The inauguration of the conserved Narinda tomb (the monument formerly known as ‘Colombo Sahib’s tomb’ – per ‘A Dacca Mystery Solved’, Rosie Llewellyn Jones’ post on 4 Jun 2025), and the nearby Moorish Gateway (‘a Mughal type gateway from the late 17th century’), was celebrated on 20 September.

The inauguration ceremony was led by The Most Rev Archbishop Bejoy N D’Cruze, Archbishop of Dhaka (and Chairman of Wari Christian Cemetery Board), with Rev Fr Albert Rozario, Parish Priest, St Mary’s Cathedral, Ramna (and Vice Chairman, Wari Christian Cemetery Board). Mr Mostofa Sarwar Farooki, Advisor, Ministry of Cultural Affairs, Government of Bangladesh, was the Chief Guest. Ms Sarah Cooke, British High Commissioner to Bangladesh, also attended.

Described by art historian Charles Greig as ‘one of the finest funerary monuments in South Asia’ the Narinda tomb had, prior to the recent conservation work, been seriously neglected, its decorative stonework hidden from sight and held in ‘a vice-like grip’ by invasive vegetation.

Echoing the excited comments from Waqar Khan (Founder of Bangladesh Forum for Heritage Studies, and former Â鶹´«Ã½Area Representative) ‘Just look at this! What is emerging looks simply spectacular! Eight years of relentless effort have finally paid off’ (Â鶹´«Ã½Project post on 28 Dec 2024), Ms Cooke expressed delight at the incredible transformation in the appearance of the monument since her April 2023 visit.

Thanking both Â鶹´«Ã½and the Commonwealth Heritage Forum for jointly funding the conservation work, Ms Cooke paid tribute to Mr Waqar Khan for initiating and supporting the project proposal for several years, before passing on his responsibilities to Professor Dr Abu Syeed Ahmed of Asia-Pacific University (Conservation architect and current Â鶹´«Ã½Area Representative), who had brought the very impressive conservation work to completion.

Congratulating Archbishop D’Cruze, Rev Fr Albert Rozario, and the other members of the Wari Christian Cemetery Board for their commitment to the project, Ms Cooke expressed her hope that the Board would build on this success by engaging the wider community in safeguarding the future of both the monuments and the nearby grave of Flight Lieutenant Edward Owens, of the Royal Air Force, that had been recently conserved with support from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. Flight Lieutenant Owens died in 1961, after ejecting from a Javelin aircraft which had suffered a catastrophic failure on a ferry flight to (then) Malaya.

Ms Cooke closed with the observation that ‘the partnership between the UK and Bangladesh to restore and preserve these monuments is a great example of our shared heritage and our very deep friendship’.

Â鶹´«Ã½message

Click to see, and hear, the 3-minute video message which BACSA’s Chairman, Mr Paul Dean, sent to the event organisers. Due to power outages in Dhaka, it was not possible to show it at the Ceremony itself.

After mentioning that ‘We at Â鶹´«Ã½have been hugely impressed by the skills and dedication of the team which has brought this restoration of ‘Colombo Sahib’s tomb’ to a successful conclusion’, Paul welcomed the prospect of future collaborative projects in Bangladesh: ‘We know, from Professor Ahmed… that there are other potential projects in Bangladesh, in which we, and we anticipate the Commonwealth Heritage Forum, may wish to collaborate. Â鶹´«Ã½very much hopes to continue our partnership with all involved, both in Wari Cemetery and further afield in Dhaka and in Bangladesh’.

Rachel Magowan

We are grateful to Ms Nur Jahan Hera of the British High Commission for providing the photos of the inauguration ceremony.

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‘The Centre for Heritage Conservation at CEPT (Centre for Environment Planning and Technology) University in Ahmedabad, led by Prof Jigna Desai, conducted a thorough expert survey of this cemetery and produced a very detailed report.

The report contains a record of all the burials, which will replace the lost originals for the church, and an assessment of the materials used in the historic graves, with recommendations for best practice conservation.

Both academics and students were involved and Prof Desai has told us that the latter found it enlightening to investigate an old British cemetery. The project cost £15,300.’ (Â鶹´«Ã½Annual Report, 2024)

These photos from the CEPT report show some of the project work in progress:

(Suggestions for Â鶹´«Ã½website news items, volunteering opportunities and diary entries, are always welcome – please send them to ‘comms@bacsa.org.uk’.)

The post St Andrew’s Cemetery, Bhuj – Â鶹´«Ã½Surveying project appeared first on BACSA.

‘In January 2024 Â鶹´«Ã½was contacted by the Walter Burley Griffin Society of Australia asking for help to restore the Lucknow grave of this distinguished American architect who designed the city of Canberra.

The President of the Society, Mr Peter Graves, had long tried to get the Griffin grave restored, but had only encountered apathy from government bodies and from the US Embassy. Bureaucrats in the Australian Foreign Affairs simply advised the Society to ‘contact the local authorities in Lucknow’ without being able to advise who these authorities might be.

This is where Â鶹´«Ã½stepped in, because one of our members, Mr Prateek Hira, lives in Lucknow where he is the Director of the Tornos Tour Company, familiar to many people visiting India. In conjunction with the Griffin Society, Mr Hira has had the simple grave in the Nishatganj cemetery, Lucknow, transformed into a suitable and lasting memorial. The new wording on the tombstone reads:

‘Here lies Walter Burley Griffin. With his wife Marion Mahony Griffin they
were the architects of Australia’s national capital Canberra in 1912. Walter was
invited in 1935 to tender for a new University Library in Lucknow and spent
the last 15 months of his life here. In India, he soon found a new spiritual
home, where the landscape of Lucknow reminded him of the Mississippi
Valley of Illinois. Griffin’s projects included homes for academics at the
University, a new student union building and municipal buildings for the city
of Ahmedabad in western India. He died in Lucknow from peritonitis on 11
February 1937 with Marion Mahony beside him.’

