Gladys Aylward left school at 14 to become a shop assistant and parlour maid. Her parents were Christian but Gladys’ Christianity was purely nominal, until she was converted by the Reverend F.W. Pitt. After reading a newspaper article about China, she became passionately convinced that God had called her there to preach the gospel. She applied to the China Inland Mission in 1929, but was rejected because of her inability to learn Chinese.

Gladys worked for Sir Francis Younghusband, saving money, for her fare, and in 1932 she booked train passage to Yangcheng, Shanxi Province, China. A dangerous journey taking her across Russia on the Trans-Siberian Railway. She was detained by the Russians, but managed to evade them with local help. She got a ship to Japan where she was assisted by the British Consul and took a ship to China, where she joined a Scottish missionary, Jeannie Lawson, in Yangcheng. Mrs Lawson had been there for half a century, operating from 'The Inn of the Eight Happinesses', a hostel for muleteers. This was an acceptable way of making contact with the local people in an environment hostile to Christian missionaries.

The Chinese called her “Ai Weh Teh” (The Virtuous One). She identified with the local peasantry, so closely that she became naturalised as a Chinese citizen. She was appointed by General Chiang Kai-Shek to serve as an inspector of feet, enforcing the abandonment of the horrible ancient custom of foot-binding that caused mutilation of the feet of girls and women in China.

Following the Manchurian Incident of 1931 and the capture of the Chinese capital Nanking in 1937, the Japanese invaded her area. She cared for the wounded and orphaned, becoming involved (against the advice of other missionaries) with the Chinese Nationalist cause. She was regarded by the Japanese as a dangerous spy.

Then in April 1940 Gladys led 100 Chinese children away from the battle zone in northern Shansi, walking hundreds of miles across the mountains to Xian, where they would be comparatively safe from the Japanese invaders. The journey was very dangerous, and she became desperately ill for a time. She remained in China until 1949, when she returned to Britain. She was immediately in great demand because of her story, which she told with simplicity, biblical imagery and the certainty of faith.

In 1957 she returned to Asia, first to Hong Kong and then Taiwan, where she worked as a missionary among both the peasants and the American servicemen. Her story was told in the book, The Small Woman, by Alan Burgess, published in 1957, and made into the film 'The Inn of the Sixth Happiness', starring Ingrid Bergman, in 1958.

BORN: 24 February 1902, Edmonton, London, England.

DIED: 3 January 1970, Taiwan.