Hotel with a history The Great Eastern Hotel in Kolkata It all started when David Wilson, an Englishman who owned a confectionery shop in Cossitola, now Bentinck Street, decided to enter the hotel business. In 1840, Dainty Davie, as he was popularly known, set up the Auckland Hotel on the premises in the corner of the road running parallel to the British India Street and the Old Court House Street. According to Major Harry Hobbs, author of John Barleycorn Bahadur (1943), the hotel was set up in 1841. But an advertisement published in The Englishman and Military Chronicle in November 1840 says otherwise: "The Auckland Hotel For Families and Single Gentlemen Opposite to Government House The above hotel is now open Pleasant, airy and well-furnished with A Table d' Hote for Gentlemen 19th November, 1840, D. Wilson & Co." The hotel was named not after its proprietor, but the Governor General at that time, Lord Auckland (1784-1849). But locally, the hotel was known as Wilson's Hotel. Until 1850, the business was carried on in the name of D. Wilson and Co., a partnership firm with A. Clader, Gregory, C.H.B. Wilson, J.C. Mandy and G. Mandy. After 1850, a project to expand the hotel began. A report published on June 16, 1862 in the Calcutta Monthly Magazine said: "David Wilson purchased land on the Old Court House Street in 1851 with existing shops and carried on the business of a hotel keeper under the name of Auckland Hotel and Hall of All Nations." [snip] >From Frontline, Volume 22 - Issue 17, Aug 13 - 26, 2005 http://www.flonnet.com/fl2217/stories/20050826001608400.htm ----- Harshawardhan_Bosham Nimkhedkar Nagpur, India