Penang | Pulau Pinang - Colonial past : journeymalaysia.com

Pulau Pinang (Penang)

Please click on map above to link to a larger interactive map of georgetown

Fort Cornwallis

Entrance into the fort

Light had his men build a wooden stockade within the clearing. Later convicts were put to work on a construction of a fort on the same site. Light named the fort after the Governor-General of the EIC - Charles Cornwallis. The total cost of the fort amounted to 67,000 Spanish Dollars in 1793. Early pictures of the Fort showed a moat surrounding the fort walls and also a number of buildings within the compound. A small group of Europeans resided within the walls whilst the Sepoys lived in Attap huts just outside of the fort.The moat was filled in a century ago due to the escalating problem with malaria in the area.

Today, the Chapel, the cells, gunpowder magazine and a few cannons remains at the fort. The tiny chapel I had its first recorded consummation of marriage in 1799 when Sir Francis Light's widow, Martina Rozells was wed to Mr John Timmers.

The cell was built in 1811 and was formerly used as barracks to house artillery and later converted to cell rooms. These cell rooms are currently used to house a little museum.

The Gunpowder Magazine was added in 1814, and was built to store explosives. Next to this are the cannons. The most noted of cannons is the Seri Rambai Cannon.

This cannon was initially presented to the Sultan of Johor by the Dutch. If you look closely, you will just make out Dutch East India Company's seal, VOC inscribed on the cannon. However, later the invading Achehnese confiscated the cannon and gave it away to the Sultan of Selangor. Eventually the Madras Native Infantry seized Seri Rambai and brought it to Penang. The cannon still sits at a vantage point, facing the open ocean, seemingly lying in wait for a resurrection of days gone.

Admission Fee:

Adult RM3.00

Child RM2.00 (3years - 11years old)

Operating Hours:

Everyday 8.30am - 6.30pm

Georgetown's Past into Present

Francis Light planned the original colonial town spanning out from Fort Cornwallis. The early commercial centre was laid out along Lebuh Light, Beach Street (Lebuh Pantai), Chulia Street and Pitt Street (Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling). Lebuh Light was reserved for offices homes and public buildings. The State Assembly Buildings (formerly Police Recorder's Courts and Magistrate Courts) , the Immigration Building, City Hall, Town Hall (originally the social venue for Penang's European Community - consisting of a Ballroom with adjoining supper rooms), The Supreme Court and a little further away, the Convent of the Holy Infant Jesus.

Convent Light Street

Also known as the Convent Light Street, Convent of Holy Infant Jesus was started by 3 French Nuns in 1852. Within the confines of its walls is the Francis Light Bungalow built in 1790. The bungalow was later leased out to the East India Company in 1803 for the Government House. The French Nuns took over Government House for their convent later. They then began adding buildings in the grounds, which in time became a complex housing a chapel, cloisters for the Sisters, an orphanage for unwanted babies, a boarding house for students and classrooms for the school. The Convent has been painstakingly restored in recent years with funds raised from the public.

St. George's Church

This is the oldest Anglican Church in the country dating back to 1818. In the grounds of the church lies a small memorial inscribed, "In Memory of Francis Light, Esquire, Who first established this island as an English Settlement & was many years Governor. Born in the country of Suffolk in England and died October 21 st 1794."

Penang State Museum

A short distance away from St George's Church is the Penang State Museum. This was the former premise of the Penang Free School, which was built in 1896 and extended in 1906.

Opening Times : 9.00am - 5.00pm everyday except Friday

Admission Fee : Adult RM1.00 Child RM 0.50

Cathedral of the Assumption

Not long after Francis Light arrived on Penang Island in 1786, he sent for a community of Eurasians from a parish in Kuala Kedah to be settled in Penang. The community was made up of descendants of European settlers who had intermarried with the Burmese and Siamese. Due to political prosecution, they had moved away from Phuket and resettled in Kedah. (Perhaps, Light's empathy for the plight and identity of these descendants may be due to him being associated with a lady of Thai-Portuguese descent?).

The Church of Assumption was so named because the first group of Roman Catholics landed in Penang on the eve of the Feast of Assumption. In 1955, the church status was raised to the status of a Cathedral of the diocese of Penang.

E&O Hotel (Eastern & Oriental Hotel)

A sightseeing trip on trishaws around Georgetown organised by Eastern and Oriental Express Train for their passengers

E&O Hotel was the first of subsequent hotels in the region managed by the Sarkies Brothers who also operated the Raffles in Singapore, the Strand in Rangoon ~ Myanmar and the Crag Hotel on Penang Hill. All except the Crag Hotel are still functioning today. E&O Hotel began operations in 1884 and by the roaring 20's had gained worldwide recognition for its opulence and perhaps more so, the generosity of Arshak Sarkies himself. He was an indulgent man whose idea of running the hotel for pleasure rather than profit. The generous man would waive friends' hotel bills and even provided passage home for stranded planters and miners whose businesses had failed. Soon E&O became known as 'Eat & Owe'. Not surprisingly, he was at the brink of bankruptcy on his death bed. Even then, his funeral in the 1930's was reported to be one of the largest in decades.

Once patronised by colonial administrators, planters and the wealthy local elite; among its more famous guests were Sir Noel Coward, Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, Rudyard Kipling, Somerset Maugham and Hermann Hesse. Having gone through a decade of obscurity and uncertainty, today, E & O Hotel has yet again been restored to it's glory of when it proclaimed itself " The Premier Hotel East of Suez"..

For a view of E&O Hotel rooms, please go here

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