David Washington Cincinnatus Olyphant was an American merchant and philanthropist who is considered to be "the father of the American Mission to China".
Background
David Washington Cincinnatus Olyphant was born on March 7, 1789, at Newport, Rhode Island, the son of David (1720 - 1805) and Ann (Vernon) Olyphant. His father, a nephew of Lord Olyphant, was educated as a physician, in his youth supported the Stuarts, and after the eclipse of the Jacobite cause in the battle of Culloden emigrated to South Carolina. In the Revolution he served the colonies in several capacities, among them as director of Southern hospitals. After the Revolution, he was a member of the General Assembly of South Carolina. He was also a member of the Society of the Cincinnati. In 1785 he moved to Rhode Island, apparently because of failing health, and there married.
Career
In 1806, shortly after the death of his aged father, young David went to New York to seek his fortune. Here he entered the counting-room of his cousin, Samuel King, senior partner of King & Talbot, a firm engaged in the then flourishing trade with China. In 1812 he removed to Baltimore, forming a business connection with a Mr. Bucklin of that city. The stormy years during and after the War of 1812 worked the ruin of that venture, and in 1817 Olyphant, in debt, returned to New York. Here he was associated with George W. Talbot, formerly of King & Talbot, and succeeded in paying his obligations. In 1818 he entered the employ of Thomas H. Smith, a picturesque figure with a somewhat meteoric career, who for a time was one of the most notable merchants in the China trade. From 1820 to about 1823 Olyphant was in Canton as Smith's agent, then returned to America for a few years, after which period he again held the Canton agency of the Smith firm - from 1826 until the spectacular failure of his employer (1827 or 1828). Thereupon, he formed in Canton, with C. N. Talbot, the son of his early friend, the firm of Olyphant & Company, and, returning to the United States, organized in New York a house under the name of Talbot, Olyphant & Company. In these business connections he continued until his death. Twice again he was in China - from 1834 to 1837 and from 1850 to 1851. It was while returning from the last trip that he died in Cairo.
Olyphant is remembered even more for his religious and philanthropic activities than for his business career. While in Baltimore, in 1814, he formally announced himself a Christian, and, as was natural for one with his Scotch heritage, he became active in the Presbyterian Church. It was in part as a result of his interest that the first American Protestant missionary to China. Elijah C. Bridgman, went to Canton. Bridgman and David Abeel - the latter an agent of the American Seaman's Friend Society, in which Olyphant was also interested - arrived in Canton in 1830, having been given free passage by Olyphant's company on one of its ships. Olyphant and his partners provided quarters for the mission free of rent for thirteen years. Olyphant also underwrote the famous publication of this early American mission, the Chinese Repository. He and his partners provided free passage to China for many missionaries, including the distinguished S. Wells Williams and the first Protestant medical missionary in China, Peter Parker.
In 1836 his firm purchased a vessel, the Himaleh, for the purpose of aiding in the distribution of Christian literature along the coast of China, and it was the Morrison, another of the company's ships, which in 1837 made a voyage to Japan in a memorable attempt to open that country to intercourse with Americans while restoring seven shipwrecked Japanese sailors to their homes. Olyphant was a member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and of the executive committee of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions, and it was largely in the interest of missions that he made the trip to China which cost him his life. It was, moreover, from deep moral conviction that he and his firm refused to participate in the profitable opium traffic which bulked so large in the foreign imports to China in his day. After David’s death his sons continued his business.
Achievements
David Olyphant was a cofounder of Talbot, Olyphant & Company. Olyphant and his partners provided free passage to China for many Protestant missionaries for thirteen years, in addition they refused to engage in the pupolar that days opium trade.
Membership
David Olyphant was a member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions and of the executive committee of the Presbyterian Board of Foreign Missions.
Connections
David Olyphant was married to Mrs. Ann Archer in May 1815.
