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20 July 2025

Cossanteli: A Greek Brief Encounter, Just Passing Through


General view of the Greek cemetery in Kolkata, 
showing the tombstone of Byron Cossanteli.
© Liz Chater 2025

 

As part of my ongoing project to photograph all the Armenian graves and tombstones in India, I took some time to photograph the same in the Greek Cemetery in Kolkata when I was there in 2017. This cemetery also contains some Armenian memorials, so it dove-tailed nicely with my Armenian graves  project.  The Greek cemetery is very small, holding just over 100 readable tombstones, with several more weather-worn and un-decipherable.  Some have been easier than others to get translated or decipher. The harder ones, I put to one side to do at another time.  

  

One of those in the maƱana pile’ was this tombstone.  Rather sad and forlorn, tucked in amongst all the other rather aging stones was one of simplicity itself. There’s nothing about it that tells the on-looker of the man beneath it. The lead-lettering has long disappeared and what is left are just the indentations made by the stonemason when he was inserting the details of the deceased onto the marble cross. From this decayed memorial comes the following story.  Pulled together from available public records, it is by no means a complete account, but if what I have done here, helps others with their own research into their Greek family history  with Scottish connections in India, then I am simply happy to help.

 

This story is about a tombstone that caught my eye for its ragged plainness. Byron Cossanteli, Greek Consul died in Calcutta, 1926. His grave in the 'barely there' Greek Cemetery is simplicity itself. He was only in Calcutta for a fleeting moment, yet his children and their descendants prove to be anything but conventional.

 

But first, the story starts in Scotland, a very long way from India or Greece.

 

I would imagine that Katherine was in India perhaps as a companion or helper for her half-sister, Agnes nee Spence, who was married to Napoleon Monnier. Agnes and Napoleon had married in Edinburgh in June 1891,[1] he was a 19 year old medical student studying at the university, she was 22 years of age. It was a shotgun wedding; Agnes was 4 months pregnant and had her first child in Scotland in November 1891, a girl they named Gladys.[2]  Their next child, a boy called Eugene was born in September 1892 in Madhapur, India.[3] Another boy, Gordon Edward was born in July 1895 in Calcutta,[4] but both Eugene and Gordon were to die within 2 days of each other in October 1895. Baby Gordon succumbed first on the 7th October and two days later, Eugene also died; both of diarrhoea.[5]  Emile William Lamb Monnier came along in September 1893 and Ivy Aileen Spence Monnier in September 1899.

 


Agnes and Katherine shared the same father, but different mothers. Agnes had been born in 1869[6] to William Spence (a commercial traveller and upholsterer) and Jessie nee Locke. William and Jessie had married in July 1863 in Edinburgh.[7]

 

William Spence and Jessie nee Locke had the following children:

 

William Locke Spence – 1865-1866

Jane Morton Rankin Spence – 1866-1930

Agnes Margaret (sometimes referred to as Marguerite) Spence – 1869-1902

John Spence – 1870-1870

 

While Jessie was still alive, William had set up home with Jane Morton Locke and the earliest recorded birth from this relationship was William Robert Locke Spence, born illegitimate in 1875. Katherine Adelaide Spence (also illegitimate) was born in 1881.

 

Katherine and 5 of her siblings  were recorded as born illegitimate (see Scottish birth records), to William Spence and Jane Morton Locke.   They were:

 

William Robert Locke Spence 1875-1954, illegitimate.  [awarded a C.B.E., and was the General Secretary of the Maritime Union of Seamen]

Minnie Campbell Spence – 1877-1877, illegitimate.

John Spence – 1878, illegitimate.

Stanley Hunton Spence – 1879-1924, illegitimate.

Katherine Adelaide Spence – 1881-1962, illegitimate.

Nora Annie Spence – 1883-1885, illegitimate.

Gladys Griffiths Spence – 1888-1962

Aubrey Spence – 1889-1936

Ivy Eileen Spence – 1892-1972

 

William and Jane Morton Locke did eventually marry in May 1887[8], but only after his wife Jessie had died just a month earlier.

