The eleventh hour
whom had been irregular in his work, and two others who had abandoned it altogether (who) were (therefore) refused a passage on board the ‘Louisa Baillie.’ ” He ordered the Agent-General to procure the lucky men, Mandut Doss, Anoopsing (h) and Govin a place on the spacious, better equipped “Water Witch” increasing the manifest to 47, and to pay the amount out of the immigration funds, directing the Attorney-General to bring the question before the supreme court for the recovery of the passage money.
Replying on June 1 to detailed if “late” queries from the British Colonial Secretary, Lord Stanley, Light estimated that about 60 Indians had chosen to stay in BG, with all but five settling in the rural districts. Officials amended the supposed number of deaths to 98 with another two, (Jummun and Pultun) having “absconded and lost soon after arrival.”
“Several of the Coolies, in their anxiety at the delay in the arrival of the promised ships for their return to Calcutta, wandered about the country, and may have located themselves in places unknown to the magistrates…” Light said.
He noted, “I have ascertained that several of those who have remained behind are purchasers of land and married to or living with black women.” The Governor argued, “Notwithstanding the long delay in the arrival of the vessels above named, the assurance thus given by their arrival, that faith was kept with the Coolies, had a satisfactory effect on the minds of all, and from all I can learn, they one and all of those who embarked, expressed their intentions of endeavouring to return with their families, satisfied that in this country they can be better off than in their own, and more free from oppression.”
ID considers Light’s view of the “selection made of these people at Calcutta” for “the agents seem to have cared little whom they engaged, and knowing from Mr. (Charles) Whinfield, the Sheriff of Berbice, who, from his various conversations with them elicited their history; that they were the scourings of the population of several of the large cities, it is only to be wondered at, that they so readily became industrious, or that so many have survived.”