Tag: chowringhee road

DHURRUMTOLLAHA AND ITS OLD BAZARS

Dharamtala Mosque on the Corner of Chowringhee Road. WilliamPrnsep-c1840-45
Tipu Sultan Mosque on the Corner of Chowringhee Road & the Dhurrumtollah Street opposite the old Bazar. An oil on canvas by William Prinsep, c1840. Courtesy: ANU

ধর্মতলা এবং আঞ্চলিক প্রাচীন হাটবাজার

Looking through the lenses of John Saché , the Belgian-American photographer, a long stretch of the Esplanade Row leading to Dhurrumtollah Street comes in view beyond Chowringhee Square. The photograph was taken, from the East Gate of new Government House in around 1865.

From Gov.GateJohn Edward Saché_ Views of Calcutta (ca 1865-1882)
Esplanade Row leading to Dhurrumtollah Street. Photographed by John Ward Saché. c1865. Courtesy: BL

The location of Dharmatala that we recognize today is virtually the same as when it was called Dhurrumtollah in colonial Calcutta to mean the Esplanade or Maidan in broad sense. The huge tank excavated in 1790 at the north-east corner of the Esplanade was known as ‘Dhurrumtollah Tank’ where it existed until the dawn of the 19th century.

Dhurrumtollah had been a part of the ancient jungle remaining at the south of the old Calcutta township till the jungle cleared after 1757. The Dhurrumtollah Street came up in around 1762, so did Jaun Bazar Road, both running eastward leaving Dingabhanga mouja in between. Originally a causeway raised by deepening the ditch on either side of a land owned by Jafer, a zamadar in the employ of Warren Hastings.” [Cotton] Dhurrumtollah remained for a long while “an open and airy road lined with trees leading to Beliaghata. The Street, then called  Dhurrumtollah ka rustah, goes in a line with the nor­thern boundary of the Esplanade commencing at no.1 Chowringhee Road.“ The Street is nearly equal in dimensive cha­racter to Chowringhee Road, but Dhurrumtollah Street has the distinction of being on each side bordered by a row of houses of good elevation, and many of them even splendid in their outward appearance — with but comparatively few native hut-edifices on its line — it would claim to be considered a first-rate street in any western capital”. [Handbook of India 1844]

The old scene of Chowringhee Square, where meet four highways – Dhurrumtollah Street, Cossitollah Road, Road to Rusupagla, and Esplanade Row – has been captured by contemporary painters, and the presence of a visiting bird in one of them brings about the idyllic environ of the then Dhurrumtollah.

Maidan Cor. Dharamtala ByJohnWardSache_collections.carli.illinois.edu
Dhurrumtollah Tank. Photographed by John Ward Saché. c1865

Dhurrumtollah is relatively old a district. Chowringhee, which grew along the New Fort and groomed in spot-less English style unrelated to the local traditions and culture of community living, which have always been focused in the street life of Dhurrumtollah. The good bad and ugly in Dhurrumtollah Street scenario expose the weakness and strength of ethnic fusion and liberal thinking – a breeding ground of radical forces for social change. Dhurrumtollah can be distinguished as one of the most remarkable streets in the world of happenings toward formation of new society.

The crowd of Dhurrumtollah Street has been of a different kind than anywhere in Calcutta. To Rudyard Kipling the street is like Hammersmith High­way – the main shopping street in Hammersmith, London. “Dhurrumtollah is full of the People of India, walking in family parties and groups and confidential couples. And the people of India are neither Hindu nor Mussulman — Jew, Ethiop, Gueber, or expatriated British. They are the Eura­sians, and there are hundreds and hundreds of them in Dhurrumtollah now.” [Kipling]

On this road in 1881, Rev. C Cesry found many faiths, many occupations, many institutions existing next to each other. The Union Chapel, the American Mission Home, the small old and new large Methodist Churches, the Corinthian Theatre, the Church of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and the only good looking Masjid, boarding houses, institutions, societies – all have had their part in defining the history of the street. All the largest livery stables of Calcutta were also here. About the centre is Wellington Square with a Maidan on which troops of little children frolic and gambol of an evening. Dhurrumtollah was full of shops and bazars. Here are also Engineers, Under­takers, Chemists, Doctors, Midwifes, Photographers, Professors of Music, Horse Doctors, Auctioneers, Jewelers, Book-sellers, Publicans, Barbarians, Scythians, Bond and Free.  [Cesry]  What Rev Cesry misses in his short list is the schools – particularly the Dhurrumtollah Academy of unforgettable David Drummond.

The stories of Dhurrumtollah Street I fear might take more space than what can be managed at one go. Hope, you would bear with my plan of publishing it in few instalments. Here I take up Dhurrumtollah bazars keeping other facets on hold for a while.