 

 

KATHERINE’S BIRTH RECORD

 

Her half sister, Agnes died in July 1902 in Calcutta of cellulitis[9] and by April 1903, Agnes’s widower husband Napoleon, now an established medical doctor in India, had married Agnes’s half-sister Katherine, again in Calcutta.[10] Napoleon was clearly a very red-blooded young man, because, just like Agnes when she had married him, Katherine was also 4 months pregnant at the time of the wedding.

 

As if losing a sister, and taking on her children wasn't enough to contend with, Katherine was present and watching when her new husband Napoleon drowned whilst swimming in a tank [large reservoir] with a friend, the friend survived. This tragedy coming in June 1903 only three months after her marriage to him, there is no doubt that Katherine, who was by now 6 months pregnant,  would have been severely traumatised as she watched helplessly from the edge of the water as her husband struggled and called out for help.  She attempted to go into the tank to try and save him, but was held back, and sadly, it seems, although efforts were made to reach him, they were only half hearted. It took a professional diver, employed at Calcutta docks to swim in the tank to find him. Napoleon's body was recovered many hours later in the middle of the night. It is difficult to imagine the sadness, sorrow and despair Katherine would have felt at the loss of her new husband; the father of her step-children who were also her half nieces and nephews as well as the father of her unborn child. The family’s grief would have been devastating.  Within a year, she had lost her sister and a husband and had gone from having no children to having to care for four as a widow and a single parent. Her baby was born in September 1903 in Calcutta and named Rudolph Scipio Monnier.[11]

 

The fishing grounds of Calcutta were well stocked, and like many widowed young women in India, Katherine would have been very eager to find a husband. She was a long way from home, with no known family or financial support to fall back on, and she had 4 young mouths to feed; needs must when the devil drives. By January 1904 she had fished, hooked, and had married Byron Cossanteli.[12]

 


Briish Library: N11-10A-400-29

He was a popular and successful Greek merchant and also the Greek Consul-General in Calcutta.  She and Byron went on to have three of their own children. Presumably he also provided for the three step-children Katherine took on after her sister's death, as well as the young Rudolph born after Napoleon’s death. Byron appears to have been incredibly kind, intuitive and fully embracing step-fatherhood. With his commitment to Katherine he inherited a complex family dynamic. Meanwhile, Katherine slipped into a more contented period in her life, enjoying the benefits of a busy social scene and travel that a Consul-General's wife was expected to have.

 


FAMILYTREE OF BYRON AND KATHERINE 
AND NAPOLEON AND KATHERINE

 

Byron and Katherine's first child, a girl called Theans was born in 1905 in Calcutta and was baptised in the Greek Church in the city in 1906.[13] Their second child, a boy called Leonidas, was born in Calcutta in 1910, again baptised in the Greek church[14] and their third child, a girl called Ecaterini was born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1919,[15] Katherine's home town. Byron was present at the birth of Ecaterini which he registered at the end of September that year.

 


How his death was reported in the local Calcutta newspaper.

 

Unexpected bereavement and grief came knocking on Katherine’s door again in 1926 whilst she was on a trip to Switzerland with her two daughters, their son Leonidas was in England studying.  Her husband Byron was suddenly taken ill in Calcutta and died on the 22nd November 1926.[16] He was just 45 years of age.

  

The neglected and forlorn grave of Byron Cossanteli, Greek businessman and proprietor of Cossanteli & Co., import/export merchants in Calcutta and Marseille, as well as Greek Consul to India. 
Image ©Liz Chater 2025

 

He had come to Calcutta around 1902, and like many Greek nationals, started his business life with the well-known and established company of Ralli Brothers. Later, he and his brother Georges started an import/export business, Georges ran the business in Marseille, while Byron looked after their interests in India. He traded from Mission Row, Calcutta as merchants and commission agents and they also had a foot in Hankow, China with offices at 10 Rue Dautremer,[17] and later 38 Poyang Road.[18] After Byron’s death, his brother continued to run the business from Marseille.