The wording has been approved by Griffin’s direct relatives (through his brother) in America, Andrew and Peter Griffin. For those unfamiliar with the story of the discovery of Walter Burley Griffen’s grave, it started in the Spring 1988 issue of Chowkidar. A Â鶹´«Ã½member and fellow architect, the late Dr Monty Foyle had tried and failed to find the tomb. But his unsuccessful search inspired an Australian author, Graeme Westlake, to try again. Westlake had almost given up until one evening he called on the Revd. Masih, who was responsible at that time for the cemetery. He got out the old records and found that Griffin had been buried in Plot 11, Grave No. 163. The plot then was just a mass of tangled grass with only the number visible – no stone or any other kind of marker. Over the years attempts were made to improve the site. Mr Hira has done much to keep Griffin’s memory alive and his last resting place in good order, erecting iron railings around the grave. Today’s restoration is an excellent example of co-operation between three countries – India, Australia and Britain and shows how a tomb can create a tourist attraction. The Nishatganj cemetery is now firmly on the map for anyone visiting Lucknow in the future’.

Rosie Llewellyn-Jones

Ed Note:

Although Walter Burley Griffin only spent the last 15 months of his life at Lucknow, it was an extremely prolific period in his architectural career. In their 1997 book ‘Two American Architects in India’ Paul Kruty and Paul Sprague describe Walter and Marion Griffin’s initial encounters with life on the Subcontinent, and discuss the designs produced from the 100+ commissions which flowed in after the rapid growth in the architect’s reputation.

Born in Chicago in 1876, Griffin had moved to Australia in 1913, on winning the competition to design the new capital city of Canberra. Then, in 1935, following acceptance of his design for a new University Library at Lucknow, he sailed to India. On the eve of his visit a journalist asked Griffin whether he would follow the Indian style. ‘No, I’m going to lead it’ was his confident reply.

The Vice-Chancellor of Lucknow, Raghunath Purushotam Paranjpye, had suggested that Griffin should maximise the opportunity to ‘see things on his way’. In the event, the overland part of his journey – from Bombay to Lucknow – co-ordinated by his travelling companion Ronald Craig, an Australian journalist living in India, was ‘one succession of thrills!’

Starting with 6thc Hindi caves on Elephanta Island, they routed via Agra and Delhi, spending time at the ‘vast Hindu fortress and palace of Gwalior’ and the Taj Mahal – ‘in the morning sunlight… to me this was no less breath-taking than to any devotee who has ever sung its praises, and quite independent of the fact that, architecturally, I could see many things that should have been altogether different’.

But it was the virtually intact, palatial section of Emperor Akbar’s 16thc red sandstone Moghul Capital city which really gave him pause for thought: ‘How altogether pusillanimous, puny was the effort of the civilisation of Australia toward a Continental Capital compared with this [one,] perfectly conceived and as perfectly completed monumentally, and then replaced with another in a fraction of the time consumed by merely talking about Canberra’.

As Dr Rani Massey wrote in the August 2023 edition of (from the Walter Burley Griffin Society Incorporated): ‘The old civilisation inspired new creative aspirations in architecture, fostering opportunity to unite Eastern architecture with Western modernism’.

Here are four examples of Griffin’s Lucknow commissions:

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‘In April 2024 Â鶹´«Ã½agreed to fund the digitisation of the records held by the Raniganj Wesleyan Methodist Church and sent a grant of £2143 to the Asansol Heritage Research Group to carry out the work. The Group is interested in preserving the colonial heritage of the Raniganj-Asansol area of West Bengal, which was a major industrial and railway centre in British India, and it sees the church’s records as vital evidence of this history.

The project aimed to preserve endangered historical records by transforming physical documents into digitised formats. It was completed in March 2025 and the new formats were sent to BACSA. The project has contributed to the professional development of researchers and local university students and safeguarded the church’s records for the future.

We shall share the records with our sister organisation, Fibis, and will now consider with the church and AHRG any further initiatives relating to the cemetery, in particular its protection and its promotion locally as a community asset.’

Denise Love, Projects Coordinator

(Suggestions for Â鶹´«Ã½website news items, volunteering opportunities and diary entries, are always welcome – please send them to ‘comms@bacsa.org.uk’.)

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Then the sounds from the Lake, the low whispering in boats,
As they shoot through the moonlight…’

Whether it’s to experience the earthly paradise so lyrically described in Thomas Moore’s 1817 poems, or to relive the idyllic houseboat holidays captured in the black and white photos of previous generations – or something in between – Kashmir is high on many people’s bucket lists. But, given its dramatic location, actually arriving there requires a certain amount of persistence, avoiding unpredictable earthquakes (2005), floods (2014), and, as followers of know only too well, outbreaks of military hostilities.

Â鶹´«Ã½member Andrew Whitehead, writer and broadcaster, paid a quick visit to Sheikh Bagh Cemetery, Srinagar, before the current conflict erupted:

‘This month (March 2025), I was able to have a brief stroll around the Christian cemetery at Sheikh Bagh in the heart of Srinagar. For a century until the early 1950s, Kashmir had a small but significant European community. And this is where many of them are buried.

Andrew Whitehead, March 2025.

A full account of Andrew’s visit, including photos of several graves dating from 1901-2008, is available , in his personal blog.

Shaded by majestic chinar trees and bordered by the Zabarwan hills, Sheikh Bagh Cemetery became, as the late Eileen Hewson (Â鶹´«Ã½Area Representative in Kashmir for many years), wrote: ‘the last resting place for many explorers, statesmen, missionaries and the British who preferred to ‘Stay on’ rather than return to an uncertain life in England’.