DhurrumtollahBazar_section ofDhurrumtolla Churchitho_dOyly
Dhurrumtollah Bazar – a section of the coloured lithograph depicting Catholic Church of the Sacred Heart created before 1838 (pub. 1848) by Sir Charles D’Oyly. Courtesy Heidelberg U Univ.

DHURRUMTOLLAH BAZAR

So far we know, the Dhurrumtollah Bazar, situated at the crossing of the ‘Road to Chowringhee’ and the Dhurrumtollah Street. Cotton maintained that the plot was in one of the sites thought of for the erection of present Town Hall. It was ‘a very eligible situation for the new bazar’, so writes Calcutta Gazette in September 1794. The bazar has ‘already contributed much to the convenience of the community at large. Such an establishment, from the great increase of the inhabitants and the situation of the Chowringhy [sic] houses, has long been wanted. [Setton-Karr Vol.2] The report indicates that the new bazar was established before 1794 and not in 1794, and that it served the demands of Chowringhee households as well. It was still called – by a generic name, Natun Bazar. Cotton suggested without any clue that the Bazar was known once upon a time by a quite unexpected name ‘Shakespeare Bazar’. There has been another supposed name ‘Memba Pirer Bazar’ mentioned in Harisdhan’s book with no reference, which sounds  improbable for naming a bazar created to feed the Chowringhee residents. The Dhurrumtollah Bazar was actually referred to as the Bazar at Chowringhee –  the first edition of the modern New Market.

We come to know from an advertisement issued by Messrs Tulloh & Co. dated 18th April 1799 that the Dhurrumtollah Bazar, termed as Bazar at Chowringhee, was on sale by the auctioneers. The bazar was “bounded by General Stibbert’s house on the east, by the Dhurrumtollah road to the north, by the Chowringhee road to the west, and by the Jaun Bazar to the south.” It stood on the ground measured  about nine beegahs [sic] on which there were 207 pucka built rooms or shops, 143 arched ditto, and 36 large cutcha godowns, yielding a gross monthly rent of Rs. 1,043 [Carey]  We needed to know a little more of General Stibbert’s house, which luckily came handy through a different advertisement announcing the shifting of new Calcutta Academy from Cossitollah to General Stibbert’s House. The house was described as a large, airy, commodious, and eligibly situated house in the west end of the Dhurrumtollah and in the vicinity of the Esplanade, of which, as well as of the river, it commands a view. [Setton-Karr Vol. 3]

Rev. Long put forward another hint to spot out where exactly the Bazar stood ‘half way between Wellington Square and Government House’. He held that the Bazar actually occupied the site of the residence of Colonel De Glass, the then superintendent of the gun manufactory, which has since been removed to Kasipur. [Long]. The account of Rev. Long, however, leaves some doubts as to Colonel De Glass’s occupancy since the said ‘gun manufactory’ was actually established in 1802 as ‘Gun Carriage Agency’, and only in 1830 it was shifted to Cossipore renaming as ‘Gun  Foundry’. The history of Dhurrumtollah Bazar so far revealed disallows any chance of De Glass’ occupancy in either no.1, or no.2, Dhurrumtollah Street where Dhurrumtollah Bazar housed. The street directories authenticate that the first two premises, number 1 & 2, on the right side of Dhurrumtollah Street was where the Bazar stood.

The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Register reported the government approval of the Tipu Sultan’s Mosque to be erected at “the corner where the Dhurrumtollah and Cossitollah roads join each other, opposite Jackson’s Bazar” revealing the fact that the Bazar at Dhurrumtollah was once named Jackson’s Bazar. [Asiatic Vol 29]

From a news published in December 14, 1844 we knew more of the Dhurrumtollah Bazar. It was nicknamed ‘Jackson’s Bazar’ after one Dr. Jackson who owned the Bazar  until he sold out the property to Mootee [Mutty] Lall Seal. Thereafter the name ‘Dhurrumtollah Bazar’ came to stay. We still have no good guess what the Bazar was called before Dr Jackson, but we know by now the formal name of the Bazar, its exact position and the names of the owners since 1839. [Ben.Catholic vol.8]

As it appears, Dhurrumtollah Bazar was being managed ably by Hira Lall on behalf of his father Muttee Lall Seal, and mainly responsible for its commercial success and reputation competing against rival forces. The first contender Anandabazar of Ananda Narayan Ghose went out of competition after a while, but the second one, The New Market of the Municipality, that came up in 1874 proved to be too powerful and desperate to fight out. The two cases of rivalry are being summarized before ending the story of Dhurrumtollah Bazar.

