When did Christian services start in Tellicherry and its Fort?

Figure 1, St John's Church, Thalassery in 2009.
  Photo courtesy Jissu Jacob

Who built St John's Church at Thalassery?

It is widely believed by many that it was Edward Brennan, the Harbour Master at Tellicherry during the 1860's. This "fact" appears in countless websites, tourist guides, etc. etc. but I believe masks a much earlier series of places of worship on the site.

While it is true that Brennan rebuilt the church in the 1860's, his was definitely not the first church at Tellicherry.

Figure 2. Edward Brennen's memorial plaque
 inside St. John's Church, Thalassery

There are several different Christian Churches in Thalassery today. Each one represents a different form of Christianity, Catholic, C.S.I Protestant, & Basle Mission. All make claims for their foundation dates that are at best questionable, and at worse incorrect.

St. John's Church besides the fort is a Protestant Church. The formal state religion of England had been the Protestant one from the days of King Henry VIII in the 1530's. There were short periods in English history when the Catholic Religion returned during the reigns of Queen Mary I, and King James II, but these were short lived, and most English & Scottish officials will have been Protestant at home before they left for India.

In settlements under the East India Company rule, the official garrison church was therefore always a Protestant Church.  However the East India Company always struggled to recruit enough Protestant men to fill its military units, so that in practise there were often large numbers of Indo-Portuguese, Irish & English Catholics serving in these settlements as soldiers and as lower ranking officials.  These Catholics were accommodated by Catholic Churches, as was the case at Tellicherry, where St Joseph's Catholic Church was built besides the Protestant Church, both within the outer defensive walls of the fort at Tellicherry that we can all visit today.

One of the best preserved monuments & grave stones is that erected (as it would have originally have been set into the ground vertically, is that of Captain Gaspar Moritz Gleetz 1730-1768.

Figure 3. Captain Gaspar Moritz Gleetz 1730-1768

During the middle of the 18th Century there was huge disruption in Germany caused by the many wars that were taking place there. Germany was not a single country, but was dozens of often mutually antagonistic states. Parts of Germany like Hanover were ruled by the King's of England, who ruled both states.  Many German's became full time professional soldiers and officers.

When the British government was mobilising for each new war on Continental Europe, it would need to conscript tens of thousands of often unwilling English, Scots & Irish.  These huge recruiting drives increased competition for the available men in the community.  

Very often a ban was placed on the EIC in London to stop them recruiting in competition with the British Army, and this forced the EIC to recruit in Germany. They had recruiting agents who travelled into Germany, often up the Rivers Rhine, Elbe and Oder in an attempt to find suitable recruits. They were in competition with similar agents acting on behalf of the Dutch VOC, army & navy, who had similar issues finding enough men to fill their armies both in India, the Spice Islands as well as in Europe

Quedlinburg, where Gaspar came from is a town situated just north of the Harz Mountains in Germany mid way between Hanover & Leipzig. At this period many of the officers in the East India Company infantry companies came from Europe where they had often gained extensive experience during the wars in that part of the World.

Figure 4. Childhood home of Gaspar Moritz Gleetz

Modern sources all suggest that Harbour Master Edward Brennan had St John's Church built in the 1860's. This however cannot have been the case as there was a previous church on the site before 1820, constructed by the Reverend Francis Spring, which had been built over the alignment of an earlier wall that encircled the fort facing towards the sea, which had formed part of the defences to the Fort. The fill on either side of the wall had not been adequately compacted on either side of the foundations of the old wall, so that the earlier church broke its back over the old wall, some years before Edward Brennan funded the construction of the current church. 

Figure 5. Location map for Quedlinburg, Gaspar Gleetz home town. The survival of the early gravestone for Gleetz in the graveyard which was set up in 1768 suggests that this area was already consecrated ground by 1768, and possibly much earlier, and that worship was going on close by.

Life expectancy for new arrivals in India during the 18th Century was often less than three years, although those who survived the first three years could stretch to a further twenty years or more in India. Less than 30% of those who arrived from Europe could expect to return there. This means that at least 70% are buried in Tellicherry or nearby.  Somewhere around 10 new people would arrive from Europe each year, sometimes it was more, at other times less. In some other EIC forts like Fort St David, it is known that in the absence of a church, the Gunner's Room was used as a makeshift chapel on the relatively rare occasions that a parson was passing through the settlement or arrived as a chaplain on a passing East India Company ship. Some EIC officers will have taken services  for their men too.

Figure 6. Tellicherry Fort during the latter part of the 1720's preserved at the British Library. The painting was by Samuel Scott, and was one of a number of official paintings done in London which were hung on the walls of the EIC headquarters in Leadenhall Street. Scott had not been out to India, but must have been working from drawings made by an officer on board a visiting East India Company ship. 

Notice the large buildings inside the fort, which have subsequently disappeared. Notice also that there are a number of garden terrace or defensive walls between the fort wall and the sea, in the area where St. John's Church currently stands. It was one of these walls that the Rev. Spring's 1820's church broke its back over. 

The East India Company who arrived at Tellicherry in 1699, were taking over an earlier French settlement that was founded in about 1677 in the area that is now covered by the central bazaar, would have been very wary of worshipping in public, for fear of upsetting the religious sensibilities of both the Hindu's and Muslims.

This concern about Indian objections to Christian religion being outwardly conducted was a very serious, so that the EIC Directors in London made a considerable effort to stop missionaries and clergymen from going out to India.  This policy remained officially in place until the 1830's.

This policy was often deeply unpopular with many of the EIC officials and men who would have attended church services once a week on Sunday every week of their lives. Many will have lived in homes were the head of the family had a bible, and would say family prayers every evening for his family and his servants. 

With death & illness an ever present threat in Tellicherry, many men, especially those who were ill and were close to death will have been very concerned that there was no clergyman to administer to their needs or to administer the Last Rights. Men who were probably not very religious throughout most of their adult life, would suddenly become desperately anxious to be blessed, as it was firmly believed that they would not otherwise get into Heaven.

Christening were not possible, and marriages could not be formally solemnised.

The EIC local employees were however able to get around the official EIC ban or restrictions on clergymen. All along the Malabar coast there were many ports belonging to other countries, or native states, and these ports often had entirely different policies on the presence of priests or parsons in their settlements. Most of these parsons came from Protestant states in Germany, just like Gleetz had. Although they were employed by either the Dutch or English companies, many of these soldiers & parsons were not Dutch or English, but ethnic Germans. 

From time to time one of these Dutch / German missionaries would be invited to Tellicherry were they would give services which the garrison and merchants would attend.

