Mildred Cable

Alice Mildred Cable (February 21, 1878 – April 30, 1952), Chinese name Gai Qunying (盖群英), was a well-known woman missionary who worked in Shanxi, Gansu and Xinjiang, China, in the early twentieth century.

Life

She was born in 1878 in Guildford, Surrey, England, the eldest daughter of a draper of gentlemanly character. After finishing high school she experienced a spiritual revival, so she went to King's College London to receive basic medical training, and in 1901 joined the China Inland Mission and set out for China. She arrived in early 1902 and was posted to the Huozhou mission station in Shanxi, where she met her lifelong companion Evangeline French; in 1908 they were joined by Evangeline's younger sister Francesca French. In Huozhou they established 1 church, 1 girls' school of 200 pupils, 1 clinic and 1 opium refuge.

In 1923 the three women missionaries, by then in middle age, went to Suzhou (now Jiuquan) in Gansu to open a new mission station. Using it as a base, they crossed the Gobi Desert every year, travelling west into regions no missionary had ever entered, to preach to Muslim women in Xinjiang. The three taught many people Chinese so that they could read the Bible and other spiritual books. They went from market to market, selling Bibles at every fair and singing hymns aloud. On one occasion they entered 2700 homes and tents, held 650 meetings and gave out more than 40,000 copies of the Bible.

In 1936 the three left China for the last time and returned to England; in August 1938 the local warlord ordered all foreigners to leave Gansu and Xinjiang, and they were never able to return. In 1943 all three received the Livingstone Medal awarded by the Royal Scottish Geographical Society, and in 1942 Cable also received the Lawrence Memorial Medal of the Royal Central Asian Society. In England Cable served as a vice-president of the Bible Society. She died in London on April 30, 1952.