The cemetery is one of the locations visited in ‘A Promenade Along the Bund – Colonial Heritage Walk’, a series of five Walks curated by the Kashmir Chapter of INTACH (Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage), which aim to delve into ‘the history, architecture and culture of Srinagar’s urban landscape’. (Click for further details).

One of the earliest graves is that of Dr William Jackson Elmslie, the son of an Aberdeen shoemaker, who established the region’s first Christian medical mission in 1865. He compiled the first Kashmiri/English dictionary; wrote several letters to the Maharajah complaining about the government’s careless attitude to the cholera epidemic, and died, aged 40, of a recurring heart problem in 1872.

During a smallpox epidemic in 1892, Dr Arthur Neve, one of Elmslie’s successors, refused to leave his post, ultimately succumbing to exhaustion and illness. He, too, lies in Sheikh Bagh.

The grave of Col Sydney Drumond Turnbull, who had retired from 15th Bengal Lancers when he died, aged 56, in 1911, from ‘wounds received in an encounter with a leopard’, reminds us of a different type of Himalayan risk.

Sheikh Bagh Cemetery also became the place for commemorating people who had died while working, or travelling, further afield in the more inhospitable regions of Kashmir.

In her 2002 booklet Himalayan Headstones from Ladakh, Kashmir (available through the Â鶹´«Ã½shop), Eileen Hewson mentions two such people: Captain James Palladio Basevi and Richard Edward Genge.

Captain James P Basevi, the son of George Basevi, the architect who designed the Fitzwilliam Museum, at Cambridge, was a relative of Benjamin Disraeli (through the marriage of his aunt Miriam (‘Maria’) Basevi to the latter’s father, Isaac Disraeli). An army engineer, he served as Deputy Superintendent of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India.

After crossing the Takalung Pass (18,000’), the Mori Pass (15,500’) and the Marsimik La Pass (18,000’; currently the ‘highest motorable pass in the world‘ – according to the Indian Army sign at the summit), Basevi died in 1871, aged 39, while carrying out surveying duties in the Chang Chenmo Valley, near Kiamo. His companions, not wishing to leave him in this ‘lonely place where nothing moved except the wind’, brought his remains back to Srinagar for burial.

Richard Genge, a 24-year old Army Surgeon stationed at Multan, was killed in the Upper Warwan valley (noted for steep slopes and heavy snowfalls) in 1888. Richard and his party were camping overnight at 15,000’, on a glacier near the Yaurangshan Pass, when the entire group ‘including the porters’ were buried by an avalanche. Richard’s body was later recovered, and interred at Shaikh Bagh Cemetery.

The appeal of the mountains continued to run deep. Another memorial tablet at Sheikh Bagh commemorates Matthew Alexander Forbes, of St John’s College, Cambridge, who ‘was lost’, aged 22, in 1938, on Nanga Parbat – at 26,658’ the 9th highest mountain in the world, and ‘the western anchor of the Himalayas’.

(Situated in the present-day District of Gilgit-Baltistan in Pakistan-administered Kashmir, Nanga Parbat was first summited in 1953, by Hermann Buhl).

The 2014 floods wreaked havoc in Srinagar, and severely damaged parts of the cemetery. It is reassuring to read in Shereen Naman’s recent on the Outlook.India website that ‘restoration efforts, spearheaded by the Â鶹´«Ã½ (BACSA) and supported by local volunteers, have helped reclaim this historic place. Simple fencing, repaired headstones, and careful landscaping have returned a measure of dignity to the site’.

Hopefully this local support will ensure that Sheikh Bagh Cemetery continues to retain its significance in the built heritage of Kashmir for some time to come.

Rachel Magowan

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Diary Dates

Â鶹´«Ã½Newsletter readers, family and friends may be interested in the following events:

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In 2009 Â鶹´«Ã½supported a project to conserve 40 graves in the Old Anglican Cemetery at Salem. Denise Love, Â鶹´«Ã½Project Co-ordinator, describes the work performed below. Meanwhile Rev Jawahar Wilson Asir David, Chairman and Presbyter of Christ Church, Salem, has supplied details of the church’s forthcoming sesquicentennial (150th) anniversary celebrations:

Consecrated by Rt Rev Frederick Gell, the Bishop of Madras, on 26 October 1875, the Christ Church building on Fort Road, Salem, was designed by Robert Fellowes Chisholm, a pioneer of Indo-Saracenic architecture, who also designed the University of Madras Senate House Buildings and the Madras Presidency College. Since 1950 the church, which holds services in Tamil and English, has belonged to the Coimbatore diocese.

In 2009 Â鶹´«Ã½contributed funds towards a project enabling the Salem Historical Society (SHS) to identify and conserve 40 of the most dilapidated graves in the ‘Old Anglican Cemetery’, situated opposite the church.

The result was, according to Denise Love, ‘an exemplary restoration’. Following an inaugural ceremony of prayer led by Rev Jacob Ravikumar, of Christ Church, the undergrowth was cleared; the 40 graves (of 29 adults and 17 children, buried between 1797 and 1879) were photographed, and appropriate conservation work was carried out by the contractor Mr T Joseph Dhanaraj.

The earliest grave to be conserved was that of two boys, John and Robert Morris (the infant sons of Mr Samuel M Morris, Assistant Surgeon to the Garrison), who died in 1797. Another was the obelisk tomb of Lieutenant Colonel Fehrszen, who died in 1820, aged 34, ‘after an ineffectual struggle of only 12 hours’ against cholera morbus. In July 1837 cholera tragically removed four members of the Bevan family – Mary Ann, Emma, Julia and Adela, the wife and three daughters of Captain Henry Bevan. Other graves conserved included those of Rev Henry Crisp, a missionary with the London Mission Society, who died, aged 28, in 1831, and Archibald Hamilton, Assistant to the Principal Collector and Magistrate, who died aged 27 in 1846.

