The first we heard of his name was when as students we played inter-collegiate cricket in Chennai. The competition that pitted colleges from all over the state was always played for the Pennycuick trophy. As a PUC student of Loyola College I was a member of the team that won the trophy in 1968. Our trip to Coimbatore to play the final was the highlight of college life then. The name itself did not drop a penny until we learnt the reason why the trophy was named after him was because the Colonel in the Royal Engineers himself had instituted the cup long before leaving for home after a long stay in India. It was later, as members of the historical Madras Cricket Club, were we to learn of the association of a very competent cricketer in the making of a great dam across the Periyar River at considerable personal risk and expense.
As one of the early secretaries of MCC, the Colonel had been instrumental in moving the club from its original location on The Island between Mount Road and Beach Road to its present home in Chepauk on land that originally belonged to the Nawab of Carnatic. This was in 1865 and the ground has remained virtually the same save for a concrete stadium built in the late ’60s that was later to be replaced in part by modern stands.
The Colonel was also heading the Public Works department in Madras in 1890 when a cyclone damaged the ancient clubhouse and he was generous in sanctioning the funds for repair work. A princely Rs 10,000 was the grant then and the club spent it lovingly on a new clubhouse that was in red brick to be in consonance with much of the Indo-Saracenic architecture that distinguishes the city.
Historians record that the Colonel was a decent batsman, often opening the innings and also bowled (underarm?) well enough to have actually picked up nine wickets in the first Madras-Bangalore Test match in 1862. He also represented Madras against Ceylon in 1886. The MCC placed on record his services to the club in 1896 when he retired from the game — “For over thirty years this gentleman has been associated with and has encouraged Cricket in the Madras Presidency, while his services to the Club, both as an official and in the field (he was a fine underarm bowler), will long be remembered.” He reciprocated with that first cricket trophy to be competed for by Indians in the Madras Presidency. No wonder a commentator described it as “his last, lasting and most important contribution to Madras Cricket.”
His work as an irrigation engineer may have gone on to far outstrip his cricketing talent. His masterstroke at engineering a dam to bring its wet-flowing water through a tunnel back to parched lands in Tamil Nadu (Madras Presidency then) is something he will be remembered for long even though his name now gets posthumously into controversies as two states wrangle over the state and status of the dam he built against all odds.
source: http://www.DeccanChronicle.com / Home> Channels> Cities> Chennai / DC, Chennai / January 09th, 2012
