The steep climb to Araku

The first few British expeditions to Galikonda were localized to the area now known as the Araku valley and were a far cry from today’s tourist sojourns in well-equipped, if not luxurious, resorts.

The first exploratory team that went up Galikonda and the surrounding plateaus in February, 1859, consisted of five members led by the Inspector General of Hospitals, Dr. Duncan McPherson, under orders by the Commander-in-Chief of Madras, Sir Patrick Grant, to see whether the hill would make a good sanatorium for soldiers serving in the ‘Northern Division’ of the Presidency.

They explored a few ridges and ranges and named the saddle that joins the crescentic ridge of Galikonda Grant’s Ridge (after the Commander-in-Chief); they selected a valley 600 feet below Grant’s Ridge for the sanatorium and named it Harris Valley, quite a misnomer, as it is more a plateau than a valley, located a vertiginous 4,000 feet above the sea.

Later that year a company of 60 Sappers (soldiers) cleared the ground and cut out approach routes.

In March the next year a group of 21 men of the European Veteran Company at Vizagapatam tested out the climate and living conditions in the valley. The expedition can only be called a disaster. With little more than thatched huts to protect them, these soldiers, mostly older veterans, faced the full fury of rain and wind and the malaria parasite. Only one of them escaped sickness. One can imagine the men trying to weather it out among the thick fogs common to the region, foliage dripping rain and the choppy breezes chilling them to the bone. Three of these men died, two on the hills and one on the way back to Vizag.

The Government, however, unwilling to concede victory to Nature’s forces, sent another party of younger European soldiers to the valley in May; but sickness attacked all but one man of this group too.

After trying out other locations such as Kapkonda, a higher hill, the venture was abandoned in 1861. I can’t claim to have tried very hard, but from the few sources I referred I’m unable to gather when the Araku valley was finally tamed.

References:

Francis, W. – “Vizagapatam District Gazeteer”; Asian Educational Services; first published, Madras 1907

Visakha Museum

A visit to the Visakhapatnam museum last month proved to be a disappointing affair. The objects on display were a motley collection, mostly donated by eminent and not-so-eminent citizens; most were of doubtful historical value. For instance what’s the historical value of currency notes from Latvia donated by a Latvian citizen who visited the museum a couple of years ago? Or the collection of modern coins from a dozen countries around the world? Or the modern paintings by just a couple of painters? It looked as if the museum was just kind enough to accept whatever people offered, without trying too hard to acquire anything by itself.


However, there were a few objects that made my visit worth the trouble -- a telescope from the old observatory, some old photographs of the city’s coastline, and larger-than-life portraits of the Vizianagaram and Bobbili rajahs (placed facing each other!) But the most interesting exhibits stood outside, in the cool gardens and lawns around the pretty Dutch building (which houses the museum). Among them I found this rock edict commemorating a change in the city’s name.

The entry fee was around Rs. 10 for an adult and Rs. 5 for a child. Unfortunately for me, the Maritime Museum, housed in the first building on the left, was closed for renovation when I visited. So all I could look at was the things in the old building.

Echoes 3

“What she was finding also was how one book led to another, doors kept opening wherever she turned and the days weren't long enough for the reading she wanted to do. ”
― Alan Bennett

An article on the Vizag observatory

For those interested in knowing more about the observatory in Vizag, here's the link to an article written by N. Kameswara Rao, A. Vagiswari and Christina Birdie in Current Science, Vol. 100, No. 10., published in May this year.

It's titled, "Early Pioneers of Telescopic Astronomy in India: G.V. Jaggarow and his Observatory" and is a detailed account of the founder of the observatory and those who ran it after him, the setting up of the observatory, the equipment acquired, the work carried out there, and its fading away. All this information is skillfully placed in the context of contemporary astronomical research in India and abroad.

Thomas Bowrey: The Inspiration Behind the Vizag Factory?

The origins of Vizag’s European settlements date back to the mid-to-late 1600s according to the Vizagapatam Gazeteer, W. Francis. “The settlement was founded in 1682. In February of that year the Directors wrote to Fort St. George that an interloper (unauthorized trader) was designed for Metchelepatam or Gyngerlee (i.e., Mausulipatam or Vizagapatam) and left it to the Madras authorities to decide whether a factory should not be established at the latter place. The Madras consultations of the 1st August 1682 say that ‘The Company having resolved to make some investments this year at Gingerly & given order to send down some persons to further the same, as likewise to hinder and defeat any Interlopers that shall come there, resolved that Mr. George Ramsden doe proceed for this year as Chiefe there, his Second in Council being one Clement du Jardin. Thus it is clear that it was largely fear of the rivalry of the ubiquitous interloper which led the Company to first settle in Vizagapatam.”

