The Great Dive
بِسۡمِ ٱللهِ ٱلرَّحۡمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ The following was taken from The Great Dive: The Unusual Life of William Williamson by Shaykh ‘Abd al-Hakim Murad Timothy John Winter. The Anglo-Muslim community has produced many stormy petrels over the centuries. Religious dissidents, adventurers, romancers, scholar-pilgrims – all have enriched the diverse and colourful story that is British Islam. Peter Lyall, the Scotsman who became an admiral in the Ottoman navy; ‘Abdullah Quilliam, the Liverpool solicitor who founded a mosque and orphanage in which Christian waifs were raised as Muslims; Benjamin Bishop, His Majesty’s consul in Cairo who turned Muslim and mysteriously disappeared; Lord Headley the peer; Lady Evelyn Cobbold the explorer and pilgrim to Mecca; Mubarak Churchward, the stage-painter and friend of Lily Langtry; the anonymous Scotsman who became governor of Madina; and many more. Few, however, lived such adventurous lives as the celebrated Haji ‘Abdullah F...