Part 40 - American Capuchin missionaries in China

Black and white print

A photograph of four American Capuchin missionaries in Gansu Province in China in May 1929. They are seated (on left) Fr. Agatho Rolf OFM Cap. and Fr. Gabriel McCarthy OFM Cap. and standing (left) Fr. Rudolf Blockinger OFM Cap. and Fr. Sylvester Staudt OFM Cap. These were the first American Capuchins to undertake a foreign mission arriving in China in 1922. The photograph was the last to be taken of the four missionaries together.

Fr. Gabriel died of typhoid later in 1929 with Fr. Agatho succumbing to the same disease in 1931. Fr. Sylvester was transferred to a Capuchin mission in Puerto Rico in 1930. Fr. Rudolf remained a missionary in China for thirty years, working primarily in Tianshui. He was arrested by the Chinese Communist government in 1949 and was held for three years as a prisoner on charges of being an American spy. Though he was eventually found not guilty, he was expelled from China in May 1952. He was the last Capuchin missionary to be expelled from the country, enduring a nineteen-day trek to the British colony of Hong Kong. He eventually settled in Australia and continued to work as a missionary there until his death in Brisbane in 1969.