A curiously unembellished home in Mysuru

An east side view of the Wellington Lodge. Photo by Aravind C

The front entrance of the Wellington Lodge in Mysuru. Photo by Aravind C

The recent coronation of Charles III reminded me of a certain gentleman who lived in Mysuru briefly. Though not British royalty, he was treated with nearly as much deference by his countrymen. His bungalow in Mysuru is one of the city’s oldest residential buildings. In a city of palaces, this building is remarkable for being particularly plain. There are few ornate flourishes and no extravagant adornments. Wellington Lodge’s claim to fame is that Colonel Arthur Wellesley once lived here.

Inside the house, a plaque bears the inscription: “This house was occupied by Colonel Arthur Wellesley, afterwards Duke of Wellington, when in political charge of Mysore, 1799-1801.”

What was the Iron Duke – one of the 19th century’s most celebrated western military leaders, best known for defeating Napoleon, later also prime minister of the United Kingdom – doing in Mysuru, living in a relatively modest house?

The year 1799 was a tumultuous period for Mysore. Shortly after Tipu Sultan was defeated and killed in May that year, the young Krishnaraja Wadiyar III was placed on the throne. Colonel Barry Close was appointed Mysore’s first British Resident to liaison between the new king and the East India Company.

The capital was moved from Srirangapatna to Mysore and Colonel Wellesley was given command over both. It is said that Wellesley built Wellington Lodge around this time to serve as his residence. Of course, it would not have been called Wellington Lodge at that time since Arthur Wellesley was made the Duke of Wellington only in 1814.

However, it is not clear exactly how long Wellesley stayed in the house. He seems to have spent most of his time in Srirangapatna, where he had at his disposal the considerably larger and far grander Daria Daulat Palace for his residence! Perhaps Wellesley occupied the Lodge only when he visited Mysore?

‘Stop-gap abode’

The entry to the ground floor of Wellington Lodge is through a simple porch with plain, semicircular arches. Inside, there is a large central hall, with several smaller rooms leading off, sometimes one from the other. A somewhat unusual feature is a curving passageway that wraps around and links many of these rooms.

The bungalow’s stark, utilitarian-looking exterior reminded me of some early structures built by the East India Company in Chennai and Vellore in the late 1700s and early 1800s. In his book The Royal City, T P Issar speculates that the house was perhaps built as a “stop-gap abode” while the Residency (now called Government House) was built nearby. “The only touches proclaiming its hierarchical status are its size and the two wings of its grand staircase which join at the landing of its east approach,” says Issar.

Wellington Lodge was originally larger than it is now. A photograph from the 1890s shows a large bungalow that looks curiously assembled, as if it had been built piecemeal. The third floor seen in the old photograph has long since disappeared, some rooms were knocked off at some point, as were some adjacent structures.

Other changes are more recent. A few years ago, a ramp for universal access was added next to the grand staircase that Issar had highlighted. One wishes it had been better designed and built without marring the façade quite as much as it does now. Renovation work last year added embellishments where earlier there were none: Decorative wooden eaves now adorn all the ventilators and windows.

The coronation prompted renewed questions around the world about the legacies of colonialism. What is the place of this colonial building in Mysuru? I asked Gouri Satya, a senior journalist and author of several books about the city’s heritage. “It is a historic building. We must appreciate it for its history,” he says.

After Arthur Wellesley, Wellington Lodge housed other British officers including Colonel John Briggs, who was appointed the first Senior Commissioner of Mysore in 1831. Much later, it housed a government school. In the 1930s, it served as the headquarters of the Boy Scouts in Mysore. Since 2001, the state government has leased out the ground floor to the Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Manav Sangrahalaya, which runs a small museum here that is worth a visit. The upper floor is with the Karnataka government’s Department of Archaeology, Museums and Heritage.

(Meera Iyer is the author of ‘Discovering Bengaluru’ and the Convenor of INTACH Bengaluru Chapter.)