William
Benson arrived in India either late in 1895 or early 1896 as UK Outward Passenger Lists have him
listed on the SS Borneo, leaving London on 15 August 1895.[1]
He then turns up in records of the Freemasons, which give his age as 24.[2]
William had left behind his brother James Speid, working as a solicitor and in
the Volunteer Battalion Gordon Highlanders. His other brother John Speid was
travelling back and forth to the UK, undertaking various occupations in the USA
and South Africa.
Dr Graham
started Melas, or fairs, to create
rivalry and competition among the local cultivators and based the event on the
agricultural shows which were held in his native Scotland.
This is consistent with some of the notes I have. These say that he went to India and worked as a tea planter’s assistant in the Dooars as well as spending some time with H Dear & Co Ltd, who were in the timber business and owned saw-mills in Bihar and Orissa’ Gillanders was a managing agent for them. My notes also make reference to this being a time of building bridges and railways and, although there is no evidence, Chas may have been involved because of his engineering qualifications.
My Grandmother said that Chas then spent some time in Australia gold digging and the records may agree. On 13 June 1911 he appears on the manifest for SS Orsova arriving in Fremantle, Australia from Colombo in Ceylon (now Sri Lanka). On 08 October 1912 he appears on another manifest for the SS Orsova, sailing back from Fremantle to Calcutta.[6] I believe it is from this journey that my Grandmother’s notes take up the story, though she could have been referring to his earlier arrival in 1909. Whatever is correct, it is a good place from which to carry on now.
My Grandmother also mentioned Chas’ arrival in Calcutta where he was met by a junior member of office staff from Gillanders. Before continuing further into the country, any new arrival in India is likely to have spent a few days recovering from the first part of the trip. It is very likely that Chas (and others) would have stayed in The Auckland Hotel , Old Court House Street, though he may alternatively have stayed in The Grand Hotel on Chowringhee.[7] We know that when Chas returned to Calcutta, in the future, if he had business or was sailing home, he stayed in The Auckland,[8] which had by this time been renamed the Great Eastern Hotel. In his book City of Dreadful Night, Rudyard Kipling writes, The Great Eastern hums with life through all its hundred rooms. Doors slam merrily, and all the nations of the earth run up and down the staircases.[9]
To return to Chas’ trip, my grandmother wrote that, onward travel was arranged from Calcutta to the Dooars. At that time the Hardinge Bridge [12] had not yet been built, so after travelling by railway he was forced to take a small boat to cross the river. This would have been one of the easier parts of his journey in India. To drive from the Great Eastern Hotel to the Hardinge Bridge today would take about 7 hours, not allowing for traffic, cows etc.
We know from George Barker that Chas would have travelled on the Eastern Bengal Railway from Calcutta to the terminus at Goalundo; the junction of the Ganges and Brahmapootra. From here he would have taken a paddle steamer across the water. I am not sure this counts as a “small boat”![13] George Barker describes Goalundo as the terminus of the whole civilised world.[14] Looking at a map it is worth noting that the Hardinge Bridge was built much further up than the crossing point at Goalundo. The Bridge crosses the Brahmaputra at one of its narrowest points. Today the river is known as the Padma as it falls in Bangladesh.
Once on the other side Chas was met by a tea garden employee who handed him a letter which read, “ the bearer of this letter will inform you how to continue your journey”. At this point Chas was handed a pair of strong boots so he could continue the journey on foot, unless he was lucky enough to get a ride on an elephant!
Looking at a map today the route is estimated to take about 13 hours by vehicle, so Chas certainly had a trek on his hands. Manton writes in his thesis,
In addition to the
risks of the voyage to Calcutta, some faced onward voyages by inland waterways
in "country boats" powered by human (and in particularly favourable
places animal) muscle, and only occasionally by sail……….
