Theodore Pennell, Medical Missionary to the Afghan Tribes

Theodore Leighton Pennell [1867–1912] founded a missionary hospital and a mission boarding school in what is today Pakistan. Wikipedia provides a helpful summary of his life and work. My thanks to Redcliffe College for providing a copy of this book. This title is in the Public Domain.

A(rthur) L(ancaster), Pennell of Bannu. London: Church Missionary Society, 1913. Pbk. pp.60. [Click to download in PDF]

Preface

The following brief sketch has been prepared at the request of the Committee of the Church Missionary Society in response to a desire expressed in many quarters for some account of the life and work of Dr. Pennell in a form suitable for wide circulation.

It is written with the earnest hope that some amongst its readers may be constrained to follow Pennell’s most stimulating example and give themselves to medical mission work, or at least to seek to forward the cause which he held so dear.

A book of this size cannot attempt to provide much of interesting detail or incident. A wealth of incident, however, is to be found in that fascinating volume by Dr. Pennell himself, Among the Wild Tribes of the Afghan Frontier (published by Messrs. Seeley, Service & Co.); while further stores of yet deeper interest will doubtless be available on the publication, in ·a few months’ time, of the full biography, by the one best able to prepare it.

The reason for the inclusion of General Scott-Moncrieff’s paper (from Blackwood’s Magazine of last July) will, it is hoped, be obvious to all who read it. An account written by a fellow-missionary must almost of necessity be somewhat partial, and this very vivid impression of Dr. Pennell’s personality from the point of view of the responsible Government official has a special value both as supplementing that which precedes it and as correcting the popular idea that official opinion is always adverse to missionaries and their work. [Continue reading]