Memories of Denis Compton in Mhow and Indore

                                           
Denis Compton and other MCC players practice at the nets in Adelaide, 29 October 1954. Ashes Test Series 1954-1955. Sydney Morning Herald Picture by Harry Martin. Public domain. 

The great English cricketer Denis Compton was posted at the Officers' Training School, OTS, Mhow as a PT instructor during the World War II  years. As he was eligible to play in the Ranji Trophy for the Holkar team of Indore the Army would give him leave so he could play.

He was a member of the Holkar team which played against Bombay in the 1945 Ranji Trophy final. Denis had scored 20 and 249 not out in this match but the Holkar team lost this high scoring match. Denis still holds the record for the highest fourth innings score in the Ranji Trophy.
The Bombay team included a Parsi player named Rustom Sorabji Cooper who had scored 52 and 104 in that final - a match which Bombay won by 374 runs.

In 2012 Nick Compton, the grandson of Denis, had visited India as part of  the England team. He met Rustom Sorabji Cooper in Mumbai (formerly Bombay) who shared with him his interaction with Denis and how they had played with and against each other. Click here and read this nostalgia invoking article by Derek Abraham published in DNA Nov 1, 2012.

If I remember correctly Nick had played one match against the Cricket Club of India which had Abbas Ali as a player. Abbas Ali is the grandson of the late Syed Mushtaq Ali who played Test cricket for India from 1934 to 1952 and was known as the Errol Flynn of Indian cricket. Mushtaq Ali and Denis Compton played together in the Ranji Trophy as members of the Holkar team.

Tuck's Post Cards: More than 100 year old images of Mhow

"Tuck's Post Card": A Chance Discovery on the Internet of Some Delightful Picture Post Cards on Mhow

These 'Tuck's Post Cards' I discovered accidentally while performing a google search are more than 100 year old (the date I got was 23 Sept 1916).  This is what is inscribed on the reverse of the cards (italics mine):

 Raphael Tuck & Sons' "Art Sepia" Post Cards
 Art Publishers to Their Majesties The King and Queen
 Kamroodin Mohamedally, Mhow, C India
 Printed in England
=========================================
Note: To the best of my knowledge these are public domain images as they are more than a 100 years old and were used as post cards the public could buy. If you think otherwise and have information that can prove that these images are under a copyright please send me an email at dev.kumar.vasudevan@gmail.com or post a comment here with the relevant details.

"Cantonment Gardens, Mhow"

"Infantry Barracks Facing One Tree Hill, Mhow"

"The Best Shop, Regimental Bazaar Mhow"

"Artillery Barracks, Mhow"

"Church of England, Mhow"

"Near Kalakund and Mhow"

"Post Office Road, Mhow"

"Regimental Bazaar, Mhow"

"Section Hospital, Mhow"

"Viaduct Near Kalakund and Mhow (130 feet high)

"Roman Catholic Church, Mhow"

"The Railway Station, Mhow"

"Patalpani Falls Near Mhow"

The reverse of one of the cards. 

Old houses, old memories...

November 28 2013
That old bungalow at one end of Post Office Road.... If only its walls could speak....
Clicked with my mobile phone camera...
I remember visiting this house in 1971 when a family was living here... 

A Church in Mhow.. St Anthony's Church

Tuesday November 5 2013:
I enjoyed the sunset sitting outside St Anthony's Church, Mhow. One of the lesser known churches in Mhow this is in the Infantry School Mhow campus. It was built in 1892 for troops from South India especially the Tamil troops. St Anthony of Padua is a revered figure in South India.

An Image from Colonial Era Mhow

Sola topis and doggie mascot ...   Mhow of the colonial era. A group photo by Guerra and Sons. Pre-1920.
Just love the tiled roof....

Owner: FIBIS Source: Original postcard owned by Valmay Young. Licence: CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 Unported. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/

Old Pic of Mhow "Scotch Kirk"

"Mhow Scotch Kirk" clicked in the early 20th century... sent to me from Canada by the descendants of Reverend Norman Russell who was a priest at the Builder Memorial Church Mhow and died in Mhow. I was lucky enough to find his grave in the cemetry near the Railway Station when his great grand nephew sent me a request via a message on Youtube... The commune of 'Rasalpura' on the outskirts of Mhow is named after Russell...

Pic Courtesy: Mrs Peggy McQuirk of Canada, a descendant of the late Reverend Norman Russell, priest at the Builder Memorial Church, Mhow in the late 19th and early 20th century...

Chronicle of Christ Church Mhow By Deepa Vanjani (Indore Plus, Times of India, 24 April 2011)

An Easter gift.

Deepa Vanjani's article "Chronicle of Christ Church" featuring Christ Church Mhow published in Indore Plus (supplement to The Times of India) on 24 April 2011 - Easter Sunday.
"Photo courtesy and inputs from Dev Kumar Vasudevan"

The Grave of a Child of the era of the British Raj

The history of Mhow especially the British presence here from 1818 to 1947 is something which fascinates me. I have spent hours exploring the two Mhow cemetries and photographing old British graves. This January I came across the grave of Sandra the infant daughter of Major and Mrs J Drudge-Coates of the British Army Corps of Signals. She had died on Feb 15 1943, aged 15 months.


The epitaph reads: "In Loving Memory of Sandra, youngest daughter of Major and Mrs J Drudge-Coates, Royal Corps of Signals, whom God called suddenly, Feb 15 1943, aged 15 months. An angel took my flower away, yet I will not repine. For Jesus in his bosom wears, the flower that once was mine."






During the early days of the Raj wives and children did not come to India. But the advent of steamships and later the Suez Canal changed that. The Gora Sahib in India stopped keeping desiwives when the ladywives started arriving. Of the many British children born in India many attained eminence. Some names I remember include Eric Blair (George Orwell), Lawrence and Gerald Durrell, Rudyard Kipling, Spike Milligan, the mathematician Augustus De Morgan and even the infamous cricketer Douglas Jardine of the bodyline (Ashes) series.



I do not feel particularly sad when I see the graves of British soldiers in the Mhow cemetry. It is possible that there may well be a hundred thousand British graves in all the cemetries of the Indian subcontinent. The British were here to keep the Union Jack flying and it did not come for free. I remember reading these lines of the poet Rupert Brooke from his poem The Soldier when I was in school:

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England.

Rupert Brooke had died in World War I along with other famous poets like Siegfried Sassoon and these lines were dedicated to the hundreds of thousands of English soldiers killed in the horrible trench warfare in Europe but the same spirit well applies to graves in India. When one is walking among these graves one does feel that one is in England so well have these graveyards been built.

Seeing the graves of women and children is a different matter and I must admit that seeing some of these grave makes me feel sad.


© Dev Kumar Vasudevan., all rights reserved.