Dhurrontallah Steet scene from Govt Housec_byJohn Edward Sache_Collections.carli.illinois.edu
Dhurrumtollah Street with Tipu Sultan Mosque on the left and the spire of the Sacred Heart Church on the right behind the Dhurrumtollah Bazar opposite the Mosque. A hand-coloured print from the Fiebig Collection: Views of Calcutta and Surrounding Districts, taken by Frederick Fiebig in 1851. Courtesy: BL

ANANDABAZAR AND DHURRUMTOLLAH BAZAAR

 Around 1844, when Mutty Lall Seal bought up Dhurrumtollah Bazar, a new bazar was established at no. 157  Dhurrumtollah Street, next to Hospital Lane, by Baboo Anandanarayan Ghosh, uncle of Khelat Chunder Ghose as a rival enterprise of Dhurrumtollah Bazar, which was variantly known as ‘Ananda Baboo’s Bazar’, new Dhurrumtollah Bazar, or Anandabazar. This has led to a number of assaults. The two belli­gerent powers have hired clubmen,—(this in the city!) and the Police has been vigorously em­ployed in preventing disturbances. The new market will cost Eighty Thousand Rupees, and the competition will reduce prices”. [Ben. Catholic vol.8.]  The ambition of Anandabazar never fulfilled.  Their objective was failed. The proprietor has leased it out. Miscellaneous shops were established throughout; but no market is held here.

NEW MARKET AND DHURRUMTOLLAH BAZAAR

It was long felt by the Europeans of the posh Chowringhee neighbourhood that the old Dhurrumtollah Bazar was no good any more to meet their everyday needs.  To cater all kinds of food for European consumption they resolved in 1866 to construct a large-scale market on the ground of the old failing Fenwick’s bazar and its surrounding bustee areas. The New Market, as it is still called, was housed in an extensive building, forming three sides of a quadrangle opened in 1874. The land and the building cost about Rs. 6,65,000.

Newmarket-_Sir_Stuart_Hogg_Market
Vintage Postcard with view of Sir Stuart Hogg Market Dharmatala Calcutta. A Pre 1914 anonymous photograph. Courtesy: oldstratforduponavon.com

At the outset of its career, the new market suffered severely from the competition of the Dhurrumtollah Bazar, and its fortunes did not prosper until the Justices subsequently bought the bazar for seven lakhs. The whole of this money was raised by Government loan, the interest of which is far more than met by the rents of the stalls and shops in the market. The municipal executive tried to entice stallholders and butchers away from the Dharamtolla Bazaar. There were unseemly scuffles, followed by “cri­minations and recriminations”. A local paper predicted that the Stuart Hogg market would soon be seen as a “white elephant”. [Furedy]

Hiralall brought a suit against the chairman of the municipality charging that he had no right to use municipal funds for the market and for the opening ceremonies. The Dharamtolla Bazaar owner did not win his case. The government of Bengal hastily passed an act to legalize the decisions of the Corporation. [Furedy] A few years later Hiralall had to sell the market premises to the Justices of Peace of the Calcutta Corporation at 7 lakh to let their newly created Municipal Market, later Hogg Market, runs out of competition. The old Dhurrumtollah Market was demolished and its ground was distributed in small plots and a lane in between. In 1890 the Calcutta Corporation was generous to name this new lane as Mattiloll Seal Lane in memory of Hiralall’s father.

 Besides Dhurrumtollah Bazar and Ananda Bazar, there is another deshi daily bazar called Napit Bazar on nos. 103-5, Dhurrumtollah Street. There is also another food bazar, Gopee Baboo’s Bazar situated between the Jaun Bazar and Dhurrumtollah Roads [Setton-Karr Vol.2]

CHANDNEY BAZAR

Chandney Bazar has never been for fresh food retailing as the other ones were, but a sort of native shopping complex mainly for domestic accessories and handymen’s tools. Chandney shops and entrances are on no. 167, Dhurrumtollah Street, standing at the crossing of Chandney Choke Street, or Chandney Choke Bazar ka Rastah, on the north side of Dhurrumtollah.

Chandney Bazar is a labyrinth of ill-kept passages, lined with shops, in which may be found a wonderful collection of sundries, from a door nail to a silk dress. [Cotton] The list can be lengthening endlessly by adding items like “Brass and iron hand-ware, clothes, umbrellas; shoes, stationery, and various other articles of domestic use.” Cotton left a piece of helpful advice for shopaholics that “very similar shops and stalls may now be found, but under conditions infinitely more advantageous and comfortable, in the Municipal Market in Lindsay Street, off Chowringhee”. [Cotton] While shopping in modern New Market was more comfortable and reassuring, it lacked the adventurous spirit of shopping, getting favorite picks at pocket-friendly price by bargaining at your heart’s content. For that, one must essentially be guarded with sharp shopping skill. Besides, the shop-goers should be extra-cautious as Chandney has been apparently a notorious receptacle for all stolen goods, and such encourages theft by domestics”.

