The Waterhouse Albums

THE WATERHOUSE ALBUMS Central Indian Provinces

THE WATERHOUSE ALBUMS Central Indian Provinces

VIJAYANAGARA Ruined Splendour Editor John Falconer Preface Siobhan Lambert–Hurley Contributors Rosemary Crill, John Falconer, Michael Gray, Shaharyar M. Khan

Mapin Publishing Ahmedabad

The Alkazi Collection of Photography New Delhi • London • New York

First published in India in 2009 by Mapin Publishing Pvt. Ltd. in association with The Alkazi Collection of Photography Simultaneously published in the United States of America in 2009 by Grantha Corporation 77 Daniele Drive, Hidden Meadows Ocean Township, NJ 07712 E: mapinpub@aol.com Sepia International Inc. & The Alkazi Collection of Photography United States of America: New York ealkazi@interport.net • ealkazi@acparchives.com United Kingdom: London • stephanie.roy@btinternet.com India: New Delhi • rahaab@acparchives.com Distributed in North America by Antique Collectors’ Club East Works, 116 Pleasant Street, Suite 18 Easthampton, MA 01027 T: 1 800 252 5231 • F: 413 529 0862 E: info@antiquecc.com • www.antiquecollectorsclub.com Distributed in the United Kingdom and Europe by Marston Book Services Ltd PO Box 269, Abingdon Oxfordshire, OX14 4YN T: 44 1235 465521 • F: 1235 465555 E: direct.order@marston.co.uk • www.marston.co.uk Distributed in Southeast Asia by Paragon Asia Co. Ltd 687 Taksin Road, Bukkalo, Thonburi Bangkok 10600 Thailand T: 66 2877 7755 • F: 2468 9636 E: info@paragonasia.com Distributed in the rest of the world by Mapin Publishing Pvt. Ltd 502 Paritosh, Near Darpana Academy of Performing Arts, Usmanpura Riverside, Ahmedabad 380013 T: +91 79 40 228 228 • F: +91 79 40 228 201 E: mapin@mapinpub.com • www.mapinpub.com

Text and Illustrations © The Alkazi Collection of Photography except by permission of The British Library (figs. 2–5, 51–55, 57, 84, 105–112).

All rights reserved under international copyright conventions. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording or any other information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

The rights of Siobhan Lambert-Hurley, John Falconer, Shaharyar M. Khan, Rosemary Crill and Michael Gray to be identified as authors of this work have been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

ISBN: 978-81-89995-30-0 (Mapin) ISBN: 978-0-944142-84-4 (Grantha) LCCN: 2008923792 Chief Editor: Ebrahim Alkazi Editor: John Falconer Design: Arati Subramanyam Copyeditor: Smriti Vohra Production: Mapin Publishing Printed at Thomson Press, India

Front Cover: James Waterhouse, ‘Secunder, Begum of Bhopal, K.S.I.’ [Bhopal, November 1862], Albumen Silver Print, 165 x 117 mm.

Back Cover: James Waterhouse, ‘ Rear Faces of Architraves, Northern Gateway, Sanchi’ [December 1862], Albumen Silver Print, 225 x 190 mm.

Frontispiece: “Reception of a Khillut [letter of invitation] at the Court of the Begum”, Engraving in Louis Rousselet, India and Its Native Princes.

Travels in Central India and in the Presidencies of Bombay and Bengal (London: Chapman and Hall, 1876), Ch. XLVI. P. 2: James Waterhouse, Begum of Bhopal and her Daughter Shah Jehan, in Mahratta Costume Bhopal, November 1862, Albumen Silver Print.

Front Endpapers: James Waterhouse, ‘Bheels of the Vindhyas’ [Sardarpur, June 1862], Albumen Silver Print, 148 x 195 mm.

Back Endpapers: Pages from James Waterhouse’s Transcripts, The Alkazi Collection of Photography.

Contents

6

Preface

7

Acknowledgements

8

Map and Itinerary

10

CHAPTER 1 James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography John Falconer

98

114

148

178

CHAPTER 2 The Work of Clarence Comyn Taylor in the Waterhouse Albums John Falconer CHAPTER 3 Bhopal: A Brief History Shaharyar M. Khan CHAPTER 4 Dress and Textiles in the Photographs of James Waterhouse Rosemary Crill CHAPTER 5 James Waterhouse: His Career in Process Printing Michael Gray

201

Appendices

244

The Waterhouse Albums: Catalogue of Photographs

255

Index

FOREWORD Siobhan Lambert-Hurley

I

n 1862, James Waterhouse undertook a mission never attempted before or after: to spend nearly an entire year using the then new medium of photography to record and document the peoples of central India. He did so at the behest of India’s colonial government ostensibly for display at the International Exhibition, or Great London Exposition, of 1862—though, as they did not arrive in time, his photographs actually found wider circulation in later publications such as Watson and Kaye’s The People of India (1868–75).

That Waterhouse’s assignment emerged out of an Enlightenment impulse to categorise and order knowledge is reflected in his description of his many human subjects as “specimens” of the major “tribes” of the area. Captured in his images were “representative types” of different social, ethnic, religious, caste and tribal groupings: not just princely rulers and their nobility (though his collection is probably strongest in this area), but also merchants, musicians, holy men, slaves, agriculturalists and nomads. Most were men, but some, thanks to the enthusiastic participation of the Nawab Begum of Bhopal, were women and children. Among them were those that the photographer identified, in line with the evolving colonial typology of the time, as Brahmins, Mussalmans [Muslims], Mahrattas [Marathas], Rajputs, Pathans and Bheels [Bhils]—not to mention a few that were an “admixture.”

Revealed in Waterhouse’s labels and the accompanying ethnographic descriptions are the preconceptions and imperatives of the colonial state. His venture was part of a much bigger scientific project intended amass data on “physical types” into a comprehensive archive that could be used to the administrative, strategic, commercial and scholarly ends of the British in India.

