Bangkok
From former colonial splendours of the Raj to whaling stations in the South Atlantic, they are far-flung and fast crumbling outposts of Britain’s centuries-old overseas heritage. The dilapidated and decaying legacies range from mansions and parks that were the pride of India and Myanmar to churches, cemeteries and plantations fading away from neglect on tropical islands in the Andaman and Caribbean seas.
But a leading British conservation expert has now made the economic case for government support to help save colonial and industrial treasures to promote Britain abroad as well as to bolster local regeneration.
“At a time when so much public debate is focused on Britain’s role in Europe, I think we often forget that we built much of the modern world,” Philip Davies, a former director of English Heritage, told The Sunday Telegraph. “Heritage-led regeneration works. It pays real economic dividends. Historic buildings and neighbourhoods are a huge economic and cultural asset.”
He launched his proposal as the government conducts a review of the arts and heritage sectors — and how cultural institutions can promote and enhance Britain abroad — with its new Culture White Paper.
Davies, an author whose previous books include the best-seller Lost London and works on British influence in India, has travelled the world researching and recording Britain’s overseas heritage for an illustrated history of the architecture and monuments of the Empire and Commonwealth.
Several of the sites on the target list for his preservation mission are in and around Kolkata, the erstwhile capital of the British Raj. North of the city, Government House at Barrackpore was once the summer residence of Governors-General and its elegant riverside grounds were long regarded as a pearl of Empire. But today the house is derelict, abandoned since its last use as a police hospital, and the park is a near-impenetrable jungle.
In Kolkata’s terribly neglected former Royal Botanic Gardens, the ruins of Roxburgh House are a far cry from the glories of an 1826 watercolour painting. They are the oldest such gardens in Asia, a site of world importance where the introduction of tea to India from China was pioneered. “Much of the historic fabric of Calcutta is in a shocking condition and requires urgent intervention, and conservation,” said Davies. “The UK experience in urban regeneration could help to safeguard this unique shared heritage generating jobs, skills and prosperity for the city, and opportunities for British cultural exports.”
Myanmar buildings
In neighbouring Myanmar (formerly Burma), the elegant red-brick expanse of Yangon’s (formerly Rangoon) Secretariat building, the administrative seat of British rule and the site of the assassination of Aung San Suu Kyi’s father in 1947, stands empty and abandoned. And the once-splendid teak structure of the Pegu Club is on the point of collapse, rats and stray dogs inhabiting what was one of Asia’s most famous Victorian gentlemen’s clubs.
Rangoon and Moulmein, where George Orwell’s time as a policeman is widely believed to be the basis for his essay Shooting an Elephant, have the largest concentration of British buildings in the region. They were left to slide into ruin by the old junta to highlight its anti-colonial credentials.
In his report submitted to the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, Davies has proposed that an initial £2 million (Dh10.71 million) be made available from 2017 for a pilot fund. The goal would be to conduct feasibility studies and draw up conservation and development strategies.
“People’s perceptions of a country and its culture are coloured by the way in which its global heritage is recognised, supported and celebrated,” he said. “Prominent public buildings and monuments, which symbolise Britain’s shared history with a host country and which are dilapidated and decaying, portray a nation unconcerned about its global culture and influence — a country in decline.”
For Davies, the pitch is both economic and historic. “Britain’s heritage does not end at Dover,” he said.
— The Telegraph Group Limited, London 2016