R.J Minney in 1922 penned a typical picture of the Chandney Market, its inside and outside, in few lines. The following passage on Chandney may also contribute to our understanding of Dhurrumtollah characteristics in its totality:

 “Gharis wait outside shops, the horses hunched up in their shafts and harness, limp-legged, asleep. The drivers are asleep on the box and syces slumber behind. Water and rubbish on the pavements. The air is heavy with a fetid smell of hookah and food; paint, oil and cycles. In the shadow of the gold-tipped minarets women swathed in sheets clatter their slippered feet along the road. Children’s garments flutter in the wind from the line that dangles outside the open shop front. Shopkeepers glare expectantly but have too much self respect to solicit custom. A stout undressed Bengali sits on the mattressed floor, laid with white clean linen, fanning himself lazily. By his side stands a hookah with a long stiff spout. There is more bare body than shop. He probably does not depend on his shop for a living. An inquisitive passerby, who peered in to gaze at his stock, was not even hailed as a possible customer. Idle barbers sit by their doors hailing passers-by. The patrons of the Chandni bazaar, scowling, busy; bargaining, wrangling; smiling, smirking. Cycle shops, camera shops, pigeon stalls for cigarettes and sherbet. Pavement vendors with their wares in their baskets, pavement barbers assisting the needy with their toilet; street hawkers who pause on the roadway at the hailing of a customer; quarrelsome ghari men lashing their whips at one another.” [Minney]

Chandney market has its own world of business. They operate in their own style and communicate with their European and Eurasian customers in typical Chandney-English – a pidgin dialect of Anglo-Bengali concoction. Chandney salesmen were not always as unconcerned as Minney had found in his visit. A funny dialogue of Chandney bazar touts was in circulation in my boyhood days:  “Take, take; no take, no take; একবার তো see!”, or in plain language, “You take it, or you don’t, why not give a quick glance for once?”  This may serve as an instance of how Chandney salesmen approach their nonchalant customers in typical Chandney-dialect. It represents a proactive selling approach, often hatefully nagging and annoying, but can hardly be defined as unfriendly or indifferent as Minney suggested.

UPDATES

 New Market

Richard Roskell Bayne (1836-1901)de­signed the New-Market. The unique architecture of this public market of some 7.200 square meters exerted substantial influence on the design of large urban markets throughout South Asia. [Welch]



REFERENCES

Asiatic Journal. 1839. “Asiatic Journal and Monthly Register.” 29. Retrieved (https://books.google.co.in/books/download/Asiatic_Journal.pdf?id=vCsYAAAAYAAJ&hl=en&capid=AFLRE71UN1fNXSmO80NUacGNXrTijYacn5XNM0vBRP4b3jb4htcUQHOMuHowsJWtwtIw7k70PPOyXbnuS46vH3aR0-16f5ZTsA&continue=https://books.google.co.in/books/download/Asiatic_Journal).
Bengal Almanac. 1851. Bengal Almanac , With A Companion and Appendix. 1851st ed. Calcutta: Hurkaruh. Retrieved (https://books.google.co.in/books/about/The_Bengal_Almanac_for_1851.html?id=4UNBAAAAYAAJ&redir_esc=y).

Bengal Catholic Herald. 1844. Bengal Catholic Herald. Calcutta: D’Rozario [printer]. Retrieved (https://books.google.com.au/books?id=YmKXiWDrh8QC&pg=PP5#v=onepage&q&f=false).

Bengal Hurkaru. 1838. Bengal Directory and Annual Register for 1838. Calcutta: Harkau. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.68584).

Carey, William. 1882. Good Old Days of Honorable John Company; Vol.1. Calcutta: Quins Book. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/goodolddaysofhon00careuoft).

Cesry, Rev. C. 1881. Indian Gods Sages And Cities. Calcutta: Catholic Orphan Press. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.128152).

Cones. 1877. Directory and Almanac, 1877. Calcutta: Cones. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.91820).

Cones. 1874. Calcutta Directory, 1874. Calcutta: Cones. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.94126).

Cotton, Evan. 1907. Calcutta, Old and New: A Historical and Descriptive Handbook to the City. Calcutta: Newman. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/calcuttaoldandn00cottgoog).

Firminger, W. K. 1906. Thacker’s Guide to Calcutta. Calcutta: Thacker, Spink. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/thackersguidetoc00firm).