Once published, his high-quality images of an exotic and faraway empire would also fuel the imperial imaginations of the Victorian era’s emergent bourgeoisie safely at home in Britain. The selectivity inherent to this process is reflected in his choice of subjects—among them a man of uncertain employment at the Sitamau court, seemingly picked primarily for the

picturesque quality of his immense turban [fig. 95]—and a certain imbalance within the collection. The Nawab Begum of Bhopal may have been a key ally of the British in Central India, but, in ethnographic terms, that did not really justify the large number of photographs of her and her courtiers. Her willingness to “dress up” for the camera by posing in an array of “costumes” complemented by elaborate and often unusual headgear also points to an important performative element in these early photographs on the part of photographer and photographed alike, that undermines their purely documentary function. Yet to depict Waterhouse as someone who simply fulfilled the strategic interests of the colonial state by reducing India’s population to collective groupings or generalised typologies would be to do him an injustice. In the careful and detailed notes that he kept to accompany his images, each sitter emerges as an individual to whom he gave the honour, in most cases, of recording their name, age, employment, height and often some component of personality—an amiability, a heartiness or perhaps a weakness for opium—alongside valuable observations about the colour and style of their dress. These notes reflect a genuine intellectual curiosity that must have sustained Waterhouse through the many obstacles that threatened to undermine his endeavour, not least the climate, insects, the appalling conditions of travel, and the fear, conceit and capriciousness of his prospective subjects. The same inquisitiveness could also have inspired him to take, at his own initiative, the impressive (and earliest surviving) run of photographs of the architectural ruins at Sanchi, as well as those at Mandu, Eran and the Dhamnar Caves.

The Waterhouse Albums, then, are an invaluable visual resource for the political and cultural history of a region so often neglected in the historical record. It also offers unique insight into the processes of imperial consolidation and archive construction in the early years of British crown rule in India, while also suggesting the way in which these developments were facilitated, abetted or subverted by colonial peoples.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS John Falconer

W

hile examples of James Waterhouse’s photography can be found in a number of collections both public and private, the two albums that form the basis of the present work undoubtedly comprise, in terms of condition and comprehensiveness, the finest single group of images from his work documenting the ethnic variety of Central India in 1862. This project, officially undertaken at the behest of the Indian colonial administration, was seminal to Waterhouse’s photographic career and to his emergence in later years as a major figure in the fields of photographic chemistry and photomechanical reproduction. It has, therefore, been a great privilege and pleasure to study these albums at length in the course of the preparation of this book. For this, I must first thank Mr. Ebrahim Alkazi, both for his foresight in acquiring the collection and also for enthusiastically supporting its publication in the present form. My debt to Ebrahim Alkazi is, however, more wide-ranging, and I must also acknowledge my personal gratitude for generous access to the remarkable Alkazi Collection of Photography, as well as for assistance and encouragement in both India and England over a number of years.

My own contribution to this book comprises a general overview of Waterhouse’s life. However, in the course of his career in the subcontinent, Waterhouse’s interests spanned many disciplines, from the often arcane complexities of photographic chemistry to the details of Central Indian costume. I am, therefore, grateful for the skill with which my fellow contributors have compensated for my own deficient knowledge in presenting a full picture of Waterhouse’s work and its significance. Rosemary Crill, in her essay on matters of dress and textiles illustrated in these photographs, has

provided a fascinating account of the wealth of social and cultural history embedded in the images. The most productive period of Waterhouse’s work in Central India in 1862 was centred on Bhopal, and Shaharyar Khan’s essay usefully provides a conspectus of the convoluted dynastic development of this most fascinating princely state.

Waterhouse’s later career was spent in administering the photographic department of the Survey of India; in terms of the technical history of photography, this was where he made his more significant contribution to the development of the medium, but it is also the most formidable area for the non-specialist reader to grasp. Michael Gray’s account of Waterhouse’s later career as a photographic scientist is therefore particularly welcome, in describing the breadth of his technical achievements in the context of his administrative duties at the Calcutta headquarters of the Survey Department.

The staff of the Alkazi Collection of Photography have also provided the help and support without which this book could not have been produced. I am grateful in particular for the friendship of and conversations with Sophie Gordon, former Curator of the Alkazi Collection in London; and I must also thank her successor, Stéphanie Roy Bharath. Rahaab Allana, Curator of the Alkazi Foundation for the Arts in New Delhi, has worked dedicatedly on the manuscript, as well as coped goodnaturedly with this writer’s often dilatory e-mail habits. I must also thank him for his company on an illuminating tour of Madhya Pradesh in Waterhouse’s footsteps. Finally, the work of Smriti Vohra in undertaking the copyediting of the text, and in tirelessly deciphering a spider’s web of proof corrections, is also very gratefully acknowledged.

AREA ENLARGED

N

Bhind

Morena Gwalior Sheopur

Datia

Shivpuri GANGHAR Tikamgarh Chhattarpur Nimach

Rewa

Guna

Satna Panna

SITAMAU

CHUNDWASSA

Rajgarh JAORA SAILANA Ujjain

Sidhi

Vidisha Damoh

ERAN

Shajpur

SAGAR

Katni

SANCHI

MEHDIPUR

RATLAM

Bandhavgarh

BHOPAL

Jabalpur

Raisen

SEHORE

Shahdol

N

Narsimhapur INDORE

DHAR

Jhabua

Mandla

MANDU MAHESHWAR MANDLESHWAR Barwani

Dindori

Hoshangabad

Dewas

West Nimar

East Nimar

Chhindwara

Harda

Seoni Balaghat

Betul

Areas visited by James Waterhouse

ROUTE OF JAMES WATERHOUSE'S CENTRAL INDIA TOUR OF 1862 MODERN MADHYA PRADESH December 1861 1862 18 January 24 January 27 January 3 February 11 February 16 February 14 March 14–20 March 20–24 March 24 March 29 March 30 March 5 April 11 April April [undated] 26 April 20 May