Thomas Bowrey’s name occurs in a footnote to this text, but it is not clear whether this ‘interloper’ who inspired the English to set up a factory at Vizag was Thomas Bowrey or not. He does seem to have had some connection with this episode: one of his ship’s mates, Clement Jordan (who later changed his name to du Jardin) became one of the key persons in setting up the factory in Vizag. The links, though, are difficult to pin down based on my current reading.

Captain Bowrey (as Thomas was commonly known in English records) did, however, describe the coast around Vizag (Gingalee) in his book “A Geographical Account of the Countries Around the Bay of Bengal”. He calls this area “Certainly the most pleasant and Commodious Sea Coast that India affordeth, pleasant in many respects, beinge a most delicate Champion Land, and one of the most fertile lands in the Universe, and Commodious for Navigation’s Sake, enjoying many pleasant and good harbours, very well populated, and of a reasonable good Extent.”

Thomas Bowrey’s life (or whatever could be put together by Lt. Col. R.C. Temple in his introduction to the above-mentioned book) is an interesting one.

He sailed for the East from England while still in his teens. During his 19 years in the Eastern Hemisphere, he mainly traded in pepper, cloth and tea, but his time there was a far cry from the mundane buying and selling of goods. It was also full of adventure: he was imprisoned and put in irons and was witness to mutiny in Ceylon and a massacre in the Mergui archipelago (in southern Burma). He also drew charts and pictures of various places he visited, the best known being his chart of the Hoogli river.

In 1688, he left Fort St George (Chennai), apparently for good, and set sail for England. On his long journey back home, he put his time to good use and put together material for an English-Malayo (a far Eastern language) dictionary, which was published in 1701. He later married and probably still traded, possibly in the Western part of the New World.

When he was well into his 50s, his wanderings came in useful for Daniel Defoe (author of the widely read Robinson Crusoe), who gathered from Bowrey information on which to base his book -- “A General History of the Pyrates”, in particular information about piracy in Madagascar and Indian waters from 1695 to 1705.

References:

1. Thomas Bowrey -- "A geographical account of countries round the Bay of Bengal, 1669 to 1679" -- Edited by Lt. Col. R. C. Temple; C.I.E., Haklyut Society; 1905


2. Francis, W. – “Vizagapatam District Gazeteer”; Asian Educational Services; first published, Madras 1907


3. Daniel Defoe – “A General History of the Pyrates” – Edited by Manuel Schonhorn; Dover Publicatio; 1999

What's gingelly got to do with it?

Gingelly grains

A previous blog of mine (see link), in tracing Vizag's history, mentions that European traders referred to the coast between the Godavari and Puri as Gingerlee. I kept wondering where in the world that word came from. Some light crept into my sleepy brain last night as I looked through the Hobson-Jobson dictionary. The book says the word possibly originated from the Portuguese word for sesame seeds “Gergelim”; the English too called the sesame seed oil gingelly oil.


Hobson-Jobson says: “The following quotations show that Gingerlee or Gergelin was a name for part of the E. coast of India, and Mr. Whiteway conjectures that it was so called because the oil was produced there.

“1680-81 – ‘The form of the pass given to ships and vessels, and Register of Passes given (18 in all), bound to Jafnapatam, Manilla, Mocha, Gingerlee, Tenasserim, & c.’ Fort St. Geo. Cons. Notes and Exts., App. No. iii. P.47


“1701 – The Carte Marine depuis Suratte jusq’au Detroit de Malaca, par le R. Pere P.P. Tachard, shows the coast tract between Vesagapatam and Iagrenate as Gergelin.


“1753 – ‘Some authors give the Coast between the points of Devi and Gaudaweri, the name of the Coast of Gergelin. The Portuguese give the name of Gergelim to the plant which the Indians call Ellu, from which they extract a kind of oil.” – D’Anville, 134.


“(Mr. Pringle [Diary Fort St. Geo. 1st ser. iii. 170] identifies the Gingerly Factory with Vizagapatam).”


References:

Thomas Bowrey -- "A geographical account of countries round the Bay of Bengal, 1669 to 1679")


Henry Yule, A.C. Burnell, and William Crooke – “Hobson-Jobson – A glossary of colloquial Anglo-Indian words and phrases”

Copper “dubs” from Bheemili

A Dutch-minted Mughal copper coin - 1719-48



I’m now sure that Bheemli had a mint, but am unable to find any reliable source that gives the details. Some entries on the forum, www.worldofcoins.eu, say that the Dutch did issue copper dubs (check out the resemblance to the Telugu word for money: “dabbu”) in Machilipatam, Jaggernaikpur (Kakinada), and Bimlipatam. The dubs were a continuation of a type of coin introduced by the Mughal emperor, Aurangazeb Alamgir.

The entries say the mint in Bimlipatam was established under authority of a grant by the Raja of Vizianagaram; it is supposed to have minted copper dubs at least up to 1794.

These entries also mention an English mint in Vizagapatam, which started minting dubs in 1797 and continued to do so on and off until 1809, when it was shut down.