 

In the late 1920’s widowed Katherine can next be found living in Harrogate in Yorkshire[19], presumably wishing to be close to where her children were being educated.  When she married Byron in 1904 she took on his Greek nationality. However, in September 1930 Katherine applied for re-admission as a British subject through naturalisation[20] and later in 1934 she took steps to officially change her name from Cossanteli to Cole via Deed Poll[21]. Included in the notice was her daughter Ecaterini. On a separate Deed Poll notice on the same date, her son Leonidas Cossanteli also declared he was changing his name to Cole. Katherine and two of her children were shaking off their Greek connections. 

 


In June 1939 Katherine Cole (was Cossanteli, nee Spence) married for the 3rd time to James Moir at the Registry Office in Hampstead, London[22]. He was a bachelor she was a widow. The marriage certificate confirms her father as William Robert Spence a furniture manufacturer, she gave an incorrect age on the marriage certificate as 48, when in fact she was 57. James was 46, Katherine may not have wanted him to know her real age.  One of the witnesses was her brother, Leonidas Cole.

 

Even though she had inherited a reasonable estate from Byron in 1926, she died in May 1962 in Cornwall leaving a very modest estate of £2,650[23]. The illegitimate daughter of furniture upholsterer William Spence and his companion Jane Locke had led a complex and extraordinary life, encompassing tragedy and joy, enduring unbearable loss but finding contentment. Every sinew of her body challenged when caring for her orphaned step-children and her own children at the loss of her husbands and  their fathers. Cornwall was a long way from Scotland and Calcutta, but in the latter part of her life it was a calm and peaceful place to see out her days.

 

 

In 1938, aged only 19, Ecaterini married Albert George Jiggins. Their first child was born later the same year. By 1941 Ecaterini had a second, with an unnamed man, also a son whom she named Gary. According to Garry, it seems Ecaterini abandoned him and he was left with an elderly couple from Leighton Buzzard who eventually adopted him. Gary became an illustrator and was well known around Leighton Buzzard, particularly because he illustrated a book and album covers for showbiz legends The Barron Knights.

 


 


Acknowledgement: Harley St Auctions.  ILLUSTRATIONS BY GARY RAPHAEL AKA GARYPANTLING were placed at auction here. 

 

Gary suffered a stroke in 1991 following a routine varicose vein operation that went wrong. Six more strokes followed which seriously affected his speech, Gary found himself confined to his bungalow.  In 1997, having discovered his grandfather had been a Greek Consul in India, he launched a nation-wide appeal. He had an article published in Parikiaki a newspaper of the Cypriot community in Britain, and his local paper in Leighton Buzzard also published it in the hope he could connect with his lost blood family. Such was his distance from his mother Ecaterini, he said: “I am desperate to know if I have any brothers, sisters, uncles or aunts…” [24]. It’s unknown if he was successful in finding his Cossanteli cousins, but it is unlikely he knew that his mother’s brother, Leonidas, was Regional Manager of the Ottoman Bank in Iraq, Sudan, Jordan, Cyprus and East Africa in the 1960s.  By 1964 Leonidas had been appointed Hong Kong’s first Commissioner of Banking[25]. Whilst stationed in Iraq, Leonidas had married Gertrude Victoria Warre Yeats-Brown, they went on to have three daughters, unknown cousins to Gary who was completely oblivious to his uncle’s banking career and his Cossanteli cousins.

 

Meanwhile, Gary’s mother Ecaterini married for a 2nd time on the 5th August 1944 at the Registry Office in Taunton, Somerset by license to David Leonard Olds[26], who was originally from New Zealand.  She stated she was a widow, but in fact her legal husband Albert George Jiggins was alive, and didn’t pass away until 1988.  There is currently no evidence of a divorce taking place between him and Ecaterini, and that would suggest she had committed bigamy. Her occupation was noted as a cashier at the New Zealand Club, and this is very likely where she met David.

