Channing Moore Williams, a farmer’s son, was born in Richmond, Virginia, on July 18th, 1829, and was brought up in straitened circumstances by his widowed mother. He attended the College of William and Mary and the Virginia Theological Seminary.

Ordained as a deacon in 1855, he offered himself for work in China, where he was ordained as a priest in 1857. Two years later, he was sent to Japan and opened work in Nagasaki. His first convert was ba…