When Dr. Greg Martin and his wife, Anne, sailed from America for India in November of 1919, probably most people were not too surprised. After all, Greg had been born in Gujranwala back in 1890. His parents, Howard and Elizabeth Martin, were missionaries in India. His uncle, Samuel Martin, served in India and even had a town named after him (Martinpur). Two of his sisters, Frances and Gertrude, lived in India as missionaries. Dr. Martin might have come to India sooner, for he graduated from Western Reserve Medical School in 1916, but there was the First World War, and the U.S. Army wanted his services from 1916 to 1919. In addition to the usual language study during his first years in India, Dr. Martin traveled here and there gaining experience. He worked with Dr. Holland both at Shikarpur and at Srinagar. One winter he spent traveling extensively over India surveying hospitals, as he thought and planned for the new hospital he hoped to build.
In the spring and summer of l92l, the property for Christian Hospital, Taxila was purchased. This was no simple matter, for the buying of the 27 acres involved settlement and payment on less that separate deeds! And the landowners insisted on being paid in cash, naturally, and what’s more in a certain kind of cash – Edward VII’s rupee coins. So, Dr. Martin lugged out to Taxila two sack of coins. In all, 14,222 rupees, 9 annas, and 6 pice. Why was the site at Taxila chosen when some wanted the new hospital to be in Pindi? Dr. Martin wanted to serve the tribal people, and he didn’t think they would come to Pindi. Also Serai Kala, as the location was known, was a railway junction , and the Grand Trunk Road was situated nearly. So the Christian Hospital was to be at Taxila. Having land and having a hospital are not quite the same thing. And what land it was!—absolutely treeless, and as Mrs. Martin wrote, recalling it: “The dust blowing from the road was definitely not what a hospital needed.” “So a row of California Pepper trees was planted along the road to help catch the dust. Then we planted hundred of Sheesham Seedlings—but to no avail for the cattle ate them or they would die from the lack of water.”
If you look around the Hospital now, you'll see that they solved the tree and dust problem, in time. Sir John Marshal, Director General of Archeology for all of India, and the famous archeologist of the Taxila ruins, aided the fledgling, the Hospital's grounds. He donated the shubbery and designed the placing of it; the circle of shrubs on the entrance road is his work. Sir John Marshall and Dr. Martin were contemporaries and friends.
Eventually, the work and the building of the Hospital were underway. The very early medical work was done in a tent. Once, uncle Alf, who was assisting Dr. Greg in the tent, found the perspiration too much and wiped his brow with his hand. Dr. Martin, for the reminder of operation, made Uncle Alf hold that unsterile hand behind his back. The first recorded major operation of the Hospital was on August 24, 1922—a hernia operation on Moh. Nur. done by Dr. Martin. During the remainder of 1922, 44 minor and 35 major operations (including 13 cataract removals) were performed. So, the hospital was launched, simply, but definitely.