Sri Lanka Burgher Family Genealogy
PAYNTER - Family #1247
Arthur Stephen Paynter was born in Bicester in Oxfordshire, where his father owned several breweries. Arthur married Anagi, the daughter of a Ceylonese, Arnolis Weerasooriya. Both were in the Salvation Army and worked in India and after some years left in order to start the India Christian Mission. Arthur and Anagi moved to Ceylon in 1904, and decided to start a mission in Nuwara Eliya. Fortunately Arthur was a inveterate diarist and there are several references to Kitty Wood.The Arnold Paynter Orphanage is still continuing its humanitarian work in Nuwara Eliya. I had the good fortune to visit the Orphanage in 1997 .It is still functioning well in the care of very dedicated people including a member of the Paynter family. It was a practice for the Press to cover the funeral's of prominent people, so we are fortunate in having the report of Kitty Woods funeral in Nuwara Eliya.
http://www.chandrage.com/personal/sbarrkum/family/kittywood/kittywood.htm
Kitty was born and educated in Lockport, New York. Her father, the Rev. Levi Wood, was one of the pioneers of the Free Methodist church.
Kitty sailed to the East with a group of 30 missionaries in 1867. On her arrival in Ceylon, in order to communicate better with the
people, she decided to study Tamil, and her tutor was Gate Mudaliar K.C. Barr Kumarakulasinghe, who held a high position in the office of
the governor, Sir West Ridgeway. They fell in love and married and had three children. Unfortunately K.C.B. died at the early age of 46,
when he contracted a severe illness in the Maldive Islands on an administrative trip with the governor.Wishing to educate the children in the United States, Kitty decided to return home to New York, but tragedy overtook her. Two of her
children died of diphtheria on the long voyage back and were buried at sea. The youngest died on arrival in New York. To add to her
sorrows, Kitty's father, too, had died before she got home. The grief-stricken Kitty returned to Ceylon and started an orphanage and school
in partnership with the Rev. Arthur Paynter.Kitty died in Ceylon in 1926, and is buried there. I had the good fortune to visit her grave
and the orphanage last year.
The Paynter Home
The Paynter Home in Nuwara Eliya initially
housed children and mothers left destitute by the First World War. However, as
some of the mothers deserted their children, the home eventually became a
sanctuary for needy Eurasian children. Over the years, the Paynter Home has
become a shelter for local children of all races and religions. It presently
houses 31 children, both boys and girls, and the main intent of the home is to
give these children a sound education and help them become independent.
Needs: Exercise books, red pens, school
books, compass boxes, Sinhala and Tamil books for the library.
The Paynter Home, Nuwara-Eliya
Mr. Ravi Thangaraj
Tel: (052) 22289
William George Paynter Family of UK
1 Thomas Paynter
2 Paynter
3 Arthur Stephen Paynter, born in Bicester in Oxfordshire, where his father owned several breweries + Agnes Weerasooriya, b:1863 (3088)
4 Rev Arnold Paynter
4 Ada Paynter + Greet (1193)
5 Averil Greet
5 Noel David Greet, b:26-Dec-1926, d:25-Dec-2000
5 Evangeline Greet
5 Chris Greet, broadcaster, actor (UK)
4 David Paynter 1900-1975
4 Eve Paynter + Darling
Winitha Fernando, cousin of Agnes Weerasooriya: - http://sundaytimes.lk/070211/Plus/017_pls.html
A little known fact about Winitha is that she is the niece of David Paynter, one of Sri Lanka’s greatest artists, who however, gained recognition very late. He was her mother’s cousin, "they came from the same Weerasuriya stock" and he, in fact, lived at her home in Lunawa while painting the famous mural on the transfiguration of Christ at the Chapel of St. Thomas College, Mount Lavina. Winitha relates how Paynter , principal of the Government College of Fine Arts while she was a student had once organised a contest among the class for the best portrait. The judging completed, the best portrait was found to be Winitha’s work and Paynter realising this had said, "I can’t judge this." So Stanley Abeysinghe was called in but he too found Winitha’s entry to be the best. Finally she received her prize - Rs 1.
Interestingly Winitha says that Paynter showed a marked interest in life studies and adds that most of his models were in fact members of his family, uncles, aunts and cousins, dressed up in cloth and jacket and other costumes, posing for him.
