Saving a historic hospital from certain death

View from courtyard C2 1983

Behind those sturdy pillars, past the broad corridors and into the courtyard, this new book unravels a murky saga. And who better than the man whose own career was intertwined with its conservation, to tell the story.

Gamini Wijesuriya describes it as a ‘tortuous effort’. Looking at it now, so beautifully restored, it is hard to imagine the magnitude of work that went into saving the historic Dutch Hospital from certain demolition and indeed the perseverance required to accomplish the task.

Dr. Gamini Wijesuriya was the former Director of Conservation at the Department of Archaeology, the first Asian heritage professional to become a staff member of the International Centre for the Study of Restoration and Preservation of Cultural Property (ICCROM) in Rome. Now a Special Advisor to the Director-General ICCROM and to the Director of WHITRAP (the UNESCO World Heritage Training and Research Centre) in Shanghai, China, he has also received an ICCROM award for his contributions to the field of heritage conservation and management.

Established between 1658 and 1681, when Colombo was a fortified city, the Dutch Hospital was, originally, as its name suggests, a hospital but subsequently had other functions, covering a period of about 300 years. A 1732 map shows its location.

Wijesuriya details its conservation journey – how with the open economy in 1977, the Colombo Master Plan Project was launched for the ‘redevelopment of the crumbling capital city of Colombo’ but sadly, under this ‘there was simply no regard for heritage.’ The Dutch Hospital was one of the buildings under threat and he feared it would face the same fate as the Registrar General’s Office in York Street.

Having always had an interest in historic buildings, Wijesuriya began to raise concerns and though it had been identified as a priority site and integrated into the area known as Echelon Square, he campaigned for its survival, enlisting the support of American urban planner George Kostritsky who interestingly, was part of the Central Area planning team. Another American planner Prof. Durham from Columbia University, New York also offered key support.

The outcome was that it was agreed to retain ‘or at least acknowledge the Dutch Hospital within the first Central Area Plan of 1978/79’.

In September 1978, the Urban Development Authority was created and Wijesuriya took up his first permanent job as an architect. He chronicles the efforts taken on many fronts and the role played by the ‘Committee for the Preservation of Buildings of Historical and Architectural Value’ chaired by the Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Housing and Construction Dr H.A.P. Abeywardhana along with Dr Roland Silva as Secretary, Prof. Senake Bandaranayake, Ashley de Vos and Ismeth Raheem.

The involvement of the local arm of ICOMOS International (the International Council on Monuments and Sites) headed by Dr Roland Silva, with five council members including the author played a crucial role in rescuing the Dutch Hospital once again facing a threat of destruction’ – a watershed moment in the heritage journey of the old hospital, as he puts it.

At one point he describes the horror at finding the contractor in charge of repairing the building removing the original large horizontal Burma teak tie beams – “it appeared that the repair plan was to actually remove the entire roof and let the walls simply collapse so that the entire building could be removed”. Donning his official hat as the Asst. Commissioner of Archaeology he ordered the workers to halt and rushed to alert Dr Roland Silva, President of ICOMOS and Deputy Commissioner of Archaeology, who immediately ordered two security guards from the Department to be stationed at the building to guard its safety and the timber.

It was end 1983 that the Dutch Hospital was classified as a monument under the Antiquities Ordinance but there was still a catch: it was to be handed over to the Police Department when restoration was complete. The Ceylon Tourist Board disappointingly overlooked opportunities to take over the building for ‘tourist related re-use’ and more heritage-friendly purposes. It was finally only after then President Chandrika Kumaratunga intervened in 1998 at the urging of Prof. Senake Bandaranayake that it was again reassigned to the Tourism Board and yet again, after the intervention of another President – Gotabaya Rajapaksa that it came under the UDA in 2012 and was opened as a luxury shopping centre. The author remains hopeful that a wider section of the population will be able to use the space.

The many who helped in the effort through the years are recognised in the book and its fascinating pre-heritage life is well recorded in the section by Dr G.C. Uragoda and K.D. Paranavitana with sketches of the complex by Ismeth Raheem and his note on the artist Johannes Rach (1720-1783) whose two drawings of the Dutch Hospital have survived. The measures taken to renovate the building from the roofs to the columns, the flooring, doors and windows too are given and before and after images vividly capture the onerous task undertaken.

On the vital role the Dutch Hospital played, Raheem points out that up to the early 20th century all medicine was extracted directly from plants, and sometimes animals and Ayurvedic physicians in India and Ceylon were much sought after. The Dutch quickly saw this indigenous medical knowledge as a valuable resource and among the many eminent European botanists who arrived in Colombo to pursue it further was Paul Hermann, who worked as a surgeon at the Dutch Hospital and whose research led him to be described as ‘the father of botany in Sri Lanka’.

“He sent collections of local plants to Leiden, and a herbarium he collected in Sri Lanka came to light 70 years after his death” Dr Uragoda’s article states. This led to the great Linneus in Uppsala who derived the new taxonomic binomial system to be inspired to publish the Floras Zeylanica in 1736 which turned the spotlight on Asian flora. Ceylon and the hospital in Colombo became a centre for botanical exploration and studies.

The author hopes that the critical gaps in public sector support and a lack of understanding of the heritage potential of historic buildings “issues that unfortunately have not changed or improved sufficiently over the years” would offer learning and inspiration for a smoother journey for more historic buildings to achieve heritage status, rather than be steamrollered in the relentless tide of construction.

Book Facts
The Dutch Hospital Colombo – Biography of a Heritage Building- by Gamini Wijesuriya with contributions from G.C. Uragoda and K.D. Paranavitana Reviewed by Renuka Sadanandan