In addition to his novel creation, Charles Dickens was the editor of the popular weekly magazine, Household Words. On 2nd August 1851, he published an article, The Jews in China, in this magazine.

Perhaps due to the lack of full access to the journal of the two Delegates, as they were published in Shanghai, most of the information in this article was extracted from Father Jean-Paul Gozani’s (骆保禄, 1647–1732) report to Father Joseph Suarez (苏霖, 1656–1736) written in 1704. Certain details of the trip did make their way from China to England and were included in the article.

The article appeared without a byline; thus, there is no certainty that Dickens himself wrote it. Regardless, it was overwhelmingly well-received and reprinted many times over the next few years. The story of two Chinese converts and their interactions with an exotic Jewish colony amid pagan China was more than enough to draw the attention of a large audience.

Aaron Halevi Fink was a professional photographer. He purportedly visited the Kaifeng Jews for 11 days in 1864.

The travel notes of Fink were published by the Jewish Chronicle (犹太纪事报) in a three-part series on 31st October 1867.

The Jewish Chronicle published Liebermann's journey on 11th July 1879.

Reverend William Alexander Parsons Martin (1827–1916), an energetic American Protestant missionary, arrived in China in 1850 and lived there for forty-five years. He served as an interpreter for the American team in the negotiation of the Treaty of Tianjin (天津条约) in 1858. In addition, he acted as adviser for the Qing Court on issues of international law. In 1898, Emperor Guang-xu (光绪皇帝, 1875–1908) appointed him the inaugural president of what is now Peking University (北大).

He was the first undisputed Westerner to have visited the Kaifeng Jewish community since Father Jean-Paul Gozani (骆保禄, 1647–1732), Father Jean Domenge, (孟正气, 1666–1735) and Father Antoine Gaubil (宋君荣, 1689–1759) were there between 1721 and 1723.

Reverend Martin left Beijing on February 2nd and arrived in Kaifeng on February 17th.

In the centre of the ruins was the stone with the 1489 and 1512 inscriptions. It stood unprotected from the elements and stayed in the same condition for another fifty years. In 1912, it was transferred to the care of the Canadian mission in Kaifeng.

Stood next to the stone and surrounded by a crowd intrigued by his foreign looks, Reverend Martin asked if any of them were Jews. Representatives from six of the seven clans were present. One of the young men who stood up had a face that was still noticeably West Asian.

The crowd confessed that they had destroyed their holy house of worship because, with no money to restore the synagogue and insufficient knowledge regarding Judaism, they resorted to selling the timbers and bricks of the building.

This was on a Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath day.

The frequent rebellions in central China over the past twenty years significantly reduced the wealth of the Jewish community as the economy tanked. As a result, many of them moved away to other parts of the country. Occupations were limited to fruit and cake store owners, money changers, and other unremarkable positions for those who stayed.

The congregation still had several copies of the Law and Prophets, but no one could read a word of Hebrew; they were eager to find someone who was knowledgeable about this ancient language.

Boys were no longer circumcised and members of the kehillah freely intermarried with the Gentiles.

One member of the congregation converted to Buddhism, taking in the Buddhist name of Ben-dao (本道).

Reverend Martin’s visit resulted in the article, Account of a Visit to the Jews in Honan (河南犹太人访问记), which was published in 1881.

In 1898, Reverend Martin published his masterpiece, A Cycle of Cathay, which talked about this visit and gave comprehensive coverage of life in China, from commerce to religion to everyday life. He tried to present a view of China through an unbiased lens and highlighted China's significance and contributions to the development of humanity.

Three young Kaifeng Jews arrived in Beijing with the community’s three remaining Torah Scrolls.

The Scrolls were left with Reverend Joseph Edkins (艾约瑟, 1823–1905), a member of the London Missionary Society (英国伦敦传教士会), for safekeeping and to display to potential buyers. It is unknown whether they were acting on behalf of the Kaifeng Jewish community or simply selling for their own personal gain.

Completely unaware of the differences between Judaism and Christianity, the three young visitors expressed a strong desire to learn about Hebrew and the religions. They were not taken seriously by the missionaries, for not only did they believe the religions taught by the missionaries was the same as their own, but two of the three men were also opium addicts.

The third Scroll was acquired by an Austrian diplomat Karl von Scherzer (谢尔策, 1821–1903), in 1870.