Gunner's were a separate part of the military garrison, and they considered themselves superior to the infantry. They received higher pay, and their NCO's were allowed to distill Arrack which they could retail to the visiting crews of EIC ships anchored in the bay.

They had their own room inside the Fort. The gunners were never expected to leave the settlement, having to live next to the all important cannon, on whose effectiveness the survival of the settlement depended, unlike the infantry who could be sent elsewhere. The gunners barrack rooms were generally much better quality than those allocated to the infantry.  

It is known that at the same period, in other forts like Fort St David's were my 5 x great grandfather Captain John De Morgan (a French Huguenot, who served in the EIC garrison at Fort St David from 1711 until 1746), that officers like De Morgan would hold weekly services for their men inside the Gun Room, in much the same way that Royal Navy officers often do to this day in the absence of a chaplain. 

Figure 7. Captain John Sibbald of the 34th Regiment who died in December 1843 

By the 1780's with the preaching of men like John Wesley, the Established Protestant Church began to reform itself.  It did however split as a result, in the officially recognised church and into the Non-Conformist churches like John Wesley's Methodist Church.  The increased competition from the newer churches caused the Established Anglican Church to have to reform itself, and to reinject itself with new energy.  One of the effects of this reconfiguration of the church in England was renewed pressure on the EIC Directors to allow missionaries and clergy to officially travel out to India directly in EIC shipping. The Reverend Francis Spring was one of the first of these early "official" Anglican Protestant missionaries from this new generation of active and dedicated missionaries and clergy.

Spring was sent to Tellicherry and later on to Cannanore where he played an important role in establishing both of the St. John's churches in those locations. 

Up until about 1812 a substantial garrison had existed in both Tellicherry and Cannanore. By 1815 it appears that a decision was taken to move the army out of Tellicherry to Cannanore, where the existing site and fortifications could more easily accommodate the garrisons and prisons required.

However, the judicial community that was living in large comfortable house that they had built or acquired in Tellicherry were very reluctant to follow the garrison to Cannanore. It is believed that only about seven judicial officials remained in the town plus the harbour master by 1818.

We believe that Spring had arrived in Tellicherry in about 1817, and that he set about building a new church on the site of the former much older (1720?) garrison graveyard. This was to replace the old "Gun Room."  As Tellicherry was rapidly emptying of the churches potential source of a congregation, the raising of funds and the construction of the church may have taken a while, and the work may have been carried out in a less than competent manner. This may account for the fragile nature of the structure.

At the mean time the garrison at Cannanore probably numbered in excess of 500 European men, and needed a church of its own. The Rev. Spring became involved in promoting that church as well.

Spring himself appears to have left both Cannanore & Tellicherry during 1823 heading home to England. Responsibility for his churches was transferred to the Church Missionary Society [CMS], who subsequently supplied funding an clergy from England. Some of their reports are now available online dating from the 1820's, and I will explore those in later posts. 

As many of you are aware I have had an interest in the Thalassery and surrounding districts including the Wayanad for many years, and this has led to my becoming a focal point of contact for many other people who have similar connections with the town and the surrounding areas. 

Over the years these people have included former sepoys, teachers, bakers of the famous Victoria sponge cake, Mappila merchants, temple authorities as well as the descendants of former EIC officials and army personnel who served there over the years. 

Recently I have become involved in an informal project locally to try to improve the condition of several of local heritage sites in the town, which is succeeding in drawing a much greater of level of interest in Thalassery & internationally has been much than I had originally been expecting. 

 As I was taught at school, Brutus said to Cassius in Shakespeare's 'Julius Caesar' 

“There is a tide in the affairs of men. Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune” 

Whilst I have not been a great fan of Shakespeare since I left school,that quotation has remained a very effective maxim to deploy in my subsequent life. I want to see if I can build on the momentum that people like Biju Thomas have been very successfully building up locally, especially as I have been getting a lot of very positive responses from the local community in Thalassery. 

I am trying to get into a position to hold a series of launch events in the autumn of this year, or January 2023, when I hope to be in the town for several weeks, working on my own research projects.

Figure 8. Catherine Maitland, wife of John Vaughan 1833.

Vaughan was the Principle Collector at Tellicherry throughout most of the 1820's and 1830's.

 Figure 9. A close up of the plaque on Catherine Maitland's tomb.

                               

One of the key sites that can be visited today is the former Protestant garrison church at St John’s Tellicherry. This church is sandwiched between the old East India Company Fort and the sea. When I was last in Tellicherry in 2006, it was in an appalling state.

Fortunately, in 2009 the local church and community authorities undertook a very thorough restoration of the structure of the church itself. This work is described in the following two blog posts that I made in 2009.

http://malabardays.blogspot.com/.../tellicherry-church...
and
http://malabardays.blogspot.com/.../tellicherry-church...

Since 2009 the church has had a number of further restoration efforts made, and the grounds have been maintained periodically.

Figure 10. Cecilia Lawrie's Tomb

The numbering on the tombs in red had been applied to many of the monuments and grave stones by 2009. The highest number that I am aware of is about 50, but the person who took this photo told me that he believed that there had been far more gravestones in the graveyard orginially, but that only the most robust ones had been numbered.

Figure 11. St John's Church under restoration in 2007.
Photo by Lindsay Gething.

The next door school, St Joseph's Higher Secondary School, Thalassery which has origins as an Anglo-Indian school going back to the 18th century, and which is run under the management of Latin Diocese of Kannur, has taken an interest in St John’s Church which is located in the heart of the town of Thalassery beside the original Tellicherry Fort.

The Bishop of CSI church for North Kerala Diocese has recently expressed his interest in the project and wishes to talk about how to ready the British Heritage assets in his churches for the proposed north Kerala tourism development in a way that would be helpful to the society and his community Members. Depending on the response from interested parties, we might try to develop a process to roll out our project to encompass other nearby churchyards from other denominations. If you have connections with Tellicherry or have ancestors buried in these churches, and feel that you might like to take part please email me at balmer.nicholas@gmail.com

Figure 12. Eliza Wills, wife of Henry Crewe
who died at Tellicherry in 1874

At present I have no knowledge of Henry Crewe's life. Does anybody know anything about him?

Figure 13. James Ward Esq, Indian Navy

It is hard to be certain which part of the Ward family this man came from.  There are several references to a Lieut. Ward in "The History of the Indian Navy 1613-1863" by C. R. Low, which suggest that Lieut. Ward had spent a lot of time as a marine surveyor in the Bombay Marine off Socotra and Aden at the mouth of the Red Sea.  Surveying the shores of the Indian Ocean was a very important part of the work of the Indian Navy at that time.