Furedy, Christine. 1979. “Retail Trade in Calcutta.” Capital 183(4587):4–10. Retrieved (https://www.google.com/search?q=RETAIL+TRADE+IN+CALCUTTA+Offshoot+from+the+land+of+shopkeepers+by+++CHRISTINE+++FUREDY&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&client=firefox-b).

Hobbs, Major H. 1944. John Barleycorn Bahadur: Old Time Taverns in India. Calcutta: Thacker, Spink. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.53429).

Hurkaru. 1841. Bengal-Directory and Annual Register for 1841. Calcutta: Harkaru. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.68587).

Kipling, Rudyard. 1899 The City of Dreadful Night. New York: Alex. https://archive.org/details/citydreadfulnig02kiplgoog

Long, James. 1852. “Calcutta in the Olden Time – Its Localities.” The Calcutta Review 18:275-. Retrieved (https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002715346).

Minney, Rubeigh James. 1922. Round about Calcutta. Calcutta: OUP. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/roundaboutcalcut00minnrich).

Ray, A. K. 1902. Calcutta: Town and Suburbs; Pt.1 A Short History of Calcutta. Calcutta: Bengal Secretariat. Retrieved (https://books.google.co.in/books?id=-Lo5AQAAMAAJ&q=calcutta+town+and+suburbs+ak+Ray&dq=calcutta+town+and+suburbs+ak+Ray&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjDnrz11MnXAhUCN48KHdgEDQUQ6AEIJzAA).

Setton-Karr, W. S. 1864. Selections from Calcutta Gazettes. Calcutta: Military Orphan Press. Retrieved (https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.195937/2015.195937.Selections-From-Calcutta-Gazettes-1864#page/n5/mode/2up).

Setton-Karr, W. S. 1864. Selections from Calcutta Gazettes; Vol.3. Calcutta: GOI. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.531269).

Setton-Karr, W. S. 1865. Selections from Calcutta Gazettes; Vol.2. Calcutta: Military Orphan Press. Retrieved (https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.44506/2015.44506.Selections-From-Calcutta-Gazettes–Vol-2#page/n3/mode/2up/search/beerbhoom).

Stocqueler, J. H. 1844. Handbook of India: A Guide to the Stranger and Traveller and a Companion to the Resident. Calcutta: Hurkaru. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/handbookofindiag00stoc).

Thacker Spink. 1876. Bengal Directory, 1876. Calcutta: Thacker, Spink. Retrieved (https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.68578).

Welch, Anthony, and ors. 2009. Building for the Raj: Richard Roskell Bayne.
Canadian Art Review.Vol.34, No.2 (2009) (https://www.jstor.org/stable/42630806?read-now=1&loggedin=true&seq=10#page_scan_tab_contents)

হরিসাধন মুখোপাধ্যায়। ১৯১৫। কলিকাতা সেকালের ও একালের / Kalikata Sekaler O Ekaler / কোলকাতা। পি এম বাগচি (https://archive.org/details/Kalikata-Sekaler-O-Ekaler-Harisadhan-Mukhopadhyay#page/n0/mode/2up)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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The First English Settlers: Sutanuti Sahibs, 1690 – 1706

View of Calcutta from Hooghly River by William Hodges. c1789
View of Calcutta from Hooghly River by William Hodges. c1789

সুতানুটির সাহেব; ইংরেজ পত্তনির প্রথম ষোল বছর, ১৬৯০- ১৭০৬

Charnock was the main instrument that worked behind the foundation of the British Empire in the East. He felt that Sutanuti was a strategic position and had many advantages for the English that the other places lacked. Provisions were plentiful at its bazaars and hats, Communication by land routs with interior was easier, yet the village was an island that could be cheaply defended. It was a secure position for a naval power. A suitable landing Ghat was already there. Just below the place, the river Hooghly had become deep enough for large ship to ride in. There existed a pucca building which might be used for factors, in case of need. The place, being marshy and unhealthy, had no much value in the eyes of the Moghul. Articles of export could also be had, as a trading community, such as the Setts and Byasacks, had already actively engaged in business there.

bazar india
Cloth merchant measuring cloth. Artist Unknown. 1820

Before acquisition of Calcutta the Savarnas were traditionally the proprietors of Calcutta and its adjacent areas. The Byasaks and Setts came there to settle as the earliest dwellers. After the name of their idol Chitreswari, they called their locality on the north of Calcutta as ‘Chitpur’. After their family deity Govida, the Bysaks named their village Govindapur. Among the Hindu residents of the time in Calcutta and its neighbouring village we find mentions in the traditions of Monohar Ghose, an ancestor of Dewan Shrihari Ghose, at Chitpur; of a predecessor of Govinda Mitter, who acted as a Black Zamindar under Holwell at Sutanuti; of Govina Saran Dutt and Panchanan Tagore, ancestors of Dutts and the Tagores of Hatkhola and Pathuriaghata, respectively settled at Chttanuttee and Govindapur”

