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Hemangini Bonnerjee
‐
Bengali woman who settled in Croydon, London in the late nineteenth century with her family of children
Other names
Hemangini Motilal
Place of birth
Date of arrival to Britain
Location(s)
8 Bedford Park
Croydon
CR0 2BS
United Kingdom
Place of death
Calcutta (Kolkata), India
Date of time spent in Britain
1874–5, 1888–1906
About
Hemangini Bonnerjee, the daughter of Nilmoni Motilal, was married to Woomes Chunder Bonnerjee in 1859 and had nine children. Born and raised in Bengal, Hemangini travelled frequently between England and India for their children’s education. In 1874 Hemangini accompanied her 4-year-old son Shelley, 3-year-old daughter Nolini and 18-month-old Susie to be educated in Britain. Unbeknownst to Hemangini she was pregnant at the time and gave birth to her fourth child, Kalikrishna, in December 1874 in England. Hemangini and her children stayed initially with a retired army man, Colonel Wood, and his family in Anerley, south London. They introduced Hemangini to the Plymouth Brethren Christian Church, of which she became a member, although she returned to India in 1875.
In 1888 Hemangini settled permanently in London with all her children, including Janaki, who wrote a memoir about her childhood. Although Hemangini had very little education herself, she supported all her children in their education. In about 1890, the Bonnerjees bought a large house, 8 Bedford Park, Croydon, Surrey, which they named 'Kidderpore'. W. C. Bonnerjee died in 1906 and Hemangini returned to India after his death. She died in Calcutta in 1910 but her name was recorded in memory on her husband’s gravestone in Queen’s Road Cemetery, Croydon.
Burton, Antoinette, Dwelling in the Archive: Women Writing House, Home, and History in Late Colonial India (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003)
Majumdar, Janaki Agnes Penelope, Family History, ed. and introduction by Antoinette Burton (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003)
Mukherjee, Manicklal, W. C. Bonnerjee: Snapshots from His Life and His London Letters (Calcutta: Deshbandhu Book Depot, 1944)
Stearn, Roger T., 'Bonnerjee, Woomes Chunder (1844–1906)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (Oxford University Press, 2004) [https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/76337]
1891 Census of England and Wales
England and Wales National Probate Calendar, London, 1910
Image credit
© Remaking Britain: South Asian Connections and Networks, 1930s – present