Waterhouse informed that he has been appointed to take photographs of the “tribes” of Central India dep. Saugor [Sagar] arr. Sehore dep. Sehore arr. Indore dep. Indore arr. Jaora dep. Jaora “I remained six days at Rutlam” [Ratlam] arr. Sillana [Sailana], remained four days dep. Sillana for Jaora dep. Jaora arr. Seetamhow [Sitamau] dep. Seetamhow for Chundwassa arr. Gungrar [Ganghar] “Stayed some days at Mehidpoor” [Mehdipur] arr. Indore, preparing second trip dep. Indore

24 May 30 May 30 May 7 June June [undated] 15 June 17 June 23 June 30 June 2 July 22 October 30 October 22 November 1 December 1–c.11 December December [undated] 21 December

arr. Mundlaisir [Mandleshwar] dep. Mundlaisir arr. Maheysir [Maheshwar] dep. Maheysir “Remained a week at Mandoo” [Mamdu] arr. Dhar arr. Sirdarpoor [Sardarpur] arr. Dhar dep. Dhar arr. Indore dep. Indore arr. Bhopal dep. Bhopal dep. Sehore arr. Sanchi, “halted there for ten days” With a week’s leave, “made a detour via Heerun” [Eran] arr. Saugor [Sagar]

Chapter 

JAMES WATERHOUSE: A CAREER IN PHOTOGRAPHY John Falconer

O

n his retirement from the Survey of India in 1897, at the conclusion of a career in the subcontinent spanning nearly four decades, James Waterhouse was internationally acknowledged as a figure of major importance in the development of photography.

To his contemporaries, his most notable achievements were centred on many of the more technical applications of the medium, particularly those relating to photographic chemistry and the applications of the medium to photomechanical reproduction and printing.1 In great measure, the international reputation of the Photographic Department of the Survey of India, which by the 1890s was one of the largest such organisations in the world, was due to Waterhouse’s administrative energy and scientific knowledge; while to the amateur members of the Photographic Society of India, whose president he was at the end of his career, he was considered a fount of authority on all technical aspects of 1.

James Waterhouse ‘Begum of Bhopal with Musicians’ [Bhopal, November 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 155 x 206 mm

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John Falconer

their pastime. Subsequent generations, however, have been less generous to his memory, references to his work being most often relegated to technical histories of photography, such as Eder’s classic work, in which due tribute is paid to Waterhouse’s “extremely serious and exact investigations.”2 While such neglect forms an implicit and telling comment on modern trends in photographic scholarship, it also ignores his distinguished body of mainstream photographic work. In addition to his more recondite technical and professional pursuits, Waterhouse remained an avid photographer throughout his career.

While some of Waterhouse’s scientific achievements are described in the present volume by Michael Gray (see Chapter 5), this book focuses on what is perhaps his most coherent and intriguing body of work, produced during his early years as a young army officer, in the course of a year’s sustained photographic activity in Central India in 1862. In addition to the intrinsic photographic quality and historical importance of these images, their officially commissioned status also situates them within the larger context of the 19th-century use of photography as a scientific and political tool. Produced as part of a countrywide initiative to compile a visual record of ethnic diversity, the photographs exist alongside an extensive official archive documenting the motives for their creation and dissemination, making them a particularly rewarding source for the examination of the exploitation of the medium at its nexus with the cultural, political and administrative concerns of British India.

The little we know of Waterhouse’s antecedents and early life is contained in his application for a cadetship in the Bengal Artillery.3 He was born on 24 July 1842 to James William Waterhouse and his wife Mary, living at 14 Grove End Road, St John’s Wood, in north London. His father was a solicitor by profession, and the family does not appear to have had any previous Indian connections, but after

2.

Unknown Photographer (possibly Aaron Penley) James Waterhouse as a Cadet at Addiscombe Military Seminary, 1859 Albumen Silver Print, 75 x 60 mm British Library, Photo 42 (75)

education at King’s College and University College Schools, their son was entered for the Indian Army and sent from 1857–59 for training at the East India Company’s military seminary at Addiscombe, near Croydon [figs. 2, 3]. Here cadets bound for India received training in mathematics, fortifications, geology, chemistry, surveying and the other skills required for a military career in the subcontinent.

James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

Tuition in photography was also part of the curriculum at Addiscombe, where it had been introduced by the drawing master Aaron Penley in 1855; given the scientific bent of his interests, Waterhouse may well have picked up some basics of the craft during his period there. However, he does not at this time appear to have acquired any detailed knowledge of the camera, and by his own account did not take up photography until after his arrival in India.

Immediately after his preliminary training at Addiscombe, the young 2nd Lieutenant was despatched to India with other army entrants of his year, landing in Calcutta on

13

11 October 1859 [fig. 4]. A month later, in mid November, he left Calcutta with a draft of fellow officers for his first posting at Meerut, travelling by Ganges river steamer to Allahabad,

3.

Unknown Photographer (possibly Aaron Penley) Addiscombe Cadets, Term Ending, June 1859 Albumen Silver Print, 110 x 164 mm British Library, Photo 42 (81)

Waterhouse stands in the back row, second from left. The photograph was taken at the end of his education at Addiscombe, shortly before his departure for India.

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John Falconer

a journey of some 550 miles which in the 19th century took the better part of a month. In his later account of this first journey, Waterhouse emphasised his lack of photographic experience at this time, writing that, “in those days I was better acquainted with the brush than the camera, and made a few water-colour sketches of the picturesque rocky parts of the river near Raj Mahal… Our snapshots were made more with the pellet-bow at the crews of blundering hayboats getting in our way rather than with any early form of Kodak…”4 It was at Meerut, in the north-west part of the present state of Uttar Pradesh and at that time the headquarters of the

Bengal Artillery, that Waterhouse acquired his first camera, “a half-plate set made of the good old French walnut wood, and, though it was not brass bound, it stood the hot dry climate wonderfully well.”5 As an impecunious young officer, Waterhouse’s early efforts were directed towards the

4.

