Fr Thomas Rice was born in Auchinstarry on the 23rd April 1907. After being educated at St Patrick’s Kilsyth and St Aloysius College Glasgow, he was trained for the Preisthood by the Vincentian Fathers at St Joesph’s Seminary Blackrock, Dublin and was ordained a Priest on 10th June 1933. Despite being a Scot he was issued with an Irish passport and dispatched on missionary duty to China. He arrived in Shanghai on 18th Dec 1933 and went to serve in the Parish of St Joseph’s in Tung Tang, Peking. St Joseph’s Church had an associated school called St Patrick’s and also one other small parish outside the city. The priests of the mission also had various Chaplaincy duties.

One locally remembered story in Kilsyth which does not feature in the official history of the Vincentian fathers is that whilst there, Fr Rice was arrested by the Chinese Communist Revolutionary Forces headed by Mao Tse Tung in 1948. He was sentenced to death by firing squad but due to the fact that he had a Republic of Ireland passport and was not ‘British’ his sentence was commuted to house arrest. After serving out the rest of his sentence he was returned to the West. He remained a Vincentian Father throughout and returned to his Priestly duties in Scotland and elsewhere where he was an occasional visitor to Kilsyth and Croy. He can be seen in the photograph leading the Corpus Christi Procession (holding the monstrance between Fr Brennan and Fr Anthony) in Croy in June 1949 shortly after his repatriation.

The other priests involved in the Peking Mission were;

Fr. Maurice Kavanagh (superior) arrested 28/07/1951, tortured and released 06/09/1952. After this date he arranged for his curates to leave China due to the growing threat from the Communists.

Fr. Michael Crowley – was the second last to leave the mission after the communist revolution.
Fr. Michael Howard
Fr. Kevin Murnaghan
Fr. James Feely
Fr. Thomas Rice
Fr. Andrew Kavanagh - brother of Fr Maurice Kavanagh
Fr. James Milner who died on the mission having suffered a fatal seizure after swimming in 1939

Fr. Thomas Rice died in the Western Infirmary Edinburgh on 27th February 1969 from heart failure and is buried in the cemetery at Lanark in the area reserved for Priests and Religious.

Our thanks to his nephew George Dailly for this information and also to Fr Thomas Davitt CM archivist of the Irish Province of the Vincentian Fathers.