Samuel Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky (1831–1906) was born to Orthodox Jewish parents in Russian Lithuania. His father was an Ashkenazic Jew; his mother was a Sephardic Jew.

Growing up, he spoke Hebrew, Aramaic, Yiddish, Russian, and Polish. At the age of 15, he was enrolled in a rabbinic school. It was here that a friend gave him a New Testament, and, because of this, he converted to Christianity. In the spring of 1855, he committed himself to Christ.

In 1859, at the age of 28, he arrived in China. On a trip to Nanjing during the Taiping Rebellion (太平天国运动, 1850–1864), he observed the conflict first hand and noted that the Taiping rebels were “entirely unworthy of any Christian sympathy. The spurious Christianity which they pretend to profess, besides its horrid blasphemies, does not seem to have produced in them the slightest moral effect for the better.”

Bishop Schereschewsky believed that the best way to spread the gospel effectively in China was to master the local dialects, Mandarin, and literary Chinese. A fellow missionary wrote, “I am told by a gentleman who is just down from Pekin that Mr Schereschewsky is the finest Chinese speaker at Pekin and that he is very much liked by the Chinese.”

He was part of a committee to translate the Bible. In light of his unique Jewish background, unparalleled proficiency in Hebrew and familiarity with the traditional Jewish Biblical exegeses, he was tasked with translating the Old Testament. He was the first to translate the Old Testament into Chinese. According to Irene Eber (1929– 2019), Louis Frieberg Professor of East Asian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Schereschewsky was the “Jewish Bishop.”

Bishop Schereschewsky noted that Jewish descents in Kaifeng, around 200-300 families, were detached from their religion and were hardly distinguishable from the Han Chinese in terms of rituals, beliefs, facial features and the way they dressed; they had idols and ancestral plaques in their houses; they intermarried with the natives and no longer circumcised of their boys; they could no longer read Hebrew but still had manuscripts in possession. One had actually converted to Buddhism and became a priest. Most lived below the poverty line.

Most of the information provided by Bishop Schereschewsky was second-hand information from his conversations with the non-Jews in the city.

Jacob L. Liebermann was a Jewish merchant from Vienna. He was in China for business purposes. He placed himself under British protection and was therefore supplied with a permit to visit the interior of the country.

During his journey, he maintained a low profile by taking on the garb of natives and plaiting his hair in the Chinese pigtail fashion; however, even then, he was still captured on more than one occasion because the locals suspected that he was a spy. Finally, he was able to escape.

In Kaifeng, Liebermann visited the site of the synagogue, which had nothing but mounds of pebbles, which he noted were "covered with mire and pools of water."

They still abstained from pork or meat killed by strangers, tried not to intermarry with outsiders, and still had their own burial ground.

The Jews further complained to Liebermann that they were tricked out of several of their Toral Scrolls by strangers and that they "used to have several (Torah) scrolls, but foreigners who came here, and of whom we did not know whether they were Israelites or not, took them from us. But when they once had possession of them, they kept them."

Many scholars believe the strangers here were possibly the two Chinese Protestant Delegates sent by the London Society.

Liebermann held reservations about the story because his friend, a local Muslim leader, told him that the Scrolls were legitimately purchased from the Jews at a very high price. Liebermann's own take on the matter was that the Jews were too embarrassed to admit that some of their fellow brethren had traded away their sacred texts for money and that it was much easier for them to find a scapegoat.

The authorities had directed the Kaifeng Jewry to display a Torah Scroll in the marketplace with a poster “offering a reward and a leading position to anyone who would be able to explain the wording of the Scroll,” and they had later made “similar offers in other places, but to no avail.”

Liebermann suggested the community petition for a foreign teacher to teach them about Judaism. However, a local elder claimed that this would be virtually impossible because this would put the community on the government's radar. The Kaifeng Jews wanted to stay away from all potential red flags. There also was not enough desire within the community to learn about Judaism to warrant risking government suspicion.

The travel notes of Fink were published by the Jewish Chronicle (犹太纪事报) in a three-part series on 31st October 1867.

Scholars generally believe that Liebermann’s version of the trip is more plausible, perhaps because it did not involve a plea for funding and because he was endorsed by Rabbi Lowy and published by the esteemed Anglo-Jewish Association.

Two years later, China’s anti-foreigner sentiment seemed to have subsided. Reverend Dennis J. Mills was allowed free entry into the city of Kaifeng. He stayed there for two days.