Unknown Photographer (possibly Aaron Penley) The East India Company College at Addiscombe, near Croydon, c.1858 Albumen Silver Print, 129 x 201 mm British Library, Photo 42 (122)

James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

calotype and waxed-paper processes, for which materials and chemicals were considerably cheaper and more convenient than those required for collodion photography on glass. But the demands of army life on a junior officer barely permitted him to pursue the new pastime, and it was not until his transfer to Sagar in Central India (present-day Madhya Pradesh) that Waterhouse began to take a more serious interest in photography. In May 1860 he left Meerut in the company of another young artillery officer, travelling down to Agra, where he records that a less than satisfactory attempt was made to photograph the Taj Mahal. From Agra the pair travelled south to Gwalior by bullock train, passing slowly through the country at a rate of two or three miles an hour, and from Gwalior to Sagar by palanquin, via Jhansi, which had been the scene of considerable military unrest during the Uprising of 1857. Even today the unevenly surfaced road from Jhansi to Sagar requires some endurance on the part of the traveller, and in the early 1860s must have been a long, uncomfortable and demanding route. Travelling at night to avoid the heat and hot winds mitigated some of these discomforts, although the hardships of the journey were increased by the lack of rest-houses and provisions in these wild and little-populated districts. Passing through country more or less rife with banditry and still unsettled from the events of the previous few years was an additional hazard. Although unscathed, Waterhouse recalled that one of his earliest experiences on arriving at his new posting was the sight of the body of a post-runner, “brought in with his throat cut while defending the mail bags.”6 His photographic knowledge was advanced at Sagar by living with an “old friend who had taken to photography and was fairly expert at it.”7 Waterhouse’s later memoir does not supply a name for his mentor, but he can be identified with reasonable certainty from a note written in August 1861 by the Commissioner at Jabalpur, W. C. Erskine, who had been requested, in common with other provincial administrators,

5.

15

Unknown Photographer (possibly Aaron Penley) Boyce Edward Gowan as a Cadet at Addiscombe Military Seminary, 1858–59 Albumen Silver Print, 107 x 86 mm British Library, Photo 42 (70)

to supply photographs for the 1862 International Exhibition in London. In response to the government’s appeal, he wrote that he had “obtained promise of assistance from Lieutenants Gowan and Waterhouse, who work together,”8 and it seems most probable that the former must have been Waterhouse’s early tutor. Boyce Edward Gowan (1839–92) [fig. 5] was a fellow Bengal Artillery officer and their friendship presumably dated back to their schooldays: Gowan, like Waterhouse, had been educated at King’s College School, London, and

16

John Falconer

they had been in the same year at the East India Company’s college at Addiscombe. The pair travelled to India on the same ship, but on arrival Gowan was posted for duty with the 80th Regiment of Foot at Sagar (then generally known as Saugor). They were only to be reunited when Waterhouse was himself posted to this important cantonment town in Central India. Waterhouse’s apprenticeship with his more experienced colleague was to lay the foundations for his own distinguished photographic career.

While Gowan favoured the wet collodion process for his work, Waterhouse, as noted above, was more familiar with the less technically demanding waxed-paper process. But he was soon converted to the advantages of the collodion process and lost no time in ordering “a complete equipment for 9 x 7 [inch] plates by Horne and Thornthwaite,”9 a major London supplier of photographic equipment. As Waterhouse’s later notes attest, the wet collodion process demanded considerable technical and manipulative skills in the coating, exposure and processing of the glass plates, all of which had to be achieved before the chemicals evaporated and dried. The difficulties of this demanding process were further intensified in a hot and dusty climate, but the gains in sharpness and contrast outweighed the advantages of the simpler calotype process, which from this time Waterhouse appears to have abandoned. The cost and difficulty in obtaining reliable and regular supplies of chemicals presented additional handicaps for the photographer stationed away from the metropolitan centres of India in these early years: Calcutta, hundreds of miles to the east, was the best source, but orders took weeks to be supplied and road traffic was routinely disrupted when the rivers were in flood during the wet season. But such problems and shortages fostered a pragmatic spirit of investigation, and necessity inculcated a valuable knowledge of photographic chemistry: chemicals were prepared and tested by practical experimentation, aided by the formulæ supplied in Hardwich’s book on

photographic chemistry.10 Gowan and Waterhouse also prepared their own albumenised paper, nitrate of silver and chloride of gold—the latter a working procedure that Waterhouse continued to use throughout his photographic career, noting that “I have always preferred to make my own chloride of gold when possible, so as to obtain the nearly neutral salt, giving a deep orange coloured solution, which is better for toning purposes.”11 The importance of learning through practical experimentation remained a constant throughout Waterhouse’s career, and he was to return to the topic many years later in an address given to the Royal Photographic Society in his retirement, regretting that so little is now left to the photographer himself in the way of preparing his own plates and printing papers, because it has removed a valuable educational feature of the photographer’s work and a great incentive to improvement and investigation. In the early collodion days, when we had to coat our own plates, prepare chemical solutions, sensitise printing papers, and, not infrequently, make our own collodion, silver nitrate, gold chloride, albumenised and salted papers, there was a great deal more to interest one in the actual work and more scope for invention and research than there is now…12 The efficacy of these procedures is borne out by the condition of Waterhouse’s surviving prints, which, owing to their rich toning, generally remain in remarkably bright and unfaded condition. Shellac varnish to protect the delicate emulsion side of the glass plates was also prepared on the spot, by sending a boy up a pipul tree to gather the resin secreted by the lac insect, which was then boiled and dissolved in alcohol before being filtered through charcoal and applied to the plates. Although the opening of Lyell’s photographic depot in Allahabad in 1862 subsequently offered a closer and more reliable source of chemical supplies, these early