As they approached retirement age, many former Indian Navy officers left their ship based activities for shore based posts and became Harbour Masters, so it is entirely possible that he was Harbour Master at Tellicherry at some point between Mr. Oakes and Mr. Brennen who were also Harbour Masters at Tellicherry.  C.R. Low also mentions a Lieutenant C.Y. Ward, who compiled the "Gulf of Aden Pilot" published by the Admiralty in 1863. He might be either James Ward's brother or even son.

Many people who had become seriously ill in other parts of India or the Indian Ocean, made sea voyages to Tellicherry from places like Bombay. The voyage alone was believed to be good for you, and was often prescribed by Company Doctors, and the voyage often cured many illnesses.  Tellicherry had been seen for many years as being a particularly healthy station compared with most other coastal EIC port settlements.

As Ootacamund developed into a summer hill station by the 1840's, many people from places like Bombay who were already ill travelled via Tellicherry or Cannanore to Ootacamund via the Wayanad, and their letters and diaries often contain some of the best descriptions of the Tellicherry area at that time. It is possible that James Ward had been passing through Tellicherry when he died.

Figure 14. A close up shot of the inscription on James Ward's monument

Like so many children, Elizabeth Schmidt had died aged just 10 months and 15 days old in 1822. One can only imagine the heart ache at this gravestone for her parents.

Figure 15. Elizabeth Frances Schmidt.  Schmidt is a German name that means smith.

Many earlier tomb stones have probably crumbled or been pushed aside in recent years.

Figure 16. James Crawford (possibly). 
He may have been related to Mr H Crawford who was Commercial Agent
 for the Travancore Government at Alleppey

Figure 17. James Stevens, who was the senior judge
 at Tellicherry in the early 1800's.

James Stevens played a very important role in leading the establishment of EIC law the former local rulers estates in the aftermath of Tipu Sultan's invasions. Under huge pressure to deliver, inadequate numbers of staff and with the Pazhassi Rebellion under way at the time it must have been a tough assignment. My 4 x great uncle Thomas Hervey Baber was 3rd Judge at the same time that Stevens was 1st Judge. They were of very different generations and mindsets. They did not get on very well at times.

Figure 18. James Stevens grave monument.

James Stevens modern descendants live in Australia, some of them visited this tomb about a decade ago. The dark stain was caused by the use of water to try to make the text readable. It will have dried away shortly afterwards.  You can see how the heavy rains and sun are taking the toll of the chunam plaster exposing the laterite blockwork underneath.

Figure 19. Margaret Eleanor John, who was born in 1837 and died in 1911.

Figure 20. Mary Brown, daughter of Francis Carnac Brown. This photo dates from quite recently, and shows how it was over painted in recent years.

Mary Brown's grandfather Murdoch Brown had been a really colourful character whose life would make a good film or novel. He bought a lot of slaves at Alleppey from local slave dealers, for use to cultivate his new plantation at nearby Anjarakandy. 

Figure 21. This was Mary Brown's plaque a few years earlier.
It is a great pity that it was painted over. I wonder if the paint could be removed?

By seeking to use slave labour in 1797, Murdoch Brown was following centuries old, local custom and practice. 

Thomas Baber who had only relatively recently arrived from England where he appears to have absorbed the early campaigns of anti-slavery campaigners of the Clapham Sect. He went on to take out a private prosecution against Brown in the Madras High court. 

Brown organised for an army officer (with a severe debt problem, and a reputation for fighting duels to try to pay off his crippling debt.) called Billy Robinson to challenge Baber to a duel that was fought.

As a young officer Francis Carnac Brown also challenged Baber to a duel a couple of years later. Brown and his two accomplices were prosecuted, again privately in Madras, and to the disgust of many in court Thomas Baber secured a successful prosecution, sending Brown and the other two to prison.

Francis Carnac Brown seems to have quickly recovered from his time in prison, and as an older and no doubt wiser man, he went on to play a major role in establishing planting in the Wayanad and elsewhere. He wrote several really interesting books on planting & other issues facing EIC expats in late 1830's Kerala.

One can only imagine what the scene was like in this church with the Brown family sat in one pew and the Baber family nearby in another pew.

Figure 22. Patrick Henry Gordon who died in 1876. A planter, Patrick appears to have made it back to Acton to the west of London, where he died and was buried in Kensal Green Cemetery.  It is evident that his former fellow planters regarded him highly enough to put up a plaque in St John's Church.

Does anybody know where Polly Coon was in Tellicherry?

Figure 23. St John's Church Tellicherry in 2006-2007

This was the state of St John's Church when I visited in in 2006. At that time I though that the church was probably beyond recall.

The growth of scrub in the grave yard was chest high when I climbed into the grave yard. The place was full of mongooses, and my dear local host was beseeching me to get out of the graveyard as fast as possible, as it must be full of snakes to be able to support so many mongooses.

Thankfully the community at Thalassery have taken substantial steps to look after this church in recent years, and they should be thanked for having done so much to preserve this part of our shared heritage.

Especial thanks are due to Dr. Denny, the Principle, and the pupils of St. Joseph's Higher Secondary School who are looking after the graveyard currently.

Figure 24. Here is one of the other tombs but sadly the inscription is not readily seen in this photo.
The church under restoration in 2009 can be seen in the background.
Note the amount of rubble from tumbled down tombs lying around.

Helen Baber, her life & final resting place

Helen Baber's grave stone, the English Church, Tellicherry. 

Photo courtesy of Jissu Jacob.

Throughout much of history there have been strong wives who have supported their husbands through thick and thin. These husbands would not have been nearly as effective as they were without their wives.

It is quite clear that Thomas Hervey Baber, was extremely fortunate in his choice of wife, and that Helen Somerville Baber must have been a remarkable woman in her own right.

Like so many of these wives, however it is extremely hard to discover their complete story because she was essentially a private person in the manner of those days, and one who was hidden away from sight. She only very rarely appears in the official records, and then we only occasional catch tantalising glimpses into her life. Yet when she does enter the records, the strength of her character, and the enduring nature of her love and support for Thomas Baber comes though very clearly.

Thanks to a great deal of good luck, and a great deal of kindness on the part of Jissu Jacob a local man from Periah, Helen has suddenly been brought into view.



View of Helen Baber's table tomb, in the newly cleared church yard.

On my visit to Thalassey in 2006, I had been so overwhelmed by hospitality, that I had run out of time for adequately exploring the town. Reaching the fort as dusk fell, and only able to view over the fence into the overgrown churchyard as dusk was falling, I had feared attempting to climb into the churchyard, lest I fell down a hole, or encountered a snake.