An artist who began her journey at the Government School of Fine Arts, Winitha says she owes much to the early influence in her life of David Paynter, the celebrated Lankan artist. Paynter was her mother's cousin and her tutor as well. In fact, while painting his famous mural of the Transfiguration of Christ that graces the chapel of S. Thomas College, Mount Lavinia, he lived at Winitha's family home. She first studied art at the Government College of Fine Arts and then taught for ten years at her alma mater Methodist College, before a scholarship to study fine arts awarded by the World Council of Churches took her to the UK.
Kay & Brian Bartley - http://www.globetrottersbb.ca/paynter.htm
Features - Island Mar 18 2002
To the memory of Noel David Greet
by Gamini de Silva
25th. December, 1926 - 26th December, 2000
Old Thomians with long memories might recall a strange story that reached their ears one Monday morning in 1941: a boarder had become ill after being bitten by a rat-snake — a garandiya.
By mid-morning the reptile had metamorphosed into a rattle-snake, a species unlikely to be found in the scrub-land behind the swimming pool at Mt. Lavinia. The victim was reportedly writhing in agony and fighting for his life.
The hordes of school-boys who rushed to get a glimpse of their hapless school-mate were in for disappointment. To their dismay, it was a smiling pyjama-clad lad that greeted them on the veranda of the sick-room. The fair-skinned, ginger-haired Noel Greet was enjoying every moment of his celebrity status, be it only for the day. However, a snake-bite specialist who had been consulted by the school doctor and Warden de Saram, had said that the victim could have lung problems in later life.
True to that prediction, in 1945 when Noel was reading for a science degree at Christian College, Madras, he developed lung abscesses. That eminent surgeon, Dr. J. H. F. Jayasuriya, the Hunterian gold-medalist, who was part of Noel’s extended family, kept in touch with his Indian counterparts by phone offering them the benefits of his expertise. Noel recovered and, after graduating, came to England.
It was while playing hockey at Hertfordshire, 35 years later, that he collided with a burly goalie and broke his ribs. But serious injury to his internal chest organs was prevented by the scar tissue left by the healed abscesses!
Noel was a choral scholar at St. Thomas’, Mt. Lavinia. It was his singing of O Sacred Head Sore Wounded at the Union Church, Nuwara Eliya, on Good Friday, 1940, that ignited my own passion for the music of Bach.
Settling down in Heretofore, he joined the St. Alban’s Bach Choir in 1946 and sang as a bass until his death this last Christmas. It was not only Bach that the choir sang: Rossini, Rachmaninov and Rutter were among composers in their wide repertoire.
In recent years Noel formed a successful madrigal group to sing works using smaller forces.
He had broad tastes in music and as a listener he enjoyed the baila-like cross rhythms of South America, the lyrics of Tom Lehrer and the voice of Cleo Laine.
Noel was the second in an exceptionally gifted quartet of siblings.
Elder sister Averil, a versatile instrumentalist and choir trainer, produced the first Bejamin Britten opera in Sri Lanka as well as Menotti’s Amal and the Night Visitors.
Younger sister Evangeline, a mezzo-soprano who gave regular broadcasts in the late forties, premiered Brahmss’ Alto Rhapsody in Colombo. One local critic termed her the "Kathleen Ferrier of Ceylon".
Although many know Noel’s younger brother Chris Greet as a broadcaster and master of ceremonies, few would be aware of his claims to fame as an actor. He was the only local to get a speaking part in the multi-award-winning film Bridge over the River Kwai. More recently he has been making a name for himself on British television.
Talent runs like veins of gold right through Noel’s forbears. His father Martin’s humanist Credo in, couched m pristine prose, was included in an anthology of beliefs compiled from a range of writings including those of Bertrand Russell and Christmas Humphreys.
His mother, Ada, was a soloist in performances of Handel’s Messiah in the early forties. She introduced me to the beautiful voice of the counter-tenor, Alfred Deller. His mother’s elder brother, Rev. Arnold Paynter, a first-world-war veteran and an Oxford graduate, is reputed to have beaten chess master Prof. J. B. S. Haldane in his student days. Returning to Ceylon he established the Paynter Homes in Nuwara Eliya 80- years ago.