A bound volume with photographs and inscriptions of all the graves was sent to BACSA, and lodged in our cemetery file at the British Library. Denise Love volunteered to research the biographies of the deceased. The result was published as the Cemetery Record Book for the Old Anglican Cemetery, Salem, available through the Â鶹´«Ã½shop.

The work performed attracted so much local interest that, with generous donations from Church and SHS members (exceeding the Â鶹´«Ã½grant), a further 50 graves were conserved.

A ceremony of dedication was held on All Saints’ Day (1 November) 2009 to honour the dead and mark the contribution of all who had participated in the project.

The sesquicentennial celebrations will finish on Sunday 26 October 2025, with ‘a Holy Communion Service, a Congregation Feast and a concluding ceremony’. All are welcome to attend, in particular descendants of former congregation members. In the meantime Â鶹´«Ã½is delighted to have been invited to contribute a ‘F±ð±ô¾±³¦¾±³Ù²¹³Ù¾±´Ç²Ô’ to the Church’s Souvenir Brochure.

Denise Love and Rachel Magowan

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Diary Dates

Â鶹´«Ã½Newsletter readers, family and friends may be interested in the following events:

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In 2021-2022 Â鶹´«Ã½supported a project to conserve the trench graves at Chillianwallah. Denise Love, Â鶹´«Ã½Project Co-ordinator, describes the sensitive task below. Meanwhile Â鶹´«Ã½Member and (retired) Brigadier Ian McLeod, who is a volunteer at the Royal Hospital, Chelsea, has supplied the following details of his forthcoming talk in the Governor’s Lecture Series:

The Battle of Chillianwallah

‘On 13 January 1849, in the Punjab in modern-day Pakistan, forces of the British East India Company clashed with the Sikh Empire in a fierce and bloody battle which shocked the British public due to the severe casualties inflicted on British soldiers, particularly those of Her Majesty’s 24th Regiment of Foot, which lost half of its strength in dead and wounded. Both sides claimed victory, but British prestige was damaged, and the British Commander was relieved of command.

Although little known today, the battle, at the time, fired Victorian imagination: a distinguished Victorian poet immortalised it in verse, and five years later, when two British generals were remarking on the disaster of the ‘Charge of the Light Brigade’ in the Crimean War, one remarked ‘These sort of things will happen in war. It is nothing to Chillianwala’.

In his Lecture Ian McLeod will describe the events leading to the battle, the battle itself and the aftermath. He will share personal experiences of the battlefield as it stands today, and will tell of a unique link between the battle and the Royal Hospital Chelsea.

Ian is a Friend of, and Volunteer at, the Royal Hospital and a former career officer in the British Army. After 35 years, he retired in the rank of Brigadier and subsequently worked in various conflict areas in stabilisation and humanitarian roles. His last post in the Army was the Defence Adviser to the British High Commission in Islamabad, Pakistan, which gave him the opportunity to visit many of the battlefields of the British era – Chillianwallah being his ‘first choice’.

Ian has also worked as a battlefield tour guide and has a master’s degree in military history from the University of Buckingham, where his dissertation was on brigade command in the Victorian Army, including Chillianwallah as a case study’.
(From: )

As Ian writes: ‘At the time, the battle fired Victorian imagination: a distinguished Victorian poet immortalised it in verse:’

Chillanwallah, Chillanwallah!
Where our brothers fought and bled,
O thy name is natural music
And a dirge above the dead!
Though we have not been defeated,
Though we can’t be overcome,
Still, whene’er thou art repeated,
I would fain that grief were dumb.

Chillianwallah, Chillianwallah!
Thou wilt be a doleful chord,
And a mystic note of mourning
That will need no chiming word;
And that heart will leap with anguish
Who may understand thee best; But the hopes of all will languish
Till thy memory is at rest.

(George Meredith 1828-1909)

Lecture: Wednesday 14 May 2025, 18:30-19:30

Date: Wednesday 14 May 2025
Location: Soane Stable Yard, Royal Hospital Chelsea (Royal Hospital Road, London SW3 4SR)
Time: 18:30 (Duration 1 hour).

Programme:
• The Soane Stable Yard shop and café will be open from 17:00-18:30.
• Drinks reception in Heidi Bakery from 18:00-18:30.
• Lecture begins: 18:30
• Lecture ends: 19:30.
Tickets:
• Tickets cost £15.00 (including a glass of wine). Click to see details on the Chelsea Pensioners website, and to make a booking.

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Â鶹´«Ã½Conservation project, Chillianwallah 2021-2022
In 2021 Â鶹´«Ã½received a distressing report about the ‘desolate state’ of the three low-walled enclosures south of the Moong Road at Chillianwallah, where trench graves hold the remains of over 200 men from HM’s 24th Foot.

Dr Peter Williams, the Australian military historian, found that ‘At the easternmost one some burrowing creature has made its home in the crypt several feet below ground level, and in excavating earth it has scattered human bones on the surface’.

Coupled with the news that ‘The local village headman, who showed us all three sites, would like to do something about it but does not want to interfere without permission’, this report triggered a Â鶹´«Ã½conservation project, spearheaded by (retired) Major General Syed Ali Hamid, the current Area Representative for Punjab and NWFP, Pakistan.

Denise Love, Â鶹´«Ã½Projects Co-ordinator, summarises the outcome:

‘Our project at Chillianwallah involved the conservation of the three trench graves containing the remains of soldiers of the 24th Foot. The project started in September 2021 and was completed by the following Spring. Â鶹´«Ã½gave a grant of £8700, which covered all the costs of the work and the installation of explanatory plaques.