As a result of this blog, I have been having a substantial correspondence with quite a few local people from Kerala and especially Thalassey. One of these Jissu Jacob, a local historian and tour guide was good enough to go recently to the churchyard and to take the photos in this post.

We know very little about Helen Baber's early life beyond the following passage in a note book kept by my great great great grandfather Henry Hervey Baber, Thomas Baber's elder brother.

On February 7th 1798 Henry in England, records that his father had received the following letter from his brother: -

“Feb. 7 Father hears from Tom -- Letter dated Bombay August 1797 – about the same receives a letter which came overland enclosed (by just favour) with government dispatches, requesting his consent to marry a Mrs Cameron (wife of a Major Cameron who was lately killed in an excursion down the country) she is not 18 the daughter of Mr. Fearon of Edinburgh & niece of Mr Douglas of Fitzroy Square London. She had been married to the Major about a twelvemonth.
” [1]

Thomas’s fiance, whose maiden name had been Helen Somerville Fearon, had previously been married during 1795 at the age of only 15 to Captain Donald Cameron, of the Bombay Army at Portsmouth. With the East India Company recruitment camp on the Isle of Wight nearby, this many have been a last minute affair prior to Cameron boarding an East Indiamen before setting out on the long journey east.

It had not been uncommon for girls, especially daughters of soldiers aged 15 or less to marry soldiers during this period, however it was much less common for officers to marry such young girls. Her father came from Edinburgh, and one wonders if she had perhaps run away with the Captain.

Following her marriage, she must have almost immediately boarded the East Indiaman for the voyage to India. One can only imagine what it must have been like for a teenage girl, who would still have been at school had she been born today. She would have travelled in a tiny cabin constructed towards the stern of the ship, divided from her fellow passengers by temporary timber and canvas curtains.

The ship would have been crammed full of soldiers, sailors and fellow travellers.

Conditions on-board would have often been cold, wet, and the air fetid with the smells coming up from the other decks. The relative seniority of her new husband probably meant that she ate with the ships captain and the other senior passengers in captains stern cabin. She will have been able to visit the upper deck for exercise, where no doubt she would have been an object of curiosity to the sailors.

The war with France was raging, and Britain had not yet achieved naval supremacy, so she faced not just storms and the possibility of shipwreck, but also capture by the French.

Helen will have arrived in India during 1796, probably arriving first and Surat where her husbands Battalion was stationed.  Very soon after her arrival, the Battalion was mobilised to proceed to Tellicherry. Presumably Helen travelled on with the Major to Tellicherry. Given the smallness of the fort, at Tellicherry, it is quite possible she lived in tents with the Major. However, she was not to experience married life for long, for hardly had she arrived in India than she had become a widow.

Major Cameron was killed on the 18th of March 1797 whilst fighting his way down the Periah Pass. (See http://malabardays.blogspot.com/2006/12/death-of-major-cameron.html )

One can only image the pain and grief that she must have experienced at that moment, on learning that her husband was missing and was believed to have been killed.

One can only imagine how frightening, must have been her situation, she was only 17, widowed. She was in a foreign town thousands of miles from her family, and she was dependant on the charity of others.

It is not clear how Thomas first met Helen Cameron. However it is very likely that she was staying either in Tellicherry, or at Cannanore with its fort and cantonment.

As Helen had only become a widow in March 1797, and that we know that Thomas was already writing to his father via Bombay by August 1797, we can only presume that their courtship was brief and intense as are many wartime courtships.

There were very few unmarried European women living in India at this time, and those that were their were considerably out numbered by European men, so Helen Cameron must have attracted quite a lot of attention from the single officers and officials in the settlement, who would otherwise have had little opportunity of marrying, until they either went on leave after ten or more years, or chose to live with a local woman.

Aged only 20 and with only a very small salary, it must be wondered how Thomas Baber expected to be able to support his new wife. East India Company staff generally had to wait for many years and have achieved promotions before they were in a financial position to be able to marry.

Helen will have had only a very small pension entitlement from the annuity that the East India Company would have set up for her following the Majors death, and a sum from Lord Clive's fund.

This would only be payable in England, and Helen would have been expected to return to Great Britain on the first available ship.

The Major's uniform and associated belongings would have been auctioned and the proceeds handed over to his widow following his death to his fellow officers, and in other similar occurrences, it was not unknown for very high prices to be paid for items like swords at these auctions by brother officers as a way of giving support to recently widowed survivors.

Sadly we don’t know what Thomas father wrote in reply to his letter. Thomas however had not waited for his father’s permission, for as Henry wrote on 24th August 1798: -

“Father heard from Tom – when he informs us of his being married Jan 16 – 1798 to Mrs Helen Cameron – soon afterwards was appointed assistant in the revenue department at Callicut - Mrs Baber writes to my Mother.”

During December 1798 Helen was delivered of a daughter, possibly on the 1st of December, or shortly before. It has not been possible to trace this daughter beyond this brief notice, so we must presume that she died shortly afterwards, like so many other children in India in those times.[2]

Throughout the early years of their marriage Thomas was fighting the Pazhassi Rajah who was trying to oust the English from his territory. Helen must often have been left on her own, and with every chance that she would become a widow once again.

We don't know where they lived before 1809, but by then they were living in the fort.

Thomas was by then a magistrate.

Most of Thomas Baber's East India Company colleagues would have lived in houses in the fort or in bungalow's nearby. The unmarried ones would have shared houses, and probably lived a male dominated life, which probably included a fair amount of drinking and hard living.

Surviving Bungalows inside Tellicherry Fort, one of which may have been the home of Helen & Thomas Baber

It is very likely that Thomas had missed out on much of this communal life, with its echos of an English boarding school common room. This was because following his arrival in Calicut in 1797 he had almost immediately been sent out into the district near Ponnani many miles down the coast to the south, in the company only of his Indian bodyguard and subordinates.  Once he married he was living with his wife and was therefore living away from the other officials.

This may account for his having very different attitudes to those held by his colleagues on many issues such as slavery. These attitudes in turn may well have had the effect at setting him at odds with these same officials.

His ability to retreat to his home and to the support of his wife, probably enabled him to survive in the face of the active hostility of his fellow officials. for years.

Thomas and Helen Baber’s first son, Thomas Francis was born on the 12th of May 1802 at Tellicherry.

Writing in 1832 [3] Thomas recorded how he had first learnt of the existence of slavery in the Malabar quite by chance, when out riding one day in 1803, he had met a man by the roadside who tried to sell him two slaves.