 

On the 21st August 1944 David was Killed whilst flying. The plane he was in stalled and crashed into the Bristol Channel southwest of Clevedon, Somerset soon after taking off on a flying instruction training flight, based out of HMS Blackcap. He died with another, Lt. Alfred John Hunt. Ecaterini and David had been married just 16 days. His body washed up on the foreshore at Clevedon on 1st September[27], his remains were buried at Yeovilton Churchyard R.N.A.S. Extension, Row D. Grave 4.

 

Ecaterini quietly sidestepped her marriage to David reverting to her Jiggins name after his death. By October 1946 Ecaterini changed her name officially by Deed Poll from Ecaterini Theano OLDS to BRENNAN[28]. (Although she doesn’t appear to have changed it for voting registers, and can be found in 1947 and 1948 still listed as Jiggins). 

 

In 1974 she married Richard Andrew Brennan with whom she lived with until his death in 1988. At this point it is not clear if she and Albert Jiggins had ever finalised a divorce, the legalities of this would need to be explored further and it is not something I have extended my research into. Be that as it may,  Ecaterini died in 1992 in Bexhill-on-Sea possessed of an estate around £397,000[29]. She left legacies to two Jiggins grandchildren by her eldest son, as well as legacies to him, his wife and Ecaterini’s nieces (daughters of her brother Leonidas Cossanteli). There was no mention of her other son Gary and I would think it very unlikely they were ever reunited.

 

Gary died in Milton Keynes Hospital in 2011, of pneumonia, diabetes and multiple cardiovascular attacks.[30] He had been living in a nursing home prior to his passing away and, rather sadly, it was a staff member of Milton Keynes Council who was the informant and the council arranged his funeral, suggesting he had no known family to help with arrangements. There is a Legacy page on this link for anyone wishing to leave a message.

 

In 1997 Gary looked for relations. This is
everyone I've found so far. He would have
been so happy to know he had family

  

Once again invoking the Deed Poll system; this time Gertrude, wife of Leonidas chose to revert back to her married name Cossanteli from Cole in October 1977 she also included one of her daughters in the same notice[31].  Leonidas appears to have organically reverted to his birth name (from Cole back to Cossanteli) during the course of his life but whilst working in Hong Kong he was known as Leonidas Cole. At the time of his death in 2002 in Guernsey, Channel Islands, he was referred to as Leo Cossanteli[32]. Gertrude (Trudie) died in Guernsey at the Blanchelande Nursing Home on the 20th September 2021 aged 100.

 

From one simple, almost unreadable grave stone of Byron Cossanteli, found in a ‘barely there’ Greek cemetery in Kolkata, this complex family history story has been uncovered. Far from complete, there is still much more available to look into, such as Byron’s brother and his family in France but I happily leave the India connection here for those who are interested, and I hope this provides a springboard for anyone searching their Greek and Scottish ancestors connected to India, in particular anyone who has an interest in the Cossanteli name and their family history.

 

©Liz Chater 2025



[1] Statutory Registers marriages 685/5 236

[2] Statutory Registers births 685/5 1310

[3] India Office Records

[4] India Office Records

[5] India Office Records

[6] Statutory Registers births 692/2 403

[7] Statutory Registers marriages 685/5 183

[8] Statutory Registers marriages 644/7 173

[9] BL n1-305-86 burial record

[10] BL n11-10A-163-4 marriage record

[11] Rudolph’s naturalisation application states his full date of birth

[12] BL n11-10A-400-29 marriage record

[13] BL n1-332-12 baptism record

[14] BL n1-410A-4 baptism record

[15] Statutory registers birth 685/1 624

[16] Grave and newspaper obituary

[17] Rosenstock’s Gazetteer and Commercial Directory of China

[18] The Directory and Chronicle of China, Japan and Corea

[19] West Yorkshire, England, Electoral Registers, 1840-1962

[20] Britain, Naturalisations 1844-1990, National Archives, Kew, HO 334/113/18752,

[21] London Gazette

[22] Marriage certificate

[24] Leighton Buzzard Observer 20th November 1997

[25] The Times 20th March 1964

[26] England & Wales, Civil Registration Marriage Index, 1916-2005

[27] Death certificate

[28] London Gazette

[29] England & Wales, National Probate Calendar (Index of Wills and Administrations), 1858-1995

