George and Mabel Shepherd 1893

George Herbert Shepherd and Mabel McKenna were married circa 1893. Bottom pic shows Mabel taking part in a play, presumably before marriage.

Trial By Jury 1963

Lucknow memorial 1857

SACRED TO THE MEMORY
             OF
SIR MOUNTSTUART JACKSON
CAPT PATRICK ORR
LIEUT GJH BURNES
BOMBAY EUROPEAN FUSILIERS
SGT MAJ MORTON
KILLED AT LUCKNOW
1857.

This memorial, in a Lucknow
park near the stadium, is all but
hidden behind memorials to
the Indian freedom fighters in
the shadow of trees. This memorial
is mentioned in 'The Great Uprising in
India 1857-58' by Rosie Llewellyn Jones.


The memorial plaque to
Sir Mountstuart Jackson,
St Pauls' Cathedral,
Calcutta.

St Joseph's College, Nainital medal

 This is a St Joseph's School, Nainital  medal and I cannot give it a date. The motto on it is Certa Bonum Certamen - Fight the good fight. Having searched the net I discovered the motto is also used by St Paul's.

Lucknow Residency boxing medal 1938

Boxing medal 1938

Is this medal, awarded in 1938, the only one surviving today? 

Ivan Douglas Shepherd

Ivan left with Bertie and Les Palmer in
Tel-el-Kebir, Egypt - 1943.

REME beret badge

Ivan Douglas Shepherd weds Teresa Eloise
on 23rd December 1946. With them is
Fritzgerald Lawrence the  Best Man.

2 Base Workshop Boxing Team Tel-el-Kebir, Egypt 1943
 Ivan Shepherd sitting right end.

Ivan at Khartoum 1941 
Ivan Douglas Shepherd passed away
at the age of 81 in 1999 and is buried
in the Nishatganj Cemetery, Lucknow.

Silly of me!

I tried to link my two blogs Georgie's musings and Guava gardens and have ended up as a follower of my own blog. I've tried removing myself but have failed! I'll try again later.

Banaras' St Mary's Church

Pic: Susan Elaine Penn-Berkeley in 2009

The St Mary's Church, Banaras Cantonment looked more or less the same 25 years earlier when I saw it in 1984 and for the twenty or so months thereafter. Still, being in this condition is no surprise considering that it is a Protestant church. The CNI has no money! But you do find CNI pastors and school principals rather well-off so one can guess where the money is going!
I don't know much about land measurement in sq. metres etc but I can say this church has a big compound and from the pic it seems that 25 years later its been lying idle! At a guess, the only reason that it has not been grabbed is that it is in the Cantonment area.
I went to Varanasi (Banaras) before India was flooded with motorbikes and cars so I took along my bicycle for free and easy movement. The protestant church at Sigra came as a surprise. Here also the church had a massive stretch of land a big parsonage that was shared by the pastor and a retired railwayman; something that I learned much later. There were several small old cottages occupied by Christians with most of the land lying vacant.
 At the gate was a banner proclaiming that the person sitting on the dais was on a 'fast unto death'. The lady, a Mrs Chattri, had her husband among the handful of supporters. The protest was over a plot of land given, by a former pastor, on lease for a petrol service station that was already functioning. The protest was legitimate, I thought! I should add here that the 'fast till death' went on for months - nobody died! It was at a later date that Mr Chattri showed me the whole campus; the neat little cottages, lots of open space and then the real reason for the fast staged at the church gate. There were plots marked by stone and he pointed out his plot and that cleared the matter they were fighting for permission to build homes for themselves!! 
When people protest against corruption you can bet the hidden reason, the real reason lies just below the surface - maybe self-aggrandizement!
The Chattri family is quite big and this family seemed to originate from Allahabad. I already knew of a branch of this family in Lucknow.
Today the principal of Christ Church College, Lucknow is a Mr Chattri. The CCC Principal owns a house in the Zahur Baksh Church compound, Lucknow. He has what is said to be ancestral property elsewhere in Lucknow. He also owns a house in Naini Tal. His career climbed - from a school master to a vice-principal in Jhansi and then several years ago was appointed Principal, CCC, Lucknow. The principal makes his own rules because he has the board members eating out of his hand. Free house, luxury cars, water, electricity and round-the-clock servants. But, in January he told a lady from Australia who sought information from him that there were a lot of crooks around!
 Incidentally, Christ Church, Lucknow has also leased out a plot of land to a petrol service station. This was done more than 40 years ago but a few years back the lease, I heard, was increased to 999 years! How much was paid was kept a secret.

Lionel (Sandy) Coulter passes away

Sunday May 26, 2013.
Lionel Coulter, better known to his friends as Sandy, passed away on 22nd May, 2013 in the UK. The news was broken on Facebook yesterday bring an outpouring of sadness among old Martinian friends, many much junior to him. He was like all because of his good nature. He was a good all-round sportsman. Lionel was married earlier to Lorraine Shepherd from La Martiniere Girls School, Lucknow. 

Easing roadblocks!

Old trees can be cut down but what about places of worship? That's a
 temple in front. It's strange that in a 'secular' country every government
 office has at least one temple built on its premises!

In this view we are looking back to where the top pic was taken.

The Mahatma Gandhi Marg in Lucknow, from the PWD office to the Haider Canal, is being broadened.
It will be interesting to see how the Samajwadi Party circumvents this problem. Many years ago when this party was in power, it demolished temples that were coming up on Station Rd. Protests that followed died down after a few days.  Many of Lucknow's roads that were narrow at one time have places of worship causing bottlenecks. But the good part is the people have patience lots of patience! 

Just beyond the tilting tree is the culvert that needs broadening...

Raj Bhawan on the left...

The second obstacle is the Muslim grave that is just below the road where the man in the pic is standing. 

What it was till a few years back

This old well exposed after all the debris, trees and bushes were
 removed has been filled up.

Before the bushes were cleared on the Martiniere grounds

Fencing on the bund under construction in 2008 approx.

Some things have since changed!

The lone palm stands tall from before the 1960's 

Mart road to level crossing has since been cleaned up.

The tennis ground being prepared after the Carlyle McFarland became College Principal.

Some renovation work has been done here but the walls need repair.