Dum Dum

Dum Dum
[[Image:|250px| ]]
Presidency: Bengal
Coordinates:	22.62°N 88.42°E
Altitude:	11 m (36 ft)
Present Day Details
Place Name:	Dum Dum
State/Province:	West Bengal
Country:	India
Transport links
Eastern Bengal Railway

Dum Dum was a British cantonment town north of Calcutta that now constitutes a suburb of that city. It was the headquarters of the Bengal Artillery until this transferred to Meerut in 1853. There were only artillery troops stationed at Dum Dum until the end of the end of the second Sikh War (c 1849), when other regimental troops were additionally garrisoned there.

Related articles

• Ordnance Department

Churches

• St Stephen (Anglican). This church is now the location of St Stephen's School.
• St Patrick's Church (Roman Catholic). Built in 1823, partly with the help of Irish Fusiliers, partly by contribution from Kolkata Catholics led by Mr. Joseph Baretto; initially intended for Irish soldiers stationed at Dum Dum with resident military chaplain.

The Bengal Artillery and ammunition factory

The Bengal Artillery were at Dum Dum from 1775 and an ammunition factory was established in 1846.

Bandopadhyay's History of Gun and Shell Factory, Cossipore: Two Hundred Years of Ordnance Factories Production in India explains that the small arms cartridges known as 'Dum Dum' bullets were made at the Dum Dum factory and that the pre-Indian Mutiny trouble regarding greased cartridges started in this area. By 1858, the workshops at Dum Dum had merged to become the Cartridge and Precision Cap factory.
Also see HIS Kanwar's Memories of Dum Dum, refer Historical books online, below.

See also page 'Dum Dum Gun Carriage Factory' - for further information

Dum Dum fever

Dum Dum fever is the disease visceral Leishmaniasis, also known as Kala-azar, or Black fever, spread by sandflies, which has many features in common with chronic malaria, and at one time was prevalent at Dum Dum. The disease was subsequently named after William Leishman, a doctor in the Royal Army Medical Corps who published his findings in 1903, based on post mortem pathology of a British soldier who had died while stationed at Dum Dum.

Second World War

There was an RAF Base at Dum Dum during WW2. It is now an Indian Air Force Station in Western Air Command and Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose International Airport, which serves nearby Kolkata

External links

• Dum-Dum Imperial Gazetteer
• Image: Cabul Monument and Mass House, Head Quarters, Bengal Artillery, Dum Dum. 1845. Edmund Walker, artist. With memorial wording at the foot of the image. Possibly title should read Mess House. Brown University Library Digital Repository.
• Photograph: Dum Dum Church [St Stephen's] by Captain R. B. Hill 1850s. Metropolitan Museum of Art New York. Probably Richard Barton Hill 1835-1873, who joined the Bengal Army in 1853.
• Photograph: St. Patrick's Church, Dumdum Cantonment, Kolkata panoramio.com, now archived.
• Ordnance Factory Dum Dum: History
• Dum Dums Dum Dum bullets. thegunzone.com, now an archived web page.
• RAF Stations- Letter D Scroll down to RAF Dum Dum. Lists the main units based there during WW2

Historical books online

• "Mofussil Stations: No IX Barrackpore and Dum Dum" page 17 The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Miscellany, Volume 13, New Series January-April 1834. Google Books.

"East India Stations No. IX: Dum Dum", page 166 ‪The Saturday Magazine‬, Volume 8 1836. ‪Google Books. Taken from the Asiatic Journal and Bishop Heber’s Journal.‬‬

• "Dum Dum" page 151, Volume I, First impressions and studies from nature in Hindostan; embracing an outline of the voyage to Calcutta, and five years residence in Bengal and the Doab, from MDCCCXXXI to MDCCCXXXVI by Thomas Bacon, Lieut. Of the Bengal Horse Artillery 1837 Archive.org
• "Dum Dum", page 350 Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Inquire into the Sanitary State of the Army in India : with Abstract of Evidence, and of Reports Received from Indian Military Stations 1864 Archive.org
• "Dum Dum" page 156 Thacker's Guide to Calcutta (1906) by Rev W.K. Firminger. a noted historian. Archive.org
• "Dum-Dum" page 231 Bengal District Gazetteers - 24 Parganas by L S S O'Malley. Indian Civil Service. 1914 Archive.org, Digital Library of India Collection.
• "Memories of Dum-Dum" page 35, Bengal, Past and Present Volume 26, 1923 Archive.org, Digital Library of India Collection.
• "A forgotten Graveyard at Dum Dum" by J G Brooker pages 34-36 Bengal, Past and Present Vol. 46 1933 July-Dec. Archive.org. List of names on ruinous tombstones in 1904, subsequently demolished.
• "Memories of Dum Dum" by HIS Kanwar pages 93-109 Bengal Past and Present, Vol. 80 January-June 1961. Archive.org