[30] Death certificate

[31] London Gazette

[32] The Daily Telegraph 9th January 2002

05 June 2025

Sarkis Katchadourian: A Flip of A Coin, A Pivot Point, And A Good Magistrate

 A Friend or Brother? They Shared a Love of Art 

 

 

***NOTE: UPDATE TO ORIGINAL POST***

Almost immediately after I published this story, A noted art historian on a Facebook group questioned whether Sarkis and Levon were actually brothers. He added some compelling arguments to Sarkis’s background that currently do not match with that as Levon being a brother. I’m more than happy to add amendments or notes of caution to any of the stories I publish. Genealogy is a moveable feast, and one must always be open to alternative suggestions.  With an open mind, I add a caution to this story. I will however, keep it published, because, although Sarkis himself said his “brother, L. Katchadourian” was his next nearest relative in India on the 1941 passenger list, and he further said he was born in Taurus and was from Iran; both facts are now questionable.


The story about Sarkis smuggling, getting caught and subsequent sentencing in Bombay, has never been revealed until I published it here.  Furthermore, there is a great deal of family history connected to Levon, that may help future family history researchers with their own stories. I have therefore amended the story where appropriate, and urge anyone interested in looking into this further to independently verify all information.
 

 




 

Many know Sarkis as the artist who, amongst other great works of art, reproduced the Indian murals from cave paintings. They are an incredibly important contribution to India history, much has been written about his extraordinary work there as well as Persia.  His wife Vava was also an artist in her own right. This blog isn’t about his work, but more about him and someone he stated was a brother. but was he?

 

In 1937, far from venturing into  the country without a known support network, Sarkis was actually able to rely on someone who shared the same name; Levon Katchadourian. 

 

Levon was a dental surgeon. He had trained in Berlin and Paris and moved to India in the early 1930s settling in Bombay.  He had an excellent reputation in that bustling city, and, mirroring Sarkis' art interest, Levon was an avid and knowledgeable oriental art collector. He possessed a fine collection, acquired over many years, lovingly displayed at his home in Wodehouse Road, Bombay. It included rare stone and wood carvings dating from the 5th century, antique carvings of Jade, Quartz, Lapis, Lazuli, Carnelian, Agate, Turquoise, and Ivory as well as rare snuff bottles of Opal, Malachite, Jade, Quartz, Pekin Glass, antique ivory Netsukes, porcelain and pottery figures, bronzes, copper and brass items, Indo-Persian miniature paintings and Jade mounted plaques.

 

Between 1937 and 1939 as Sarkis was finding his feet in the caves of India, Levon focused on his own career.  Nothing could have been so far removed from art, Levon was planning on attending a Congress Meeting of the Association for the research of Pyrohhea in Copenhagen, and placed notices and adverts locally encouraging other Bombay dentists to participate. Levon was a specialist in this area of dentistry.

 

While Sarkis was painstakingly making tracings to reconstruct the cave art impressions, Levon, his wife Gassia nee Madarentz and their children Quarnig, Wagharsh and Anahit  respectively, busied themselves in local community life in Bombay. Although they were not born in India, Quarnig and Wagharsh originated in Germany whilst Anahit was born in Iraq, their formative years were spent in Bombay where they were educated. The boys attended the Bishop Cotton School, and did well in sports. From his base in Bombay, Levon went on to apply for British naturalisation in December 1937 for himself and the children. He would have been aware that anyone with a German nationality in India at the time of war was usually expelled; naturalisation put the family on the right side of colonial rule.

 

It was Levon that Sarkis noted as his next of kin whilst in India[1], but was he really a brother? Some thirty years later Vava was interviewed extensively by Barbara Kashian Gubbins in New York[2].  Vava recalled Sarkis’ time in India, and referred to Dr. & Mrs Katchadourian as “friends of Sarkis” with whom he stayed with when in Bombay. There was no mention that Dr. Katchadourian was related. Sarkis and Levon actually  had a lot in common. Vava labelled Levon as a friend, Sarkis labelled Levon as a brother. I will leave it up to the more experienced professionals to establish who was right.