James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

habits of self-reliance clearly provided a valuable schooling in photographic chemistry and formed the basis of Waterhouse’s lifelong dedication to practical research and experimentation. And while the Photographic Society of Bengal had been in existence for some years, “in an out of the way place like Saugor, its influence was not much felt.”13 Waterhouse’s earliest photographic activities were concentrated around the military station at Sagar, where the old Maratha fort, “a number of picturesque temples, bathing places and gardens… afforded us endless subjects for our cameras.”14 Within a year of his arrival, however, Waterhouse and Gowan’s photographic horizons were expanding. Possibly inspired by a reading of Alexander Cunningham’s The Bhilsa Topes, or, Buddhist Monuments of Central India: Comprising a Brief Historical Sketch of the Rise, Progress and Decline of Buddhism with an Account of the Opening and Examination of the Various Groups of Topes around Bhilsa (London: Smith Elder & Co., 1854),15 their attention was drawn to the archaeological remains at Sanchi to the south-west, in the native state of Bhopal. First brought to European view in 1818, the monuments, then apparently in a good state of preservation, had suffered over the years from undisciplined excavations and by the 1860s were in ruinous condition.16 Waterhouse and Gowan made their first trip to Bhopal in mid-1861, where they were hospitably received by the ruler Sikander Begum, before proceeding to Sehore, the headquarters of the Political Agency of Central India, “where the arrival of two photographers was a very welcome event in the dull monotony of a very small European settlement.”17 En route they had visited the great Buddhist stupa and monastery at Sanchi, just outside the Hindu holy city of Vidisha, and it was on this occasion that they took the first recorded photographs of the site. Whether these photographs have survived has not been established, although Erskine’s note of 1861, referred to earlier, indicates that the pair “had

17

executed many photographs of the beautiful ruins near Bhilsa”. These results had clearly impressed him, since he recommended that “these officers be allowed again to visit Bhilsa and its neighbourhood at the Government expense, that is Rs. 4 each per diem travelling allowance; and that they charge the full cost of material to Government, and in return furnish copies of all their photographs of these curious buildings, and also of tribes.”18 Presented in retrospect as a relaxing interlude from official duties, this first photographic foray in Central India was in fact a taxing journey undertaken during the hottest months of the year, which required a good deal of logistical planning to coordinate travel, photography and provisioning. Official duties prevented Waterhouse and Gowan from taking time away from Sagar except in May and June, when hot winds blew throughout the day and the temperature was around 104°F in the shade. In order to travel in these conditions, as much as possible of each ten-mile daily march was undertaken in the cooler hours before dawn. Setting off at around 3 or 4 a.m., their line of march was preceded by an Indian guide bearing a lantern, while porters followed hauling the heavy dark tent, folding table, cameras, baths and chemicals, all packaged with cotton to prevent breakages. Photographic activity was also carried out in the cool of the early morning, between 6 and 9 a.m., after which the searing wind began to blow in earnest. By now, the entourage of baggage carts carrying provisions would be pulling into camp and breakfast would be prepared. Despite the heat, the daylight hours would be spent printing up negatives, varnishing plates and preparing chemicals for the next day’s photography. Extensive work in the dark tent was impossible during the day, and after an early dinner, preparations would be put in hand for the advance party to move off to set up the next day’s campsite. But the beauties of the country through which the photographers travelled supplied at least some compensation for this rigorous routine. The high

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John Falconer

tableland running north of the Vindhya Hills enjoyed cool nights even in the hottest weather, while the dry climate allowed the travellers to sleep in the open air. The abundance of bird and animal life in the hills made the early mornings particularly pleasurable as, “just before sunrise, when all nature was waking up… the songs of birds, the screaming of pea fowl which abounded, with an occasional herd of antelope, gave life and animation to the march for miles and miles, often through almost uninhabited tracts of country, in which we were the only travellers.”19 While he did not realise it at the time, this early photographic expedition was to afford Waterhouse valuable experience for the major official commission which he was to undertake the following year, and which was to exercise “a very considerable influence in giving a photographic trend to my after career.”20

Central India: January–December 1862 In June 1861, an official circular was issued under the authority of the Governor General Lord Canning, “containing instructions for a collection being made of photographic likenesses of characteristic specimens of the more remarkable tribes in India”. Addressed to provincial administrations throughout British India, the memorandum enclosed a list of the major ethnic and tribal groups, while calling for “photographic likenesses” to be made “of a few characteristic specimens of such of them as exist within your jurisdiction.”21 Mindful of the potential costs of such a scheme, officers were requested to utilise the skills of government officials in taking the photographs, with reimbursement offered for the actual costs of chemicals and equipment. Descriptive notes on the subjects photographed were also solicited22 and instructions were further given that, while acknowledging that different equipment and

working conditions would to some extent determine the format of the photographs, “these should be large enough to exhibit the chief physical peculiarities and distinctive costume of each race.”23 This circular gives no precise indication—beyond their somewhat broadly perceived scientific value—of the specific use to which the resulting photographs would be put, but it is clear that they were originally intended for transmission to the London International Exhibition of 1862. This initial intention, however, was later to be developed in different and more ambitious directions. The appeal was particularly directed towards those government servants most likely to come into contact with the more isolated tribal groups of the subcontinent; and while relying on the amateur enthusiasms of military officers and civil servants to supply much of this material, the authorities recognised that in certain cases the collection of such material would require release from official duties for the work to be completed.

Of those government servants who were granted time away from their official duties, it was Waterhouse who received perhaps the most important and extended photographic commission. In December 1861 he received official notification that he was to be seconded to undertake photographic work in Central India, a commission which was to occupy him fully for the whole of 1862 and involve him in a series of strenuous trips in Central India in search of suitable subjects.

