Hove in the Past: Sir George Everest (1790-1866)

Judy Middleton 2020

Colonel George Everest

attributed to William Tayler,
pencil, 1843, NPG 2553

Although there is no debate as to the date George Everest was born – 4 July 1790 – there is uncertainty about the actual place of birth. This is because his father owned an estate in Wales but baby George was baptised at St Alfrege Church, Greenwich on 27 January 1791. Indeed, a census return gives his place of birth as London. George’s father, William Tristram Everest, solicitor and J. P., purchased the Welsh property in the 18^th century when it was known as the Manor of Gwernvale, Brecknockshire; the house still exists today called The Manor, Crickhowell. Everest most probably spent some of his childhood in Wales, but the family also had a London residence.

George Everest’s mother was Lucetta Mary, and the Everests had six children, George being the third child and the eldest son. It is interesting to note that George’s two younger brothers became priests while George decided on a military career, being educated at both Sandhurst and Woolwich.

The year 1806 was a momentous year for young Everest because not only did he become a cadet in the famous East India Company, but he also found himself on his way to India as a 2^nd Lieutenant in the Bengal Artillery. It did not take long for his superiors to take note of his knowledge of mathematics and astronomy, and in 1814 he went to Java where the governor, the celebrated Stamford Raffles, wished him to undertake a survey of the island – the task took him two years. He was back in Bengal by 1816, and two years later was promoted to Captain. During his time there he improved the navigation of the outlets of the Ganges. In 1817 Everest was appointed as Chief Assistant on a most ambitious project known as the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India.

However, in 1820 Everest was felled by a bad bout of malaria, and in 1821 he sailed to the Cape of Good Hope in order to convalesce in a gentler climate. It is fascinating to note that a certain Mary Doherty was a passenger on board this same ship. She was going back home for a sad reason because her husband, Major Doherty of the 13^th Light Dragoons, had died suddenly of fever in India, leaving her bereft and with two young sons, Henry and Charles, to care for. Her late husband’s fellow officers organised a whip-round to fund the cost of her passage home. The family only arrived in India in 1819, although Mary had been very apprehensive about going there in the first place. Perhaps keeping a journal was a way of focusing on the present and overcoming her grief, and she wrote fascinating details about her fellow passengers.

However, her comments on Captain Everest were not complimentary, and indeed Everest was later noted as being a very difficult character. But Mary did concede he was a clever man, and that his conversations with the missionary were entertaining. On one occasion the two men were locked in an intense discussion about the comparative merits of different mathematical instruments.

It was known on board ship that Everest was recovering from fever and Mary acknowledged that such an illness often left people craving for food. Her acerbic comment in her journal ran ‘this charming gentleman not only wanted more than his share, but he also wanted the best of everything.’ Obviously he was not a gentleman of polished manners. In those days, it was considered unseemly for a lady to help herself at table. Instead, the gentlemen on either side were supposed to proffer her food. Mary once found herself in a difficult situation leaving her half-starved, when seated between Captain Clark and Captain Everest, because both gentlemen ignored her while conversing with the lady on their other side. Finally, she had to beg to change her seat to one on the opposite side of the table.

A particular grouse was when a dish of plums was placed upon the table for dessert. It seems that Everest was very fond of plums and helped himself liberally. The other gentlemen noticed what was going on and prevailed upon Charles, Mary’s young son, to steal some plums – apparently the only child on board who would dare to do such a thing. Even the flirtatious Mrs Davidson never could entice Everest to give her ‘any of the plums or sweetmeats till he had plentifully helped himself’. One day the ship required an urgent alteration to the sails, but the crew was few in number, and all the gentlemen at once rose from the table to assist. All that is except for Captain Everest who stayed seated and drew the fruit nearer, ignoring the ladies.

Mary gave Everest the nickname ‘Ginger Tea’ because every morning his black servant was seen walking about bearing a little pot of ginger tea for his master. Lastly, her comment on his character was that he was the ‘greatest oddity ever seen; he was a radical in principles and always took the opposite side in an argument.’

Everest did not stay long at the Cape of Good Hope and soon returned to India. In 1823 he was appointed Superintendent of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India. It was perhaps Everest’s misfortune that he succeeded Colonel William Lambton who had been very popular with his workers – the same could not be said about Everest who was positively disliked. Indeed in Keay’s opinion, Everest ‘may have been the most cantankerous sahib ever to have stalked the Indian stage.’ He was angry, he was sarcastic, and he was habitually critical, but he was also single-minded in pursuit of his scientific goal.

However, the creation of the ‘great arc’ came at a great cost in both deaths and manpower and the losses were almost the equivalent to those suffered in the waging of a small war. Everest became ill again with malaria and the attack was so virulent that his limbs became paralysed, his skin peeled, he had nightmares, and became delirious. This time he returned to England and spent five years recuperating. But such a man could not be intellectually idle. He transported enough paperwork back home home to enable him to write up the results of his great work so far, besides studying the latest developments in Ordnance Survey, and pestering the East India Company to provide him with more efficient equipment. But nothing galvanised his speedy return to duty more than the news the government was seeking his successor.