His mother’s younger brother, actor and artist David Paynter was a Royal Academy Gold Medalist and has had 18 of his paintings hung at the R.A.’s annual exhibitions.
His mother’s younger sister, Eve Darling, was a brilliant pianist and choir trainer. She produced the first performance of Rutland Boughton’s choral dramas in Sri Lanka. First, The Immortal Hour and then the entrancing Bethlehem. These performances have been referred to even in the British press.
A survey of Noel’s antecedents would not be complete without a reference to his courageous maternal grand-mother, and my grand-aunt, Mrs. Agnes Paynter (nee Weerasooriya). In her 98th year (1961) she was still keeping abreast of world news through the daily press. She was outraged by the carnage in Vietnam and summoned me to her Rajagirya home to take down a letter to the press.
Foolishly, I tried to dissuade her. Like the proverbial devil quoting the scriptures I said:
" Aatchchi, Christ has said that one should give unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and give to God the things that are God’s."
There was a moment’s silence. Then she leaned forward and, holding both my hands, said:
"But my dear young man, Christ did not say we should give to Caesar the things that are God’s! Human life belongs to God."
I felt chastened but full of admiration for my grand-aunt. At this moment, someone brought us cups of tea. And the tea triggered her memory of an event that had taken place in the early 30’s in the States.
She recounted this memory:
"My niece and I had been collecting for charity in Philadelphia. It was noon and we had gone to a cafe for a cup of tea. But the waiters seem ignore us: people who had arrived much later than ourselves were being served. I felt angry. I stood up on my chair and said to the assembled waiters and patrons of this cafe:
‘Brothers and sisters, this is Philadelphia, which in Greek, means brotherly love. Is it brotherly love to ignore strangers? The tea is served here comes form the hills in Ceylon, where I live.’
An embarrassed manager soon put things to rights. We were served and no charge was made. We even got donations for our charitable work!"
Agnes Paynter’s father’s brother was the Venerable Piyaratne Maha Thera whose Buddhist Seminary is still in existence at Dodanduwaa. Yet her younger brother Colonel Arnolis Weerasooriya was a pioneer of the Salvation Army in Sri Lanka, as was her own husband.
This multi-national, multi-faith Weerasooriya family has excelled in various walks of life. It includes people such as Lt. General Sirilal Werasooriya, the former Army Commander, Hilda Naidu the concert pianist, Hubert Weerasooriya the novelist and lawyer, and Dr. H. S. R. Goonewardene and Merril Weerasooriya, both ace athletes, as well as Aravinda de Silva Sri Lanka’s legendary cricketer.
Noel was proud of them all. His own great contribution to human progress came from his professional work as an eel-worm expert. For over thirty years he worked as a micro-biologist at the Rothamsted Agricultural Research Station as well as the Commonwealth Institute of Helminthology. His work on the life and the mating habits of nematodes enabled his fellow- researchers to develop chemical agents to control the ill effects of these parasites which ruin potato crops and tea plantations.
The high esteem in which he was held and the affection for him by so many was movingly portrayed in the wonderful memorial event held a few weeks after his death. The Bach Choir sang, so many friends and family members made difficult journeys to honour his memory in the convivial manner he would certainly have wished and which was a hall-mark of his own conduct. He leaves us with the enduring memory of a jovial, musical, genuinely warm-hearted cousin, father, brother and friend.
Re: Count de Mauny-Talvande
Posted by: Alan Little
Date: July 20, 1998 at 15:14:51
In Reply to: Count de Mauny-Talvande by Cindy Wilkinson of 854
Dear Cindy, There is indeed a lovely book written by the Count de Mauny "The Gardens of Taprobane" Edited by Bernard Miall, published in London in 1937 by Williams & Norgate. It is all about his island home called Taprobane just of the coast of Ceylon, and includes several black & white photos of the house & gardens. The frontispiece is a colour print of the Author from a painting by David Paynter. I have a copy of the book in my extensive library of Ceylonese books. There are many lovely references to The Count and his guests. I imagine it will not be very easy to find a copy as this is long since out of print, but you may be lucky if you contact a Public Library or a Book Search Agency. When I visited Sri Lanka in 1995 I passed by 'Taprobane' but unfortunately did not have time to explore, but it looked rather run down like so many other places on the island. If I find any other references I will let you know.
Alan