Kampong Dhoby, Queen Street: A lost North Indian quarter

This is Part 10 of a 10-part series of excerpts from an NHB HRG Research Project (Ref. 029, 2019-2021) led by Dr Imran bin Tajudeen.

The name Campong Dobie is indicated in the Government Surveyor John T. Thomson’s 1842-45 survey maps. It is spelled slightly differently as Campong Dhoby in municipal notices from 1849 to 1855. However, this is not at Dhoby Ghaut, but at the upper end of Queen Street between Middle Road and Arab Street. This name corresponds firstly to the Malay usage, but more significantly is also reflected in the Tamil name for the same area, Dhoby Kampam (Haughton 1891, 64). It is significant to note that this is one of the instances where the Tamil transliteration of the term Kampong is used. Dhobies in Singapore hail mostly from Uttar Pradesh (Rai 2004, 4, 12).

Interestingly however, Dhoby Ghaut is not called Dhoby Kampam in Tamil, but instead as Vannan Theruvu, Street of the Washermen (Haughton 1891, 63).

Campong Dhoby at Queen Street owes its origins to the confluence of the siting of the military cantonment there in the 1820s (for about 6 years) and the presence of the Rochor River.  A military cantonment was located at the area of Short Street from the 1820s up to 1827, before moving to the Outram Road area. This was a “large exercising ground… roughly bounded by Prinsep St., Albert St., Queen St., and Bras Basah” (Murfett et. al. 2011, 57). The north Indian presence in the area lasted long after the removal of the Cantonment to Outram, as can be seen below.

Kampong Dhoby: Sikh Temple and Queen Street Hanafi Mosque

Two religious buildings once stood along Queen Street in Kampong Dhoby as a testament to the north Indian community’s presence there. Both are expunged. They are:

Queen Street Hanafi /Benggali Mosque

The Queen Street Hanafi Mosque at 151 Queen Street was founded in 1908 and was also known as Masjid Benggali. It is a Hanafi mosque, built on freehold land. This far, the originaldrawings for its foundation in 1908 has not been found.

However, a set of drawing for alterations done in 1923 to the mosque have been found. It bears the trustee’s and architect’s signatures (NAS 580/1923).

Early in its history the mosque must have been at the centre of the north Indian Hanafi community in Singapore. One of the trustees of the Queen Street Hanafi/Bengali Mosque, Abdul Oodod, owned some properties in the mosque’s vicinity in 1910 that are captured in the building drawings record:

1. Shophouse at 147 Queen Street, by R. H. Young (NAS 10232/1910)
2. Bakery at 16 Albert Street, by Tomlinson & Lermit (NAS 10003/1910) and by R.H Young (10233/1910)

In 1940, a new Qadhi for the Hanafi Muslims in Singapore, Moulana Moulvi Mohamed Idris Gowhary, was appointed.

The Malaya Tribune (23 Oct 1940) reported that two functions were organised in his honour. Both receptions for the new Hanafi Qadhi were held at the Queen Street Hanafi Mosque, suggesting its significance to the Hanafi community here. In addition, the new Qadhi was the head Imam of the Queen Street mosque and the honorary secretary of the Bengal Muslim Association (of Singapore) since this was revived in 1938. The latter fact explains the association of the Hanafi mosque specifically with the Bengalis, as will be seen below.

However, the report also noted that the Moulana is “the only Hanafi Imam and Kathi [Qadhi] in Singapore who knows Urdu, Bengali, Parsi, Arabic, Malay, as well as English.” This statement suggests the linguistic and cultural composition of the Hanafis in Singapore,  mainly northern Indian (Urdu and Parsi-speaking) and eastern Indian (Bengali).  

The mosque was sometimes also called the “Benggali Mosque”, though this sometimes created confusion with the Masjid Kampong Bengkulu / Bencoolen Street Mosque. In 1963, Singapore’s Malay daily Berita Harian listed the mosque at Queen Street separately from the mosque at “Kampong Bengkulu”.[1] From 1965 to 1967, Berita Harian distinguished between the two by stating “Masjid Bengkulu (Bencoolen St)” and “Masjid Bengali (Queen St)” separately.[2] In 1970, however, the last reference to the two mosques in the same article appears in the conflated form “Masjid Bengali (Kg. Bengkulu)”.[3] It is not clear whether this refers to the Hanafi Mosque at Queen Street or Bencoolen Mosque at Bencoolen Street.

The Queen Street Mosque was expunged some time in the early 1980s and its site is now covered by the Fu Lu Shou Complex.

The Central Sikh Temple

By 1906, a Sindhi residence at 175 Queen Street was being used as a Hindu and Sikh Temple. In 1920 drawings indicate that the building had been converted for use as a Sikh Temple, on freehold land. There are three drawings: for Messrs. Ram Pugan and Hakam Singh (NAS 843/1920); for Lachman Singh, by L. K. Wah (NAS 843B/1920); and for S Kania Singh, architect’s signature illegible (NAS 843C-1/1920). The temple was demolished in 1978 after a protracted process of negotiation with the authorities to protect the temple from demolition, which ended when the then Prime Minister Lee Kuan Yew called the Sikh leaders to a meeting to state that no concessions would be made. The state offered the temple three sites – the third offer was accepted. All of these events were reported in the newspapers (refer to Appendix 10).

[1] Berita Harian, 17 February 1963, p.10

[2] Berita Harian, 9 April 1965, p.2; Berita Harian, 15 January 1966, p.8; Berita Harian, 21 December 1967, p.2.

[3] Berita Harian, 14 October 1970, p.2

Other aricles in this 10-part series:

Part 1: Campong / Kampong: Forgotten shared urban ward names in colonial Singapore

Part 2: Compound houses and compound shophouses

Part 3: Lorongs in Kampung Bengkulu: The forgotten alleys of history

Part 4: Kampong Serani: Some Notes on the Eurasian Community in Town

Part 5: Kampong Melaka and the other story of Singapore River

Part 6: Chinese beyond Chinatown: Kampong Melaka

Part 7: The multiple sites of the Chulia community

Part 8: Malays in the heart of “Chinatown”: Kg Penghulu Kesang

Part 9: Kampong Bengkulu’s Jewish Mahalla and Japan Town

Part 10: Kampong Dhoby, Queen Street: A lost North Indian quarter

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