The Late Mrs. Sonia John - Obituary

Montage by Liz Chater

This is the full obituary For Mrs. Sonia John courtesy of the Indo-ArmenianFriendship NGO Facebook page.

It is with the deepest regret and with a heavy heart that we announce the sad passing of Mrs. Sonia John, on the 10th August 2020 in Kolkata. She was 94 years old.

Born in Shiraz, Iran on July 2 1926, Sonia arrived in India as a young girl with her grandmother, aged only 4 years old. She subsequently attended La Martiniere for Girls School in Kolkata where she excelled at both studies and extracurricular activities. In appreciation of her commitment to getting an education and her overall behaviour at the school, young Sonia was awarded the "Good Conduct" medal by the school authorities. Sonia later went on to become an accomplished hockey player and captained the Bengal Women’s Hockey Team for many years. She also captained and managed the Bengal Womens' Basketball team, along with many clubs during her career. As a keen sportswoman, Sonia was a fierce competition on the Golf Course as well, winning several titles and trophies. In the 1950s, years after her marriage to Arathoon Mackertich John and after having worked as an educator for a few years, Sonia set up the Moir Hall School in Calcutta. Moir Hall School was her focus and passion right up until her passing, believing education of children in Kolkata to be of paramount importance. The school continues to be one of the most affordable places to get an education in the city, with many pupils from low-income households having studied under her guidance free of charge.

As a multi-talented and accomplished person, Sonia also succeeded in her entrepreneurial skills, successfully running a hotel with her husband for many years. Her "Carlton Hotel" was one of the many Armenian-owned hotels in Kolkata. As a patriotic Armenian and a devout Christian, Mrs. John couldn't be indifferent to matters concerning the Armenian Community of India. She helped activate the Armenian Sports Club and was elected a member of the Committee of the Armenian Holy Church of Nazareth. In the late 1990s, when the Armenian College and Philanthropic Academy, built in the year 1821 was at a brink of certain closure, Sonia John, with the help of certain community members came to its rescue and through hard-fought litigation, secured an order from the Calcutta High Court for the school to be placed under the Management of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin. This act of patriotism and devotion forced her to be even more involved in the day-to-day running of the Armenian College & Philanthropic Academy (ACPA) as well as the Armenian Holy Church of Nazareth Kolkata for many years, taking the position of Honorary Chairperson of the Church Committee, a position she held until 2005. She was also appointed as Manager of Armenian College by His Holiness Karekin I, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of All Armenians, a position she held on an Honorary basis as well.

As Chairperson of the Armenian Church Committee and in her capacity as the Manager of ACPA, Sonia oversaw the successful renovation of many of the properties of the Armenian Community, including the Churches, the old-age home as well as the Armenian College and Davidian Girls Schools, among others. It is not known to many, that the current building of the Armenian Embassy in India was completely designed by her. It was during her tenure as Chairperson that the Armenian Church donated the plot to the Armenian Government and financed the building of the Embassy in Delhi. For her contribution and service, during his official visit to India in 2003, Armenian President Robert Kocharyan awarded her with an Honorary Passport of the Republic of Armenia, acknowledging her tireless devotion to the Armenian cause. She was also awarded the St. Nerses Shnorhali Medal by His Holiness Karekin II, Supreme Patriarch and Catholicos of all Armenians for her extraordinary services rendered to the Armenian Apostolic Church. Years earlier, in 1999, she had been the only delegate from Asia and Oceania at the National Church Assembly of the Armenian Apostolic Church which was bestowed with the mandate to elect the Catholicos.

Mrs John, as one of her most important contributions to social welfare, oversaw the completion of the Armenian Church Trauma Center as well as Sir Catchick Paul Chater ward at the Rabindranath Tagore Hospital, Kolkata, which the Committee of the Armenian Holy Church of Nazareth financed during her tenure. It is here that she passed away having suffered a heart attack.