The voyage up to Assam through the Sunderbands and along the Brahmaputra river could take a further three months. [15]
In his Himalayan Journal, written in 1848, Sir Joseph Dalton Hooker, describes his journey by palaquin from Calcutta to Darjeeling, which took four days. Griffiths summarises this,
Hooker travelled from near Siliguri up the old military cart road, which was built between 1849 and 1852, and which proceeded through Pankhabari to Kurseong and thence via Dow Hill to Ghoom - a route of which Hooker says that it zig-zags extraordinarily in and out of innumerable lateral ravines, each with its watercourse, dense jungle, and legion of leeches.[16]
Little is
known about William’s arrival in India; unfortunately my grandfather would not
have known (even if he had lived long enough for me to ask him), something I
will explain more about later.
Chas had engineering qualifications, but like William and most Britons arriving in India, he would not have spoken the language (and certainly not the local dialects), or had previous experience of the weather, people and food. For both men it was a trip into the unknown. Manton writes,
Undoubtedly India was
seen as a "land of opportunity" by those with courage and an
adventurous spirit, those with the makings of entrepreneurs.[17]
George Barker writes that,
A mens sana in corpore sano is absolutely necessary to resist this dreadful climate: the work is very hard, the sun a terrible enemy; there are many comforts wanting, scarcely any society, and in his daily habits a man has to exercise an enormous amount of self-denial and discretion if he wishes to retain good health.[18]
These sentiments are echoed by George, who writes,
They were doubtless and
adventurous persevering men.[19]
My
Grandmother gave me some notes that said that Chas arrived at the Garopara TE
in the Dooars, where he worked as an assistant manager and would have learned
not only about tea, but also the country in general. The time spent at Garopara
would have supplemented his earlier experience from 1909.
Although Garopara is in the Dooars, in attempting to locate the area today it is worth highlighting results of different internet searches for “Garopara Tea Estate” and “Garopara”. The first search links Garopara with several tea gardens in Jalpaiguri in West Bengal, which constituted the Western Dooars at the time. The second search, without the word “estate”, places Garopara in Assam which constituted the Eastern Dooars.
My Grandmother’s notes said that he met Nelsie Rossiter at Garopara; she was a young woman from Shillong. We are not sure what Nelsie was doing at Garopara, though some family members believed that she was there with her father Harry Daniel (who was a tea planter at Lackatoorah in Silchar, which was also owned by Gillanders, and is now in Bangladesh).[20] My Grandmother’s notes continue by saying that Chas took Nelsie as his wife “under Scotch law” in 1914. This would not have been a formal ceremony, but rather the two decided to live as man and wife. We do know that by the time she met Chas, Nelsie had already been married, and had at least one daughter by her previous Khasi husband. It is unclear whether her first husband had died (my notes imply that he did), or if the couple had divorced; it is also unknown whether Nelsie’s daughter Melida was an only child. I will say more about the Khasis in a future chapter.
In 1910 William Benson is based at the Luckynugger Tea Estate in Cachar, but it is unlikely that he was based at this Estate in 1899, as new arrivals in India usually started out elsewhere learning the ropes. We know that William was a Visiting Agent, but in contrast to him, after completing his training Chas was sent to Assam in the Lakhimpur District to open a new garden out of virgin countryside. This would have been a long and difficult process, and my grandmother said that Chas and Nelsie lived on site in a mud hut with a thatched roof. George describes what they would have faced,
In the early years of
jungle clearance and planting the first generation planters had to undergo many
hardships living in primitive mud huts and fighting with wild animals and
diseases.[21]
He continues,
During the pioneering phase, plantations were often opened up, managed by the individual owner himself…... They were doubtless and adventurous persevering men.
