In 1931 the Rev. Percy Knight, Superintendent of Baptist Mission Press, who came from the Knight family firm of printers in Derby, needed an assistant.
An advertisement was placed in the Baptist Times. The successful applicant was Norman Ellis, a 21 year-old from a much smaller family firm of printers in the village of Riddings, Derbyshire. He had been trained by his father, a skilled printer, and had studied printing at Nottingham University. He was given no missionary training, and was not a Baptist minister, though the Ellis family were members of Riddings Baptist Church (an offshoot of Nottingham's Friar Lane Baptist Chapel that had been founded in the early 19th century) and all the family members were active within the church.
When Norman arrived in Calcutta, in 1931, Rev. Percy Knight encouraged the eager young man to update the image of the Press and to attract suitable commercial work from the business community of Calcutta. This was gradually built up over the years and the Press increased in size and profitability as a result.
The academic community, conscious of the Press's history and reputation for integrity, entrusted it with the printing of examination papers for universities all over India. Superintendents of the Press were always on the Publication Committee of the Asiatic Society and the Press printed many of Oxford University Press's most important productions in India. Over time, Norman, succeeded by Bernard, edited, published, and printed the trade magazine for the Indian printing and paper industries called "Indian Print and Paper". A reflection of the standing the Press had in India.
Rev. Percy Knight retired after the Second World War and Norman succeeded him as Superintendent. Norman now needed an assistant of his own.
Previously, in 1938, Bernard, who had also been trained by his father in the family firm of Ellis & Sons, had gone out to Calcutta to work as a representative for a Calcutta firm of blockmakers called Calcutta Chromotype. One of his clients for letterpress blockwork was Baptist Mission Press and the senior workers there got to know him. During the War Bernard had returned to England to join the Sherwood Foresters and rose from Private to Captain. He joined Mountbatten's headquarter's staff and served as a Military Observer in Burma. After the War he returned to England and was worked as a reporter for the Derbyshire Times.
When the position of Assistant Superintendent became available the first choice of the senior workers at the Press was Bernard Ellis. Norman communicated their request to the Society.
The Society invited Bernard to join, whereupon he offered his services.
With his new family he made arrangements to join Norman in Calcutta within 6 months. No missionary training was provided.
Helped by the Press's long printing tradition, and the skilled workforce, Norman was able to continue to make the Press a thriving concern. He could perform all the basic skills required in letterpress printing. They became a formidable partnership. Bernard learned from Norman the print management skills necessary to continue that success.
The Press was my childhood home. It surrounded us on all sides. Our whole family lived and breathed the Press. It was our world.
As a graphic designer I have dealt with print and printers all my working life. Specifications for my print material have varied from the requirement to capture someone's attention for a few minutes, to reference material that requires occasional use over a couple of decades.
Bibles and New Testaments demand printing, paper-making, and book binding skills way beyond any projects I have encountered. Only a Press with the experience of meeting these specifications over a century and a half, like Baptist Mission Press, stands any chance of achieving these specifications.
A BMP NewTestament I have in my hand is an almost perfect example of the art of the letterpress printer and bookbinder. Few printers, even in England, could equal it.
From my experience the specifications for this Hindi New Testament would need to be:
It has to be used EVERY DAY... for a LIFETIME.
It needs to be LIGHT and easy to carry.
The type has to be SHARP and the ink JET BLACK.
Although the printing process is metal on paper there must be NO INDENTATION on the extremely thin, but strong, paper.
Holding the top and bottom edges in the left and right hand you should be able to bend it WITHOUT CRACKING THE SPINE.
No page must COME LOOSE in the book's lifetime.
It will be used in a damp, humid climate, so the printing ink MUST NOT SMUDGE.
It must be resistant to TERMITES which are capable of eating paper before it is even printed.
You must be able to print it in ALL the 114 languages of India; some with up to 700 characters.
There must be NO ERRORS in the text.
It must be produced at COST PRICE.
This New Testament fulfills all these specifications to the letter.
Only a press with the heritage of Baptist Mission Press could come anywhere near such a feat, and yet they did it every day, as a matter of course, with pride and dedication.
Those managing the Press were paid missionary salaries. They, and their families, had to make all the normal personal sacrifices expected of a missionary.
The profits, which were at least £100,000-£140,000 in today's money, went to the Society to help pay for evangelists in India.
In 1966 Bernard was looking forward to celebrating the Press's 150th Anniversary in 1968. It was thriving. But in that year he had to retire due to ill health brought on by the stresses of the job. Within a few years the Press started losing money and the Society had to start pumping money in. It closed, the buildings were flattened, and the land sold.
Rev. Earnest Madge's complaint "The trouble with Baptist Mission Press is they make too much money." is reminiscent of the 'Colossal Fortunes' debate William Ward had with the Society in England in 1819. As Bernard succinctly says "It's not going into our pocket."
I think William Ward... and William Carey... and Joshua Marshman... would have applauded everything that had been done by Norman and Bernard to achieve a sound and profitable Press that was an asset, in every way, to the Baptist Missionary Society.
These recordings were made on 5th April, 1980 and 16th, 17th August, 1980, at Odd Down, Bath, Avon, where Bernard and Freda Ellis were living in a Baptist Missionary Society owned bungalow that had been left to the Society for the use of retired Baptist missionaries.
Freda had been renowned for her ability to talk but was incapacitated by a stroke a few years earlier and had become almost silent, though she could follow what we were saying.
Whenever I visited them much of the time was spent talking about the past, so it was just a question of asking my father if I could put a microphone in front of him to preserve his reminiscences. He agreed, and so 12 hours of recordings were made, over time, for essentially family purposes.
The subjects covered in these extracts are ones that were directly concerned with my father's working experience at Baptist Mission Press. It would have been helpful to us today if the wider missionary context of the Press's roll in Indian Christian Literature was covered. It wasn't. However, it is touched on elsewhere on this site:
a) In the 'Digital Library' section under 'Service Forum'. A Christian Literature Magazine for India and Pakistan, written, published and printed at Baptist Mission Press.
b) In the 'Miscellaneous Section' there is the 'BMP Heritage' page and the 'BMP on the Internet' page which lists much of the Press's output over 148 years.
It is worth mentioning that as far as all my family were concerned the name William Ward meant no more than as part of 'Carey, Marshman and Ward'. My father may have known that he was a printer from Derby, but no more. When it was suggested by visitors that it was a historic Press he played down the idea. I think if he had known the story contained in this web site he would have reacted rather differently to those suggestions.
The account is recorded in stereo and has been edited very slightly.
To understand the relationship between the Printing Office at Serampore and Baptist Mission Press, Calcutta, there are two short movies on this site which seek to explain the connection.
Return to Miscellaneous