Page 257 →Appendix A Letter to Miss Conklin, 1905

Dear Miss Conklin:¹

I have been and am so busy, but as this letter is one of the things on hand I might as well begin with it.

I have never kept a diary but on Jan 1st 1887 I began what I called a journal “the main object of which is to note my advancement in the Christian life.” I see that I was “striving after” but had not attained much, altho’ I had been converted in the revival held in our church the winter before my senior year in high school. I had joined the Methodist church a number of years before when I was only 12 years of age. Well the pages of the journal tell of my struggles in giving up one after another card playing dancing theatre-going and cheap novel reading. The first intimation of a call to special work is suggested by an entry made on Jan 7th ’87 in which I say—“I am so anxious to do something in this world, something useful. I can’t help but wonder what shall become of me. I think that surely something will happen before long to change my life some. When it is I do not know.” Then from June till August of the following year I have written nothing. When I wrote again I said “I have not told my journal that my burning desire is to be a missionary. If my health permits I feel that is my calling.” I presume Mrs. Brand in her paper mentions how in preparing a paper for our Young Ladies Missionary Society I borrowed some “Friends”² of her, or rather one for she had given away all the others. This had in it a letter to young ladies from Mrs. Lucy Rider Meyer³ entitled “Why should I not go?” Before I had finished reading every excuse I could offer had been answered by Mrs. Meyer and I sat there with the paper in my hands and my heart beating so fast, a moment or so & then bursting into tears I asked the Lord to make me Page 258 →willing if it were his will. I had never thought of being a missionary before, it came just as suddenly as I have described it. Then to tell my pastor or my parents, I had not the courage and only to my girl friend Mary Miller now Mrs. Joseph Colton did I tell it for nearly two years. Fearing opposition from my father I concluded to try to make enough money to go to Chicago training school and so accepted an offer from an experienced dressmaker to open a shop in a nearby town. My journal says “no one knows my motive for being here.” I saw however it was going to take me too long to make the money I needed and pressure was brought to bear upon me from home so after six months I gave up that plan. I believe as I look back upon it that it was a part of God’s plan for me and I learned many things that have helped me in my work on the mission field through that experience.—Sept 2nd 1888, I speak of a providential meeting and conversation I had with Belle Allen and I have written “She went last Monday morning & will not arrive for over a month at her destination—Tokio Japan.” I probably told her my purposes and I am sure she encouraged me altho’ I have not recorded our conversation.

There are some things in my journal which I might let you have if it were my obituary you were writing but they are most too personal to use in the leaflet. It seemed as though every time I was tempted to make other plans for my life the Lord would in some plain manner show me that to be a missionary was his will for me. I speak in my journal of opening my Bible to read before retiring one night and the first words I saw were those of Ezek[iel] 33–6⁴ and I felt that in like manner if I did not “warn” the people God would hold me accountable for some of the lost souls in heathen lands. I closed that entry in my journal by saying “May God still open the way more clearly for me,” and the next entry written 10 days later I say “I am still in the dark as to what to do,” and two weeks later Sept 12th 1889, which by the way was just four years to the day of my date of sailing for Korea, I wrote “I have decided to be a missionary. It will probably be three years before I go but I intend to prepare in the meantime. If I am mistaken in God’s will I will be likely to find it out by the time the three years have passed.” I finally made my decision by going to my pastor, then Rev. J. L. Albritton⁵ who did much for me spiritually during his pastorate here, and telling him about my call to mission work and the struggles I had had for two years past. There was a strange thing in connection with that conversation. I had asked him after the evening service if I might see him in his study the next morning. The hour was set, and as I entered I said “I suspect you wonder what I want to speak to you about” and he answered “No, I know, you want to ask me what I think about your being a missionary. I said “Who told you?” and he Page 259 →answered—“no one”—He talked very plainly to me and asked me many pointed questions to see if I understood the gravity of the step. He prayed with me and helped me to clear away the doubts I had as to whether I were really called. He then promised to further help me by telling my father all about it. Then Father came to me and said “If the Lord has laid his hand upon you for His service I shall not lay any stumbling blocks in your path.” A few weeks after I attended the Branch Annual held in Xenia, Miss Humphrey, a friend of the family and District Secretary then, piloting me. I met & advised with Mrs. Cowen⁶ & Miss Thoburn.⁷ Dec. 19th I say “The Lord has been doing wonderful things for me since I wrote last I am going to Delaware⁸ to college the first of Jan’y.” I graduated as you know June of 1892. I wanted to go to Chicago⁹ but I felt that I could not ask father to do any more for me than he had in paying all my expenses at Delaware. I remember clearly how I counted it as a special answer to prayer when the Monnett¹⁰ Missionary Soc. gave me the proceeds of the Lawn Fete—I think it was something over forty dollars. That summer and fall I kept the books for my father who was then in the hardware business. By the first of the year I had enough money laid by with the gift I spoke of to take my course in Chicago. I was four months in the C. T. S. and about two months in the Moody Institute.¹¹ Before going to Chicago I had sent my testimonials to the Gen. Ex. Comm. & had been accepted. While there I had a number of letters from Mrs. Cowen suggesting Mexico, South America & other fields, asking if I had any preference, but I always said “Where I am needed the most when I am ready to go.” You remember Mrs. Sallie Fisher who was married to Mr. Swallen¹² of the Presby Ch. on the evening of Commencement day. She had been in Korea a number of months when one day Miss Paine calling at her home saw my picture—no, Miss Paine mentioned the need of some one in the school and Mrs. Swallen said she had a friend who was an accepted candidate and then showed her my photograph. Mrs. Scranton wrote to the Secretaries and Miss Paine to me. That was how I came to go to Korea.

As to my duties as missionary I think Dr. Ernsberger’s¹³ letter will give them better and sound better coming from another. Mother will answer as to my old letters, she has them of course.

Now if there is anything you want to know that this culling from my journal does not cover, let me know I presume you had asked Miss Humphreys for a letter. Mr. Albritton might be able to give you some word that would be interesting altho’ I am just a little in doubt as to whether you would want to use his name considering the scandal which came out about him a number of years ago.

Page 260 →I give these pages into your hands to be “worked over” and “corrected” as you used to do, when I studied under you “How to write clearly.”

Thank you for your interest in me. I am sure the leaflet will be satisfactory to me if it comes from your pen. I was very interested in the sketch you wrote of Julia Bonafield.¹⁴

Very lovingly Yours—

Lulu E. Frey