survived the extensive bombings of Kobe in 1945. After the war, Occupation Forces used Gloucester House as a hostel.
On September 17, 1952, CA reopened its doors at Gloucester House with six teachers and 110 students.
I have some sort-of-almost-in-laws who spent World War II as enemy (American) aliens in a Japanese internment camp in Manila in the Philippines - also a school. St. Thomas, if I remember correctly. Not a pleasant experience for them.
The first mention of Miss Jamieson was when the Canadian Presbyterian mission board referred Sibyl to the Canadian Congregational mission board.
1922-12-11 LETTER FROM CANADIAN PRESBYTERIAN MISSION BOARD TO SIBYL
Now this afternoon, in speaking with Miss McGillivray our President, and without her knowing even of your existence, she told me that she had a phone, from Miss Jamison of the Congregational Board this morning, asking if there were more nurses applying than we could use. Immediately I said to myself, "All things work together for good" etc. and I thought of you, because they want the nurse for Africa.
2.
Every day I have been expecting a letter from you to state that you had gone on to Angola
The next letter we have from Sibyl is from Angola, but I don't know if she had left yet on the 13th.
3.
The new missionaries, and Miss Read, sailed from Montreal on July 1st. They had a lovely party for them at Emmanuel Church the night before, with fine gifts and warm messages, and the Misses Melville and Miss Miatt were there too on their way to the sea, and Mr. Steed and Mr. Collins, so they had seven missionaries present and that made it a thrilling occasion.
Everybody here except for Miss Miatt is mentioned in the Non-Family Mission Folks page on this website. And I may end up adding Miss Miatt to it as well.
4.
My youngest sister, Olive, is going out to Japan for a year to teach music at the Canadian Academy at Kobe
About the Canadian Academy at Kobe, Wikipedia says:
On September 13, 1913, Canadian Methodist Academy opened with sixteen students at Aotani-cho. Under the leadership of Principal Mrs. Ethel Gould Misener, the school served children of missionary parents from grade one through high school and offered boarding facilities for students. The school changed its name to Canadian Academy in 1917. In 1920, CA held its first graduation ceremony and PTA Bazaar, predecessor of the annual Food Fair.
The rest of the article is interesting, although of course irrelevant to this website:
CA remained at the Aotani-cho campus until it closed due to World War II. The last formal graduation ceremony took place in 1942. The Japanese government seized the school to serve as internment camps for enemy aliens. Only Gloucester House and the principal's house survived the extensive bombings of Kobe in 1945. After the war, Occupation Forces used Gloucester House as a hostel.
On September 17, 1952, CA reopened its doors at Gloucester House with six teachers and 110 students.
I have some sort-of-almost-in-laws who spent World War II as enemy (American) aliens in a Japanese internment camp in Manila in the Philippines - also a school. St. Thomas, if I remember correctly. Not a pleasant experience for them.
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