Last summer a striking bronze statue was revealed on Lake Road near Ricards Lodge School in Wimbledon. It was of Sister Nivedita, an Irishwoman who did great work as an educationalist and champion of Indian freedom. I was fascinated to learn she was born Margaret Noble and was originally from Dungannon in County Tyrone. This is however not the first occasion that an Irish person with connections to Wimbledon and India has had a statue erected in their honour. Has anyone out there heard of Sir Patrick Aloysius Kelly, Commissioner of Police in Mumbai (formerly Bombay)? He was also from Tyrone, raised in an old farmhouse just across the road from where I grew up, in the small village of Kilskeery.
My Dad retired as the Rector of the parish in 1972 and we moved into a most incredible house, an old railway station called Bundoran Junction. It was only about 15 years since its own retirement, a much-loved stop on the Great Northern Railway that got its name from its most popular destination, the seaside town of Bundoran in County Donegal, confusingly about 35 miles away. The house across the road was probably the same age, dating from the 1850s.
We knew this place simply as ‘Kelly’s’. It was the 1970s and it had been empty for quite a few years. Overgrown and surrounded by trees it was a great place for a young boy to explore or hide himself away. In the 80s it would be converted by a local farmer who had bought it some years before and kept cattle in the surrounding fields. It was only many years later when I became curious about local history that I discovered ‘Drumsonnis House’ was connected with someone called Patrick Kelly who became a police chief in India and that there was a life-size marble statue of him there. I stumbled upon this in an old parish history pamphlet written in 1955 by Father Bernard O’Daly. The statue story fascinated me, particularly when I moved to London and found myself living in an area where many people with South Asian heritage had settled. I was fascinated by the culture and made several trips to India but even as the internet age dawned I couldn’t find out any more information about it.
That old ruined ‘Kelly’ house where I used to play appeared to have so many stories to tell. There was talk of an elderly lady being the last to live there and although it hadn’t been inhabited for some time, there were signs of life; old papers, some crockery, bottles and tins – I especially remember trying unsuccessfully to bring an ancient typewriter back to life. The stuffed lion sent back from India had unfortunately gone by then. I also recall a wide sweeping staircase which I think was restored by the owner. I never took a photo of it but on one occasion I did a pencil drawing of it which I later gave to him. When my Mum’s house was being renovated about 25 years ago some of the furniture was stored there and that was the last time I was in it.
This summer I was visiting the area and met up with a local historian friend, Barney McAnespy of Trillick Arts and Cultural Society. We spoke about the Kelly house and Sir Patrick. He mentioned that he was very interested in finding out more about him and the statue. There was also a personal connection, as one of Patrick’s sisters was Barney’s grandmother. That night, I couldn’t believe my eyes as a quick google revealed a recent article in The Hindustan Times and a fascinating thread on Twitter/X.
A couple of tweets later I was in contact with Mumbai author and journalist Dhaval Kulkarni. He kindly dug out several old newspaper cuttings and I saw an image of Sir Patrick Kelly’s statue for the first time. It was a copy of a copy and not crystal clear but I hope very much that before long we might see a photograph of it in its current state.
Patrick Kelly was born in Drumsonnis House on 4 July 1880. On the high ground just outside Kilskeery on the road to Irvinestown. It looks over the countryside to distant Brougher Mountain, a local landmark with its distinctive TV transmitter mast. It was on here in 1971 that five BBC workers were killed by a bomb. Unrelated to this, a few years later a local councillor (also called Patrick Kelly) was abducted and his body pulled out of a lake. People generally got on together around here through those troubled times but occasional incidents like these reminded us that the scenes we saw on our TVs in Belfast or Derry were actually happening in our own gentle country.
Close to Brougher in the glebe townload of Golan, Patrick Kelly’s grandfather was a small tenant farmer rearing a family during the potato famine. His father James became a successful ‘loan fund’ manager, a system intended to improve the lives of the very poorest by lending to them without collateral. He married Rose Anne Lindsay in 1871. She was the daughter of a protestant land agent and their union would have raised eyebrows. Widowed in 1895, she did a remarkable job ensuring the education of Patrick and his ten siblings. One of these was Alice, Barney’s grandmother. Patrick went to Magheralough School and then Roscor, later burnt down in the 1920s troubles. Along with five of his brothers he was then educated at prestigious Blackrock College in Dublin. Patrick captained the rugby team and the brothers were contemparies of Éamon de Valera.