Even in her 80’s Sonia never slowed down, and one of many of her finest events was the Armenian Church pilgrimage to Hong Kong in 2005 to honour and remember the late Sir Catchick Paul Chater. In 2017, at the remarkable age of 91, Sonia, in conjunction with the Indo-Armenian Friendship NGO, collaborated with La Martiniere for Boys' School in Kolkata to finance the erection of a bust of the late Sir Catchick Paul Chater in the ground of the Boys' School, where Sir Paul had been educated. As always, she was involved in all aspects of the organisation of this magnificent event and was deeply gratified that La Martiniere chose to honour Sir Paul Chater in this way. Not only was Sonia John a former pupil of the institution but had also served on its Board of Governors for many years.
Sonia continued to run her school, attending and teaching there daily, right up until the COVID pandemic crisis hit in March. Life at the Armenian Community in Kolkata would have been very different had it not been for her devotion, patriotism and many years of dedicated service. Her contribution to community life in recent decades remains unmatched.

Sonia is survived by her children, Angela and Paul and grandchildren, Julian, Maria and Noah.

Indo-Armenian Friendship NGO has lost one of its strongest supporters. Her guidance and words of wisdom will be missed greatly. The Armenian Community of India, the Armenian Diaspora and the entire Armenian nation has lost an icon.

Rest In Peace, Mrs John and thank you for everything.

Sonia is buried at the Armenian Cemetery Tangra, Kolkata with her late uncle John Martin.
The tombstone is situated adjacent to another late uncle, Haik Martin.

Further reading about Mrs. John's family, in particular her grandfather, Jordan Martin, and how he was a spy for the British in Persia during WW1, can be found here.

In 2017 Mrs John was the generous benefactor of the Sir Catchick Paul Chater bust unveiled in the grounds of La Martiniere School, Kolkata. View a short video clip of Sonia looking through my private album on Sir Paul Chater and her natural enthusiasm and reactions to it.

How the Armenian Community Prepared for the Centenary of the Armenian College & Philanthropic Academy in 1921

Image: © Liz Chater

As thoughts are beginning to turn to Kolkata’s Armenian College & Philanthropic Academy’s bicentennial celebrations in April 2021, it is interesting to see how the local Armenian community prepared for the centenary 100 years ago in 1921.

With ideas of new premises and a new location for the Armenian College, 1919 was an interesting and potentially exciting time for local Armenian merchant and businessman, Carr Lazarus Phillips. He had a dream of opening an Armenian school in the hills of India; closing the  Armenian College, and selling it off to pay for the new one. We know, of course, that didn’t happen and the school is still situated in the original location in Kolkata. Less fanciful dreams have become a reality, but I wonder how close Carr Phillips got to fulfilling his?

A letter to the Editor of the “Englishman” in November 1919 gave some useful background information:

"Sir, There are few people in Calcutta who know, or care to remember, that in the premises of the Armenian College, Calcutta was born in 1811 the great novelist William Makepeace Thackeray, and to this day a tablet testifying this event is placed by the gate of the building.

Image: © Liz Chater

The premises are, however not only on this account historic there are other associations that gather round so old and well established an institution.  Few people realise that there is fast approaching the centenary of the College, and it might be of some profit to review briefly the past.

Zatoor Mooradian*,(sic) an Armenian merchant, born at Julfa, Ispahan, came to India settling down to business in Calcutta. He met with success and when he came to adjust his final accounts, in for love of Armenia and her sons he left by his will the sum of Rs 8,000 with which to found an Armenian educational establishment. That was in the year 1797. He died in 1799. 

Image: © Liz Chater

Things moved very slowly in those days and in 1821 i.e. 22 years after his death the school was still unbuilt, when another Armenian merchant of Saidabad, residing in Calcutta and also a native of Julfa, Ispahan, remembered that the amount of Rs 8,000 already bequeathed was lying idle.

Image: © Liz Chater

The name of that worthy gentleman was Munazakan Vardan** (sic). In that same year 1821, he gathered together a few friends and compatriots and that meeting was one of the most important in its far reaching effects ever held in the history of our community in India. He explained the crying need there was for an institution where Armenian boys could be educated in Armenian and English.

