Arthur Henderson Smith

Arthur Henderson Smith was a Christian missionary and a member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions, noted for spending 54 years as a missionary in China and writing books that presented China to foreign readers. These books include Chinese Characteristics, Village Life in China, The Uplift of China and China in Convulsion (1901), which describes his time under siege in Beijing (Peking) in the Boxer Rebellion. In the 1920s, Chinese Characteristics remained the most widely read book on China among foreign residents there.