One of the best known names in early photography in India was Samuel Bourne. When he arrived in Calcutta in 1863, he found that William Howard had a studio in business there from 1840. Charles Shepherd, who had run a studio in Agra and Simla, teamed up with Howard and Bourne, who had joined in 1863 to form Howard and Bourne, and the firm became Howard, Bourne and Shepherd on the Esplanade in Calcutta. When Howard left for England in 1866, the firm became Bourne and Shepherd. Throughout the days of the Raj, it was the Indian studio that was best known internationally. Sadly, the digital age has led to the closing down a fortnight ago of Bourne and Shepherd, in Indian hands from 1955. And with that, an era in Indian studio photography as Art comes to an end.
Bourne’s photography may have been mostly associated with the Himalayas, from his Calcutta base, and with the Simla area, from Bourne and Shepherd’s Simla branch, but he also did much photography in the rest of India, including in the South. He was particularly well-known for his work in the Nilgiris.
The 26-year-old Bourne set foot in India when he arrived in Madras in 1863. He was, it is reported, pleasantly surprised to find that photography had sunk roots in the city, thanks to the efforts of Dr. Alexander Hunter who had introduced it in the curriculum of the Madras School of Arts he had founded and who had also founded the Madras Photographic Society (Miscellany August 20, 2001). The surroundings of Madras did not, however, interest Bourne and he moved on to Calcutta and then Simla. Of his work thereafter it was said, “(he) was to form the model to which the succeeding generation of commercial photographers aspired.”
Christopher Penn, who has produced pictorial histories of the work of Madras photographers James Nicholas, of Nicholas Brothers, and Albert (ATW) Penn (Miscellany, May 4, 2015) writes, “Bourne represents the pinnacle of professional photography in 19th Century India, by virtue of his technical expertise, photographic ambition and the determination with which he sought to document the full breadth and variety of India’s landscape and architecture. Such was the success of his project that his work inspired… a generation of photographers… The Penn studio (and its predecessor in Madras, Nicholas and Co.) was to become a distinguished exemplar of this trend.”
It was in 1869 that Bourne came back to South India and that was on his way to Bombay and return to England in 1870. Bourne’s work in the Madras Presidency focussed on the Nilgiris. In a catalogue of Bourne’s Indian photographs, 53 pictures are listed as being taken in and around Ooty and 32 elsewhere in the Nilgiris. All these were taken during the few months he spent in the Nilgiris. Many a photographer who followed plagiarised his compositions with only minor differences, it has been alleged.
In November 1869, Bourne held an exhibition and sale of this and other work at the ‘Ameer Bagh Hotel’, later home of Spencer’s/Ambassador Hotel. A report on this exhibition in the Madras Times said, in part, “The views of the Neilgherries were taken during the season that is just at an end, and many who have spent happy months on the Hills will be delighted to see their favourite haunts so faithfully and artistically portrayed. Almost every point of interest about Ootacamund scenery has when seized upon, and the bold scenery of Avalanche and the Pykara has enabled Mr Bourne to produce many fine pictures… As specimens of the photographic art, the pictures are prefect. They seem to combine the merits of good line engraving with the peculiar effects that photography alone can produce.” Bourne himself, addressing a photographic society in England, in 1860, before his India period, said, “There is another very important qualification which the photographer must possess, (namely) a facility for observing and attending to the smallest particulars, united with a patience that can (never) stop to do anything thoroughly. I am fully convinced it is the possession, or non-possession, of this qualification, which more than anything else constitutes the chief difference between a successful and an unsuccessful photographer.”
Must heritage live dangerously?
Why must heritage in this first city of modern India always live on the edge? The newest threat to a small bit of it is the possibility that a tomb with a history may have to make way for an Electricity Board transformer. Can’t a transformer be placed a little away from this tomb? Must it be on the very same site? Will a few yards make a difference to power supply? Or, is it just a case of a ‘don’t care’ attitude? The tomb in question is that of Dr. Edward Bulkley who is a part of Indian medical history. I have written of him and his tomb that is on the Fort glacis just opposite the Medical College’s ‘Red Fort’ (Anatomy Block) in the past (Miscellany, August 30, 2004 and October 4, 2004). But allow me to refresh memories as to why this tomb is a significant part of our heritage.
He was in 1692 appointed the head of what was the first Government Hospital in modern India. In August 1693, he performed the first medico-legal autopsy in India, and that same year issued the first leave certificate for “absence on medical grounds”. Two years later, he issued the first injury certificate. He passed away in 1714 and was buried in the garden of his house which, in time, made way for the glacis and military quarters.
That it is a tomb that should be on any heritage list cannot be doubted. And that it must be protected cannot be denied by any but the callous. Why is the Chennai Heritage Committee quiet about this threat? Is it because it is not sure of its status under a Heritage Act that, in limbo, awaits implementation two years after its enactment?
I’m happy to hear that the medical students are making an attempt to save the tomb from the wreckers and have it renovated. I’m even happier to hear that the young are taking an interest in heritage.
When the postman knocked…
* Prof. Alladi Krishnaswami writes to tell me that The Ramanujan Journal is not published as 12 issues a year (Miscellany, May 30). It is, as in 2012, published as nine issues a year but with more pages per issue, increasing from 150 pages to 225. Regarding the history of the genesis of the journal, he writes: “Prof. Ramachandra of TIFR asked me to take over his Hardy-RamanujanJournal as early as 1986. But this did not materialise, as he did not want an expansion of the Editorial Board like I did. The idea to launch a journal came to me in 1987, but I was not clear how to proceed. I told Prof. Berndt about my discussion with Ramachandra and, after hearing what had happened, he said it was better to launch a separate journal. It was at Prof. Berndt’s suggestion that John Martindale of Kluwer contacted me.”
* Referring to the era of Best cricketers (Miscellany, June 20), R.N. Ratnam writes that Madras was captained by C.P. Johnstone of Burmah Shell (“a martinet, but a great cricketer”) while playing on his team was a rival petroleum man, an American (!), F F Richardson (I can’t find my earlier reference to him in Miscellany) who worked for Standard Vacuum (Stanvac). Richardson, he adds, made a great right hand-left hand combination for Madras with M. Robinson, who worked in Salem with the Salem Magnesite Company.
* Seeking my help in putting him in touch with a publisher is Joshua Mathew, who says he holds the rights for the 11 books Kenneth Anderson of Bangalore, the man-eater hunter, wrote. Mathew himself is writing a book on Donald Anderson, the son of Kenneth Anderson. Donald Anderson, he says, was “arguably, India’s last white hunter”. The Andersons, he tells me, also had a Madras connection; many of the family were married in The Kirk in Egmore. In Kenneth Anderson’s day and during much of the life of his son, Bangalore was a part of the Madras Presidency and the two knew well the jungles of what is now Tamil Nadu.