Black (Gentoo) Pagoda, Chitpore-Daniel
Gentoo Pagoda and House – Thomas Daniel. c 1787

Due to the diversion of the trade of Satgaon, cities and villages rapidly grew up along its banks. The situation helped the villages Sutanuti, Govindapur and Kolikata to grow into prominence together with some newly come up villages, namely Chitrapur (Chitpur) on their north, and Bhowanipur and Kalighat on their South. Govindapur and Kalighat were separated by a creek marking the northern edge of the old Adi-Ganga that connected the Hooghly and the Balurghata and the Salt-water Lakes. Shortly after, a place for the sale of cloth was set up further north that became famous as Sutnati Hat, the Cotton Bale Market, In the 17th century, Betor gradually washed out and its foreign trading were shifted to Sutanuti where new connections with European traders, particularly the English, are being fostered.
“On 24th August 1690 for the third and last time Charnock found himself at Chuttanutte (sic), where ‘the restored merchants were received with respact.’ This was the foundation day of the City of Palaces.” – Hyde Parochial annals of Bangal. Charnock’s Sutanuti was considered the best choice for business prospect, but worst for the settlers. Three miles to the north-eastward was a salt-water lake that overflows in September -October, then prodigious numbers of fish resort thither, but in November –December, when the floods are dissipated, those fishes left dry, and with their putrefaction affect the air with stinking vapors, and cause a yearly mortality.

View of Circular Road, Calcutta- Prinsep, Edward Augustus 1848
Circular Road Calcutta, by Edward Prinsep. 1848
Procession of the Goddess Kali - Calcutta October 1841
Procession of the Goddess, L.H. de Rudder 1848

Charnock died in 1693 leaving the new settlement in chaos. During last days Charnock lived like a spent-force landlord, allowing everyone the liberty to enclose lands, dig tanks, and build houses where and how they pleased. The settlement remained unfortified and vulnerable even ten years after his death. In 1696 during insurgence of Subah Singh, the English obtained the much delayed permission to defend themselves.

North view of the Water Gate and Royal Barracks at Fort William in Calcutta by William Baillie . 1794

A bastion and a walled enclosure were completed by January 1697. The Company has by the year 1699 sufficiently secured their position in Bengal and elevated to the rank of independent Presidency. Supposedly, by this time the supply of the ten guns ordered for did arrive from Madras. Next year their rising fort was granted the name ‘Fort William’ a tribute to the reigning King. The construction of the Fort took some 16 years more to complete. It was, as the Court of Directors observed in 1713 , of very little real use as fortification. See CR Wilson/ Old Fort William

The first English settlement at Sutanuti ‘seems to have consisted of mud and straw hovels’. Its chief defence was the flotilla of boats lying in the river, The renewed settlement established by Charnock in 1690 was of the same nature. Except a small area round the Park and the Factory, there had been no township grown in the settlement during early days of British occupancy. The only noticeable masonry building Charnock acquired was the Catchari of Sutanuti jaigirdars. With the construction of the Fort at its site and reclamation of the great tank, the Portuguese and Armenian together with few Dutch and Danes flocked around the Fort.

Chitpore Road Calcutta, by Simpson William. 1867

The huge area of its neighboring marketplace, Burrah Bazaar, had every available space within its boundaries taken up by houses and shops of the native traders. The Bazaar was accessible by a road east of the Fort and west of the Park that ran northwards, and one of its branches passed through Algodam (potato godown). There was also the old zamindari avenue leading eastwards that crossed the junction of Broad Street and Chitpur Road – Calcutta’s earliest thoroughfare. Along these waysides, the affluent Company merchants and opulent native traders happily started settling in garden houses. Omichand, the Sikh millionaire had his mansion on the north of the Tank Square. Rasbehari Sett and Ramkissen Sett had theirs on the west of the Burying Ground. Near Middle Street the Company had its own vegetable garden and fish ponds. The Company’s factors and writers still resided in ‘convenient lodgings inside Fort.

In 1706, only 2248 bighas of land occupied with dwellings in Town Calcutta, and 364 bighas were shortly to utilized for houses, although the Burrahbazar to its immediate north was already most populous, having 400 bighas built over out of its entire area of 488 bighas. The land actually held by the English at Calcutta at this time was about three miles in length and about a mile in breath, its inland boundary being the Chitpore road, which afforded access to the famous Kalighat temple.  This immemorial pilgrim path disguised today under such various names as Chitpore Road, Cossaitollah Gully (or Bentink Street) and Chowringhee Road.

