– A book review by the WLHG
Published in Windlesora 16 (1998)
© WLHG
Sisters of the Raj is the final volume in a trilogy chronicling the life and work of the sisters of St John Baptist, Clewer. The two previous volumes are A Joyous Service [published 1989] a general overview of the Sisters’ work, and A Place in Life [published 1992] which covers the period 1849-83. Sisters of the Raj begins in 1881 when they were invited by the British Government to send Sisters from Clewer to work in Calcutta, organising the nursing in the Presidency General Hospital. From this small beginning grew the work encompassing several other hospitals and schools in Calcutta and Darjeeling. Missionary work in the Sunderbuns, pioneered by Angelina Hoare, considerably enlarged the compass of their work.
The 64 years of their work in India took place during the heyday and decline of British rule. Valerie Bonham’s book gives us a fascinating insight into this period and of the tensions which existed between the views and attitudes of the nuns and those of the memsahibs. To set her book in its context, the author had to skim rapidly through those historic landmarks in British/Indian history, such as the Indian mutiny of 1857, the massacre at Cawnpore, the siege of Lucknow and the final abolition of the East India Company.
Calcutta, according to Kipling, was the City of Dreadful Night and so the sisters had to endure the inevitable illnesses associated with the climate and hygiene of the overcrowded city. They endured a catastrophic landslip at Darjeeling and a shipwreck during the Great War. Moreover, the religions of their patients conflicted with their own religious beliefs; in spite of their difficulties they made great improvements to general nursing standards in India and grew to love the country.
In 1876, they entered the field of education. The Pratt Memorial School educated the Anglo-Indian community but as there was even more need for good education for European girls, the sisters were invited by the Bishop of Calcutta to run the school, and so began their work in education which, after initial set-backs, flourished.
My favourite chapter, which I read several times, was “Homecoming – Return to Calcutta”. It was in this chapter that the adventures of the author and her companion, Joyce Sampson, show that travelling in modern India is no less arduous than that faced by the nuns back in the 1880s. As independent travellers, the two women had to face the idiosyncrasies of airport timetables, train departures and the perils of road transport via buses and taxis. A leisurely bullock cart would have been much more tranquil,
Valerie Bonham does not judge the inadequacies of the British Raj, but records, with the aid of meticulous footnotes and well-researched history, the work of this remarkable community of nuns who set their seal on the nursing and educational record of India – an influence which still prevails today and flourishes under Indian leadership, a testament to the fine achievements of the Sisters of St John Baptist of Clewer.
Sheila Rooney
BONHAM, VALERIE Sisters of the Raj: The Clewer Sisters in India The Community of St John
Baptist, Hatch Lane, Windsor Berks SL4 3QR 1997 322pp £12.95 ISBN 0 9508710 3 6
Windsor Local History Group 