The three trenches were cleared of vegetation and invading animal habitation, where necessary. The areas were consolidated with concrete, and a brick plinth was built in the centre of two of the trenches. The third trench was so affected by porcupine depredation that it was simply consolidated.

The surrounding walls of the other two were rebuilt and coping added. The contractors tried to reuse old materials but these usually crumbled away, so new materials were fabricated from traditional sources. Upright features in the walls were retained and used for plaques, one to repeat what had been placed there before and two to record the conservation work undertaken by BACSA, in English and Urdu’.

(Denise Love and Rachel Magowan)

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‘In the Wari Cemetery, sometimes called Narinda, in Dhaka, Bangladesh, there is splendid monument covering the graves of three people.

It is known as Colombo Sahib’s tomb, but nothing is known of such an individual. Even its date is not certain, but experts think it may be late 17th century.

The earliest image of it is a painting by Johann Zoffany in 1787. It is regarded by many as one of the finest funerary monuments in South Asia.

Â鶹´«Ã½had for several years been trying to promote its preservation and conservation because it had been neglected and gradually taken over by trees – in a ‘vice-like grip‘, as can be seen in the photograph of Robert Chatterton Dixon, the then British High Commissioner to Bangladesh, who visited the monument in October 2020. Such a significant site could not be allowed to collapse and be lost.

Finally, at the beginning of this year our efforts began to bear fruit. In collaboration with the Christian Burials Board of Dhaka, BACSA’s area representative, Professor Ahmed of Asia-Pacific University, a noted conservation architect, produced a detailed specification for conserving the tomb.

Â鶹´«Ã½has contributed £10,000, and the Commonwealth Heritage Forum has also made a substantial contribution.

The unrest in Dhaka this year and very heavy rains delayed the start of the work, but since the end of July it has progressed well under Professor Ahmed’s direction. Earlier this month Waqar Khan, Founder of Bangladesh Forum for Heritage Studies, and former area representative, wrote: ‘Just look at this! What is emerging looks simply spectacular! Eight years of relentless effort have finally paid off!’

The project is expected to be completed by March – April 2025.’

Denise Love

Editor’s Note:

Who was Colombo Sahib?

As Denise says, ‘the tomb is known as Colombo Sahib’s tomb, but nothing is known of such an individual’. In September 2016 Waqar Khan summarised current thinking in ‘The Enduring Enigma of Columbo Sahib’, an article published in the Daily Star. (As befits an enigma, the subject’s name is sometimes spelt ‘Colombo’, and sometimes ‘Columbo’).

An HEIC employee?

The name ‘Columbo Sahib’ first appeared in ‘Narrative of a journey through the Upper Provinces of India, from Calcutta to Bombay, 1824-5, with an account of a journey to Madras and the Southern Provinces‘ by Bishop Heber, the metropolitan Bishop of Calcutta, which was posthumously published by his wife Amelia, in 1828. After consecrating the Narinda cemetery at Dhaka during his 1824 Episcopal tour, Heber enquired about the imposing, but unidentified, monument. He zealously noted down the chowkidar’s Hindi reply ‘Yea Kalumbo Sahib ka maqbara, Kampany ka naukar’ (‘It’s the tomb of Columbo Sahib, a servant/employee of the East India Company’); but failed to identify this significant Christian personage.

From Ceylon?

Tim Steel, a British ‘amateur archaeologist, history buff and writer’ and former area representative, who once lived in Dhaka, strongly felt that Columbo Sahib was a prosperous merchant who had come to Dhaka from Colombo, and became known locally as Columbo Sahib.

Although speculative, Waqar considers this a plausible theory. He suggests that Columbo may have been a ‘Portuguese or Sri Lankan Sinhalese Christian who came to Dhaka from Colombo’, or perhaps a ‘local Luso-Portuguese gentleman from the Indian subcontinent’, and points out that the Portuguese connection is also supported by Â鶹´«Ã½Committee member Charles Greig, who says: ‘I think it is also a very real possibility that Columbo was Portuguese – the translation of the name we know as Columbus is Columbo in Portuguese. At the time that the tomb was built (in my opinion) – c. 1670-80 – there was still a very strong presence of Portuguese traders in Dhaka. Moreover, the early Church at Narinda seems to have been Catholic.’

Or Holland?

However, another Â鶹´«Ã½Committee member, Dr Rosie Llewellyn-Jones, has suggested that Columbo was probably sent by the Dutch East India Company from Colombo, Sri Lanka, to Dhaka to look after Dutch commercial interests.

Rosie points out that this tomb has a striking resemblance to the famous grandiose Mughal/Islamic style Dutch mausoleums in the old Dutch-Armenian-English cemeteries in Surat, India. In 2016 she wrote ‘my supposition that Colombo Sahib’s tomb may mark the resting place of a Dutch man is based on comparisons with the Dutch tombs in Surat, together with information that Dutchmen were sent to Bengal, from Sri Lanka (the capital Colombo in particular), to start textile trading from Dacca in the middle of the 17th century. We may never know, unless someone is prepared to go through the VOC (Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie) records at The Hague.’

In 2024 Rosie added: ‘I did investigate the possibility of this being the tomb of a Dutch person. There were Dutch governors in Bengal in the 17th century but a Dutch historian I contacted thought none of them were of sufficient importance to have commissioned a tomb like this. We don’t know the names of the Dutch Governors and unless someone is prepared to research the records of the Dutch East India Company in the Hague, we will probably never know. So my only reason for suggesting Dutch influence is the Dutch tombs at Surat’.

And the others?

