An ative of Surrey, England, Christopher Penn is visiting India for the seventh time. He first came in 2002 to unravel the story of A.T.W. Penn (1849 – 1924), his famous photographer great grandfather in South India. It began with an old letter he inadvertently found in 2000, with which Christopher traced his late father’s cousin Patricia. She produced the obituary of A.T.W. Penn in the South of India Observer . Written by an ‘Old Timer’ it began, “To few men is it given to write their names so indelibly on the scroll of Time”. Christopher was sufficiently intrigued. At the antiquarian booksellers Henry Sotheran Ltd in Piccadilly, he located a book by Thurston, which carried many of Penn’s photographs. “It was enough to get me hooked,” Christopher says, with his infectious laugh. He found Penn’s photographs in the Royal Geographical Society, Cambridge University Library, the British Museum, National Army Museum, everywhere in the world from Paris and Basel to Vienna and Berlin.
A cart de visite shows a young Albert Penn around the time he left home at the early age of 12. Four years later, at the age of 16, Penn arrived in Madras in 1864, where he was employed at the Nicholas Brothers’ photography concern. “My belief is he went to London and found work in a photographic studio, and so when he arrived in Madras, he was already a qualified photographer,” says Christopher. In 1865, he left for Ooty, and in 1875 Penn acquired the business from the Nicholas Brothers. Records from St. Stephen’s Church in Ooty show that A.T.W Penn and Zillie Eagan were married in 1870. In 1876, Penn purchased Cranley Cottage for a sum of Rs. 3,750 with mortgage. An 1878 photograph taken in a London studio shows A.T.W Penn with a full beard. “He had gone to England to introduce his wife to his family and update himself on the latest photographic techniques,” says Christopher.
Penn had an extraordinary ability to create a sense of movement within the space of a still photograph. His titles were equally captivating. The Public Shave is a portrait of street barbers and Bheestie, a water carrier with his cow. Penn’s photographs of Kurumbas and Todas capture tribal people living with great dignity despite their sparse resources. “He was a marvellous artiste,” says Christopher. Unlike the standard portraiture of dancers performing pretty hand gestures, Penn’s are atypical documents of real life. His ‘Dancing Girls’ are sullen, collapsed tiredly in a heap. His own portrait with Misquith (who started Misquith & Co in Madras in 1842, now Musee Musical) is purposely casual, Penn with one shoe off.
In the lecture hosted by INTACH, Christopher noted that photographers in the 19th Century were deeply concerned with the documentation of rapidly-diminishing forms of culture and ways of life. From his extensive research since 2002, Christopher has produced three books; the most recent in 2014, published by Quaritch — The Nicholas Brothers & A.T.W Penn: Photographers of South India 1855-1885 . A.T.W Penn’s daring and dedication is matched by Christopher’s ardent research and storytelling, with leaps of imagination that complete missing gaps. Plugging away from 2002 to 2006 at the British Library in London, Christopher read rolls of microfilm collating information on Penn. He bought every album and print related to Penn he could lay his hands on, reconstructing a past entirely through clues left behind.
Are there things we will never find out? Christopher knows Zillie Eagan’s father fought in the Crimean war, but not where she is from. An album in their family titled ‘To Harold with love from home’ shows Penn’s enduring love for his runaway son, who was Christopher’s grandfather, whom he never met. Many of these are fascinating puzzles.
A.T.W. Penn retired briefly in England, where he affectionately named his home The Mund. He returned to India, spending his last years in Coonoor, where he died in November 1924. He was buried in Tiger Hill Cemetery.
This visit, Christopher planted a tree in his memory. A.T.W. Penn sold his photographs to make a living, but never sacrificed his principles.
He believed in the power of photography over reports, for instance to show the severity of the famine in South India in 1875. While there may be uncertainties in tracing historical facts, the most definitive relationships are revealed in A.T.W Penn’s images, between people, events and the land. The journey to trace a personal history has led Christopher Penn to find us greater histories of South India.
