TWENTY-FIVE YEARS IN PERSIA
THE MEMOIRS OF MARY ALLEN WHIPPLE
by
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Chapter Seven
The First Tragedy
1875
It was a hot summer for Seir and the children were
taken outside and up to a few trees where it seemed cooler and by the middle of
September we were taking of returning to the city. Will had gone to Salmas to arrange
a book room and on the 18th Max developed a sore throat and Dr.
Holmes said it was diphtheria. He told me to send for his father. He came,
riding day and night while we fought to save the precious life but two hours
after his father reached us, the spirit took its flight from the beautiful home
of the soul.
Mr. Labaree led a very tender service in the chapel
and we laid his little casket up in the Seir Cemetery. Mrs. Cochran and Emma
had kept Willie in their rooms but that night just as we sat down to supper at
Mrs. Cochran’s, Willie who was asleep suddenly cried out. I ran in and his head
was hot. He wanted water. We called the doctor and he shook his head, saying
the symptoms are very clear. Mrs. Cochran insisted we bring him in her guest
room where the fireplace made the ventilation better. Our bedroom was on the
roof, difficult for sickness. For four days we fought the dread disease and
then the doctor said he would try the last remedy. Then he opened the windpipe
but it was too late for there were only a few short breaths and the spirit had
gone to join his little brother, so dear to him.
While the body was lying on a couch in the Cochran
parlor, Emma begged to see him, so their man put up a ladder to the window. She
climbed up and shed many tears over her little friends. She insisted she loved
him like her own brother.
Mr. Oldfather led the service with tender loving
messages. Jerry and Felicia, in spite of our urging they run no risks, came up
form the lake. He led in the singing of “Jesus, Tender Shepherd lead us”. The
entire circle was so very helpful and sympathetic and Mrs. Cochran so like a
mother. Then we went to the cemetery and laid the casket by the side of his
brother. You can, perhaps, understand what it meant to go back to the city to that
empty home with empty arms.
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About the Book
This book is not just another missionary story but
rather a unique account of a family whose ideal of service required them to
make the difficult journey to Persia and to make considerable sacrifices in
seeking that ideal. While detailed accounts of missionary work had been
published over the decades, a few of them tell us about the missionaries- the
persons and their other interests. This is what this book is about: an edited
version of the previously unpublished memoirs of the Whipple family who shared
everything they had and provided the ultimate sacrifice, their lives, to spare
the lives of those whom they never knew.
In these pages, Mary Allen Whipple provides her life story from the
first time she met William Whipple, throughout their life together as
missionaries in Persia for more than twenty-five years and afterwards. She
provides snap shots of herself, her family and friends, the hardships and
tragedies that befell her family, the moments of triumph, and the changing time
in which she lived.
But what kind of people they were and what kind of
life they lived? Find out in this book.
About the Author
The author is an Assyrian Surgeon born in the
suburbs of Baghdad, Iraq in 1958. He graduated from the University of Baghdad
School of Medicine in 1983 after which he was drafted by the Iraqi military
during the first and the second Persian Gulf wars. After surviving six years of
active duty he migrated to the United States of America where he completed his
residency in general surgery. He joined the faculty at Loma Linda University
School of Medicine and is currently an Assistant Professor of Surgery. In
addition to his interest in surgical education and clinical research, he is
intimately involved in the history and culture of the Assyrians, a small
Christian minority in the Middle East, who are still struggling for their
existence in their homeland.