Munazakan Vardan (sic) appealed for further co-operation, and we have it on record that the little band of patriots, subscribed the sum of Rs 50,000 on the spot, Munzakan Vardan(sic) himself heading the list with Rs 3,000. Among the list of donors, which is still preserved, maybe found the name of Bishop Heber that saintly personage that ruled over the ecclesiastical affairs of Bengal in the years gone by.

The institution this day possesses in invested funds a sum of over 6 lakhs of rupees this money having been subscribed by our own people.  The college has at present on its roll over 150 pupils. Since its foundation the institution has had a very chequered career. The desire of its founders was that it should be a seminary for the learning of Armenian, together with instruction in other languages. For a while, in common with other European schools in Bengal the institution adopted the old Entrance course of the Calcutta University, which is equivalent to the modern matriculation standard. In the early[18] ‘80s, during the Principalship of Mr. Herbert A. Stark B.A. (now a distinguished officer in the Government Educational Service) it was raised to the status of a College, and from it appeared pupils for the then First Arts Examination of the Calcutta University. Later on owing to the wants of funds for the maintenance of a good college staff, the college abandoned the University course, and reverted to the Entrance Examination, but from that time henceforward the institution was commonly known as the Armenian College. Formerly it was known as the Armenian Philanthropic Academy.

Image: © Liz Chater

It may not be out of place to state here that although the present state of the Armenian College is far from bright, it will soon be restored to its pristine glory by Mr. C.L. Phillips, who in conjunction with Messrs. Stephen and Galstaun and other rich Armenians, has drawn out an elaborate scheme for its amelioration. It has been the dream of Mr. Phillips’s life to build an up-to-date college with a number of hostels attached to it at one of the hill stations wherein the youths of the Armenian community as well as those of the Anglo-Indians in India may receive a thorough up-to-date collegiate education in science, literature and arts. His contribution alone towards this great scheme will be Rs 20 lakhs and as has been said, he has other affluent Armenians to support him in his great project.  It is intended to endow the college as well with Rs 50 lakhs and it must appeal to all as a scheme well planned and thought out by the genius of Mr. Phillips.

The present premises of the college in Free School Street will of course be disposed of and the sale proceeds along with its present endowed funds will amount to over 10 lakhs which will be solely utilized for building the college and the several hostels that will be attached to the Institution besides fittingly furnishing them.  I am sure all those interested in the welfare of this old and historic institution will be glad to see the fruition of a great scheme destined to come about in the near future.

Then there will be in India an Armenian College worthy of the name, and worthy of the Armenians who have for centuries past kept burning the torch of civilization in Asia."

However, delving a little further, it can be found that as early as 1892 there were plans afoot for the Armenian Bishop of Calcutta to have a summer palace in Darjeeling. A welcome refuge from the sweltering summer heat of the city. The land had been donated by the generous owner of the Windsor Tea Estate. The palace required the remaining Armenian community of Calcutta to supply the outstanding funds, not something they were keen on, and the project never got off the ground.

Newspapers continue to reveal further developments

28 October 1920

Armenian College Centenary

Revision of Educational Programme

History of the Institution

In connection with the Centenary Anniversary of the founding of the Armenian College and Philanthropic Academy, Calcutta, which will occur on April 2, 1921, Messrs M. Mackertich and A.M. Arathoon manager of the college, have addressed a circular letter to the old boys of the college and to the Armenian community in general. We represent the more important paragraphs, and suggest that application be made to the Principal for copies of the letter.

Messrs. Mackertich and Arathoon urge that the commemoration of so great and significant an event should be not merely “external and transient, but also internal and permanent.” They add that “the development of our loved Fatherland on the lines of a progressive and enlightened Republic, must necessarily lay an increased demand upon the educational resources and national assets of the College; and as the years immediately before us will be years of national reconstruction, the scope and character of the Armenian College must continually be enlarged to enable it to keep pace with the march of events in Armenia herself.” They then refer to the necessity for the accommodation of a much larger number of pupils to whom must be given a higher and more diversified education than has hitherto been within its financial possibilities.