Waterhouse had clearly responded swiftly to Lord Canning’s circular calling for photographs, for even before he received the notification of his official secondment, he was busy printing up a series of ethnographical portraits of the tribal people of the Sagar District, presumably taken in the latter half of 1861. This work had exhausted his supplies of plates and chemicals, but replenishments arrived from Calcutta on 16 January 1862, and on 18 January he set out from Sagar for Sehore, arriving on 24 January. Waterhouse

James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

had been instructed that one major purpose of the trip was to obtain portraits of the Begum of Bhopal, but since she was at that time absent from her capital, he decided to proceed first to Indore and return later to Bhopal. On his arrival at Indore on 3 February, he received instructions from the officiating Assistant Agent to the Governor General that his photographic work lay “in two directions, north and south of Indore”. Here he also learnt that Nawab Ghaus Mohammad Khan of Jaora, about a hundred miles to the north-west, would soon be hosting festivities on the forthcoming occasion of his son’s marriage. Thinking this a good opportunity to secure photographs “illustrating some of the ceremonies, etc., of a Mussulman marriage, and also of getting portraits of the Chiefs who had been invited,”24 Waterhouse set off for Jaora on 11 February, arriving five days later.

At Jaora, Waterhouse experienced the first of the many setbacks that were to beset the course of his work: the nawab’s son was taken ill with smallpox on the day of Waterhouse’s arrival and the ceremony was cancelled. The Indian guests departed immediately, but the nawab insisted on entertaining the 24 European officers present to a week of festivities, and these celebrations prevented Waterhouse from undertaking any serious photographic work. His difficulties continued after the departure of the nawab’s European guests: by now the weather was becoming uncomfortably hot and he found it impossible to persuade potential subjects to appear before the camera at an hour sufficiently early to make photography practical. While he waited for his sitters from 6 a.m. each morning, they rarely arrived before 9 a.m., if at all. By this hour the temperature in his dark tent had risen to 100°F and the manipulation of wet collodion plates, which required coating, exposing and processing while still damp, had become all but impossible. Another source of frustration was the interest taken in the proceedings by the nawab, who repeatedly

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interrupted Waterhouse’s work with requests for the loan of negatives, or prints of the photographs he was taking. In the daytime temperature of the season, this led, in several cases, to negatives cracking in the heat and the consequent necessity of re-photographing his subjects. From his time at Jaora, Waterhouse estimated that on average only one photograph out of five was successful, while “some plates I took nine times before getting a satisfactory negative.”25 Although Waterhouse succeeded in taking at least three reasonably successful studies at Jaora,26 the only portrait from this visit that he appears to have considered worthy of including in the album is a group of Muslim employees of the nawab [fig. 6]. The negative of this portrait was later damaged by attempting to print from it in wet conditions, but a few prints had been made before it was destroyed.

On 14 March, Waterhouse left Jaora and headed south for the neighbouring states of Ratlam and Sailana. Armed with official introductions, he was received with what he neutrally describes as “tolerable civility” by Bhairon Singh, the Raja of Ratlam, but here too his photographic activities were hampered by the great heat. Several attempts to take a portrait of the raja seated on his gaddi (throne) and attended by his thakurs (noblemen) ended in failure and were eventually abandoned, while the speed with which Waterhouse’s collodion plates dried meant that it was impossible to prepare negatives larger than 6½ x 4¾ inches.

From this visit to Ratlam, three portraits were finally included in the album [figs. 7, 8, 9]. After remaining at Ratlam for six days, Waterhouse moved on to Sailana, arriving on 20 March. The four days spent here were bedevilled by similar problems: the heat and dust made it impossible to use large plates, while attempts at a portrait of the ruler ended in failure due to the inability of Raja Dule Singh to remain still during the length of the exposure.

The only reasonably successful outcome of this period appears to be the portrait of Thakur Hari Singh of

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Sailana, about whom Waterhouse supplies little further information, beyond a description of his dress and a remark on the Rajput propensity for opium, which, he claimed, accounted for the lack of success of many of his pictures (see fig. 93, note).

This unpromising start also highlighted the problem of obtaining photographic supplies that was to continue throughout the tour. The high proportion of failed negatives at Ratlam and Sailana had exhausted Waterhouse’s stock of collodion; efforts to obtain replenishments from Jaora were unsuccessful and he was obliged to send to Indore for further chemicals. On 29 March he once more set out from Jaora for Sitamau to the north-east, presumably travelling part of the way by rail, since he arrived on the following day. Praising the “civility and assistance” he received here—“not the case at most places I stayed at”27 —his photographic efforts were more successful and two portraits taken here, a group of thakurs [fig. 87] and a likeness of a man named Purta [fig. 95 ], found a place in the albums. The latter photograph presented an unusual practical challenge, since Waterhouse found his subject so stupefied by opium that it was difficult for him to remain steady for the length of the exposure. But this shift in the photographer’s fortunes proved only temporary. On 5 April he left for Chandwasa, armed with letters from the Raja of Sitamau supporting his request for official aid in bringing in from outlying areas representative types of the Sondi and Grassiah tribes for photography. On his arrival he was informed that there were none in the neighbourhood, but that he would find some at Ganghar.

Taking the opportunity to photograph en route some Gupta period Buddhist cave temples at Dhamnar [figs. 10, 11, 12], Waterhouse set off for Ganghar, arriving on 11 April.

Here he was once again informed that there were no Sondi tribespeople in the district, although Waterhouse put this absence down to the fact that “they were suspicious and

6.