Appalled, he bought the two slaves, a boy and a girl in order to free them. He appears to have sheltered them, and to have provided them with an education, as he recorded how one later rose to become a gentleman’s butler and the other an ayah.

Helen must presumably accepted these two children into her household, and to have played a large part in developing them. One begins to wonder if she was not just as committed a reformer as he was.

By 1808 Thomas and Helen’s eldest boy had reached the age at which he was old enough to travel back to England to commence his education. Henry, the boys uncle, recorded his arrival in England on 27 August 1808: -

“Returned to town & saw my nephew at Mrs Jones’s – this little fellow arrived in England 14th augst: he went to his grandfather augst – 29.”

Aged only six this little boy must have had some tales to tell to his uncle and grandparents when he arrived in England. He had just sailed half way around the world in the midst of a convoy at the height of the Napoleonic Wars.

The boy appears to have been sent on to school almost immediately. On 14 October 1808 his uncle Henry recorded: -

“Took my nephew to school at Mr Rowes’s Bromley – Kent.”

It must have been a terrible moment for Helen as she had to part with her boy, knowing well that they would not see each other for many years, and quite possibly never again, should either of them die.

Life must have often been very anxious for Helen, as for instance when smallpox raged through Tellicherry and the district.

Judicial from 29th February 1809. 59261.

Soon after he was established in his Cutcherry at Tellicherry the smallpox broke out and raged with considerable violence, throughout the Zillah, Mr Baber made great efforts to stop its progress by the introduction of vaccination, in which his conduct was highly approved by the Court of Directors. [4]

Thomas and Helen's attitudes towards the Indian's and slavery caused a substantial rift with his fellow English & Scottish colleagues, and I expect that a lot of the local EIC officials came to see him as both as a threat and well as a very great nuisance.  After all, judged by the standards of 1809, what was wrong with having a few slaves? There were masses of slaves in the Americas, and West Indies, and the Indian’s had had slavery themselves for centuries.

Everybody knew that you went to India to make money. The previous generation of Nabob’s like Barwell, Clive and the others had been able to make many thousands of pounds.  Why shouldn’t they too also have the opportunity to make a fortune?

What was all the fuss about?

One of the disputes that Thomas had entered into came to a head in 1809, and led to his eventually fighting a duel.

Thomas Lumsden Strange later recounted the story of the duel.  The local officials and offices had taken such a dislike to Thomas that they recruited a army office who had a reputation for fightinf duels.  This was with an officer by the name of Fortune.  The two were placed back to back to measure out six paces each, when Fortune, after taking but a step or two, turned round and fired and wounded Mr Baber on the thigh, before immediately bolting.  Strangely enough his second encouraged him, saying “run Billy, run!”

Billy however in his hurry to escape fell, and Mr Baber came up to him and shook his pistol in his face saying that he would be justified in blowing his brains out. [5] 

Thomas survived the duel, and was morally vindicated by the mores of the time, but he was in mortal danger. Helen immediately began to nurse him back to health. She realised that it would greatly help if he could be taken up the Ghats to a higher and cooler location.

She travelled to Ponnani, and it was there that an extraordinary event occurred, which was related to me by one of the descendants of the Brahmin priest who had taken part in the events.

During 1809 the Rajah's of Travancore and Cochin had been ousted from power, by an official supported by the East India Company.  This official had them begun to persecute many of the inhabitants of Cochin and the surrounding districts.  The Queen Mother and Aunt of the deposed Rajah had at first tried appealing to the EIC official in Cochin to prevent these abuses, before writing to Madras to no effect.

After several months they determined to try another way of getting help. They had somehow learned that Thomas Baber was an EIC official who was sympathetic to the plight of the Indian's so they determined to send three local officials to seek him out, and to try to get his support.

The story goes that these officials found Baber at Ponnani in a house with two floors.  They arrived at the house to try to meet him, but were told that they would have to wait as Thomas was too ill to come down to see them.  After a few minutes Helen arrived at the head of the stairs carrying a baby in her arms, and invited them to come up the stairs to see Thomas Baber.

As the three Indians climbed the stairs, all of a sudden the baby gave a great wringle and fell from Helen's arms.

Fortunately at that moment the Brahmin was stood immediately below Helen and was able to catch the baby, preventing its tumbling to the foot of the stairs.

As the Brahmins descendant related to me in 2006, this broke the tension for them.

Eventually the truth of the situation in Travancore and Cochin came out and an expedition was mounted to remove its abusive ruler.

Helen was to go on supporting her husband for many years ahead, through both thick and thin, as I will relate in future blog posts.

[1]Henry Hervey Baber’s Memoranda relating to the life of Henry Hervey Baber.

[2] The Asiatic Annual Register, or a View of the History of Hindustan, 1799. Page 147.
[3]Thomas Hervey Baber “An Account of the Slaves Population in the Western Peninsula of India”, page 36.
[4]OIOC O/6/9 folio 6.
[5]OIOC Mss Eur D.358, 20^th Sept 1870 Page 131 to 133.

Private Lappe's Providential Escape following the outbreak of the Pyche Raja Rebellion

It is only very rarely that we can get a glimpse into the lives of an ordinary soldier in India, let alone come across their individual names.

Here is the story of one such man, Private Lappe, who was extraordinarily lucky to survive a ferocious ambush at the outbreak of the war between the Pazhassi Rajah and the East India Company at Tellicherry.

The date that the actual battle took place is unclear, possibly before the 4th of November 1796, but certainly by the 18th of January 1797.  The following account however only appeared in the Sussex Advertiser many years later on Monday the 1st of September 1800.[1]

Had Private Lappe by that time been invalided home?

Perhaps he told his story to the local Sussex  reporter.

We will probably never know.

PROVIDENTIAL ESCAPE

A soldier, of the name of Lappe, who belonged to an European battalion, and who made his escape from the Jungle, after the action between a detachment of Europeans and Sepoys belonging to the Bombay Army, and the insurgents in the Cotiote country, has related the following" miraculous “ account of his gaining the British Military post, after the defeat of the detachment, given at Bombay, the 4th of November:—"I was shot, says Lappe) about noon, with a musket ball, in my right breast; and, to resist or escape being utterly impossible, as the only means left me to save my life, I threw myself down among the mortally wounded and the dead, without moving hand or foot. Here, in the evening, the Chief Surveying his conquest, ordered a Jamedar to begin instantly to dispatch those who were likely to survive. This fellow, having already killed Captain Bowman, and several other Europeans, left the remainder to die of themselves, or to fall a prey to the voraciousness of the wild creatures with which the Jungle abounds; for in places it is almost impenetrable. They then filed off to the right, towards the hills, carrying along with them five or six prisoners alive; I believe they were all Sepoys but one, with their hands tied behind their backs, of whom I never since have heard. When I apprehended these sanguinary rebels had entirely left the scene of action, it being very quiet, and rather dark, I found means, on my hands and feet, to creep out from among the carnage, for many men were killed that day by the Rajah's troops, owing to our force having been weakened by sending it in small detachments into the Jungle, where they had never before been, and the enemy firing at them in ambush, where it was impossible to trace them: I got at length at some distance from the place where I lay, and met another of our party, who was less wounded than myself, with whom, after some days wandering in torment and despair, not knowing which way to proceed for fear of being intercepted, we at last fortunately arrived at the military post, worn out with fatigue and the loss of blood, where, we understood, the account of the defeat had been received four days before.

