Landfall at Chandpal Ghat
Participants
- Nathaniel Holt — gave his farewell and walked into the city
- Havildar Pratap Singh — presented himself with the Magistrate's compliments
- Freddy Cavendish — settled the party's lodging on his cousin's estate
- Elizabeth Ashby — named Blacktown as her family's home
- Adrien de Montferrand — asked after the French settlement upriver
- Emma Wentworth
- Georgiana Wentworth
- Katherine Ward
- Thomas Wyndham
Summary
On the morning of Saturday 8 October 1814, after five weeks at sea and two of them battened below decks in monsoon rain, the party came ashore at Chandpal Ghat in a downpour. A Company pilot had taken the helm at the river mouth to work the Hooghly’s shifting James and Mary sands, steering past the standing masts of ships that had not managed it.
Two things happened on the landing steps within minutes of each other, and both read as ordinary business. Holt made a brief and theatrical farewell speech and walked into the city. Havildar Pratap Singh came through the crowd of coolies and palanquin bearers in East India Company uniform, presented the compliments of the District Magistrate, and offered himself as guide and liaison.
Context
Their names entered a clerk’s register the moment they landed — the mechanism by which Calcutta catalogues a newcomer inside forty-eight hours. See Scene 02 Chandpal Ghat for the prepared shape of the scene.
Outcome & Consequences
- Nathaniel Holt left the party, leaving unpaid the apology he owed the Wentworth sisters, the drinks owed to Thomas on a lost duel, and an unacknowledged debt to Georgiana for two patchings in one day. He is an NPC somewhere in Calcutta.
- Havildar Pratap Singh was accepted without a probing question and made himself indispensable inside an hour: porters, palanquins, lodging, and an open offer to get the party anything it needed or out of anything it got into.
- When Ashby mentioned her family lived in Blacktown, Pratap Singh understood her parentage instantly and said nothing. No European present registered it.
- Adrien established that a French settlement lies some twenty miles north of Calcutta, under British occupation.
- The party chose the Cavendish estate over Company quarters, holding the latter in reserve.
- Ashworth’s name reached them first as a kindness — directly against Pew’s warning at Suez.
Relationships
- Located at Chandpal Ghat — The principal European landing place in Bengal
- Participated in Havildar Pratap Singh — Introduced himself here and was accepted as the party's escort
- Participated in Nathaniel Holt — Left the party on the landing steps with three debts unpaid
- Participated in Charles Ashworth — The escort arrived bearing the District Magistrate's compliments — Ashworth's name reached the party as a courtesy