Page 5 of 11. An Electronic Supplement to Bilham, R.,Tom LaTouche and the Great Assam Earthquake of 12 June 1897: letters from the epicenter. Seism. Res. Lett. 79(3), 426-437, 2008. doi: 10.1785/gssrl.79.3.426.
1892-1895 Salt Range and Baluchistan. Few letters have survived from this period presumbly because Tom and Nancy traveled together to the field. The director of the GSI, William King retired in this interval, and was replaced by Griesbach. The letter from Griesbach to LaTouche and provides a first glimpse of Griesbach as director. It shows him to be opinionated and lacking in diplomacy.
28 Nov 1892, Camp via Lahore, Mss Eur C258/11To Willie:
I have a School of Mines man named Edwards, who joined the survey a year ago, to assist me at this job. He isn't a bad fellow, rather musical, but not very strong and I don't think he has taken to this kind of life very much.
28 Nov 1892, Salt Range, Mss Eur C258/11 to his father- thanks his father for teaching him how to survey, plane table etc when he was younger. "The salt occurs in a red marl at the base of everything, but there are some very curious points about it, as the red marl is frequently intruded into the overlying rocks as if it were an igneous rock. One of our men, Middlemiss, has started a theory that it was a sort of salt seam on the surface of igneous rocks that did not flow at the surface, but that idea does not seem to have met with much acceptance. I have not seen any of these eruptive beds yet, but I hope to do so before I leave the country.
10 April 1892, Lahore, Mss Eur C258/11 to Polly?
Slept the night at Harranpur (near Lahore). We picked up Mr Middlemiss, who is on the survey and a great friend of mine, at Lake Musa, the junction. He had come down from Abbotabad. Dr King walked the whole way up from Harranpur 16 miles and did two days hard walking while he was here. He left us on the 7th and walked most of the way back. Truly he is a wonderful man, 60 years old and most of it spent in India .
1893------------------------------------------------------
1894-------------------------------------------------------
25 Dec 1894 On the train to Sukkur C258/60
Hari Lal relates an accident with the drilling casing. Drilling operations in Sukkur. Sibi by train to Baber Kach. Fishing
1895------------------------------------------------------
9th February 1995 Tuesday C258/60
I have said goodbye to Mr Griesbach who has been talking away forgainst me for the the last two or three hours. He has been giving me all the news of the Dept. I fancy he hasn't been having an easy time of it with Messr. Oldham and Bose to say nothing of Dr Warth and his 8 children to keep in order. Anyhow he does not give a very rosy account of his position and I fancy he would be very glad to find himself an irresponsible Superintendent again. He is looking very well all the same as if Calcutta agreed with him.
23 July 1895 , Calcutta, Griesbach to la Touche C258/55.17. Geol. Survey of India
My Dear laTouche
Your letters of the 31/5 and 28/6. To begin with the maps etc. from the VI International Geological Congress: they were sent off some time ago and Blandford has done the needful with them. He has kindly consented to act as our deputy on the congress. I suppose the exhibition is going on now.
I do not know what they are doing at Sukkur now; the job has been handed over to the N. W. R. to manage the whole now. I do not suppose that so far anything too startling has occurred or else I should have heard of it, and I should not wonder whether they are still trying to make way in that stiff clay. I do not fancy they will strike oil, I must say.
As regards the remarks in my quarterly notes. I fully anticipated your annoyance but as I acted in perfectly good faith according to my [?lights] you must excuse the remarks. I still think Mr. Early need not have been engaged and I cannot agree to what you say about the fossils. Those few which Hira Lal brought are not casts but are rather poorly preserved, though covered with dry mud and as the greater depth of the bore-hole was cased, any caving in of the sides could only affect a small thickness of the beds, so that there could not be any very extensive mixing of specimens from different horizons. You are wrong about the fossils in the Sukkur limestone, the latter is simply crammed full of them, but one has to hammer a good deal before good specimens come out of the hard rock. Especially the flint nodules are full of bryozoa and forams which are admirably preserved.
As regards the box of speciments of salt sent I must confess to an error, which I shall acknowledge in my next quarterly notes. As you correctly suggested, the box was stored away in the office. Webb had received the R. receipt, sent for the box and just put it somewhere without reporting it to anyone, although I made repeated inquiries after that particular consignment from Sukkur. The fault rests partly with you though. Had you sent an official Memo with it, instead of just writing to Webb, we should have had a record of the box of specimens and I would have known that you sent it. I remember, for instance, nearly a year ago, when the office was put in order, we discovered a box which had opened and was partly filled with specimens badly wrapped up, and most with cutcha sort of labels and insufficient references. They were mostly rubbish, and all, I think, was chucked away. From the writing on the labels they must have been yours.
But that is and must be the fate of all specimens which are not properly authenticated by proper and very definite labels, containing every possible reference to identify the locality.
Those salt specimens are very poor by the way. You showed me nicer ones when I was at Sukkur, though they wanted shaping. - There is no oil film on the water in the bottles sent but it smells like kerosine.
You sent before leaving Sukkur a number of maps, one or two geologically coloured, but without an index to the colours. What do these maps refer to? There was not a line with them to show what you wanted done with them, and I keep two on my table as simple curiosities.
We have no monsoon this year and I fear there will be difficulties over it.
Have you seen King and his new baby?- With kind regards to you and Mrs. LaTouche.
Yours sincerely, C.L. Griesbach