Lawrence Samuel Durrell (23 September 1884 – 16 April 1928) was a

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. * British national identity, the characteristics of British people and culture ...

engineer. He was the father of novelist

Lawrence Durrell Lawrence George Durrell (; 27 February 1912 – 7 November 1990) was an expatriate British novelist, poet, dramatist, and travel writer. He was the eldest brother of naturalist and writer Gerald Durrell. Born in India to British colonial pa ...

and naturalist and writer

Gerald Durrell Gerald Malcolm Durrell Order of the British Empire, OBE (7 January 1925 – 30 January 1995) was a British naturalist, writer, zookeeper, conservation movement, conservationist, and television presenter. He was born in Jamshedpur in British Ind ...

Early life

Durrell was born in

Dum Dum Dum Dum is a city and a municipality in the Kolkata Metropolitan Area of North 24 Parganas district in the Indian States and territories of India, state of West Bengal. It is a part of the area covered by Kolkata Metropolitan Development Author ...

, north of Calcutta (present day

Kolkata Kolkata, also known as Calcutta ( its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary ...

) on 23 September 1884, the son of Samuel Amos Durrell and his wife, Dora Maria Johnstone, and christened in

Fatehgarh Fatehgarh is a cantonment town in Farrukhabad district in the state of Uttar Pradesh, India. Located on the south bank of the Ganges River, it is the administrative headquarters of Farrukhabad District. Fatehgarh derives its name from an o ...

, Bengal, on 7 October 1884.

Career

engineer Engineers, as practitioners of engineering, are professionals who Invention, invent, design, build, maintain and test machines, complex systems, structures, gadgets and materials. They aim to fulfill functional objectives and requirements while ...

by profession, he studied in the Thomason College of Civil Engineering (now the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee). While he worked for the North-West Railway in

Jalandhar Jalandhar () is a city in the state of Punjab, India, Punjab in India. With a considerable population, it ranks as the List of cities in Punjab and Chandigarh by population, third most-populous city in the state and is the largest city in the ...

, his son Lawrence was born in 1912. Durrell went on to work for the Mymensingh–Bhairab Bazar Railway Company in Bengal. In 1918, he became the chief engineer of the

Darjeeling Himalayan Railway The Darjeeling Himalayan Railway, also known as the DHR or the Toy Train, is a narrow-gauge, gauge railway that runs between New Jalpaiguri and Darjeeling in the Indian state of West Bengal. Built between 1879 and 1881, it is about long. It c ...

, and in 1920 left the company to found his own company Durrell & Co., Engineers and Contractors at Sakci, which became the industrial boomtown of

Jamshedpur Jamshedpur (; ), also known as Tatanagar, is a major industrial city in eastern India. It is the List of cities in Jharkhand by population, largest city in the state of Jharkhand. With a population of 629,658 in the city limits and 1.3 million ...

. Gerald Durrell was born in Jamshedpur in 1925. Many of the important industrial constructions in Jamshedpur were undertaken by his company, including the Tinplate Company of India, the Indian Cable Company, and the Enamelled Ironware Company, and contractual work for the Tata Iron and Steel Works. Although Durrell purchased a house in

Dulwich Dulwich (; ) is an area in south London, England. The settlement is mostly in the London Borough of Southwark, with parts in the London Borough of Lambeth, and consists of Dulwich Village, East Dulwich, West Dulwich, and the Southwark half of H ...

and was planning on moving to

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

, he transferred instead to

Lahore Lahore ( ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Administrative units of Pakistan, Pakistani province of Punjab, Pakistan, Punjab. It is the List of cities in Pakistan by population, second-largest city in Pakistan, after Karachi, and ...

with his family for supervising contract work. In 1928, he fell ill due to causes which were medically undiagnosed and attributed to overwork. The family moved to Dalhousie for the climate in 1928, but Durrell died on 16 April 1928 of suspected

cerebral haemorrhage Intracerebral hemorrhage (ICH), also known as hemorrhagic stroke, is a sudden bleeding into the tissues of the brain (i.e. the parenchyma), into its ventricles, or into both. An ICH is a type of bleeding within the skull and one kind of stro ...

and is buried in the British cemetery at Dalhousie. Like many British whose families had been resident in India for generations, Durrell worked and socialised with Indians of all professions and castes. On one occasion, according to a story told by Lawrence Durrell, his novelist son, Durrell gave up his membership at a club when his proposal to include an

Oxford Oxford () is a City status in the United Kingdom, cathedral city and non-metropolitan district in Oxfordshire, England, of which it is the county town. The city is home to the University of Oxford, the List of oldest universities in continuou ...

-educated Indian doctor who had saved his son's life was turned down.

Personal life and family

Roorkee Roorkee (Rūṛkī; ) is a city and Municipal Corporations in India, municipal corporation in the Haridwar district of the state of Uttarakhand, India. It is from Haridwar, the district headquarters. It is spread over a flat terrain under the ...

, he met Louisa Florence Dixie and married her in 1910. The couple had three sons and two daughters: Lawrence (1912), Margery (1915),

Leslie Leslie may refer to: * Leslie (name), a name and list of people with the given name or surname, including fictional characters Families * Clan Leslie, a Scottish clan with the motto "grip fast" * Leslie (Russian nobility), a Russian noble family ...

(1917),

Margaret Margaret is a feminine given name, which means "pearl". It is of Latin origin, via Ancient Greek and ultimately from Iranian languages, Old Iranian. It has been an English language, English name since the 11th century, and remained popular thro ...

(1919), and

Gerald Gerald is a masculine given name derived from the Germanic languages prefix ''ger-'' ("spear") and suffix ''-wald'' ("rule"). Gerald is a Norman French variant of the Germanic name. An Old English equivalent name was Garweald, the likely original ...

(1925).

References

Works cited

*''Through the Dark Labyrinth: Biography of Lawrence Durrell'', Gordon Bowker,

Sinclair Stevenson Sinclair-Stevenson Ltd was a British publisher founded in 1989 by Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson. Christopher Sinclair-Stevenson became an editor at Hamish Hamilton Hamish Hamilton Limited is a publishing imprint and originally a British p ...

, 1996 *''Gerald Durrell: The Authorized Biography'',

Douglas Botting Douglas Scott Botting (22 February 1934 – 6 February 2018) was an English explorer, author, biographer and TV presenter and producer. He wrote biographies of naturalists Gavin Maxwell and Gerald Durrell (the former also being a personal friend ...

, Carroll & Graf, 1999 *''Alexandria: City of Memory'', Michael Haag, Yale University Press, London and New Haven, 2004, which contains biographical material on the writer Lawrence Durrell and his family. {{DEFAULTSORT:Durrell, Lawrence Samuel Durrell, Lawrence S Durrell, Lawrence S Durrell, Lawrence S Durrell, Lawrence S Durrell, Lawrence S People from Haridwar IIT Roorkee alumni British people in colonial India Lawrence Samuel