Landour, Greater Mussoorie Part 2 (July 2024)

Part 1, explored the charms and history of Rokeby Manor, the hotel I was staying in. I was now ready to explore Landour, of which there are two parts: the cantonment area (where my hotel is) that is higher up and the lower level municipal town.

The Chukker

The Chukker (circuit or loop) is a 3 kilometer motorable road that circles around the Landour cantonment area, forming the number 8 and is also referred to as the infinity loop. Most sites of interest in the cantonment lies on this road (including the Rokeby Manor hotel and the Bothwell Bank cottage that I described in the previous post). The trail itself is green and beautiful:

You can see stunning vistas around the trail:

I began the journey in the clockwise direction from Rokeby. For anyone staying on a property in the Chukker, it makes sense to start the perambulation from the place of stay. However, for those not residing within the Chukker, the best place to begin is clockwise from Saint Paul's Church, which was my first stop. The church and the adjacent Chaar Dukaan, form one base of the 8 shaped loop.

I began my walk admiring the rather haunted look of the Log Cabin, the only part of the Rokeby Manor that is visible from the Chukker:

Chukker Stop 1: Saint Paul's Church

The first landmark on the clockwise circuit from Rokeby Manor is Saint Paul's Church:

The history of Landour is closely tied to Fredrick Young, an Irish army officer serving the British East India Company. It's strange to think of corporations running armies, but even today, the Russian giant Gazprom maintains a mercenary force. Young came to India in 1801 as a trainee with the East India Company at the young age of 15. In 1814, he arrived in Dehradun as part of the British contingent fighting the Nepalese. Captured as a prisoner of war, he accumulated significant local knowledge while intermingling with the locals.

When in 1815, the British eventually annexed the area, including Mussoorie, Captain Young, now a freed man, rose through the ranks due to his impressive understanding of the region. In fact, Fredrick Young created the first Gurkha military unit of the East India Company enlisting the Nepalese prisoners of war, whose bravery he had come to admire when he was their prisoner. Promoted to a colonel, Young stayed in the area for three decades and became the de facto "King of Doon" before being transferred to Eastern India. He eventually retired as a General and returned to his native Ireland. One can only wonder what life back in Ireland seemed like to him after spending most of his life in the hills of Doon Valley.

It was Fredrick Young who established the Greater Mussoorie area as a resort town for the British in 1825 by building a mansion that lies in lower Landour. By the time Saint Paul's Church was consecrated in 1840, thanks to Young's sponsorship, the area had a substantial western population (Europeans and Americans, apart from the British) . The family of Pahadi Wilson, whom we encountered in the previous post was closely associated with this church. His youngest son, Henry was baptized here and the wedding of his second son, Charlie with a British woman named Clara occurred here.

The grounds of the church are unkempt, though the current owner of the Rokeby, funded its renovation in 2008:

In October 1859, a gentleman called Christopher married Mary Jane Doyle, a widow with three children at this church. Christopher, who was the postmaster of the Landour Cantonment Post Office, was a widower with three young children of his own! Not long after their wedding, in 1863, the couple moved to Nainital. In 1875, the couple had an illustrious son, christened Edward James Corbett, known worldwide as Jim Corbett! Hence, Jim Corbett has a connection with Landour and St. Paul's Church through his father Christopher William Corbett! More recently, the late actor Tom Alter got married here in 1977.

Chukker Stop 2: Chaar Dukaan

Continuing the journey around the Chukker, the next stop was Chaar Dukaan, which is adjacent to Saint Paul's Church, whose steeple you can see in the picture below behind the Tip Top Tea Shop on the extreme right:

Though the literal translation of Chaar Dukaan is four shops, I counted 6 shops (one is opposite to the row of shops in the picture), an outlet of State Bank of India and a post office. The name harks from a time when there truly were just four shops that were established in the 1840s to cater to the needs of the westerners. The saying chaar dukaan and 24 makaan is a pithy description of what lies around the Chukker. I got habituated to snacking at the Himgiri Cafe. I do not find the milk and sugar laden tea and coffee of Northern India appetizing, nor do I find the presence of stray dogs and monkeys reassuring while I am eating. But I did find their pakoras to be very nice. If you are staying in upper Landour, the existence of Chaar Dukaan is an utilitarian blessing but it is puzzling to me on why this would be a tourist attraction!

