David Washington Cincinnatus Olyphant was an American trader in the Far East and "the father of the American Mission to ".
Background
Born in Newport, Rhode Island he was the son of Doctor David Olyphant, a Scottish supporter of Bonnie Prince Charlie, who arrived in America in the 1740s shortly after the Battle of Culloden, and Ann (née Vernon) Olyphant, granddaughter of Richard Ward, governor of Rhode Island. In 1806, following the death of his father, he went to New York where he worked for the firm of King and Talbot, who were involved in the trade.
Education
At least 1 son, Robert Morrison. Started career in counting room of cousin Samuel King, senior partner of King & Talbot, New York City, circa 1806. Businessman in Baltimore, during War of 1812.
Associate with George West. Talbot, 1817.
With Thomas H. Smith, merchants in China trade, 1818, agent, Canton, China, 1820-circa 1823. Formed (with G.W. Talbot) Talbot, Olyphant & Company.
New York City, circa 1827. Member American Board Commissioners for Foreign Missions.
Member Executive Committee.
Career
After living in Baltimore between 1812–1817, he returned to New York where in 1820 he became an agent of Thomas H. Smith of Canton (now Guangzhou),
On behalf of King and Talbot, Olyphant arrived in Canton in 1820, where he met the Scottish missionary Robert Morrison. Delays by the London Missionary Society in sending Morrison assistance led to Olyphant writing to the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM) with the news that his ship Roman would be departing for Canton in December 1829, and "if a missionary could be sent out in her, the passage should be free." As a result, the chosen individual, Elijah Coleman Bridgman, became the first American Protestant Christian missionary in Olyphant offered all subsequent missionaries free passage on his ships and free lodgings in Canton as well as supporting the locally produced newspaper The Canton Register. In addition, Olyphant allowed the physician and missionary Peter Parker to use one of his warehouses as a hospital "so that patients could come and go without annoying foreigners by passing through their hongs, or excite the observations of natives by being seen to resort to a foreigner"s house, rendered it most suitable for the purpose."
On November 29, 1834, Olyphant, along with James Matheson, William Wetmore, James Innes, Thomas Fox, Elijah Coleman Bridgman, Karl Gützlaff and John Robert Morrison, formed a committee to inaugurate the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge in In 1838, Olyphant was elected to the board of the ABCFM.
In 1828, along with Charles North. Talbot, Olyphant founded the trading house in Canton, trading in "silk, mattings and fancy articles" after their former employer King and Talbot went bankrupt.
The new firm was unusual in that it eschewed the opium trade unlike many of its contemporary competitors.
Forced by ill-health to leave for the United States, Olyphant died en route in Cairo, Egypt on June 10, 1851. Olyphant"s son Robert Morrison Olyphant joined his father at and was later progressively Assistant President, Vice-President, and for twenty years President of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company (later the Delaware and Hudson Railway).
Membership
He was an elected member of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (ABCFM), the organization that sent the first American missionaries to in 1829.