A member of the Gao Clan who had previously visited Beijing told Reverend Mills that he alone possessed one of the remaining Scriptures and intended to bring it to the Jewish community in Shanghai.

Three years after Reverend Dennis J. Mills’ visit, A.S. Annaud, a member of the National Bible Society of Scotland (英格兰国家圣经学会), visited Kaifeng for a few days. He went to see the ruins of the synagogue and saw that the 1489 Stone Inscription was still there. There were still Jews who lived near the compound.

Annaud mentioned that Gao Hui-gui “had some Jewish (facial) features.”

Hong Jun (1839–1893) was a Chinese historian who focused on the Yuan Dynasty and was a diplomat. He was appointed by Empress Dowager Ci-xi (慈禧太后, 1835–1908) as Chinese Envoy to Russia, Germany, the Netherlands, and Austria.

Hong Jun was considered one of the first Chinese scholars to address the topic of Jews in ancient China. Despite the brevity of the article and the term wotuo was also used to refer to Islamic merchants, it nevertheless marked an inflexion point in the historical study of Jews, Judaism, and Hebrew in China.

The Secretary of the Shanghai chapter of the Royal Asiatic Society reported that “the Jewish colony has spread to other towns. Their occupation as silk weavers took some of them to a distance. Some families were well-to-do through connection with this trade. One of the moderately large towns near Kaifeng, where there is a colony of Jews, is called Tang-chwang. It is a mile and a half long and is about 100 miles southwest of Kaifeng. The Jews are all people well-to-do. They weave the silk fabric called ling and take it or send it to Peking."

Colonel Lehmann found the community to be “of a pronounced Semitic type” and was told by his guide that they were part of the Sect that Plucks the Sinews (挑筋教). There were about 500 Kaifeng Jews, and most were part of the silk trade. However, some have found this claim questionable because no one else seemed to have written about the community.

According to the High Priest, the Jews came to China about three years after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE. They "travelled to China via Persia, through Khorasan and Samarkand" and were kindly received by the Chinese.

The man confessed that both he and his predecessor had no knowledge of Hebrew. His predecessor's father, probably the last one versed in Hebrew, died when his predecessor was still a child, before the beginning of his education.

On 12th January 1900, while stationed in Qingdao (青岛) and still part of Germany’s military service, Colonel Lehmann published his experiences in the article Lehmann: Jews in China (雷曼: 中国的犹太人).

Philippe Berthelot (贝特洛, 1866–1934) joined the foreign office in 1904. In 1905, he visited Kaifeng and met with the heads of six of the seven Jewish clans. The Zhao ran a tea shop; the Ai was in the shoe trading business; the Gao was a mason; the Li was in the military; the Shi was in the silk wholesale business; the Jin had no profession. Berthelot did not meet the leader of the Zhang Clan. He was told that they had disappeared from Kaifeng about thirty years ago. It is unknown whether they left the city or assimilated into the larger population entirely.

Although they still regarded themselves as Jewish, they did not know any Hebrew and were no longer distinct group that gathered regularly.

According to Philippe Berthelot, in 1904, a visiting American engineer Edward Jenks discovered the 1679 Stone Inscription. The tablet was embedded in the wall of one of the houses of the Zhao Clan. Jenks took it out and placed it up against the wall.

Oliver Bainbridge was an English explorer and reporter for the National Geographic (国家地理杂志). His journey covered over 200,000 miles across the many unfamiliar lands of the world. In 1906, he visited Kaifeng and took many photographs of the locals. According to him, “after much difficulty and tipping I persuaded my visitors to be photographed.”

One of the Jews that Bainbridge met recounted the history of the Jews in Kaifeng and described in detail the structure of the former synagogue and various religious rituals.

After proclaiming that their ancestors suffered many hardships because of the objections of the Chinese officials to their religious practices, he added, "even today, they object to our circumcision, which they denounce as a barbarous and cruel practice." This statement, made in 1906, probably meant that circumcision was still performed by the community around the turn of the century.

Bainbridge managed to obtain a cylindrical Torah case from a local mosque and brought it to London. The Torah case was photographed in the courtyard of the Dongda Mosque (东大寺) before it was given Bainbridge. The case was taken from the Kaifeng synagogue around the 17th century.

