Li Hongzhang bestowed upon Dr. Coltman the decoration of the Double Dragon and made him a mandarin of the fourth rank.

[3] Robert married Alice Winifred Gallagher, on August 26, 1881 in Pennsylvania.

During the siege of Peking by the Boxers in 1900 he sent out the first message that reached the outside world, acting as correspondent for the Chicago Record.

He became attorney for the Standard Oil Company at Tianjin, China.

He was author of The Chinese, their Present and Future: Medical, Political, and Social (1891) and Yellow Crime, or Beleaguered in Peking (1901).