 

Whilst still conducting his work, Sarkis held exhibitions in India to showcase the reproductions he was undertaking.  In February 1939 a well received exhibition was held at the Gwalior Archaeological Museum, attended by the Governor of Bombay, Sir Richard Lumley, his wife Lady Lumley and the Maharaja of Scindia. In March 1939 the Bombay Field Club hosted the exhibition at the University Convocational Hall. According to his wife Vava, Sarkis left India in 1939 for a brief time and travelled to Paris. He was back in India in May 1940  and exhibited at the newly opened Exhibition Salon of the Bombay Art Society, in the Sassoon Building Rampart Row.  He also included his Ceylonese frescos as well as  his Persian work. All in all, this exhibition was considered a real coup for the city of Bombay and it enchanted all who attended.


 





He also held an exhibition in Calcutta, and on the 14th February 1941, he took time to renew his passport there  before embarking on his journey back to the USA from Bombay a month later.  However, what is missing from Vava’s interview is a rather heart-stopping moment at the dockside in Bombay. Sarkis had a faltering start to the trip and fell foul of the law. He was booked to sail  on 6th March 1941 on the President Monroe, it was scheduled to depart Bombay and sail via Cape Town and Trinidad to New York and Boston.

 

All passengers were instructed to bring their luggage to Alexandra Port, Bombay the day before the sailing to enable Customs checks. He was not travelling lightly and checked in 13 pieces of baggage, which were packed with his frescos from around the world. However, having filled out the Customs Declaration form stating he had no coins or bullion with him, he then hoped he could get away with deliberately smuggling 56 rare gold coins that he had sewn into the shoulders of his overcoat. This was a flip a coin, heads or tails moment. Could he have been thinking: “will I, or won’t I get away with this?”

 

In Vava’s interview with Barbara Gubbins, she focused on the monumental effort Sarkis made in order to successfully complete the drawings, and rightly so.  What she didn’t draw to Barbara’s attention was the local Customs Preventive Officer in Bombay who stopped and searched Sarkis and discovered the haul of Turkish, Russian and English treasure. Sarkis was swiftly prohibited from boarding, removed from the dockside and kept in custody for two days. A Court was convened on Saturday 8th March, Sarkis pleaded guilty and the Magistrate convicted him of smuggling under the Defence of India Rules. The Chief Presidency Magistrate of Bombay made it clear to Sarkis that he faced either a R500 fine or three months’ rigorous imprisonment. Given his guilty plea, and rather incredibly, Sarkis couldn’t help himself and asked the Court if he could keep the coins “as a provision against a slump in business”.  A guilty man with a whole lot of cheek! Who knows if this was a bravado moment or a genuine request, but the Magistrate, clearly feeling a modicum of sympathy for the guilty artist said that in view of his age, he would pass the least sentence. Sarkis was fined. It’s unknown if he was allowed to keep the coins. 

 

Given who he was, what he had been doing, the extraordinary historic value to the work he had just undertaken, the debt that India owed him for the reproduction and reconstruction of the cave art that would otherwise have been lost, the Magistrate minimised his punishment. A different Magistrate may have had a different view, and it is one of the pivotal moments  that could so easily have changed his entire life direction had he been sentenced to the harsher punishment. He was, by all accounts, a very very fortunate man, and Vava elegantly chose to gently slide over this potentially disastrous  smuggling incident.

 


Needless to say, Sarkis missed the sailing on the 6th March, but managed to secure a place on the President Madison which sailed out of Bombay on the 19th of the month. He arrived in the port of New York on the 25th April 1941, probably a very relieved man.