Patrick Kelly joined the Imperial Police Service in India as a 22-year-old in November 1902. With sectarian strife looming in Ireland, it’s easy to see why his options may have seemed more promising overseas. He held various postings at Nashik, Kathiawar, Thane, Solapur and Mumbai. In 1908 he returned home to marry Elizabeth O’Callaghan from Dublin who was working there as a nurse. Gandhi was still in South Africa at that point but would soon return to lead the drive for independence. In April 1919 the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar was possibly the lowest point in British-Indian relations.
What we have learned recently is extraordinary. Sir Patrick, who assumed his Commissioner role in Mumbai in June 1922 was revered as ‘the father of the modern day Mumbai police’, awarded the police medal twice for exemplary service and knighted in 1930. There were stories of his bravery and devotion to keeping the city safe through some very turbulent times. Fluent in Marathi and Pashtu he was apparently sympathetic to independence, perhaps not surprising given the cracks in the Empire already happening in his homeland. The statue was placed on 2 September 1936, three years after his retirement. In a prominent place on the Crawford Market square outside the Police Commissioner’s office, funds to pay for it were raised by the citizens of Mumbai. We believe the photo below, which would seem to date from the 1940s and popped up recently as a postcard on eBay shows it in situ, indicated with a circle on the left hand side. The caption reads ‘Police Offices, Crawford Market, Bombay’.
An account in ‘The Times of India’ reported on the statue’s unveiling by Mayor Jamnadas Mehta in the traffic island facing Crawford Market. He mentioned that ‘It is perhaps the first time that a police officer had been shown such an unmistakable mark of respect and confidence by the citizens of Bombay’. It was prepared by local sculptors, the Goregaonkar brothers who were presented with a gold medal in recognition of a good job. A beautiful garland was placed upon it by the Deputy Commissioner of Police. Guests including many leading citizens who were personal friends of Sir Patrick were accommodated in a huge shamiyana tent, temporarily erected in the main police HQ compound.
In requesting the Mayor to unveil the statue, Mr Behram N. Karanjia, Joint Honorary Secretary of the Sir Patrick Kelly Memorial Committee described the former Police Chief as ‘One of the greatest and most popular Police Commissioners Bombay has ever had’. It was seldom he said ‘that a police officer was loved and honoured in India. Sir Patrick was one of those who had endeared himself to the public and was adored by them for his impartiality, generosity and cordiality. He was a man of sterling character, sweet temper and polished manners. Before he was placed in charge of the Bombay police, the average Bombay policeman hardly considered himself a friend and guide of the citizen. But under Sir Patrick’s influence and discipline he became polite, courteous and considerate.’
Putting up a statue was all the more remarkable at a time that India was striving for independence. It was incredible to learn that Sir Patrick was so highly-regarded and made such an impact on policing in the state. I had imagined that his statue would surely have been removed after independence and very likely destroyed. To understand it had survived, is in safe-keeping and to read eulogies praising his legacy was extremely heartwarming.
So where does Wimbledon fit in? It seems Sir Patrick and his wife Elizabeth retired there. He was a devout catholic and was perhaps attracted by the Jesuit presence in the area and good schools. They were resident at No30 Ernle Road in the 1939 register and still there in the 1965 electoral roll. His son, also Patrick, who became a notable surgeon, lived in the same road at No2. As a baby he was sent home from India with his mother who was expected to die of diabetes. She became one of the first recipients of insulin and lived into her 80’s still taking it.
Sir Patrick’s public service continued in 1938, when as another War beckoned, he was appointed ‘Chief Air Warden of the Borough of Wimbledon’. There is a story in his family that he may also have been involved in some way with the Wimbledon Tennis Championships. Having left India in 1933 he was certainly back in SW19 to see Fred Perry win his three men’s singles titles. If anyone out there knows any more, please get in touch!
