Frederick O’Neill, an Irish Presbyterian missionary, lived for forty-five years in Faku, a small town in Manchuria, northeast China. From 1897 until his expulsion by the Japanese army in 1942, he witnessed and reported the extraordinary events that convulsed China – the Boxer Rebellion, the Great Manchurian Plague, the overthrow of the Qing dynasty and the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. He also served with the China Labour Corps (CLC) in France in World War One. Mark, O’Neill, his grandson, traces his footsteps and presents an eloquent account of a man in a largely forgotten page in history. From his comfortable upbringing in Northern Ireland, to the culture shock he experienced upon arriving in Manchuria, to receiving the Wen-Hu medal for his work with the CLC in World War One, Mark pays tribute to his grandfather’s legacy.

故事的主人公弗雷德里克．奧尼爾在一八七O年出生於當時是歐洲發達城市的貝爾法斯特（Belfast），從小過著豐衣足食的生活，因受到家人宗教信仰的熏陶而在完成學業後成為愛爾蘭長老會（Presbyterian Church of Ireland）的牧師。從一八九七年首次踏足滿洲以來的四十五年裡，為把福音傳遍中國東北的使命作了許多貢獻，期間見證了義和團之亂、辛亥革命、第一次世界大戰和中國抗日戰爭等歷史大事。作者馬克．奧尼爾是故事主人公的孫兒，在書裏透過講述這一位傳教士的事跡，向他偉大的祖父致敬之餘，亦以一個嶄新的角度來解構這段在中國歷史上充滿動蕩與變化的時期。