The news slowly spread out from London to the regional towns of England and Scotland.  Many families with relations in India must have anxiously wondered what had been happening in the passing months, it took news to travel around the globe.

On Saturday 5th July 1797, readers in Norfolk came across the following report in their newspaper.

We learn from the Coast of Coromandel, that on the 18th of January [1797] the Rajah of the Cotiote had commenced hostilities against us, and that Captain Bowman and Lieutenant Bond, who had been sent to take possession of One of his strong holds, had, the perfidy of their guide, been led into defile, where they were both killed with most the Sepoys of their party. Captain Lawrence, who went to relief, was like wise led into a defile, from whence he fought his way to a pagoda, where passed the night and following day, till permitted to proceed with his party to Tillicherry. Captain Troy, on his return from a muster of the native troops, had been killed, and Captain Shean desperately wounded. Twenty-four Sepoys were killed, and 50 wounded and missing. General Stuart immediately appointed Major Anderson to march against the Rajah with 250 of the Bombay regiment, a detachment of light artillery, 1,000 Sepoys, and Mopals.

Over the following weeks, more details came out from Leadenhall Street. Readers of the Oxford Journal on Saturday the 29th of July 1797, were given more details about the outbreak started by the Pychy Rajah.

From the Madras Gazette, January 28. By letters from the Malabar coast of the 15th instant, we have been advertised of the revolt of the Cotiote Rajah on that coast, who is said to have commenced his refractory conduct on the 28th instant, by firing on a detachment of Sepoys under the command of Capt. Lawrence, in the neighbourhood of Cootiungarry. On the same day, Capt. Bowman and Lieut. Bond were sent with a detachment to take possession of a strong hold, near the last mentioned place, and were decoyed by an Hircarrah, employed on the occasion, into a narrow defile, where, a strong party of Nairs, in ambuscade, availing them selves of the disadvantageous situation of the detachment, and their mode of attack, beset the party with a ferocity peculiarly their own, when Captain Bowman and Lieutenant Bond were almost immediately overpowered and killed. Several Sepoys, it is also added, were killed and wounded on the spot. Captain Lawrence, on hearing the report of the musquetry, proceeded with all possible expedition, at the head of a body of grenadiers, towards the succour and support of Captain Bowman's detachment; but having experienced a similar breach of faith in his guide, was also attacked in the same defile, but after a warm and fortunate resistance effected his retreat, and took post in a Pagoda the whole night, and part of the next day, hemmed in by upwards of a thousand of the Rajah's troops. On the 9th, however, he was permitted to retire with his men to Tellicherry. In addition to the above melancholy relation, Captain Troy, who had been employed in mustering the native troops, and Captain Shean on his return from a visit, fell in with a party of these sanguinary savages, who having surrounded them, coolly and unprovokedly put the first to death, and wounded the latter in a shocking and barbarous manner. General Stuart, to whom the intelligence was sent to Cannanore, recommended to Major Anderson immediately to take the field to punish so daring an outrage. The force to be assembled for this purpose, will consist of 250 men of the Bombay regiment under the command of Captain Grammant. A detachment of artillery, with light guns, about one thousand Sepoys, together with a Corps of Mopals, consisting of about 200, raised expressly for the purpose of hunting and counteracting the Nairs in the woods and fortresses. The unhappy fate of so many officers, in being cut off from their friends' and relations, in this cruel and insidious manner, cannot be too much lamented; and provides a melancholy example of the inherent ferocity which has ever been the characteristic of the cast of Nairs.


[1] The Old Soldier's Story - Edward Bird (1772–1819), ca 1808.
[2] These reports and many more from British regional newspapers going back to 1700 are now available at http://www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/

The fate of the slaves "rescued" by Thomas Baber

Modern Dalit Slave [1]

For most of history we have absolutely no idea how those at the bottom of Society lived, and it is also very hard to understand what they went through.

Just very occasionally their voice comes through the years and with startling power.

For nearly decade I have been aware that Thomas Baber in the early 1800's had been one of the first of a number of idealistic East India officials in India who had tried to try to put a stop to slavery. He had felt so strongly about slavery that he was prepared to take on his fellow officials and existing Indian custom and practise. See http://malabardays.blogspot.co.uk/2009/01/murdoch-brown-overseer-of-randattara.html

I had assumed that the story had a happy ending, however as the following evidence provided by F.C. Brown, son of Murdoch Brown in 1833 to the House of Commons proves every story has two sides, and the fate of these released slaves was less than a happy ending.

It appears that on their return to their former homes in the south of Kerala they had been unable to resettle into their villages, and in many cases their former owners had not wanted them back.

They in many cases drifted back to Anjarakandy to work for Murdoch Brown.

No. 5.

Narrative of Teepadee Ayapen a Betwan, taken at Anjarakandy.—

"30 Chingom 1008. 13 September 1833.


Question. When Mr. Baber's people carried away from here all the slaves, were you carried away ?—Answer Yes, I was.


Q. Where were you taken? What were you asked? And what did you say?—A. From here we were taken to Irrivery Cutcherry; after remaining two days I was asked, “Who is your master?" I said, “My present master is Mr. Brown." "Who brought you here? Who sent you from your country? Who sold you to Mr. Brown?" I said, “It was the Karwakar Moopen." We were then all sent to Tellicherry and kept one, or one and a half months. The same questions that were asked at Irrivery were asked at Tellicherry and we were made to take an oath. After that two menons, with armed peons, took us all to our own country. At Kootangel Cutcherry (Chaughaut), from whence orders were issued to the owners to come and take away their respective slaves, some of the slaves were sent with the peons to Kakat Fort. From thence they were again brought to Kootangel. The Vellatichees and the Cochin Pooliars were embarked in a boat and sent south. After that I alone remained I said, “My owner is not come, what am I to do; my country is Tokye." When I said this to the menons, they desired me to go where my family was. I went to my country and staid with my family.