They were working and
living side by side with their labourers, while clearing the jungle. The social
distance between the planter and the labourers was relatively small in this
early period.[22]
My grandmother said that the local Assamese were unable to work on cutting down trees, with both George Barker and Jim Glendinning writing after 1950 [23] putting this down to the fact that they were lazy and would not work, unless necessity dictated. My grandmother said that Chas employed the fierce Nagas to clear the forest, with the assistance of some elephants, which were the JCBs of their day. Barker had written that during his time, the Nagas would not work for the British. [24] My limited research on this has shows that the British had first invaded the Naga homeland in 1832, action which was followed up by the arrival of American Baptist missionaries who began converting the Nagas. This marked the beginning of the Nagas attending colonial schools and becoming Christians, leading to the erosion of their traditional belief system and ways of living.[25] Chas used the Nagas to clear the land, which would have used their traditional, manual labour skills.[26] We cannot know for certain, without significantly more research, why they now chose to work for British, but it may have had something to do with the 26 year gap between the arrival of George Barker in 1883 (incidentally the same year as Harry Daniel Rossiter) and that of Charles Ramage Blake in 1909. For the record, William Benson arrived in 1895. My grandmother added that a well was dug on the land which provided all their water needs; due to the clay soil it would not have been very clean for drinking and which could have a negative effect on all concerned.
While we were visiting Dibrugarh in Assam in January 2017, we saw work being undertaken to prepare the ground for the replanting of tea. Unlike Darjeeling where tea gardens cling precariously to lush green slopes, Assam is warmer and flat. To prepare the ground for the planting of new tea bushes, the old ones need to be removed as well as the huge trees which provide shade. We saw trees on their sides [picture] and JCB style diggers being used to both remove the trees and turn over the ground.The conditions to do this work in 2017 were probably similar to those experienced by Chas in the 1900s.
George Barker describes the,
rugged beauty of the
dense jungle, twisted and interlaced in a perfect network of trees, ferns,
creepers, and undergrowth - the impenetrable intricacies of this vast mass of
foliage…[C]learing this for tea planting is a labour of great difficulty [27]
It is only
now when I review my grandmother’s notes that I realise that Chas’ tea garden
was finally built in 1917, and we had visited 100 years later. Another
coincidence I had missed during our stay! It is not my intention to go into the
specific details of the tea garden, nor the production of tea. There are many
other volumes, including by those with firsthand experience in the industry,
which can provide better information than I.
A major part of our plan in January 2017 had been to visit Chas’ tea garden itself. Over twenty years before I had discovered the fact that Jutlibari was still in business, now owned by the Kothari Group, and that the tea had received excellent reviews. It was so good in fact that it was impossible to buy in the UK.
After
careful negotiation we found a mutually convenient date to visit Mr Chakravaty,
the outgoing tea garden manager. The four of us were slightly nervous about our
visit, as my uncle had previously visited with a coach load of his family and
been feted with dancing, a large meal, speeches and a presentation. Wonderful
as their experience was, thankfully our welcome was more low key; we were
grateful for this as we all felt more relaxed and able to ask questions about
the work of Mr Chakravaty. We also met his father and were treated to a buffet
lunch prepared by his wife.
It was unfortunate that, having been in India since 14 January, as soon as we arrived at Jutlibari, the heavens opened. While this did result in lunch (to be served on the lawn) being moved inside, it was actually a bonus for us as we got to eat and explore the building actually built and lived in by Chas. The weather also prevented us from doing any walking around the garden (though I am not sure that was the plan), however we were given an excellent tour of the factory, but I am afraid I missed much of the explanation as I was too busy taking photographs.
I know that the Luckynugger Tea Garden, where William worked, is also still in business, though it is now just a “unit” of Aenakhall which is owned by an Indian firm. Most of the gardens where my ancestors worked are still around, the majority now owned by Indian firms, and many have had their names Indianised to remove their British roots. Unfortunately there was no time to arrange a visit in 2017, but we still intend to do this in the future.
[1] UK and Ireland, Outward Passenger Lists, 1890-1960.
[2] England,
United Grand Lodge of England Freemason Membership Registers, 1751-1921.