EsplanadeRow-River-CouncilHouse-x
Esplanade Row from the river to the Council House, Etching by William Baillie. 1794

 

In spite of the increasing effort being made for suburbanization the settlement stll reeking with malaria. Mortality was extraordinarily high. Out of the twelve hundred Englishmen no less than 460 died within five months as Hamilton reported in 1710. Till August 1705 there was only one doctor to attend and until the autumn of 1707 there was no hospital in town Calcutta. It was ‘a pretty good hospital in Calcutta’ where many go in to undergo the grievance of physic, but few come out to give accounts of its operation. Braving such a challenging situations the Englishmen built their home away from home and did their best to live in their own style.

As Calcutta became settled with its fort, quarters, parks, roads, bazaar and other amenities, Sutanuti became abandoned by the English as a place of abode. They left behind their favourite Perrin’s pleasure garden, ‘where once it was the height of gentility for the Company’s covenanted servants to take their wives for an evening stroll or moonlight féte. Bellamy lived to see a gunpowder factory in the grounds. As he rode out to Perrin’s besides his wife’s palanquin, along what is now Clive Street, he would have marked how between the new stockaded Christian town and citadel and the old defenseless village of the cotton market lay the gardens, orchards, and houses of the thriving native middlemen to whom English methods of trade then, and revenue administration later, gave so ample scope of fortune-making.’

The English Company boys, who landed at Sutanuti accompanying Charnock, were evidently differently motivated people than the factors and writers arrived decade after. The first generation settlers were a band of adventurist traders, with little or no education and no high ambition in life. Who knows, they might have preferred to continue in Sutanuti rather than to live in town Calcutta alienated from the rest.

Job_Charnock_founding_Calcutta,_1690-2
Job Charnock Founding Calcutta. Illustrator unknown. Source: Hutchinson’s story of the nations

In that wee hours, none of them, neither their Company nor the Royal authority, had an inkling of the future role of the English in India. It was, however, not unlikely that the idea of a permanent English settlement first came to Charnock’s mind when Sutanuti was the ‘halfway house of the European merchants’. He had a speculative flair. As the time-honoured legend goes, he used to sit and smoke a meditative hookah under the shade of the famous peepul tree where Bow Bazaar Street meets Lower Circular Road. The tree is no more there. It was uprooted unceremoniously during Marquees Hastings’ regime, in 1820, leaving behind a memory of the tree hidden in the new street name, Baithakkhana Road. Charnock nevertheless, could not have taken his ideas further because of his growing indifference and lack of initiative, as discussed before. History took its own course. Calcutta suburbanization eventually made Calcutta the second-best city of the British Empire. The first English settlers, the Sutanuti sahibs, were lost by this time in oblivion.

 

SOURCEBOOKS

The book ‘Calcutta, town and suburb’ has been extensively used besides few other sources.

 

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Fort William’s Chowringhee Gate, Gobindapur, Calcutta, c1880

Chowringhee gate Fort William an albumen photo, 1880's

ফোর্ট উইলিয়াম কেল্লার চৌরঙ্গি ফটক, গোবিন্দপুর, কলকাতা, c১৮৮০
The Fort William’s Chowringhee Gate faces Chowringhee. Earlier the gate was exclusively used for the elite and so was also called the Royal Gate. The old quarters on the top of the Chowringhee was renovated later. The General Officer Commanding (GOC), Headquarters, Bengal Area, stays here. The Flag Staff House was built in 1937-38 to replace the original structure. It affords a splendid panoramic view of Chowringhee and Maidan.
Albumen photo by unknown photographer. c1880

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Fort William Interor View, Gobindapur, Calcutta, c1828

fort William Interiof_1828ফোর্ট উইলিয়াম কেল্লার আভ্যন্তরীণ দৃশ্য, গোবিন্দপুর, কলকাতা, c১৮২৮
This is a view of the interior of Fort William Calcutta looking east across the courtyard towards Chowringhee Gate and Chowringhee Road The new Fort William was constructed as a result of the damaging attack on the original fort by the forces of Siraj-ud-Daulah the Nawab of Bengal in 1757. It was situated to the south of the city in Gobindpore and designed by John Brohier. The structure is polygonal in form and has extensive defences including bastions, earthworks and a moat. The area surrounding the fort, known as the Maidan, was cleared to provide an unrestricted line of fire. This view looks east across the Maiden towards Chowringhee Gate and Chowringhee Road. The Neo-Gothic church of St. Peter, started in 1822 and consecrated in 1828, is on the left.
Watercolour painting by William Wood (1827-1833), c.1828. Courtesy British Library

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Russel Street, Chowringhee, Calcutta, 1828

রাসেল স্ট্রিটের দৃশ্য, কলকাতা, ১৮২৮
Russel Street in Chowringhee in Calcutta. Behind Bengal Club on Chowringhee Road, Russel Street runs north-south between Park Street and Middleton Street. The Street was named after Sir Henry Russel, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court from 1806-1813.
Watercolour with pen and ink, dated 1828, by Marianne Jane James, the wife of the third Bishop of Calcutta.