Q. Do you know the menons and kolkars who came here to take away the slaves?—A After we were taken to Tellicherry I knew them by sight; I did not know them before; I know the name of one of the peons, it is Cheknoo; his country is Ellatoor, so I heard him say.


Q. Who questioned you at Irrivery Cutcherry and at Tellicherry?—A. At Irrivery Cutcherry the menon who took us away from here; his name is Chatoo Menon; and at Tellicherry Mr. Baber himself.


Q. Do you know Mr. Baber?—A. At that time I saw him at Tellicherry.


Q. When did you lose your sight?—A. It is now, I think, about five or eight years.


Q. Do you know the menons and kolkars who took you away from Tellicherry?—A. I do not know them.


Q. After Mr. Baber's people took you to your country, how did you come here? and why did you come ?—A. Bappen Cooty Mapilla (in Mr. Brown's employ) came in a boat to load paddy from Jegnee Mapilla; he (Bappen Cooty) told me that Valia Saib (Mr. Brown) desired me, if I wished, to come back; I then came by land.


Q. When you were coming by land, how did you pay the ferries and subsist?—A. I took it from my own hand (what I had).


Q. When in your country, what employment had you?—A. I worked for any one who would hire me, when they would give me something; I remained in this way for one year.


Q. When you returned here, did any of your relatives come?—A. No one; I came alone.


Q. Who is your owner in your country?—A I have no owner, but my mother had, Karrakat Moideen Mapilla; they are all dead and gone; none of his family now remain.


Q Altogether how many slaves from here were sent to the south?—A. Of the Betwan caste alone there were 28, big and little.


Q. Of that number how many are there to return?—A. Five Betwan females and three children remain to come.


Q When you were at Irrivery Cutcherry and Tellicherry did the persons who examined you put questions to make you say what they liked, or only to learn truth?—A. We were told not to be afraid. "Tell the truth, it is for your good." Then they said loud for us to hear, "These slaves have all been got for nothing."


Q. At what time did Mr. Baber's people come here? When did they find you? And where were you kept?—A. Mr. Baber's people took us away twice; I do not recollect the time they first came; the second time they came in the morning at six o'clock, when we were all sent into the karembala (a walled enclosure). When the southern slaves were being separated, the menon here, Kanarachen, came and said something; in consequence of which words passed between him and Mr. Baber's menon; and Kanarachen went away about 10 o'clock without allowing us to take food or our clothes. We were marched to Irrivery Cutcherry and kept there. At six o'clock in the evening all the northern Dooliars were returned, and the southern Pooliars and Betwans were kept there. To us of the Betwan caste was allotted a shop on the border of a paddy field west of the Cutcherry; rice was given us, which we cooked and ate, and slept outside. To the Pooliars rice was given, which they cooked and ate, and slept round the Cutcherry in the paddy field. In this manner we were kept there for three days.


Q. At that time was there only Kanaren here as menon, or were there any others?— A Whether the Tambooran (Brahmin), who died in Cotiate, was here at that time I do not perfectly recollect; I think he was.


Q. How many years before the rebels burnt this house did you come here?—A. I was here before the burning, but how many years before I do not recollect; I was then a child.


Q. You have said there are eight individuals of the Betwa caste who have not come back; is your country and theirs far or near? what is the reason that they have not come back ?— A Their country and mine may be as far as from here to Mamakoon; that country is the Cochin country; it is under the orders of another gentleman. They have not come, because their masters will not let them.


Q. You have said that in your country you hired yourself to any one who called you, and so lived; was there constant employment?—A. There are many people that have constant work, but there is not the same comfort as here.


Q. You were detained at Tellicherry one or two months; were you kept under restraint or free ?—A. We were kept on the west side of the tank, where, during the day, one kolkar, and during the night two kolkars, stood guard always.


Q. At Tellicherry where were you all lodged?—A. At the tank, in a hut about the size of the kitchen here." [2]


The strength of F. C. Brown's feelings against Thomas Baber come out in the following paragraphs in his letters to the House of Commons.

Francis Brown had previously served a term in prison for having challenged Thomas Baber to a duel, and he evidently greatly resented Baber's attitude towards his father Murdoch Brown, as is shown in the following passages.

"It would be easy for me to proceed with the refutation of every other of Mr. Baber's assertions and references, by the evidence of the facts and authorities furnished, or referred to by himself, did it become me, on so grave a subject, to come before the Government armed with no better defence; but I cannot forget that the gist and gravamen of his accusation against the late Mr. Brown, an accusation which he signed as a magistrate, attested with his seal of office as a judge, and reported officially to the Government, which he has since sworn to before the House of Lords, deliberately repeated, in writing, to the Indian Board, and finally published to the world, is, that " 76 persons, found" by him "in the possession of Mr. Brown, made affidavit before him that they had been stolen, banished from their country, and transported, against their will, to Anjarakandy," and that he had "liberated," he had restored to " liberty and to their country," these aforesaid persons. Words of more dreadful import, against the character of any human being, were never uttered, and never, I believe, more deliberately, more reiterated, more perseveringly, or with more solemn invocations to their truth. Read, then, Sir, I beseech you, the following testimony of one of those very persons, now delivered without dread of violence, delivered to a native writer, himself wholly ignorant of the transaction, whom I directed to question the witness apart relative to what she now remembers of it, on my seeing Mr. Baber pointing out himself to the public of India as the protector of slaves (Bombay Gazette, 17th August 1833). This pamphlet I have seen only within these few days." [3]


"Such, Sir, is the simple affecting narrative given at this distance of time, by this poor woman, of the real manner in which she, her husband, her child, and all the other slaves were barbarously driven from their homes. No man acquainted with the condition of the caste can read it, I believe, and doubt its truth.

Mark, I beseech you, the ultimate design stamped upon the cruel deed from its commencement to its close. The native officers, deputed by Mr. Baber to Anjarakandy, immediately they appear, rush up stairs, followed by the armed peons, to where Mr. Brown was sitting, in order that the slaves may see, from the insulting treatment received before their eyes by their master, a European gentleman, well known, advanced in years, and never approached by the highest natives without respect, the treatment which was reserved for them. The circumstances make an indelible impression, as terror does upon an uninformed mind. All the slaves, male and female, are next collected from where they are at work, by strange armed men, driven, with their children of all ages, into a walled enclosure, like cattle into a pen ; their master's people are forcibly ejected, the gates shut, and the whole, upon their answering truly and simply to the questions put to them, are kept, the women with their infants at their breasts, without food for that night. The day following they are taken under custody, to a public cutcherry, four or five miles off, turned into a paddy field, and there kept three days and three nights, so that one child dies on the spot. They are here again called up, one by one, and authoritatively questioned by Mr. Baber's deputy.