In 1830 Everest returned to India, and in 1832 was promoted to the rank of Major. During the 1830s he acquired a house in Mussoorie, which he purchased from General Whish without bothering to inspect it beforehand. It is said that he occupied this house for around eleven years, using it as a retreat, and as a place where he could make his calculations in peace. (This house still exists, and in 2016 it was reported that the Orient Trust was seeking funds to restore the house. In Mussoorie local people are proud of the association with such a great man as George Everest). In 1835 Everest became ill again and was treated with the application of hundreds of leeches, cupping and blistering, besides having to swallow noxious-tasting medicines. In 1838 Everest became a Lieutenant-Colonel.

It is important to recognise that Everest revolutionised the way surveying was done in India. Before he came along, surveying was undertaken during daylight hours, and often during the monsoon season because visibility was better. However, the Great Plains were frequently covered with a dense heat haze, which of course meant that days at a time were wasted. Although Lambton had experimented with night flares, it was Everest who perfected the blue flare; this solved the problem of synchronising two flares several miles apart. Everest’s idea was to use a variation of an ordinary terracotta lamp with the light being provided by cotton seeds steeped in oil. By working at night it was possible to avoid the heat haze, while the men worked in more comfortable conditions during the cool season, and even the hot season.

copyright © National Portrait Gallery
Sir George Everest

by Camille Silvy, albumen print,

28 July 1862, NPG Ax60654

The Great Indian Arc of the Meridian covered 1,600 miles, and it was the largest earth measurement ever undertaken. The work started in 1800 and took nearly 50 years to complete. It meant that the Himalayas could be accurately measured for the first time, and the highest peak measured 29,002 feet. Yet this amazing endeavour soon fell into obscurity, and no statues or monuments were erected for Everest. Today, his name survives in the naming of the world’s highest mountain. It was Everest’s successor, Andrew Scott Waugh, who in 1856 suggested the highest mountain should be called Mount Everest. There was considerable opposition to this suggestion by the British living in India because there was still antipathy towards Everest. A Buddhist scholar came up with the name Devadhanga, which was mentioned in Nepali legend, but was also applicable to several other peaks. Incidentally, the popular story of an excited Bengali rushing into Waugh’s office, saying he had just discovered the world’s highest mountain is simply not true.

On 16 December 1843 Everest retired and came home to England. On 17 November 1846 he married Emma, eldest daughter of Thomas Wing, attorney-at-law, Gray’s Inn and Hampstead The bridegroom was aged 56, being six years older than his father-in-law, and the bride was aged 23. Everest entered family life with enthusiasm and there were six children of the marriage with the brilliant mathematical gene being passed on to some of his descendants. The couple lived in London and in 1861 Everest received a knighthood. He also became friendly with David Livingstone and Michael Faraday. Everest must have had a robust constitution because not only did he survive those attacks of fever in India, which carried off so many of his compatriots, but he also enjoyed twenty years of married life before dying at the age of 76.

He died in London on 1 December 1866 at 10 Westbourne Street, Paddington, and he was buried on 8 December 1866 in the churchyard of St Andrew’s Old Church, Hove, where the gravestone can be seen to this day. But until the 1950s his grave was ‘lost’ to the general public because nobody seemed to know where he was buried. It was not until 1953 when Tom Stobart was making his film The Conquest of Everest that a search was undertaken. Mr Stobart said it took him five weeks to discover the whereabouts of Everest’s grave, the clue finally being provided by the Royal College of Heralds. The opening shots of the film show grass waving in front of Everest’s grave.

Everest was buried next to his father-in-law Thomas Wing who died at Brighton on 12 November 1850. Also remembered on Everest’s tombstone are his two young daughters – Emma Colebrooke who died at Dover on 10 February 1852, and Benigna Edith who died aged four months on 24 January 1860 at Paddington. On the other side of Everest’s grave is the grave of his elder sister Lucetta Mary Everest who died aged 69 on 19 January 1857. It seems likely that Miss Everest may have lived at Hove – in view of the burials at St Andrew’s Old Church. But there is no mention of her in the local directory of 1850 She may have occupied a furnished house, in which case there would be no record of her name in the directory.

Sources

Dictionary of National Biography

Encyclopaedia of Hove and Portslade

Keay, J. The Great Arc (2000)

Mussoorie was George Everest’s Home for a Decade, internet

Mystery of Sir George Everest, internet
National Portrait Gallery

Sunday Times (5 June 2016)

Wheeler, P. Ribbons among the Rajahs (2017) He quotes from Mary Doherty’s Journal stored in the Asia, Pacific and Africa Collection (formerly known as the Oriental and India Office Collection ) Doherty, M. APAC MSS Eur C537

19 March 2020

Sir George Everest (1790-1866)