Judy Middleton 2020
 |
| copyright © National Portrait Gallery
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 18th
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 2nd
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 13th
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.
 |
| copyright © J.Middleton This photograph of St Andrew’s Old Church was taken in 2009. |
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.
 |
| copyright © J.Middleton Sir George Everest (central gravestone) |
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
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
Copyright © J.Middleton 2020
page layout by D.Sharp
page layout by D.Sharp