Indian Colonial Railways
What can the Turnbull Collection tell us about European attitudes towards India?
Watercolour of a Mughal bridge near Rajmahal, Jharkhand, India (1857) by Glinn, George James HerveyNational Railway Museum
Who was George Turnbull?
George Turnbull was a Scottish engineer hired as the Chief Engineer for East India Railways. He worked in India from 1851 to 1863. During his time in India, he collected a number of artworks created by various employees.
This collection gives us an insight into how Europeans viewed India during the creation of the railway.
Portraits
A number of drawings in the collection are portraits of individual sitters.
This image is of Mr Fox, who served as the Assistant Engineer for the Patna area of Northeast India.
Here we can see a portrait of ‘Miss Garstin’, who became Mrs Constance Crossman after her marriage. Turnbull met Miss Garstin while they both were holidaying at a summer resort in Darjeeling in 1861.
Drawing of Walter Bourne, East Indian Railway Resident Engineer, Mugra District, India (1857) by Unknown personNational Railway Museum
This illustration depicts Walter Bourne, the Resident Engineer of the Mugra District. The image shows him leaning comically over a notebook. He is surrounded by food, and his hat can be seen abandoned haphazardly behind him.
In contrast almost every Indian person we see goes unnamed.
The exception is ‘Tiarmarree’, the man depicted in this picture.
Though we are given a name for him, he is still defined by his position in relation to the Europeans around him.
He is described as a ‘Mr Gilbert Hickey’s Khansamah Madrasee’. Khansamah is an Urdu word meaning house steward or cook in charge of a kitchen.
The other individual Indians are left anonymous.
This man is only referred to as a ‘palki bearer’- someone who carried a covered wheelless vehicle consisting of a large box carried on two horizontal poles.
This image by the same artist leaves the sitter completely unidentified. We can assume that this is a depiction of another palki bearer. This is due to the similar clothing that he is wearing, and because these images are on the reverse of the same piece of paper.
This anonymity exemplifies the British attitude to Indian people.
By failing to name the Indian portrait subjects, the viewer is forced to consider them purely by their occupations. This stands in contrast to the Europeans, in whom individuality is maintained.
Two Watercolours, Coolies and Bullock Hackeries Collecting Materials, and Bengalee Brickmaking (1852) by Archer, G. W.National Railway Museum
Landscapes
The collection also features a number of watercolours that depict the landscape, and the creation of the railway lines.
Here you can see the process of brick building.
The watercolours in the Turnbull collections almost exclusively depict Indian people in scenes of heavy labour.
Watercolour of Connagore Bungalow and East Indian Railway Works in Konnagar, India (1853-11-03) by Archer, G. W.National Railway Museum
This watercolour of construction work in Konnagar in the 1850s vividly highlights the colonial hierarchies of the time.
In the background, Indians can be seen manually moving earth. They are stripped down in the intense heat.
In contrast, the sole European is shown in a position of authority, under a parasol that is being held by one of the workers.
It was very common for British men to be brought over to India to oversee the building of the railways.
This meant that Indians were relegated to positions of manual labour.
This watercolour depicts workers collecting materials with which to make the railways. The people are referred to by the offensive term ‘coolies’ in the description at the bottom.
'Coolie' was a word that was used to describe Asian workers who were considered low-skilled.
It was commonly used at the time, but its roots are tied to the Urdu word for slave.
Watercolour of Connagore Bungalow and East Indian Railway Works in Konnagar, India (1853-11-03) by Archer, G. W.National Railway Museum
This disregard for the native people meant that the British refused to learn from the local population's inherent knowledge of the environment.
We can see in the corner of this image a number of tree stumps.
Mass deforestation caused by railway construction created the perfect environment for disease.
Fissures left in the ground after trees were uprooted would become filled with water when it rained.
These stagnant pools of water were the perfect breeding ground for malaria and cholera: diseases ravaged Indians and Europeans alike.
Watercolour of Soane (Koilwar) Bridge Mid-construction (1860-02-25) by Schmidt, BernhardNational Railway Museum
There are also stories of bridges being washed away when monsoon season came.
If people with intimate knowledge of the area had been consulted these disasters could have been avoided.
What are we not seeing?
The imposition of colonial projects on India wasn't something that happened passively.
This watercolour depicts the third attempt to complete the Sone Bridge.
The bridge had been destroyed in the rebellions of 1857 and 1858. These rebellions were specifically against the East India Company, who were functionally running India on behalf of Britain.
The bridge was finally finished in this third attempt. At the time it was the longest bridge in India. Although we can see the process of building in this image, the surrounding context is obscured.
This bridge, now called the Koilwar Bridge or the Abdul Bari Bridge, still stands today. It is one of the oldest railway bridges still in use in India. It is named in honour of Abdul Bari, an activist who was dedicated to Indian freedom and social reform.
Watercolour of a Mughal bridge near Rajmahal, Jharkhand, India (1857) by Glinn, George James HerveyNational Railway Museum
Indian railways started as a colonial endeavour. Much of this colonial infrastructure still stands.
Colonial rule of India ended in 1947.
Despite its origin, Indian railways are a product of Indian people. Indians have always been at the heart of the railways, and the network today is a testament to this work.
You are all set!
Your first Culture Weekly will arrive this week.