Scottish Cemetery at Calcutta
christian cemetery at Kolkata
The Scottish Cemetery at Calcutta was established in 1820 catering to the specific needs of the large Scottish population in the Kolkata area. These Scots, including soldiers, missionaries, jute traders and businessmen, were attached to numerous enterprises in the area such as the headquarters of the East India Company, and the administration of the British India, whose capital was here. The cemetery was utilised until the 1940s but was abandoned in the 1950s and neglected following India's independence. Well over 90% of those buried bear recognisably Scots names such as Anderson, McGregor, Campbell and Ross. Around 10% are Bengali.
Description
Extending to 3 acres (12,000 m2) the cemetery lies within the dense urban area on Karaya Bazar Road. It is roughly square in plan and is laid out largely in a grid pattern, but with more random tombs closest to the road, in the oldest, south-west section. It contains over 1809 burial plots, with at least 2000 burials. The entrance, which bears the title "Scottish Cemetery" over an archway is flanked by a gatehouse. The entire cemetery is enclosed by a high wall.
“Scottish Cemetery at Calcutta” enters the record as christian cemetery at Kolkata. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Scottish, Cemetery and Calcutta can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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“Scottish Cemetery at Calcutta” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, Scottish, Cemetery and Calcutta provides the most credible route into that argument.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 23, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7437647. Authority coordinates are 22.545, 88.363. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1820, 1809 and 2000.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Scottish Cemetery at Calcutta” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.