Those who still tell the the truth are grossly abused by him, called liars, and threatened with instant mutilation; a E. I. Company and violence admitted by Mr. Baber to be practised upon persons of their caste (p. 25). Being Board of Control, now thoroughly intimidated, separated from all succour, and dreading what is to befal them, (Documents.) they are next taken under continued custody to Tellicherry, where a man dies; they are brought up before Mr. Baber, and separately examined, having gone through a form of being sworn. This poor woman has the courage to repeat to him what she had said twice before to his deputy, that she had been regularly sold by her former master, mentioning his name. The magistrate exclaims "that she is telling a falsehood," bids her "tell the truth; that she has been stolen;" which declaration, the very reverse of what she has all along said, and then desired to say, is written down as her voluntary deposition upon oath before Mr. Baber, and is by him quoted and appealed to, from that hour to this, in proof of the truth of his charge against Mr. Brown. She and all the other slaves are detained in custody day and night for many weeks; at the expiration of this imprisonment, disregarding her entreaties to be suffered with her child to return to her home, she is made to accompany the others; rejoiced to escape anywhere and on any terms. Part of them are taken to Chowghaut, a distance of 110 miles; part double the distance, to Cochin and Travancore. Instead of being "liberated" she and her child are delivered with her husband to the latter's former master, with written injunctions from Mr. Baber to report their deaths in writing, that is, in other words, to detain them while alive. In a state of actual starvation, she, her husband, and child, set out on their return, begging and working their way by such field work as they can get (the only work slaves are employed in), and in about two months succeed in reaching Calicut, 60 miles distant, where they find Mr. Brown.

This is the declaration of one of those slaves. Shall I be credited when I state, that not one, but 21 of them returned, and that 13 of the number still survive (one died in August) to bear witness, in terms almost similar, against the inhuman outrage perpetrated upon them. I am ready to produce them at any time, at any place, before any persons who will descend to the level of their capacities, and permit them to tell their artless tale without fear. Gratefully and lowly do I bow down before that all-seeing Providence, which, in its infinite justice, has permitted this black iniquity, renewed and relevelled against the memory of a revered parent, to be exposed to the eye of day, in all its turpitude, by the mouths of the victims appealed to to attest it. Not to swell this letter to an inconvenient size, I annex only two more of the depositions (No. 4 & 5). Let them, I entreat, be compared with the letter of Mr. Brown (No. 7), penned after the slaves had all been removed, and with the See p. 733-735, of testimony of an eye-witness of the scene (No. 6.) Even some of the Pooliars returned; of the printed volume. Pooliars, interdicted the high way, who cannot approach within 40 paces of their fellow slave, the Vettoowan, without polluting him. Let the sufferings they endured in tracking back their way be pictured! But the majority of the Pooliars (they amounted to 23, the Vettoowas to 28) were transported by Mr. Baber to the Cochin and Travancore countries, and delivered back with the same written injunctions to their former masters. He therefore transported them, from the British territories, and from under the safeguard of British laws, which, he admits, make no exception as to slaves, and have repeatedly visited their murder with death (p. 2607), to countries, where he also admits (p. 19) adopting General Walker's words, that "a proprietor is accountable to no person for the life of his own chaumar, but is the legal judge of his offences, and may punish them with death; and where it is feared that the only check upon the unrestricted exercise of this power is the presence of the Resident." Gracious God! and this wholesale, forcible reduction of these poor creatures to native slavery and to death, Mr. Baber has dared to call, in the sight of God and man, "liberating them, restoring them to liberty and their country." Sir, Mr. Brown possessed, I inherit from him, 155 slaves; I have also upon my estate 105 other slaves, voluntary settlers, of 10 and 20 years' habitancy. I further employ 250 free labourers. I implore you in the strongest words, the most earnest, I will even add, the most abject, that language supplies, to examine and satisfy yourself, by any mode of inquiry you may think proper to adopt, of the treatment and condition of these slaves; as to whether the whip or the lash has ever been known among them ; as to the restraints imposed upon their personal liberty ; as to their well-being compared with slaves elsewhere; and lastly, as contrasted, whether as regards their persons, their food, their houses, their comforts, and the kinds of labour they are employed in, with those of the free persons employed with them. After this examination, I will leave you to say whether those transported to Cochin and Travancore would not try to escape; and then to think, without shuddering, of the fate which awaited their hopeless attempt at the hands of irresponsible masters, burthened in the name of the British Government with the compulsory guardianship and maintenance of refractory slaves worth each the sum of 12 rupees.

The judges of the Provincial Court residing on the spot, who had all served for many years in the province, and were thoroughly acquainted with Mr. Baber's character and motives, (for these exemplary men, like every other gentleman, civil or military, in Malabar, had long before spumed the unhappy man from society,) sought to avert the consequences which they foresaw were designed, from the wanton and forcible removal, without cause or complaint, of these helpless victims, by ordering their restitution to Mr. Brown until a claimant to them appeared. It is this humane interposition which the judges considered themselves bound to exert in favour of the most defenceless party, which Mr. Baber studiously and repeatedly calls the singular protection extended by the court to Mr. Brown! To mention only the names of the judges even now would be to confound the defamer, did such men need a defence. The judges of the Sudder Adawlut were of opinion, upon a review of the proceedings, that the interposition of the Court of Appeal could not be upheld, Mr. Baber having acted towards Mr. Brown in his capacity of justice of the peace, not of zillah E. I. Company and judge, and hence that his conduct was cognizable only by the Supreme Court at Madras."[4]

The whole report extends to many volumes and reports on slavery in many areas of India from Assam, to Dehli, the Konkan and the Malabar. The testimonies on Malabar run from approximately page 409 to 430, and are especially detailed and powerful.

The terrible thing is that even today in India many people are living in conditions of slavery much like those found by Thomas Baber, as the following article about the film Papilio Buddha dated 1st October 2012 makes clear. http://www.thehindu.com/arts/cinema/the-butterfly-effect/article3954653.ece

[1]  Photo of modern slave taken from http://calltohumanity.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/modern-slavery-in-contrast-haiti-and-india/

[2] From Slave trade (East India) Slavery in Ceylon: Copies or abstracts of all ... Volume 16. Page 407 onwards.  Published by the House of Commons in 1838.

[3] From Slave trade (East India) Slavery page 409.

[4] [2] From Slave trade (East India) Slavery page 411 to 412.