Ross Island Penal Colony

The penal colony was used as an experimental station for various methods of torture and medical tests During World War II, the island was invaded by the Japanese army, forcing the British to evacuate.

The First War of Indian Independence in 1857 rekindled the interest of the British Administration in India to establish a penal colony in the Andaman Islands for political prisoners.

In November 1858 temporary barrack-type huts with walls made of mats and with leaking thatched roofs provided accommodation for about 1,000 prisoners.

Sir Robert Napier, who came to Port Blair to investigate, found the conditions "beyond comprehension" as there was no food, clothing and shelter provided to the convicts.

However, Ross Island was comparatively a better place than in the earlier initial years as Colonel RC Tytler and his wife Harriet had improved the facilities for the community.

[2] At the beginning of World War I in 1914, Dr. Robert Heindl of Germany had noted that the 15,000 political prisoners at the penal colony could create an undesirable revolution and therefore their release in one stage, following capture of the island by a German ship by bombardment, was risky.

He suggested that after due care and adequate security had been put in place the convicts of the penal colony could be shifted to the mainland in small boats.

When 81 out of the 288 inmates tried to escape they were savagely attacked by the aboriginal people of Andamans which made them turn back to the prison camp seeking medical help.

JP Grant, President in Council in Calcutta complained to the higher authorities, but Walker was not reprimanded; instead, he put the convicts at the Penal Colony into an "iron collar" to prevent them from escape.

Finally, on 3 October 1859 he was removed from the penal settlement as he had suggested branding the convicts on their forearms with information of the crime and sentence that they had been given.

However, when the Andamanese were on the verge of mounting a massive attack on the penal colony on 16 May 1859, he ran away and secretly conveyed this information to the Superintendent.

[7] Another political prisoner who suffered the longest period of 47 years of incarceration was Musai Singh who was released for good behavior in July 1907 on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of India's First War of Independence in 1857.

One of the notable actions Khairabadi did while in the penal colony was to write on the details of the First War of Independence and his experience of the "Kalapani", using charcoal sticks and rags of cloth; these were later published in Arabic as Al-Surat-ul Hindia and Al-Fitnat-ul-Hindia.