Regarding the ‘other people’ buried under the monument, Charles Greig recently clarified: ‘The interior of the tomb has the headstones of numerous individuals – these are clearly rescued from other tombs long gone. But there are what appears to be three tombs on the floor of the tomb… (later covered with bits of old broken cut stone) as well as two of the broken minarets – we just do not know who these belong to as they are completely redone and no inscriptions remain’.

Conclusion

While conceding that ‘it is a fact that there is no other place in the entire subcontinent… except in Surat, where likeness to Columbo’s tomb can be observed’, Waqar considers it ‘most likely’ that Columbo Sahib was Portuguese, and may have come to Dhaka from Colombo, Sri Lanka or elsewhere. That he could have been Dutch ‘cannot be dismissed outright’; if his Dutch name was difficult to pronounce, and he came from Colombo, he may well have become known in Dhaka as Columbo Sahib.

Clearly, archival research in Calcutta, The British Library, the Hague and in Lisbon, is a pre-requisite for unravelling ‘the mystery of Columbo Sahib’. But even this may not provide an answer; as Waqar warns: ‘It is also quite possible that even after all the suggested research has been conducted, his identity may still elude us’. If that is the case ‘he will continue to be known just as before, simply as ‘Columbo Sahib’ of Dhaka, thereby remaining an enduring enigma well into posterity’.

Rachel Magowan

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‘St George’s Cemetery, Pallikunnu, is a small site of about thirty graves situated in the hills of Kerala, and reflects the history of the local tea industry. Â鶹´«Ã½has in the past given a grant of £3,500 for improving the boundary wall and grave conservation. The active church committee, led by Rev Liju Abraham, has kept the cemetery in good order and recently asked for a contribution towards the costs of cleaning, polishing and painting their graves. Our Executive Committee was impressed by the church’s intention to renovate and develop the cemetery site as a heritage walk so that a significant number of people can visit. The Committee has contributed £850 to the costs the church has already incurred.’

In their 1993 book ‘Above the Heron’s Pool’ Heather Lovatt and Peter de Jong explain the history of the Central Travancore Planting District, including St George’s Church at Pallikunnu and its cemetery. (The book is no longer available through the Â鶹´«Ã½website shop, but second-hand copies may be obtained via the internet).

St George’s Church at Pallikunnu was built in 1869 by Rev Henry Baker of the CMS (Church Missionary Society), who selected the site of Mundakayam (‘Heron’s Pool’, described as ‘a glade in the jungle, beside a stream and below a steep scarp of the Western Ghauts’) for a Hill Mission ministering to the residents of the new plantations. A walk from the church site – which is in an area of humid, sub-tropical vegetation – leads up a steep track to a cool grassland plateau, known as Peermade.

Henry’s daughter Henrietta Baker (1851-1909) married her father’s cousin John Daniel (‘JD’) Munro (1833-1895). With two of his wife’s uncles, JD, who lived in ‘bamboo huts put up by the Munnans’, their ‘roofs thatched with lemon grass, the eaves brought down to four feet from the ground as protection from the monsoon gales’, cleared and planted the Hope, Ashley and Stagbrook Estates, before taking on Volong John, and Glenrock.

For each estate this entailed clearing, initially, a small area of undergrowth, ideally by a stream, where a camp surrounded by an elephant trench could be created for huts for the planter and the labourers. Lanes were then driven through the jungle to mark the limits of the clearing, following which the timber inside these boundaries would be felled and burned.

J D Munro was responsible for opening up Peermade – clearing the main path for transporting the coffee and cardamom crops downhill, and cutting a series of bridle paths beyond Ellapara and along the Cheenthalaar valley. The cart road between Kottyam and Peermade was completed in 1872; the stretch across the district to Gudalur by 1885.

Munro died, aged 61, in 1895, and was buried in St George’s Cemetery. There is a memorial to his wife Henrietta, who died in 1909, aged 58, inside the church. Famously, the cemetery also contains a memorial to his white mare ‘Downy’.

The early planters had grown coffee, from plants carried up to Peermade in baskets. The seedlings would ‘come into bearing’ three years later, during which time the planter had to keep the clearing free from the encroaching jungle, build permanent accommodation and cut cart roads.

Following the onset of coffee leaf disease in the 1880s, most Peermade estates were gradually converted to tea production. Unlike coffee, which had needed little capital, and could be prepared for market relatively easily, tea required upfront investment for the factories and machinery needed to prepare the leaves for sale.

In addition, whereas coffee could be harvested by seasonal labour, tea was harvested throughout much of the year, necessitating a larger and more permanent labour force. One impact of this change was that in 1888 the CMS, noting the rapid increase in the Tamil population, engaged Rev M Nallathamby, a Tamil clergyman, as Pastor for St George’s Church.

Rev Nallathamby died, aged 54, in 1901, and was buried in St George’s Cemetery.

Â鶹´«Ã½member Charles Lovatt, who visited the area earlier this year, reported that ‘the church, church hall and graveyards have been maintained to a very high standard’. Extracts from the birth, marriage and burial registers, together with a listing of the memorial inscriptions inside the church, are included in ‘Above the Heron’s Pool’.
Both of the church’s cemetery areas were reported as being ‘in excellent condition with good fencing, excellent paths and nothing is overgrown’. The older part, which was in use from 1875-1962, frequently receives visitors who are descendants of the planters buried there. Â鶹´«Ã½looks forward to hearing news of the planned heritage walk.

Denise Love and Rachel Magowan

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The aim of this phase of the project was to conserve the monument and re-lay the approach pathways, while adhering to heritage policies and guidelines in maintaining the original fabric and structural elements. The work was carried out by Jeernodhar Conservators, Pvt Ltd, with the expert guidance of our Area Representative for Tamil Nadu, Ravindra Gundu Rao.

