Landour, a small cantonment town contiguous with Mussoorie, is about from the city of Dehradun in Dehradun district in the northern state of Uttarakhand in India. The twin towns of Mussoorie and Landour, together, are a well-known British Raj-era hill station in northern India. Mussoorie-Landour was widely known as the "Queen of the Hills". The name Landour is drawn from Llanddowror, a village in Carmarthenshire in southwest Wales. During the Raj, it was common to give nostalgic English, Scottish, Welsh or Irish names to one's home (or even to British-founded towns), reflecting one's ethnicity. Names drawn from literary works were also common, as from those by Robert Burns, Sir Walter Scott, Thomas Hardy, Robert Louis Stevenson and many others.
History
Origin as British sanatorium
Landour is within Dehradun District of the former United Provinces. The United Provinces themselves were carved out of the former Northwest Province of the vast Bengal Presidency, which stretched from Burma to the Khyber Pass; accordingly, early accounts show Landour as part of "Bengal", which was technically true though the description was incomplete.
Landour was initially built by and for the British Indian Army. From 1827 when a sanatorium was built in Landour, the town was a convalescent station for the military, and hence much of Landour is a Cantonment. The original sanatorium is now occupied by the Institute of Technology Management ("ITM") of the DRDO; it is at the eastern end of the Landour ridge. In the early 20th century, a full British Military Hospital (BMH) was opened, with a medical staff that specialized in tropical diseases; the hospital closed soon after 1947. Also within the ITM premises is the former Soldiers' Furlough Home, a holiday home for British and Irish soldiers and JCOs in Indian regiments who lacked the means to return to Europe regularly. Or, the holidaying soldiers were serving in British regiments on rotation in India, their tours of duty lasting anywhere from 6 to 48 months. In terms of area, Landour Cantonment comprises about two-thirds of Landour; the remainder includes Landour Bazaar, which stretches along the spur that connects to Mussoorie.
The first permanent building in all of Mussoorie-Landour was also built in Landour in 1825. The house was built by Captain Frederick Young, the "discoverer" of Mussoorie, who was also the Commandant of the first Gurkha (or Gorkha) battalion raised by the British after prevailing in the Gurkha War. Young's house, Mullingar (hinting at his Irish blood), was the family home during the hot summers in the plains. Young's Dehradun-based battalion, then called the Sirmour (or Sirmoor) Rifles, was initially raised in a Gurkha POW camp in Paonta Sahib in Sirmour District – hence the name. The huge L-shaped building, with an outsized courtyard inside the bend of the "L", sits prominently atop Mullingar Hill in Landour Cantonment.
Among distinguished house guests at Mullingar in the early decades were Emily Eden (see below). Mullingar was expanded, changed hands several times and by the early 20th century had become the Mullingar Estate Hotel. During World War II, Mullingar was leased by the army to house the overflow of convalescing soldiers from the sanatorium, given the huge increase in war-related injuries. The hotel was bursting at the seams, as a number of British civilian evacuees from Burma, the Andamans, Manipur and Nagaland, which were occupied by Japanese forces, were also housed in Mullingar before being shipped out elsewhere. Mullingar finally fell into disuse after 1947 when Britons began to leave India, with the army already having vacated it after the postwar demobilization of 1945–46. The building soon fell into disrepair, occupied largely if not entirely by squatters (see below). A number of the families now living in Mullingar are Tibetan. Prayer flags flutter in the wind every day, and Losar celebrations are held in the courtyard every year.
The legal distinction between Mussoorie and Landour did not arise until the 1860s, when after the historic events of 1857 cantonments were properly surveyed and formalized. In particular, control of the ridge-lines and water sources was crucial, given rising British anxieties over their grip on India. The defensibility of garrisons was critical, especially in hill stations with large European populations. The Cantonments Act of 1924 further clarified the rights of the property owners; new construction of any kind, especially of private homes, was virtually banned. Conservation was also a key goal, given the excesses of the 19th century (see below); the Act clearly states that title to all trees remains with the army, hence there has been no logging in Landour since in over a century. By definition, all non-military and non-governmental buildings built after 1924 are illegal. Therefore, there are few modern homes in Landour, though renovations and reconstruction of pre-existing houses are permitted. Due to the 1924 Act, Landour Cantonment is—unlike Landour Bazaar—largely free of the commercialization that can be seen in much of Mussoorie proper, especially along the main drag of Mall Road, where tourists throng in the summer.