 


Later, in 1942 Sarkis signed up for US WW2 Draft Registration,  also known as the Old Man’s Draft, he was 56 years old. The application shows evidence he had already undergone an appendectomy operation, as it lists his scar. [3]

 

 


 


Meanwhile, Levon and his family continued about their daily lives.  In August 1941 young Quarnig was noted in The Jewish Chronicle as coming third in the “Best Developed Man In India” competition. An event promoted under the All-India Standing Committee by the Zionist Institute of Physical Perfection, Calcutta to discover the most perfectly developed man and youth in India. Although because of the war, competitors were not judged in person but solely on photographic and anthropometric merits. Just a few days later his brother, Wagharsh, was on the Bishop Cotton School winning football team, beating the Lawrence Royal Military School 5-1 in Simla.  Both boys immersed themselves in school life, drama was popular and  each of them had a part in the school play, Pirates of Penzance with local reports giving glowing reviews. In March 1946 Wagharsh took part in the annual athletic meeting of Tata Sports Club and came 2nd overall in the individual championships; he had victories in the 100m and 200m running and was 2nd in the discus. In January 1947, representing Tata Sports Club Wagharsh took first place in the local provincial Olympic Games, winning the discus competition with a throw of 101ft 217/8 inches.


 

As it’s already known Sarkis Katchadourian passed away in March 1947 in Paris. The obituary in the New York Times in March of that year gives a rich visual of his extended artistic life and contribution. I speculate his widow, Vava would have contributed with facts and timelines, and the last sentence states: “he leaves a widow, the former Vava Sarian.”  No mention of his alleged brother[s], nephews or niece.  The question remains: was Levon a brother, related in some way or just a friend?

 

Meanwhile, Levon’s wife Gassia, passed away in Bombay in August of the same year.  It must have been a very difficult time for Levon to come to terms with these losses so close together, yet geographically so far apart.

 

In 1946 Quarnig had left Bombay and travelled to the United States to study architecture in New York. In September 1947 he announced his engagement to Adrienne Halburian and they married in New Jersey in December of that year.  A daughter was born a year later, but the union wasn’t to last and Quarnig and Adrienne went their separate ways, each marrying for a 2nd time in the 1960s and 70s.

 

Wagharsh continued to live in Bombay and in December 1948 he married for the first time to Anne Louise Smitham nee Morley at the local registry office.

Marriage record of Wagharsh Kachadourian and Anne Louise Smitham in Bombay December 1948. 
BL N3-178-282
 

As an aircraft ground engineer for Lockheed, Wagharsh travelled extensively to the USA as part of his job and can be found on a number of re-positioning or “ferry” flights between the US and India.  His wife Anne had been born in Stoke Newington, London in 1909 to publican parents, James Edward Morley and Annie nee Hiat. Anne had attended Sandal Dene School New Malden, a very small establishment.  In early 1937 she had married Thomas Augustus Smitham, a newly qualified dentist. She and Thomas appear to have lived with his mother, also a dentist, in Dulwich up until May 1939.  Thomas was scheduled to sail from Liverpool to Bombay, in the same month on board the “Britannia”. Although he was on the passenger manifest, his name was crossed through and he didn’t sail. As a member of the Army Dental Corps, he is likely to have been part of the medical professionals who were tasked with assessing the young men who were being conscripted to serve in readiness for WW2, this may well have been the reason for not travelling. However, his wife Anne did sail, and the no-show of Thomas on the vessel was to prove a turning point for them both.

 

Given that Levon was a dentist, I wonder if Anne had found work at his practice as an assistant or perhaps dental nurse of some kind. Co-incidentally, he had started to advertise for female assistants in the local Bombay Times just a month earlier. This would have brought her into contact with Wagharsh.  She returned to England briefly in 1947 and lived with her parents in Sussex for a while before sailing back to India and marrying Wagharsh in December 1948 as a divorcee.  How accurate that statement is, can only be speculated at. So far, I have not been able to find any reference to a divorce between Thomas and Anne Smitham.   The union between Wagharsh and Anne was another short-lived marriage, and by 1954 Wagharsh had married again and his first child was born in 1955 in Karachi, named affectionately after his late mother, Gassia.

 

Wagharsh had applied for naturalisation in the USA in 1949 which was granted, but by 1953, he requested another naturalisation certificate be issued in his new name of Quarnig Levon Dorian. 