James Waterhouse ‘Mussulmans of Mundlaisir’ [Jaora, February–March 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 135 x 168 mm

The location of this group at Jaora is identified both in Waterhouse’s own notes and in the published version in The People of India (plate 380), where the following note on the Muslim population is supplied: “The Mussulman population, though sparse, is yet of considerable antiquity, and is descended from the former conquerors and settlers, chiefly Afghans and Pathans; but they have no power, except at Jowrah and Bhopal, and serve as military and civil servants of those states, and also with Holkar and Sindia. Although locally so powerful during the existence of the Ghori dynasty, and in some degree a settled population, the conquest and settlement of the Gond and Bheer countries, to the east and south-east, seems never to have been attempted, or even their conversion to the Mussulman faith. In those times the Gond chieftains were extremely powerful, and were inaccessible in their mountain fastnesses. Of the subject of the photograph, the two persons in the centre belong to the ordinary military classes; those on the right and left hold ministerial situations under the Nawab of Jowrah. None of these differ in any respect from ordinary Mussulmans, either in religion or habits.” Waterhouse also gives further details regarding the sitters: Seated on the right is Abdul Rahim Beg, a 60-year-old member of the Writer Class in the Jaora Katcheri, who is described as wearing a khaki and gold silk pugri [turban], a yellow silk chupkun [coat] with white flowers and a blue choga [robe]. On the left is seated his colleague, the 55-yearold Sheikh Abdul Huq, dressed in blue and khaki pugri, flowered chintz coat and brown woollen choga. The two standing figures, Abdul Majid (left) and Anur Khan (right), aged 21 and 35 years respectively and wearing red pugris and white chupkuns, were in the military service of the Nawab of Jaora. Waterhouse also notes that the negative of this photograph was destroyed by attempting to print from it during the rains. This is one of the few prints made before it was damaged.

James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

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James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

7.

Facing page James Waterhouse ‘Thakoor Buktawin Singh of Rutlam’ [Ratlam, March 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 105 x 80 mm

Waterhouse describes the dress of Bukhtawar Singh, “a very finelooking man”, then 34 years of age and Prime Minister of Ratlam, as being a “white dress, gold pugree, red silk scarf, turquoise ornaments on pugree”.

8.

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James Waterhouse ‘Baba Sarubdas-ji Chamu of Rutlam’ [Ratlam, March 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 111 x 84 mm (oval)

In his notes to this photograph, Waterhouse writes, “Baba Sarubdas was originally a Charun, but is now a devotee, and held in great reverence by the Rajahs of Rutlam, Sillana, and Seetamhow: he is their spiritual guide, and they are bound to follow his advice: he is very old; his age was given to me as 60, but I think he is older.

He is very wealthy and wears very sumptuous dresses.”

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James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

ignorant, and thought their pictures might be used against them, and therefore refused to sit.”28 Waterhouse therefore proceeded south to Mehidpur, where he spent a frustrating few days waiting for chemical supplies that failed to arrive. He had intended during this leg of his trip to photograph the several classes of Brahmins resident at Ujjain, but lack of photographic plates forced him to abandon this plan and return to the town at a later date. Strenuous travelling had by now taken its toll on his equipment, and his “apparatus was getting out of order by the heat and continual knocking about.” 29 He therefore decided to return to Indore to replenish his supplies and service his equipment before setting out on a second trip.

The first leg of Waterhouse’s tour—three frustrating months of hard travelling in the heat of Central India which had resulted in very limited photographic success —had at least prepared him for the difficulties he could expect to encounter in such work. By 26 April he was once more back at Indore, where he occupied himself in preparing for a second journey. Some attempt was also made in this interval to print up the photographs made in the preceding months, but the difficulties of

9.

James Waterhouse ‘Gassyram Cotari of Rutlam’ [March 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 114 x 79 mm

Of this sitter, Waterhouse notes that he “calls himself a Rajpoot and dresses as such, but is really a Kayath”, aged around 60 and wearing a red pugri [turban] and white coat. Waterhouse describes the encounter in the following terms: “Ghasseram is a Thakoor of Rutlam and is in charge of the Treasury; he did not much like having his photograph taken, and seemed much relieved when he found that he had nothing to pay...”

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getting suitable printing frames made, compounded by the relentless heat that threatened to crack his negatives, dissuaded him from risking the precious horde of images, secured with so much effort. On 20 May, after waiting nearly a month for new chemical supplies, Waterhouse once more left Indore, this time heading south towards Mandleshwar, which he reached four days later.

Here the Political Agent Captain Wood had arranged for various groups to be brought in and photographed.

On 28 May, working in darkroom temperatures approaching 92°F, Waterhouse was able to secure group portraits of Bhil tribesmen of the Vindhya and Satpura ranges. Probably because a later and presumably more satisfactory group of Bhils was taken in the following month, this photograph was not included in the album, nor was a Brahmin group from Mandhata, taken at the same time. The short journey westwards from Mandleshwar to Maheshwar, where Maharaja Sir Tukoji Rao Holkar of Indore maintained a picturesque residence on the north bank of the Narbada River, was made on 30 May. During his week in the town Waterhouse visited the maharaja in order to take his portrait, but once more the heat prevented his chemical bath from working satisfactorily and after about twelve attempts he was forced to be satisfied with one of the earlier plates, although not in his opinion, an “altogether good one” [fig. 13]. A further appointment to secure a better portrait, scheduled for the following morning, was aborted by the abrupt departure of the maharaja, who had left for Indore during the night. The albums also contain portraits of Holkar’s second minister, Rai Ramchander Rao [fig. 14], and the Dewan, Ram Rao Narain [fig. 90], as well as other officials in Holkar’s administration [figs. 15, 16], but it is likely that these were taken at Indore on a different, unspecified occasion.30 Waterhouse, by now no doubt inured to these abrupt reversals, set off for Mandu on 7 June, where he spent

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James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

Facing page 10. James Waterhouse ‘Large Temple Cave of Dhumnow’ [Dharmanatha Temple, Dhamnar, April 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 205 x 168 mm The flat-topped hill of Dhamnar, about 12 miles west of Shamgarh, was once the home of a large Buddhist community, and over 50 caves have been exposed in the vicinity. In addition to Buddhist caves the site also contains an important Hindu temple. Waterhouse’s view shows the monolithic 8th–9th century Vaishnava shrine known as the Dharmanatha Temple, with the sanctuary tower rising above the porch.