European legacy
Racially, Landour was distinctly and intentionally more European than Mussoorie. First, the army presence (albeit non-regimental) offered an excuse to keep out Indians. Second, Maharajas were encouraged to build grand summer homes, but were directed towards Mussoorie. Among them were the ruling families of Kapurthala, Nabha, Alwar, Jind, Baroda, Kasmanda, Katesar, Kuchesar and other princely states. And this despite Maharajas being hand-in-glove with the Raj in terms of ruling the Indian masses; the former, who remained nominally autonomous, legitimized the rule of the latter. No princely residences were ever built in Landour, with the exception of The Castle, built by the British as a quasi-prison. Even the ruling family of Tehri-Garhwal (from whom the region was seized by the British) had no residence in Landour, though the family later did acquire some properties from Britons who sold out. These racial barriers, while quite real, were more informal than formal; they began to weaken after World War I as the Indian freedom movement gained steam. The author Emily Eden, sister of the Governor-General Lord Auckland, wrote incisively about the biting racism of Britons towards all Indians (except Maharajas, whose over-the-top hospitality they craved), after spending much time in Landour, Shimla and Ooty in the late 1830s. Many Anglo-Indian families also put down roots in Landour, and in Barlowganj just below Mussoorie, in the 19th century. They were attracted in part by the schools, and by the sense of otherness versus quotidian India. A handful remain, most having emigrated after 1947.
The events of 1857 led to a spurt in the European population of Mussoorie-Landour, with many families leaving the exposed towns of the Gangetic Plain. Among the Britons who thus moved to Landour were the parents of Jim Corbett. Both had lost their spouses, and would meet and remarry in Landour (see below). His mother had moved from Meerut, where her first husband had been killed in action in 1857. Thousands of Europeans, mostly Britons, are buried in the twin towns. The Cantonment has adjacent Protestant and Catholic cemeteries, though due to overcrowding in the former, the latter has of late become non-denominational – they are managed by the same committee. In 1901, the town had a population of 1720, which climbed up to 3700 in the summers, when the heat of the Indian plains became unbearable.
Americans in the Himalaya
Aside from its British legacy, Landour has a thick vein of Americana too, with American missionaries having had a strong footing in the town since the 1830s, when the policy changes introduced by the English administrator Lord Macaulay prompted the rapid growth of American missions across India, particularly those of the Presbyterian and Baptist churches. Generations of American missionary children (third culture kids) were educated at Woodstock School and/or born in Landour (see John Birch, below). Of late, their descendants have been deeming a dekko{a look} worthwhile. Nowadays, many young Americans on gap years or on exchange programs spend time learning Hindi at the popular Landour Language School, which was founded in the late 19th century to teach newly arrived missionaries. Another durable reminder of the American connection is the ubiquitous Landour Community Cookbook (1st formal edition: 1938; informal stencil copies since c. 1900), though the Landour Community Centre—once the locus of Anglo-American community life—is itself moribund. A half-dozen bakers in Landour still offer various breads, cookies or biscuits and cakes from 'The Cookbook'. Landour was also one of the first places in India where an American classic such as peanut butter was made commercially. A number of houses in Landour have American (rather than British) names, among them Aloha, Hollywood and Roanoke.
Geography
Topology
Landour is located in the Lower Western Himalaya, in the Mussoorie Range, the second of the five parallel folds of the Himalaya. On average, Landour is about above Mussoorie, which itself is mostly at an altitude of .
Landour offers striking views of the Garhwal Himalaya, with a wide vista of up to visible on a clear day. The visible massifs and peaks include (West to East) Swargarohini, Bandarpunch, Yamunotri, Jaonli, Gangotri, Srikanta, Kedarnath, Satopanth, Chaukhamba (Badrinath) and even Nanda Devi. At its closest point, Tibet is about away as the crow flies; it is through Landour that Heinrich Harrer escaped to Tibet during World War II after breaking out of a British internment camp in Dehradun.
If one travels the to Landour from New Delhi by train or bus, a switch at Dehradun is needed. Buses, taxis, and shared taxis are easily available. There are also direct buses from New Delhi, and taxis are available at any of New Delhi's railway stations or at the Delhi airport. There are 40-minute flights from Delhi to Jolly Grant Airport east of Dehradun; to Landour from the airport is a further 90-minute drive.
East of Landour lie the small hamlet of Dhanaulti and the Surkhanda Devi temple; further east are Kanatal, Tehri (now submerged by the Tehri dam) and Chamba (not to be confused with the town and district of the same name in Himachal Pradesh). And to the West lie Kempty Falls, the military town of Chakrata and the region of Jaunsar bordering Himachal Pradesh.
Climate
The town lies largely on an east–west ridge, with a prominent southerly spur connecting its western end to Mussoorie. The altitude differential, aided by Landour being partly Tibet-facing, has a marked effect on the temperature, which can be lower than in Mussoorie. During the monsoon, Landour receives almost daily rainfall, often heavy. Additionally, pre- and post-monsoon showers mean a rainy season that can run from May to September, though it can be shorter. Before the rains arrive, April–May is the warmest period, with the temperatures rising to over on hotter days. December to February is particularly cold, especially if one there is a lack of enough direct sunlight, as on the northern slopes. It can snow anywhere between 3 and 15 times in the winter, at times heavily. In a given year Landour receives perhaps twice the snow that Mussoorie does; it also takes longer to melt especially on the north-facing slopes.
Ecology
Flora