 

He and his second wife, Micheline went on to have a large family finally settling down in Mexico.  Wagharsh died there in 1992. His first wife, Anne continued to use her married name of Katchadourian throughout her life and in 1981, when her own mother died in Eastbourne, Sussex, Anne is recorded as executor of the will and living in South Africa. This is very likely where she died.

 

In 1949, Levon married for the 2nd time, in Bombay, to Eliza Alice Berberian. She was Bulgarian by birth, and prior to her marriage in India, had been naturalised as a citizen of Lebanon. [4]

 

Marriage register entry for Levon and Eliza Alice Berberian,
Armenian Church Bombay

They continued to live in Wodehouse Road, Bombay, but it must have been difficult for him with his children all now settled in the USA.

In 1958, when Levon left India for the USA, he deposited a large proportion of his immense art collection with the Art Museum in Delhi.  During his lifetime in Los Angeles it became his retirement fund and from time-to-time, he would have a number of pieces shipped from India to Los Angeles to sell at auction. He is known to have held auctions in 1958, not long after his arrival, and again 1967 in LA, the latter sale was considered one of the finest auctions of arts of the Orient and India in recent times.[5]

 

Passionate, patriotic and pugnacious, Levon chose to live a clean, healthy lifestyle in the USA, but regularly voiced his opinion on the injustices meted out by Turkey against Armenians. He supported and join rallies  and used any means possible to speak publicly at demonstrations as they happened. As an avid keep-fit senior in his 80s and 90’s, he lived simply; eating fresh fruit and vegetables, no meat, beans, plenty of olive oil and brown rice. Coupled with an astonishing, and quite frankly punishing exercise regime, he would get up before dawn, exercise in his home, listen to music, drink lemon juice to ward off germs, jog for a couple of miles, swim, ride his bicycle, do yoga – lots of yoga, then start it all over again. Journalists didn’t quite know how to handle him, his interview style was brash, impatient and distracted, mainly by his persistent daily exercise programme which he never stopped during questions. Lying on his back, holding his knees rocking side-to-side, sticking his tongue out and moving it in circles, or standing on one foot hopping up and down in place then switching to the other foot, all while the interviewer attempted to conduct a seamless conversation.  They came away from him in awe, perplexed and perhaps tongue-in-cheek, wondering if he’d had a bump on the head, or, were they being cleverly manipulated and tested, given the difficulties in getting him to stay on one subject? He confused and tied them in knots but at the same time, made a lasting impression for all the right reasons.

 

Leon, aged 91 demonstrating in Los Angeles 1981

Asked why he was marching on the streets in November 1981 aged 91, he said:

people lazy. They sit and watch the TV, sit in cars and buses. Sit, sit sit! What they ought to be doing is fighting for something they believe in. Why did I picket the Turkish ambassador to the United States for the alleged slaughter of Armenians 65 years ago? Because I had to![6]

 

Levon wrote letters endlessly on the claimed genocide and gladly spoke at length to anyone willing to listen. As he got older, so the urgency to tell his story and get people to not just listen, but hear it, became vital.

 

His second wife, Alice, had been in a convalescence home for some time, she passed away in 1982 in New York.

 

Levon, the art-loving, lesser known name-sake Katchadourian had a fire and life-long passion inside him for truth and justice. He had lived in Turkey, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Egypt, India and finally the United States. He said: “I have seen both my father and brother killed by the Turks. That seems so very long ago now – the flash of a knife, the sound of a gun – even the old rages  [in me] have been mollified by time.  I have seen death. I forget it. LIFE!

 

Life was his benediction.
He lived to 100, passing away in August 1990 in Los Angeles.

 

My thanks to:

Karen de Bruyne

Kathryn Manuelian

 

 

© Liz Chater 2025



[1] Passenger manifest 1941

[2] In the 1973 Spring edition of Ararat published by AGBU. I am very grateful to Kathryn Manuelian at AGBU New York who located the issue for me via the AGBU archive

[3] U.S., World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1942 for Sarkis Katchadourian

[4] California, U.S., Federal Naturalization Records, 1888-1991 for Alice Katchadourian

[5] LA Times February 1967

[6] LA Times December 1981