Born near Edinburgh in 1738, Dr James Anderson joined the East India Company and became surgeon-general of Madras in 1781. Interested in medicinal plants and horticulture, he set up a botanical garden, where he introduced mulberry trees and experimented with making silk. He also introduced other plants of commercial value, including sugar cane, coffee, American cotton and European apples.

Anderson died in 1809. The monument at St Mary’s Cemetery, Madras, was erected by his 24-year old nephew Andrew Berry, as a tribute to ‘the best of uncles’, who was ‘the most distinguished physician on the Coromandel coast’.

In 1945 Julius James Cotton recorded in his ‘List of Inscriptions on Tombs or Monuments in Madras possessing historical or archaeological interest’, that the name Anderson appears ‘on the four corners of the dome, in Tamil, Telugu, Hindustani and English characters’.

In addition to the tombstone, inscribed with Berry’s lengthy, fulsome Latin tribute to his uncle, the stone-clad brick monument originally sheltered two items (a bust of Anderson, and a ‘patent magnifying glass’), both of which disappeared several decades ago.

Paths to the area had become overgrown with bushes, making it largely inaccessible. The structure itself had been badly damaged by vegetation growing in and around the masonry, which was dislodging the brickwork, displacing the steps and cracking the inscribed tombstone. Parts of two tree trunks had insinuated themselves between the brick masonry and the stone cladding, becoming integral to the monument structure and rendering their physical removal impossible (without destroying the monument). Â鶹´«Ã½Executive Committee chose instead to limit further growth by cutting back leaves and branches, believing that this will slow down the deterioration, and the monument will survive for many years to come.

The old plasterwork was removed, loose bricks were replaced and plaster applied. Loose pointing between the stone surfaces was replaced; displaced stones in the base and pediment were relaid, and the gaps filled with coarse lime mortar. Stones missing from the steps were replaced with material of similar nature, colour and texture.

The inscribed gravestone
The flooring round the gravestone was cleared, and laid with Kadapa stone, to facilitate access. Missing portions of the inscribed stone were replaced with stone of similar appearance and texture, and the cracks were grouted. Finally, a flat glass roof with lead flashing was installed above the monument, to prevent further ingress of water and inhibit plant growth.

Transcribed in full in Cotton’s List, the inscription on Anderson’s tomb reads:

Translated into English by Â鶹´«Ã½Chairman Paul Dean, this becomes:

Anderson is also commemorated in St George’s Cathedral, Madras, where his colleagues in the Madras Medical Department erected a ‘wonderfully lifelike and natural’ statue of him (by Chantrey), which was subsequently positioned by the west doorway of the Cathedral.

Anderson’s daughter, Ann Anderson Young (a widow), died, aged 33, in 1810, and was buried at St Mary’s Cemetery. Once again, her cousin Andrew (‘Andreas’) Berry took care of the burial arrangements.

Pathway to the monument

After the pathways had been cleared of invasive vegetation, they were laid with laterite blocks and rounded edge kerbing, to ‘connect’ the monument with the entrance gate.

All in all, a very impressive piece of conservation work, which has made the monument accessible again and will hopefully keep the structure safe for many years to come.

Rachel Magowan

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Phillida Purvis, the Â鶹´«Ã½Area Representative for Seringapatam and Nilgiris, regularly visits the Garrison Cemetery, and Colonel Baillie’s Monument, at Srirangapatna, and reports on the ongoing conservation work – most recently at the Â鶹´«Ã½AGM on 21 March 2024.

Garrison Cemetery, Seringapatam
Situated on the banks of the river Cauvery, near the Bangalore – Mysore Highway, Garrison Cemetery holds just over 300 graves of the European officers killed in the final assault on Tipu Sultan in 1799. This includes 80 graves of Officers in the Swiss de Meuron regiment (named after its commander, Colonel Charles-Daniel de Meuron), who joined forces with the British East India Company in the war against Tipu.

Following their 2007 visit to the Cemetery, Louis Dominique de Meuron, a descendant, and his wife Monique arranged for the badly overgrown graves to be restored by RGRA (Ravi Gundu Rao & Associates), a Mysore heritage preservation agency. The Cemetery is visited by descendants of the soldiers, and others interested in the history of Mysore / Srirangapatna, and is becoming well-known on the tourist itinerary.

Since the demise of Louis and Monique de Meuron, an ongoing programme of conservation work, involving clearing vegetation, as well as repairing and repainting tombs, is being supported by their son Jean-Leonard de Meuron, and their daughter Dr Sophie Sallès de Meuron.

The local community has also been engaged. In 2017 Phillida mentioned that ‘A teacher and pupils from a nearby school are engaged in regular cleanup activities and are exploring ways to attract more visitors to the cemetery’. Shortly afterwards Â鶹´«Ã½gave £2,000 to support the de Meuron family project to ‘carry out conservation work on graves, erect improved signage and construct a chowkidar’s hut’.

By 2023 further repairs were needed at the Cemetery, including to the entrance gate, and to a boundary wall severely damaged by an unauthorised drain. Regular maintenance is now ongoing, thanks to de Meuron family support. Â鶹´«Ã½AR Phillida Purvis arranged for QR codes to be displayed, linking to a CAD map and burial data on the Â鶹´«Ã½website.

A ceremony to celebrate completion of the conservation work was held on 31st October, with several members of the de Meuron family visiting from Switzerland and the UK.

Colonel Baillie’s Monument

Lieutenant-Colonel William Baillie was captured by Hyder Ali (the father of Tipu Sultan) during the Battle of Pollilur (‘Perambaukan’) in 1780 and died, in captivity, on 13 November 1782. This ‘austere but poignant and pretty’ memorial, located next to the Gumbaz (the Muslim mausoleum where Tipu Sultan and his parents are buried), was commissioned by Baillie’s nephew Lieutenant-Colonel John Baillie some 35 years later.

