Page 89 - Protestant Missionary Activity in the Arabian Gulf

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Kuwaiti soldiers dying from their wounds after the Battle

of Jahra., it was obvious to a.11 Kuwaitis, even the most tra­

ditional, that a stronger medicine was needed than their tra­

ditional society possessed. When Dr. Bennett was successful

in saving the daughter’s eyesight and Dr. Mylrea successfully

cared for all but four of the 120 Kuwaiti warriors brought

to the hospital, even the most doubting had to look with favor

on the Mission doctors. What greater gifts can be provided

than those of life and sight? Thus it was the malaria epi­

demic of 19H that first brought Ibn Sa’ud to the Mission

doctors and the influenza epidemic of 191S which brought

about his first invitation for a missionary to come to Riyadh.

All barriers were thus quickly broken down. As Zahra Ereeth

wrote of Dr. Mylrea in Kuwait, "He was admitted to the women’s

quarters of many houses in the town to give medical treatment,

and was received without suspicion where other male visitors
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are normally strictly excluded.

The modern scientific edtication and instruction in

English that the missionaries provided was also much in de­

mand particularly in the post-World War I period, Thus it is

that we see the Mission schools being so well received in

Thousands of the Basrah school
Iraq, Bahrain and Kuwait,
graduates went on to successful careers in business and politics.

Of the 2,000 boys who had graduated from the school by 1938,

the mission reports clained that "some have become doctors,

dentists, managers, head clerks, interpreters and teachers and

are earning good salaries. With very few exceptions all have