How Breithaupt became Prathapet and Pugh became Buck

I do not know whether to laugh or cry. I think the former may be the better option, considering that this is the first epistle of mine for this column in the new year. But researching recently the history of Vepery for a video, I sent my assistant Surya Kumar on a tour of the streets in that area. “Be sure to cover Breithaupt Street,” I told him and he returned with the information that Prathapet is its present name.My impression is that the names are spoken aloud by one person at the Corporation, while another simply writes them in Tamil based on how they sound, without referring to the original text.

Breithaupt to Prathapet

Blame it all on the two-language formula at least as far as street names and signboards are concerned. Breithaupt in English becomes Preithapt in Tamil. This in turn changed the English to Brethapet, which is how it remained for much of the past few decades. Then the Tamil became Prathapet and the English followed. It is my guess that someone in the Corporation dictates these names off a list and someone else notes it down in Tamil as heard, and not as written.

Tracing Breithaupt the Missionary

Having chortled over it, I then went about hunting for what I had squirreled away about Breithaupt. The story begins with the missionary John/Johann Christian Breithaupt, native of Dransfield, Hanover who arrived in Madras in 1746. He could not have been more unfortunate in his timing, for his arrival coincided with the French invasion and that must have prompted his move to Cuddalore in 1747. In 1749, he and his superior Rev JP Fabricius moved to Pulicat, closer to events after Madras was restored to the British.

A Letter That Shaped Church Politics

On May 17 the two wrote a letter to Fort St David, Cuddalore, which was then the British headquarters. This document was to form the basis of how Roman Catholic churches in Madras were to be treated by the newly returned British. Published in full by HD Love in Vestiges of Old Madras, the letter highlighted how French priests and Roman Catholics had colluded with Pondicherry during the occupation. They called for retribution and spelled out their preferences in church acquisitions across the city.

Breithaupt gets Vepery

The two stipulated which RC churches they wished to take over — not the one in the north as “there Allways dwell the Most part the black Soldiers and Palanquin-boys,” nor the one at the west near “Waperi” as that was too far off, but one at Sepakam on the way to St Thome. What they eventually received was the church in Waperi, today’s St Mathias Church, when the English took over the private chapel of Coja Petrus Uscan, the Armenian merchant. Breithaupt and Fabricius worked together there.

Breithaupt, the son

Breithaupt died on November 17, 1782, at Vepery, of a “short but violent illness.” His son, Christopher Breithaupt, appears to have preferred commerce to missionary work. Julian James Cotton, in his 1911 survey of Madras Presidency tombstones, records that Christopher began his career with the East India Company as Conductor of Ordnance in 1777. By 1798 he was Joint Collector and Surveyor of Madraspatam with William Cockell, a tenure marked by unpopular civic decisions.

Rates, Resistance, and Irony

That year their proposal to increase scavenger rates in Black Town met stiff resistance from the locals. Ironically, some of those whose payments were in arrears and who protested loudly later had streets named after them in that very area. Perhaps wearying of civic rate collections, both men shifted to business. Cockell founded Stephens & Cockell and later became Sheriff of Madras. Breithaupt entered business with Joseph Pugh and Thomas Parry, laying the foundations of what was to become a lasting commercial legacy.

Parry, Pugh and Breithaupt

It was Parry, Pugh and Breithaupt who together formed Parry & Co, a firm still very much with us. It is Breithaupt the son, not the father, after whom the road is named. In 1794 he owned sixteen acres in Purasaiwakkam and later acquired five more in Vepery, likely the reason his name entered the city’s geography. Over time, however, that name would undergo transformations few could have imagined, ending finally as Prathapet.

Remembered Streets and Forgotten Graves

Interestingly, his partner Pugh, pronounced “Pew,” has a small road in RA Puram named after him. In Tamil this became Puck’s Road and finally in English, Bug’s Road. Of the three partners, Parry is remembered best through Parry’s Corner. Cotton records that Elizabeth, wife of the younger Breithaupt, was buried at St Mathias Church, her tombstone still visible. Curiously, there is no clear record of where either Breithaupt, father or son, was buried perhaps together, somewhere nearby.

This article appeared in The Hindu–https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/how-breithaupt-became-prathapet/article70473283.ece

My book, Chennai, A Biography can be ordered-http://- https://sriramv.com/2021/12/27/how-to-buy-autographed-copies-of-chennai-a-biography-from-outstation/