The inscription on the memorial tablet reads:

‘To the Memory of Colonel William Baillie, who, with a detachment of troops under his command, after a most noble and most gallant resistance to a superior force on the plains of Perambaukan, was ultimately compelled to surrender to the united armies of Hyder Ali and Tipoo Sultan on the 10th day of September 1780, and died in the fortress of Seringapatam on the 13th day of November 1782. This monument erected by his nephew Lieut Colonel John Baillie on the Establishment of Bengal, and Resident at Lucknow, 1816’ (Chowkidar, Spring 2011).

Along with the de Meuron, Baillie and Tritton families, Â鶹´«Ã½contributed to the restoration of the memorial by the same heritage architect, Ravi Gundu Rao, in 2010. A rededication service attended by descendants from the Baillie and Tritton families was held on 13 November 2010, the 228th anniversary of Baillie’s death.

A review of the 2013 book When The Tiger Fought the Thistle: The Tragedy of Colonel William Baillie of the Madras Army by Â鶹´«Ã½Vice President Alan Tritton (whose mother was a Baillie descendant) was published in the Spring 2014 issue of Chowkidar (Vol 13, No.5,p.110).

In 2017 Phillida Purvis reported that an unsightly wall had recently been built alongside the memorial, which falls under the control of the Karnataka WAQF board (Phillida explains: ‘WAQF is a permanent dedication of movable or immovable properties for religious, pious or charitable purposes as recognized by Muslim Law, given by philanthropists’). Because of its proximity to Tipu Sultan’s Gumbaz, this has made the memorial a little more difficult to access.

In 2023 Â鶹´«Ã½contributed £600 to further conservation work on Colonel Baillie’s monument (which needed finials replacing) and its perimeter wall, and was mainly ‘funded privately by Â鶹´«Ã½members’.

As Phillida writes: ‘’Thanks to the efforts of Heritage Matters, the monument is now looking wonderful!’

Phillida Purvis and Rachel Magowan
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Denise Love, Â鶹´«Ã½Projects Coordinator, reports on a new Â鶹´«Ã½project at Raniganj, in West Bengal:

‘Â鶹´«Ã½has agreed to give a grant of £2143 as a contribution to the work of the Asansol Heritage Research Group (AHRG) in its investigation of Raniganj cemetery and its burial records. The digitised burials information produced will be added to the Â鶹´«Ã½burials database.

The AHRG is a collection of local academics and teachers interested in the social and industrial heritage of this part of West Bengal, known for the first coal mine in India and for its iron and steel industries. The railways came to Raniganj in 1855 and a good number of Europeans settled in the growing town. AHRG organises heritage walks around the area of Raniganj and Asansol, including its stations, colonial era housing, churches and cemeteries.

The cemetery was established in 1863 and has about 300 graves, but the burial records list many more. The records also list both European and Indian Christian burials and identify the various castes of the latter. AHRG’s proposal to Â鶹´«Ã½commented: ‘Since Raniganj was an elephant camp as well as a small cantonment during the Mutiny of 1857 and the divisional railway office operated from there, its importance is beyond question . . this cemetery has also been remembered as a place of regular visit of two noted Bengali authors, Kazi Nazrul Islam and Shailajananda Mukhopadhyay, when they were buddies at school.’

The members of AHRG involved in the Digitalization of Archives, and their respective roles, are:

Project Supervisors: Dr Santanu Banerjee, Hemonta Mondal and Suvojit Chatterjee.
Archival Partner and Digitalization and Meta Data Consultant: Mr Rajarshi Das.
Archival Partner and Custodian of Original Material: Rev. Sumanta Das.
Project Assistant: Tridev Ruidas.

As well as using our grant for the documentation of the burials, AHRG will use its own resources to survey the cemetery, photograph the graves and engage local communities and authorities to generate interest in the historic site.’

Denise Love

Ed. notes:

• Raniganj Coalfield

Currently owned by Eastern Coalfields Limited, the Raniganj coalfield covers around 170 square miles (440 km²).The first coal mine in India was founded there in 1774, after John Sumner and Suetonius Grant Heatley, of the British East India Company, found coal near Ethora (in present-day Salanpur). Over the next two centuries Raniganj became the major producer of coal in India.

The 2023 ‘disaster-thriller’ film Mission Raniganj: The Great Bharat Rescue tells the story of the rescue work following a flooding accident at Mahabir Colliery, Raniganj, on 23 November 1989.

A total of 71 miners (out of a potential 220) were trapped underground when the mineshaft became inundated. Six people lost their lives, but 65 were rescued, mainly due to the ingenuity, and leadership, of Jaswant Singh Gill, Chief Mining Engineer, who, in 1991, received the Sarvottan Jeevan Raksha Pradak award (‘for conspicuous courage under circumstances of very great danger to the life of the rescuer’) from President Ramaswamy Venkataraman, for his achievement.

The two Bengali authors who, as schoolboys, regularly visited Raniganj Cemetery:

As Banglapedia (‘National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh’) explains: ‘Shailajananda started his education at Raniganj School, where Kazi Nazrul Islam was among his classmates’.

Famous as both a novelist and film director, Shailajananda Mukhopadhyay (1901-1976) initially composed poems, but afterwards concentrated on fiction. He wrote several novels, many depicting the lives of labourers and coal miners. The films he directed were often based on his own stories.

His schoolfriend Kazi Nazrul Islam (1899-1976), the ‘rebel poet’, portrayed contemporary social and political phenomena in his poems, which often deal with fundamental conflicts of human civilisation. Now considered ‘the national poet of Bangladesh’, he was buried with state honour on Dhaka University campus, on the northern side of Dhaka University mosque.

Rachel Magowan

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