Indian Antiquary Vol 61

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Charles E A W Oldham, S Krishnaswami Aiyangar, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarka
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 46

38
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(FEBRUARY, 1.
Nicobar. The name has been Nicobar since at least 1560. The fanciful story of the taile is repeated by the Swede Kjoeping as late as 1647.
In the seventeenth century at least, and probably much earlier, as Haensel speaks of pater =sorcerer, and Pere Barbe of deos and reos=God as survivals of Portuguese missionaries, the Nicobars began to attract the attention of a variety of missionaries. As early as 1688 Dampier mentions that two (probably Jesuit)" fryers " had previously been there "to convert the Indians." Next we have the letters (in Lettres Édifiantes) of the French Jesuits, Faure and Taillandier, in 1711. And then in 1756 the Danes took possession of the islands to colonise, the previous possession being a shadowy French one, but employed the wrong class of men sent by the Danish East India Company. The colony, affiliated to Tranquebar, had perished miserably by 1759. The Danes then in 1759 invited the Moravian Brethren to try their hands at conversion and colonisation, and thus in due time commenced the Moravian (Herrnhuter) Mission which lasted from 1768 to 1787. It did not flourish and the Danish East India Company losing heart, withdrew in 1773 and left the missionaries to a miserable fate. In 1778, by persuasion of an adventurous Dutchman, William Bolts, the Austrians appeared, but their attempt failed in three years. This offended the Danes, and from 1784 till 1807 they kept up a truly wretched little guard in Nancowry Harbour. In 1790 and 1804 fresh attempts by isolated Moravian missionaries were made. From 1807 to 1814 the islands were in English possession during the Napoleonic wars, and were then handed back by treaty to the Danes. During this time an Italian Jesuit arrived from Rangoon, but soon returned. In 1831 the Danish pastor Rosen from Tranquebar again tried to colonise, but failed for want of support and left in 1834, and by 1837 his colony had disappeared, the Danes officially giving up their rights in the place. In 1835 French Jesuite arrived in Car-Nicobar (where the Order claim to have succeeded 200 years previously) and remained on in great privation in Teressu, Chowra and elsewhere till 1846, when they too disappeared. In 1845 the Danes sent Busch in an English ship from Calcutta to resume possession, who left a good journal behind him, and in 1846 the scientific expedition in the Galathea with a new and unhappy settlement scheme. In 1848 they formally relinquished sovereignty and finally removed all remains of their settlement. In 1858 the Austrians again arrived scientifically in the Novara with a scheme for settlement which came to nothing. In 1867 Franz Maurer, an officer, strongly advised the Prussian Government to take up the islands, but in 1869 the British Government, after an amicable conversation with the Danish Government, took formal possession, and established in Nancowry Harbour, under that at the Andamans, a Penal Settlement which was withdrawn in 1888. In 1886, the Austrian corvette Aurora visited Nancowry and produced a Report and also a series of well-illustrated articles by its surgeon, Dr. W. Svoboda. At present there are maintained native agencies at Nancowry Harbour and on Car-Nicobar, both of which places are gazetted ports. At Car-Nicobar is a Church of England mission station under a native Indian catechist attached to the Diocese of Rangoon; the only one that has not led a miserable existence. The islands since 1871 have been included in the Chief Commissionership of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
The long story of the European attempts to colonise and evangelise such a place as the Nicobars is a reoord of the extreme of useless suffering that merely well-intentioned enthusiasm and heroism can infliot, if they be not combined with practical knowledge and a proper equipment. Nevertheless, the various missions have left behind them valuable records of all kinds about the country and its people : especially those of Haensel (1779-1787, but written in 1812), Rosen (1831-1834), Chopard (1844), Barbe (1846). Scattered English accounts of the islands are also to be found in many books of travel almost continuously from the sixteenth century onwards.
(To be continued.)