Sir Patrick died aged 85 on 13 February 1966 but kept close ties with Mumbai sending a greeting card every year to his successors. This was also the year when the statue was taken down and moved to the police museum where we understand it still is. There was still strong anti-colonial feeling at that time and it was very likely removed for its own protection. A 1965 newspaper report mentions that ‘both ears were chipped off’. Sir Patrick got off lightly, Lords Wellesley and Cornwallis lost their heads and Lord Sandhurst a nose and moustache.
In 1989, police chiefs considered a plan to reinstall the statue in their headquarters as part of the force’s 125th anniversary but this was vetoed by the Mayor and Sir Patrick remains ‘under wraps’. It was though a clear indication of the respect he was held in and an understanding of his part in the development of policing in the city.
In trying to imagine how the place where the statue stood might look today I naturally went onto Google maps. Amidst a predictable modern day maelstrom of motor vehicles, it was an odd feeling to see the main Police HQ building and consider Sir Patrick’s statue somewhere inside. Nearby is Dr Dadabhai Naoroji Road – a name familiar to me. There is a plaque (and a street) commemorating him near where I work in Clerkenwell, London. He was an MP in the British Parliament in the 1890s. Carry on down that road and you come to the waterfront and the giant ‘Gateway of India’ monument. Nearby is the Royal Mumbai Yacht Club where I went on a visit to the city in 2010 to see if I could find trace of an ancestor.
Also in Bombay in the Edwardian era was my Great Uncle, Alan Lendrum, based there from 1907-10 whilst serving in the Royal Indian Marine. He was a sailor with some notable nautical connections and had been round the world several times on Lord Brassey’s yacht so it’s quite likely that he visited the Club. It’s also not beyond the realm of possibility that whilst in this extraordinary city, so far away from home, he met up with someone from his locality. Not only were Patrick and Alan roughly the same age but the father of Patrick’s mother was the Lendrum family’s land agent. From beautiful Magheracross Graveyard, half-way between Kilskeery and Ballinamallard, their ancestor’s resting places look down onto country that they both would have known very well.
Having lived in Wimbledon for thirty years, Sir Patrick Kelly and his wife Elizabeth are buried in Randalls Park Municipal Cemetery in Leatherhead. A twenty minute drive down the A3, it’s a little bit of a trek outside London on the North Downs but this was much-needed land purchased by Wimbledon Borough Council in the early 60s. It’s a tranquil spot, the only potential troublemakers, the exuberant squirrels frantically chasing chestnuts on the day I visited. About as far-removed from the bustling streets of pre-war Bombay as you could imagine.
What next then, perhaps some wider acknowledgment of an incredible life. How within a century, someone from a family struggling on the slopes of Brougher mountain during the famine, went to being knighted and having a statue in one of the most important and thriving cities in the world. Surely this is worthy of a plaque in Kilskeery or in Ernle Road? Its just a short walk from one of my favourite pubs ‘The Hand in Hand’ on the edge of Wimbledon Common and as I sat in there the other evening I couldn’t help wondering if Sir Patrick had cosied-up in one of its snug corners. What memories he must have had, what stories to share. I like to think of how proud that elderly lady in Drumsonnis House must have been, whether it was Patrick’s mother or one of his sisters, rattling out letters to Bombay and Wimbledon on that old typewriter…
UPDATE: February 2025 Early in the year I received a message out of the blue from Chris Madden (above left) who works for an international law firm based in Singapore. As a regular visitor to Mumbai with an interest in history, he was fascinated and intrigued when he came across what I’d written here. He wondered if he might be able see the statue and I put him in touch with Dhaval Kulkarni. A few weeks ago Chris wrote to me with the exciting news that he had seen the statue and has kindly shared photos. He met the Mumbai Police Force historian Deepak Rao (above right, himself a former deputy police commissioner) at the commissioner’s office and was shown the statue. It was in the process of being cleaned but already looks quite wonderful. The intention is to display it in the new police museum which will hopefully open in a few years time.
In putting together this item, my thanks to members of the Kelly family; Barney McAnespy and Stephen Quinn. To Dhaval Kulkarni and Lynda Cazeaux for their research.