Chukker Stop 3: the sanatorium

In 1827, two years after Fredrick Young built his mansion in lower Landour, the British set up a sanatorium in upper Landour for wounded British soldiers and established the cantonment character of this part of Landour. Fredrick Young, who was effectively running the show in the Doon Valley, had lobbied the British administration for building the sanatorium here, much as politicians lobby industrialists for locating factories in their constituencies. In fact, Landour's post office (currently in Chaar Dukaan) was also on account of Fredrick's Young's lobbying the East India Company that nothing would be more salubrious than letters for the sanatorium inmates! The facility is now owned by the Department of Defense:

As is true for most buildings around the Chukker, not much can be seen from the road:

Hill stations in British India were commonly established to house sanitaria, providing the English an escape from the tropical heat and diseases. The Mussoorie-Landour area was no exception. Beyond serving as convalescent stations, these hill stations evolved into resort towns where the British could replicate their home country social customs, free from the judgmental eye of the locals. While places like Simla and Darjeeling functioned as both social hubs and government centers, Mussoorie and Landour were purely leisure retreats for civilians and military personnel alike. After the Sepoy Mutiny of 1857, Landour, like other hill stations, saw an influx of Europeans fleeing the plains for the relative safety of these areas with fewer natives. Upper Landour was so racially exclusive that even Indian princes allied with the British did not build mansions here.

Chukker Stop 4: Lal Tibba

Walking further along one comes across the well-known tourist attraction Lal Tibba (Red Hill), which is an observation point:

From the top of the cafe you can see spectacular views of the mountains:

During the monsoons, the views from Lal Tibba is a cat and mouse game with the mist, with the atmospheric conditions changing by the hour.

Chukker Stop 5: the residences

The Chukker trail is home to the mansions built by the British, Scottish and Irish expatriates, some of which continue to be private residences of the ultra-wealthy. The name of the homes reflect the nostalgia of their original owners for their home country. It is not always apparent to a casual observer which home is a private home and which one is run as a hotel. For instance, the Shamrock Cottage (see below) like the Bothwell Bank House that I peeked into in the previous post is run by the Rokeby Manor hotel:

While the homes are not visible to the public, the little glimpses you can see from the road provide clues to the size of these estates. For instance, the peripheral view below of the private residence with its blue picket fences tickles our imagination on how large the estate is likely to be:

Unlike the home with the blue picket fences, the Parsonage with its white ones, is most clearly visible from the trail. The home is named after Emily Bronte's home in Yorkshire, with whom, quite appropriately, the owner, the Bengali actor Victor Banerjee shares a birthday:

While the homes themselves are mostly not visible, the humorous signs at the gates are part of the charm of the Chukker. Next to the Parsonage is a very tall tree and just below the Tibetan flags (not visible in the picture and you have to be looking for it in real life), Victor Banerjee warns Beware of rabid thespian.

My personal favorite was the one below on a home further down when you walked towards the Landour Bakehouse (covered in the next post):

Chukker Stop 6: the cemetery

If you are squeamish about stray dogs and monkeys, a walk along the Chukker is not for you. But if you are ok with them, you then may want to reckon how you feel about ghosts because just a short walk ahead from the Parsonage you walk through a cemetery.

Nothing in life is as guaranteed as death and taxes. Sure enough, the British felt the need for a cemetery, a short time after they settled in the Greater Mussoorie area, when they had to bury one Sir C Farrington by the roadside in 1826. Two cemeteries were established subsequently-one in Landour in 1828 and the other, in 1829, at Camel's Back road in Mussoorie. The Landour cemetery exists on both sides of the Chukker road-one below the road and one above. Regarding the cemetery below the road, you have to strain your eyes as you peer down to see gravestones (they may not be visible to you in the picture below) and if you are sufficiently valiant, you can hike down for a closer look (I was not!) :

The cemetery above the road is gated, though easily accessible:

Historically, the cemetery above the road was for protestants and below the road for Catholics. But since the top side is full now, all burials occur below.

In this interview, Victor Banerjee mentions that Ruskin Bond was a regular guest at the Parsonage but avoided the cemetery when he went home at night. This is surprising because Bond famously discovered John Lang's grave in Camel's Back cemetery in 1964. Perhaps the intrepid grave discoverer became more cautious in his later years or perhaps he reckoned the ghosts only come out at night! Interestingly, John Lang is best remembered in India for his unsuccessful defense of the Rani of Jhansi in 1854 against the East India Company's land seizures under the notorious Doctrine of Lapse. In 2014, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi gifted the original petition to his Australian counterpart during a state visit.

This brings me to the end of Part 2 of these Landour chronicles. Click here for reading the next installment.