The tall (1.75m/5' 9"), blonde Swedish actress Ingrid Bergman was inconsistent with Aylward's small stature, dark hair, and North London accent. Although she found herself a figure of international interest because of the film's popularity and television and media interviews, Aylward was mortified by her depiction in the film and the liberties it took. It drew from the biography The Small Woman, by Alan Burgess. The Inn of the Sixth Happiness Ī film based on her life, The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, was released in 1958. There, she founded the Gladys Aylward Orphanage, where she worked until her death in 1970. After rejection by the Communist government and a stay in British-administered Hong Kong, she finally settled in Taiwan in 1958. After her mother died, Aylward sought a return to China. Settling in Basingstoke, she gave many lectures on her work.
She did not return to Britain until 1949, when her life in China was thought to be in great danger from the Communists – the army was actively seeking out missionaries. In 1938, the region was invaded by Japanese forces, and Aylward led more than 100 orphans to safety over the mountains, despite being wounded and sick, personally caring for them (and converting many to Christianity). Īylward became a national of the Republic of China in 1936 and was a revered figure among the people, taking in orphans and adopting several herself, intervening in a volatile prison riot and advocating prison reform, risking her life many times to help those in need. She met with much success in a field that had produced much resistance and even violence at times against the inspectors. For a time she served as an assistant to the Government of the Republic of China as a "foot inspector" by touring the countryside to enforce the new law against footbinding of young Chinese girls. Lawson not only provided hospitality for travelers but would also share stories about Jesus, in hopes of spreading nascent Christianity. Upon arriving in Yangcheng, China, Aylward worked with an older missionary, Jeannie Lawson, to help manage The Inn of the Eight Happinesses ( 八福客栈 bāfú kèzhàn in Chinese), a name based on the eight virtues of Love, Virtue, Gentleness, Tolerance, Loyalty, Truth, Beauty and Devotion. She then traveled across Japan with the help of the British Consul, and took another ship to China. She was detained by the Russians, but managed to evade them with local help and a lift from a Japanese ship. The dangerous trip took her across Siberia on the Trans-Siberian Railway at a time when the Soviet Union and China were in an undeclared war. On 15 October 1930, having worked for Sir Francis Younghusband, Aylward spent her life savings on a train passage to Yangcheng, Shanxi Province, China. Because of her lack of progress in learning the Chinese language, she was not offered further training.
Following a calling to go overseas as a Christian missionary, she was accepted by the China Inland Mission to study in a preparatory three-month course for aspiring missionaries. From her early teens, Gladys worked as a housemaid. Early life Īylward was born in 1902, one of three children of Thomas John Aylward and Rosina Florence, a working-class family from Edmonton, North London. The film was produced by Twentieth Century Fox, and filmed entirely in North Wales and England. The book served as the basis for the film The Inn of the Sixth Happiness, starring Ingrid Bergman, in 1958. Gladys May Aylward (24 February 1902 – 3 January 1970) was a British-born evangelical Christian missionary to China, whose story was told in the book The Small Woman: The Heroic Story of Gladys Aylward, by Alan Burgess, published in 1957.
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