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Top Left 11. James Waterhouse ‘Small Temple Caves of Dhumnow’ [Dhamnar, April 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 183 x 130 mm Top Right 12. James Waterhouse ‘Cave Temple, Dhumnow’ [Dhamnar, April 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 183 x 131 mm

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James Waterhouse: A Career in Photography

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13. James Waterhouse ‘Holkar’ [Maharaja Sir Tukoji Rao Holkar of Indore, Maheshwar, May 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 155 x 110 mm Waterhouse describes the Maharaja of Indore as wearing a white pugri [turban], white dress, red silk shawl and a necklace of emeralds for this, the only portrait of him (the ruler) Waterhouse managed to obtain. Sir Tukoji Rao Holkar (1833–1886) succeeded to the gaddi (throne) of Indore as a minor in 1844, and ruled as maharaja from 1848–86. Waterhouse writes that as the maharaja left Maheshwar suddenly he had no opportunity to note his personal history, but Watson and Kaye’s The People of India (8 vols., 1868–75), where this portrait appears as plate 387, supplies a detailed account of the ruler and his state: “The Maharajah Tukajee Holkar is the present representative of the family which for several generations has provided the most eminent and illustrious men and women among the Mahrattas. The family itself is of obscure origin. Holkar’s progenitors were shepherds and cultivators in the village of Hull, in the Deccan, from which their surname Holkar, or more properly, perhaps Hullker, is derived… Since the Mahratta and Pindharee wars closed, there has been nothing to interrupt the prosperity of the state. The mutiny and rebellion had little effect upon it, and the mutinous troops having at once marched to join the main body of the rebel army, Holkar was spared the loss and vexation which attended his brother potentate Sindia. Holkar’s state ought to

be very prosperous, but the chief ’s mind is perhaps too active and restless to ensure quiet prosperity. He would have a railway, which is partly completed, cotton mills and all sorts of English improvements; but at present he is in trouble about his revenue assessments, and is too hard and grasping in regard to his subjects—the landholders and cultivators. He would fain do everything himself, take up projects and abandon them, and start others with a like result. In short, in everything but his faith to the British Government he seems to be hard to manage; but he has complete freedom from interference in the affairs of his state, and is solely responsible to his subjects for them. The investigation into rent-free lands has been a hard one, and has incited discontent and distrust, which it will be difficult for him to overcome. Personally Tukajee Rao Holkar is a most courteous prince, alike to his subjects as to the English around him; and were he as steady in his administrative capacity as his fine talents should make him, there would not be a more popular, or a more practically useful native prince in India, and this he may yet become by experience. He is much interested in education, and in his college at Indore instruction in English as well as in native languages is soundly imparted.”

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Top left 14. James Waterhouse ‘Rai Ramchander Rao, Holkar’s Second Minister’ [probably at Indore, 20 October 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 138 x 82 mm Top right 15. James Waterhouse ‘Keshorao Appa Changun’ [probably at Indore, 20 October 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 112 x 85 mm (oval)

Facing page 16. James Waterhouse ‘Ramchundur Wichut’ [probably at Indore, 20 October 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 138 x 88 mm

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a week attempting to photograph the magnificent remains of the ancient capital of Malwa. Although he managed to take views of Hoshung Shah’s Tomb, the Jami Masjid and a general view of the present-day town [figs. 17, 18, 19], this work too, was not entirely satisfactory. A further plan to search out and photograph some Bhil groups in the district was also abandoned, since It was too late in the season to have gone into the dense jungles bordering the Nerbudda in search of specimens of the wild Bheel, and even then it would have been very difficult to have obtained really good specimens owing to the shy and suspicious nature of the tribes.31 However, by moving north towards Sardarpur in mid-June, he was able to find Bhil “specimens” among the enlisted sepoys of the Malwa Bhil Corps, whose appearance, according to Waterhouse, “is more civilised than when in their wild state”32 [fig. 20]. In addition to photographing these tribespeople, Waterhouse assiduously prepared a detailed historical and ethnographical sketch of the Bhils, describing the mythological origins of the tribes, their appearance in Rajasthan and their subsequent migration southwards, where they had settled among the hills and impenetrable jungles of Central India. Here, “protected by the strong and difficult nature of the country… they have since dwelt, subsisting partly on their industry, but mainly on the plunder of the rich landholders in the vicinity of their haunts.”33

17. James Waterhouse ‘Mausoleum of Hishung Shah, Mandoo’ [Mandu, June 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 235 x 286 mm

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18. James Waterhouse ‘Juma Musjid, Mandoo’ [Mandu, June 1862] Albumen Silver Print, 156 x 208 mm

“Besides giving access to a rich collection of photographs, this well produced book also includes other kinds of visual material such as etchings and hand coloured images derived from the photographs.”

—Biblio: A Review of Books

PHOTOGRAPHY

Mastering the Lens

Before and After Cartier-Bresson in Pondicherry PHOTOGRAPHY Rahaab Allana, Shilpi Goswami, Deepak Prof.

Kittu the alkaziBharathan, collection of photography Reddy and Jennifer Chowdhry

The Waterhouse Albums

Central Indian Provinces 84 pages, 77 colour photographs Edited 2 map by John Falconer 9 x 9.5” (241 x 229 mm), pb 264 pages, 120 colour photographs ISBN: 978-81-89995-73-7 (Mapin) 5ISBN: colour drawings and 3 maps 978-1-935677-28-4 (Grantha) 9.45 x 10.8” ₹1200 | $35 |(240 £25 x 275 mm), hc ISBN: (Mapin) 2012 •978-81-89995-30-0 World rights ISBN: 978-0-944142-84-4 (Grantha) ₹3250 | $70 | £45 2009 • World rights