It is proposed also to have a review of the past in the form of a centenary Report, which will recount the history of the Academy, during its hundred years, and which will be a record of the valuable work which it has been done for the intellectual, social, spiritual and national life of the Armenian community. The intention is to compile a list of Old Boys, and to print the portraits of those who have distinguished themselves. They therefore ask old pupils by the 15^th of next December to send them particulars regarding themselves and others.

Messrs. Mackertich and Arathoon also appear for funds. Donations should be paid into the Bank of Bengal, Park Street Branch, Calcutta, to the credit of the Centenary Celebration Fund of the College, or to any of the members of the College, or to either of the managers.

Mr. Herbert A. Stark, B.A., M.R.A.S., one of the best known and most experienced educationists in Bengal, who has been appointed Principal of the College has proposed a scheme of studies and a policy for that institution. Briefly it is this:

1.    For all pupils there should be a sound and liberal all-round education with an industrial and commercial bias.

2.    At the age of eleven or twelve, talented boys should be placed as boarders in the best European schools, at the expense of the Armenian College, with a view to their ultimately proceeding to a local Professional College or to the Arts Degrees of the Calcutta University.

3.    Those of them who should themselves to be specially brilliant, should be sent to England at the age of seventeen or eighteen years on scholarships provided by the College, there to take their Degrees at a British University, or to enter one or another of the learned professions – law, engineering, medicine etc. Possibly some of them may eventually take Holy Orders in the Armenian Church. In any case, some may be induced to take the Oxford or Cambridge Diploma in Teaching, and join the staff of the Armenian College. Thus may we work for the time when our national institution will be manned solely by thoroughly able and proficient members of our own community.

4.    The bulk of the pupils of the school at the close of their general studies, should be apprenticed for three years or so, during the busy season, for instruction in tea, jute, shellac, mining, hides, trains etc. In the slack season they should return to College for specialised studies correlated to the industry they are learning.

Thus, for example, during the tea season the group learning tea would be on a tea garden. During the slack season they would come back to College - subject to a good report on their application, progress and character from the Manager of the garden – and be taught those theoretical subjects which are of importance to the tea planter e.g., scientific agriculture, manuring, draining, insect pests, blight, the tea markets of the world, etc., the groups learning other industries would be similarly death with. 

Finally, the programme for celebration was revealed for the Armenian College centenary on 3 February 1921

Arrangements for the celebration of the Centenary Anniversary of the Armenian College, which falls on the 2^nd April, are well in hand, and include the following items:

On March 28^th there will be an evening garden fete at Galstaun Park. It will be open to the public. It will provide the usual attractions, and also al fresco teas and dancing on the lawns.

On April 2^nd there will be a breakfast for the present scholars of the college and a banquet for old boys. During the day there will be athletic sports on the college playing fields.

Sunday, April 3^rd, will be observed by Divine Service at the Holy Church of Nazareth, when special prayers will be said for the Founders of the College and its deceased benefactors. In the afternoon there will be a solemn procession of priests, choir, pupils, old boys, friends, the managing committee, the Members of the College, and visitors.

The celebrations will terminate on April 5^th with a grand Centenary Fancy Dress Ball (evening dress optional).

The following are the Office Bearers to the Celebration Committee: President, Mr. J.C. Galstaun, O.B.E., Vice-President, Mr. M. Mackertich; Treasurer, Mr. A. Stephen; Secretary, Mr. H. A. Stark, M.L.C., the Principal of the College. Old Boys desirous of attending the Old Boys’ Dinner are invited to communicate with the Secretary.

The bicentennial celebrations may not have a garden fete at Galstaun Park, nor perhaps a fancy dress ball, but it will surely still be an occasion to remember, celebrate and toast to the next 200 years of Armenian education in Kolkata. I know there are many people who are looking forward to the upcoming events in 2021.

Image: © Liz Chater

* He was more commonly known as Chater Moratcan, a renowned Calcutta Jeweller of distinction. His fortune went to this family, causing the inevitable squabbling and in-fighting. I'll write another blog piece on this in due course.

** Although Manatsakan Vardon raised over Rs 3,000 in aid of the formation of the Armenian College in Calcutta, unlike several other community members, he left no further contributions in favour of the Armenian College in his will.

© Liz Chater 2020