While at a mosque investigating the whereabouts of the items that disappeared from the demolished synagogue, Bainbridge was attacked by a mob of angry Kaifeng Muslims.

The following is from his article, The Chinese Jews, which was published the following year:

Accompanied by Mr. Shields, Mr. Hu (interpreter), and two soldiers, I visited mosque after mosque, which excited and annoyed the Muslims, who mistook me for a Jewish rabbi in disguise.

The fourth proved to be the one I wanted, for in a small room I saw the ark on a table, and made toward it, when the crowd objected and pushed me out, emphasizing their disapproval in no uncertain manner. The soldiers were helpless, but I had a strong suspicion that they were at heart with the mob.

The climax came when I clambered on the roof of the mosque and began to examine the tiles, for thousands of Chinese surrounded the mosque, yelling out, ‘Kick the devil's stomach!' 'Batter his devil's brain on the stones!’ ‘Kill the Jew!’ ‘Choke the sinew-puller!’ ‘Tear the foreign devil's entrails out!’ and other diabolical things too numerous and too disgusting to mention.

The majority were armed with bricks, clubs, or knives and were mad with rage. Every second I thought would be my last, for the fury of the Chinese mob beggars all description. A happy thought flashed through my mind and, quick as lightning, I pulled out my folding camera and turned it toward them, thinking to photograph the murderous beasts before they butchered me. The shock was tremendous; they dropped their bricks, knives, and clubs, and crushed and jammed one another in their rush from the ‘devil's glass.’

In October 1907, Bainbridge’s article, The Chinese Jews, was published in the National Geographic.

Count Carl Gustaf Emil Mannerheim (马达汉, 1867–1951) was a Finnish military leader and statesman. In the book, Memoirs of Marshal Mannerheim, he recorded, "Kaifeng looked smart and clean, with macadamized streets and well-stocked shops. Of its two hundred thousand inhabitants seventy were said to be orthodox Mohammedans, which was surprising in view of the great distance that separated them from the Muslim world. Once there had been a considerable number of Jews among the inhabitants of Kaifeng, but very few now remained. In the Chinese they had encountered an even more vital race which was gradually absorbing them."

He kept a personal diary where he recorded his encounters with several of the Kaifeng Jews; he took a photograph of one of them.

Zhang Xiang-wen (1867–1933), a Chinese historian and geographer, accompanied by his daughter, Zhang Xing-hua (张星华), visited the Kaifeng Jewish community in 1910. He was a founding member of the Geographical Society of China (中国地理学会) and served as its first President. He was generally credited with identifying the tomb of Genghis Khan; this is, however, subject to debate.

On hearing Zhao's claim that he had rubbings of the inscriptions at his home, Zhang and his group followed Zhao home and met Zhao's nephew. According to Zhang, "everything, the household and ancestor worship, were exactly the same as in an ordinary Chinese home. But, on close inspection, their high bridge noses and deep-set eyes likened rather those of the Caucasian race. I questioned them thoroughly about their origin and history.”

According to the nephew, when their ancestors first arrived in China, there were seven clans; but now there were only six, "we do not know where the Zhangs went later on." The congregation now had a population of fewer than 200. They frequently intermarried with the surrounding Han Chinese and Muslims.

The nephew informed Zhang, “The scriptures of our religion were preserved by our ancestors in gilt tubes which were stored in the synagogue. But I heard that several hundred years ago there arrived a Taoist priest (道士), who insisted on airing the scriptures in the sun. A sudden storm sprang up, by which all the scriptures were blown away and disappeared. It was probably taken away by a heavenly sprite.”

In The Jews of Kaifeng, Bishop White remarked that “some time after, a Taoist priest in Shanghai was offering Hebrew Scripture rolls for sale.”

According to the nephew, two years ago, an Englishman named Pan (潘) visited the community. This was believed to be Oliver Bainbridge (班布里奇), reporter for the National Geographic.

The nephew continued, "he (Bainbridge) said that he had been commissioned by our King to make friendly inquiry about us. Before he left, he took a picture of us. We presented him with a tube, expecting him to hand it over to our King. But these several years until now nothing has been heard of him."

This visit was detailed in Professor Zhang's book, An Early Chinese Source on the Kaifeng Jewish Community (大梁訪碑記). According to him, "for thousands of years, Jews have been stateless. But they survived as a race in the world with enormous power, and they have also kept their own racial identities."