Posted on: 21 January 2012

Painting; gouache on mica, A paddle-steamer with blue pennant, wheel and deckhouse, Murshidabad, ca.1830.

These paintings were acquired by W.G. Archer in Patna in 1948 from Ishwari Prasad, the Patna painter, who attributed them to his Murshidabad ancestors and had retained them as models for further paintings.

Source: V&A, London


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It has a US flag?

... Maritime flag/ ensign of East India Company vessels, 1801 - 1858 ( as below) : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Flag_of_the_British_East_India_Company_(1801).svg

Thanks! Never knew this.

... RBSI ~ if you look very carefully at the flag in the illustration above ( the resolution is not the best) you can just make out the lines of the Union Jack... ~ although, in the era of ' free trade ' ~ American commercial vessels would have been far from unknown in Indian waters during the 19th century ... ships under the flags of many nations sailed up and down the Hooghly and to and from the coastal ports etc.

similar vessels were used in the early days of the penal colony in Andamans. RIMS Pluto, Semiramis and Sesostris were some...

flat bottam paddle-steamer with low prow and stern ....used in river navigation.