[3] Manton, M.G. (2008). The rise of the British managing agencies in north eastern India 1836-1918. [MPhil thesis, SOAS University of London]. Available at: https://doi.org/10.25501/SOAS.00028816 (Accessed 8 December 2025), p15.
[4] For
an interesting article on Early travel to India by A Lane, see https://www.koi-hai.com/Default.aspx?id=726440
(Accessed 04 January 2026).
[5] There
is a personal recollection of a plane crash here in the 1940s by J O’Kelly, available
at http://www.koi-hai.com/Default.aspx?id=726572
(Accessed 04 January 2026).
[6] Fremantle, Western Australia, Passenger Lists, 1897-1963 and Western Australia, Australia, Crew and Passenger Lists, 1852-1930.
[7] Lane, A. Early travel to India. Available at: http://www.koi-hai.com/Default.aspx?id=726440 (Accessed 04 January 2026).
[8] Letters from Charles Ramage Blake to Dr Graham, 18 November 1918 and 10 May 1932.
[9] Kipling, R. (1888). City of Dreadful Night. Available at: http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/rg_dreadful_intro.htm (Accessed 06 January 2026), Chapter 2.
[10] Sanchari. The World Around Me is a Beautiful Place. Available at: https://alltheworldaroundme.wordpress.com/ (Accessed 06 January 2026).
[11] Visit the hotel’s website at: https://www.thelalit.com/the-lalit-kolkata/ (Accessed 06 January 2026).
[12] For a brief introduction on the bridge see, https://wiki.fibis.org/w/Hardinge_Bridge (Accessed 06 January 2026).
[13] Lane, A. Early travel to India. Available at: https://www.koi-hai.com/Default.aspx?id=726440 (Accessed 04 January 2026).
[14] Barker, G.M. (1884). A tea planter’s life in Assam. Thacker, Spink & Co. Available at: https://archive.org/details/teaplanterslifei00bark (Accessed: 8 December 2025), p39.
[15] Manton, M.G. (2008). The rise of the British managing agencies in north eastern India 1836-1918. [MPhil thesis, SOAS University of London]. Available at: https://doi.org/10.25501/SOAS.00028816 (Accessed 8 December 2025), p15.
[16] Griffiths, P. (1967). The History of the Indian Tea Industry. p645.
[17] Manton, M.G. (2008). The rise of the British managing agencies in north eastern India 1836-1918. [MPhil thesis, SOAS University of London]. Available at: https://doi.org/10.25501/SOAS.00028816 (Accessed 8 December 2025), p16.
[18] Barker, G.M. (1884). A tea planter’s life in Assam. Thacker, Spink & Co. Available at: https://archive.org/details/teaplanterslifei00bark Accessed: 8 December 2025), p3; the Latin phrase translates as a healthy mind in a healthy body.
[19] George, A.J. (2002). Human resource management practices in the tea industry: a Gandhian critique. [DPhil thesis, Mahatma Gandhi University]. Available at: http://www.mgutheses.in/page/about_book.php?q=T%201544&search=&page=&rad= (Accessed 8 December 2025), p189.
[20] If you search on Facebook, in particular you will find some photos of bungalow and the tea garden.
[21] ibid, p180.
[22] ibid, p189.
[23] Glendinning, J. (1990). Tale of a Tea Planter.
[24] Barker, G.M. (1884). A tea planter’s life in Assam. Thacker, Spink & Co. Available at: https://archive.org/details/teaplanterslifei00bark Accessed: 8 December 2025), p81.
[25] Thong, T. (2012). “‘To Raise the Savage to a Higher Level’: The Westernization of Nagas and Their Culture.” Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 46, No. 4. Available at: http://www.jstor.org/stable/41478422 (Accessed 19 Dec. 2025), pp. 894-896.
[26] ibid, p905.
[27] Barker, G.M. (1884). A tea planter’s life in Assam. Thacker, Spink & Co. Available at: https://archive.org/details/teaplanterslifei00bark Accessed: 8 December 2025), p127.
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