The streets of Wonsan in the late 19th century / Robert Neff Collection

In the early years of the twentieth century, Wonsan was, for the most part, merely a brief stopover for steamships traveling between Shanghai, Vladivostok and Japanese ports. It was one of those places that travelers occasionally mentioned in their travelogues but rarely devoted much ink to describing. Fortunately for us, Francis Arthur Coleridge was an exception.

In the summer of 1900, Francis Arthur Coleridge, a 30-year-old Englishman with the Indian Civil Service, made a brief visit to the port aboard the Japanese steamship Tarien Maru. Among his fellow passengers were a diverse mix of nationalities, including Russians, Japanese, Chinese, French, and an Italian. Upon arriving in Wonsan, Coleridge was somewhat surprised to find himself the center of attention among his peers – simply reason because he was English. Everyone was curious to hear about the enigmatic Englishman and his wife who lived a secluded life just outside the port.

Of course, Coleridge knew exactly who they were. He explained that the man was simply an amateur carpenter and metal worker who came to Wonsan with his mother to live a quiet life of farming. Yet, despite Coleridge's assurances, no one believed him, dismissing it as “much too prosaic.”

It was reported that “lights could be seen in [the mysterious Englishman's] workshop after 9 p.m. when decent folk were in bed.” Even more damning was the notion that no one would live an isolated life without an ulterior motive. “The general opinion was that he was a coiner, making Russian roubles and Japanese yens and making a profit on the cheapness of silver.”

A view of Wonsan in the early 20th century / Courtesy of Diane Nars Collection

Coleridge denounced the accusations, remarking, “In the Far East no one credits Englishmen or England with anything but interested motives.” Although he never mentioned them by name, we know the identity of the Englishman and his mother: they were Charles Francis Stanhope Bilbrough and his elderly mother Gertrude. And, their stay in Korea was far from prosaic. The details of their checkered past in Korea has been explored in previous articles.

Coolridge was an observant and colorful writer, though it seems likely he took some artistic liberties and borrowed details from other writers' accounts. He claimed to have stayed in a Korean inn, where he lived “on more or less Korean food, which was decidedly odd and unusual, including young dog, snails, aged fish, seaweed and millet cakes.” He described the inn as being “perfectly clean” – thanks to the Japanese influence – and noted that the usual fire beneath the floor was not used due to the summer heat. By his own account, he spent only one night at the inn before returning to “European life” as a guest of a Norwegian employee of the Korean Customs Service.

Coleridge described the Japanese settlement in Gensan as bustling, with a post office, a Japanese-style inn, clean streets and “the appearance of life and bustle about the street not seen in Korean villages.” Venturing into a Korean village “free from Japanese restrictions,” he found it to be a “truly dirty place” with mud-and-straw houses and gutters filled with “filth unutterable.” Yet, almost in the same breath, he added, “A rich Korean's house is artistic and his gardens charming with little ponds and summer houses and peeps of landscape for he is a born gardener”

A Korean woman washing vegetables with her child, circa 1900s / Robert Neff Collection

His descriptions of Korean men and their clothing echoed the impressions of many early visitors:

“For coats [Korean men] have a long white blue garment with huge loose sleeves tied in, under the arms. If the man is of any dignity at all, his coat is almost ivory colour from the beating it gets when washed. The head dress is quaintest of all. The hair is done up in a knot on the back of the head with a huge amber comb in it round the forehead, a very tight band of plaited horse hair about an inch deep. So tight is this band that it draws all the lines out of the face. On top of this again a hat like our silk hat with a straight brim but made of plaited horse hair…”

Of course, every Korean man – and often women and children – carried at least one long pipe with a small bowl. This, declared Coleridge, was the very image of “the Korean gentleman, and all Koreans are gentlemen and men of leisure.”

But not everyone he encountered lived a life of leisure. Coleridge was astonished to learn that the Korean coolie (laborer) could carry a massive load – sometimes over 90 kilograms – on his back for more than 20 kilometers. Of course, the coolie did so at his own steady, mechanical pace and nothing on earth could induce him to walk faster.

Korean women were also exempt from the life of leisure. According to Coleridge, they did “almost all the work, [whether] they [were] cooking, or working the fields, or cutting wood, and all their spare time [was] spent beating their lord's clothes with wooden clubs to get the right shine into them.”

While he admired their strength, he was not fond of their fashion or their physical appearances. Their “loose petticoat and a bodice cut off in front to allow the breast to hang out” revealed that they were “most decidedly not good looking,” though he added that some of the small children were pretty and had a pink complexion.

A Korean gentleman on his pony and his attendants in the late 19th century / Robert Neff Collection

Another denizen of Wonsan that caught Coleridge's attention was the Korean pony. These ponies are ubiquitous in most foreign accounts of Korea, and it seems that nearly everyone who encountered them had little good to say. Even missionaries expressed pleasure at seeing the ponies suffer while being shod.

Echoing their sentiment, Coleridge claimed that “there is no villainy a [Korean pony] is not capable of.” Their teeth are ever present and “their capacity for kicking is phenomenal.” It is curious that Coleridge failed to describe the pony's propensity to fight – others did.

Lillias Underwood, an American missionary, declared them to be the most “self-willed, spoiled, obstinate, quarrelsome, uncertain, tricky and tough little beasts as ever carried a load.” A Canadian visitor echoed her thoughts and declared them the “equine wickedness in the Realm of the Morning Calm.”

One early visiting English missionary was terrified of his mount. “As soon as the creature saw me approaching to mount, it reared and kicked furiously, and opened its mouth and flew at me like a tiger.” He was only able to mount once the pony's eyes had been covered with a bag. In defense of the pony, it's worth mentioning that the English missionary was a very large and heavy man.

Coleridge suggested that even the Korean riders were afraid of their ponies.

“The [Korean] ‘Yangban' or landed gentry never think of riding without a servant holding each side of the bridle, and then he sits perched upon a sort of pack saddle very uncomfortable and very insecure.”

While there were many things in Wonsan that displeased Coleridge, one place in particular thoroughly annoyed and amused him – the Korean post office. This will be the subject of our next article.

My appreciation to Diane Nars for her invaluable assistance and for allowing me to use one of her images

Robert Neff has authored and co-authored several books including "Letters from Joseon," "Korea Through Western Eyes" and "Brief Encounters."