Life in Calcutta: Two manuscript diaries.
[Col. Francis Raymond (1854-1945), CIE, Indian Civil Veterinary Department; Principal, Veterinary College of Calcutta; Founder and Principal, Raymond (Govt) Research Laboratory].
Two Autograph Diaries by the wife of Major Raymond, describing her life in India over two years. 1901 and 1902. [Calcutta: 'Traill's Indian Diary', Calcutta.] In two uniform 4to volumes: 'Traill's Indian Diary' for the years 1900 and 1901. Each volume in printed boards and interleaved with blotting paper. Front and back matter in both volumes including a large number of advertisements (covering 32 pages in the 1900 volume), many illustrated with engravings (including a striking depiction, covering almost two pages, of the Britannia Iron Works of Hughes & Kimber Ltd).
The illustrations cover practically everything a respectable household might require in British India, from horsedrawn carriages to White Horse whisky. The volumes are worn and shaken, but internally sound and clean, with the text clear and complete. Most of the entries short and businesslike, detailing the day-to-day life of an English gentlewoman in India. The two volumes end with a total of seven pages of the writer's accounts, casting interesting light on the domestic expenditure of the English middle-classes in the Raj. One section lists meals.
Towards the end of the diaries the writer is in ill health, and in September 1901 she describes how her husband has suggested, after 'a bad haemorrhage', that she go to a sanitorium. She is subsequently operated on for a placenta tumor. In addition to the writing and receiving of letters, attending of 'At Homes', and entertainments including 'theatricals', she describes visiting the plague camp (at Poona?), the women's jail at South Point; accompanying her husband to a conference. Her husband's occupation results in her travelling extensively, and she visits places including Delhi, Cawnpore and Darjeeling.
One of the longer entries (14 January 1901) reads: 'Started 7 o'clock on Steam Launch - we went to Phoenix Bay. Work Shop & saw the Burmese prisoners working. Bought Easel, two cocoa nuts & stands & dancing figure with gong - thence to Chatane - inspected basket making bought nothing saw nothing for sale - thence passed Viper prison which is on an Island - (the prison which is coloured grey & white with the trees on the hillside very picturesque) thence to Elephant Point where Frank inspected the sheep farm - whence round the other side of Viper & back to Ross. Went to Andamanese Settlement saw number of them - they are very small - not more than 4ft high the woman [sic] very ugly - one woman offered the skul of her husband for sale - but it smelt too high - On our return we found Capt Anderson had come back from the nicobars'.
Loosely inserted are a short letter (12mo, 1 p, 5 June 1901) from Major A. Leahy to Major Raymond, thanking him for a gift (of a silver cigarette box, according to the diary); and a printed list (12mo, 1 p) listing the 'houses of the Cooch Behar Estate (that) are available for Tenants for 1903', annotated in red ink. While the author's name is not given, she refers to her husband as 'Frank', and the enclosed letter from Col. Leahy (see above) identifies him as Major Raymond. A note in a modern hand further identifies this individual as Col. Francis Raymond, father of the crime novelist James Hadley Chase (real name René Brabazon Raymond). Colonel Raymond (who was a major at the time the diary was written) has an entry in 'Who Was Who', but it gives no family details.
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