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Bishop’s House, Chowringhee Road, Calcutta, 1849

কলকাতা বিশপের আবাস, ১৫ নং চৌরঙ্গি রোড, কলকাতা, ১৮৪৯
In October 1825, Bishop Heber, the second Bishop of Calcutta, officially took up residence at 5, Russell Street. The original building was constructed by Major Mark Wood in 1763 on twelve bighas, the first construction on the street. Till the consecration of the new Cathedral named after St. Paul, No. 5 was home to five Bishops. In 1849, The Bishop’s House at 51, Chowringhee Road, with its teak-wooden floors, rambling staircase with its polished banisters, stood till recent time. After 1919, Bishop’s Palace was re-christened as Bishop’s House. A gigantic yet fascinating cast-iron bell hangs from its dragon-bracket in front of the entrance. The bell is covered in beautiful and mysterious numerous characters of the Chinese language etched on its surface and belongs to the Manchu Period, built by Tek Cheong Wu in the city of Hongchu. See more
The photograph was taken by Francis Frith in early 1850s

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Bengal Club, Calcutta. Chowringhee Road, Calcutta, 1850s

বেঙ্গল ক্লাব, চৌরঙ্গি রোড, কলকাতা, c১৮৫০
The Bengal Club was founded at Calcutta in 1827. When the Club was first conceived, it was christened the Calcutta United Service Club, at a meeting held in the Calcutta Town Hall. The Club was housed in a building in Esplanade West, erected in 1813. It moved to Tank Square around 1830 and subsequently purchased the house in Chowringhee Road formerly occupied by Thomas Babington Macaulay. The Bengal Club is still in existence at this site.
This is a whole-plate albumen print of a photograph taken by Francis Frith between 1850 and 1854.

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United Service Club, Calcutta, 1850s

ইউনায়িটেড সার্ভিস ক্লাব, চৌরঙ্গি রোড, কলকাতা, c১৮৫০
General view of the classical building, housing the United Services Club. “Was formerly styled the Bengal Military Club, the members of which were limited to the I.C.S. and military services. As time, however, moved on and things changed they found that this particular form of exclusiveness was rather an expensive luxury, and very wisely threw open wide the heavenly portals and admitted within their celestial and sacred precincts members of other government services, save and except those of the Bengal pilots. Why the club ever made this invidious distinction, of course I cannot say, but at a later period, recognising possibly the injustice of their action, they rescinded their prohibition, and now the pilots sit in the seats of the mighty amongst the members of the other services. The club house, as many people will recollect, originally stood on the site of Chowringhee Mansions. It was quite an ordinary looking dwelling enclosed by a brick-wall skirting Chowringhee Road, and the building extended for some little distance down Kyd Street” – Recollections of Calcutta. Massey. 1918
Photograph taken from Chowringhee Road by Francis Frith in 1850s.

See a comparable photograph taken by W. G. Stretton taken in the 1870s

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Panoramic View Of Chowringhee Road Across Maidan, Calcutta, 1868

অক্টারলনি মিনার থেকে ময়দান সংলগ্ন চৌরঙ্গী রোডের বিসারিত দৃশ্য, ১৮৬৮
The view looks south along Chowringhee Road with impressive array of private and public buildings on the far side of Maidan. The Monohurdass Tank in the foreground and General’s Tank beyond can be seen with sight of the spire of St Paul’s Cathedral on the skyline at the extreme right.
This is the section 7 of the ‘seven-part panorama of Calcutta from the Ochterlony Monument’ taken by Samuel Bourne in 1868.

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Panoramic View of Chowringhee Road, 1850

চৌরঙ্গী রোডের বিসারিত দৃশ্য, ১৮৫০
Here is another panoramic view of Esplanade area focused on the Chowringhee road – the most elegant part of city. The city was then known as ‘The City of Palaces’ due to the impressive array of public buildings along with Esplanade Row and Chowringhee Road. The view of the Chowringee Road, on the far side of Maidan and Dhurrumtala Tank, was probably taken from the top of the Ochterlony Monument like the two other photographs he took focusing on different points, one on the Government House and the other on High Court.
Photographer: Francis Frith

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