The cemetery survived the 1910–1945 Japanese colonial period and the 1950–1953 Korean War, and is remembered as a historic site for Korea's interactions with the West and Christianity.

The Korean government coordinated with the small foreigner community to find a plot of land suitable for burials.

[1][2] Horace Newton Allen obtained the land rights of the bluff overlooking the Han River.

[4] In 1961, President Park Chung Hee decreed that foreigners in South Korea were not allowed to own land.

The 100th Anniversary Church reportedly compared the expulsion to the 1997 Handover of Hong Kong, where foreign-occupied territory was returned to the original owner.