96
The relations of our medical missionaries Dr. Gibson and Dr. Sibree with each other have been almost from the time of the latter's arrival a cause of grievous distress here, now our relations with them both occasion constant searchings of heart.
Disagreement amongst missionaries was not uncommon, shown in their correspondence with the Foreign Secretaries, who gave pastoral support to each missionary. As Goodall notes, the criticisms missionaries made of colleagues just indicates their human characteristics.68 However, the relationship between Drs. Gibson and Sibree reached its lowest point at an important time for the District Committee. The change to District Committee responsibilities introduced in 1895 was under discussion in Hong Kong in 1909, with a view to devolving its powers to the locally established church of Chinese Christians. As well, the growth of the LMS was making funding of mission work very difficult. Thus, controversy within the District Committee would put at risk the credibility of the LMS and the continuity of local funding.
69
Miss Davies, Principal of an LMS school, and a long-time member of the District Committee, reported that Dr. Sibree, contrary to her claims, had been overworked through 1907-08, and expressed the view that Chinese women would not support her in private practice. Rather, they would support the new lady doctor, presumably because the latter would have the sponsorship of the subscribers and the hospital.70 In correspondence with Mr. Cousins, she wrote:
I wish the Lady Doctor were on her way out. There is no doubt that the right kind of woman will find abundance of work. We all have to make our own work. We all of us have had, in a large measure, to make our own work: certainly the best part of it.71
Dr. Mitchell, who felt that she had not made an effort to adapt to the conditions of Hong Kong, continued to support Dr. Gibson in his claim on the Nethersole and the existing male dominance of clinical medicine at the hospital.72
This contradiction between Dr. Sibree's claims and the perceptions of others, female and male, is puzzling. One explanation is that it was politically motivated, in that to overcome gender perceptions relegating her to midwifery, she needed to win a medical argument about the small