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Meanwhile, a team of researchers has unearthed a lot about the school which traces its roots to Nano Nagle, from County Cork, Ireland who, in 1775, set up the charitable institution that became the Order of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary whose Sisters established a presence in Madras in 1842. In 1884, they founded their first school in Madras in Vepery.

It was in search of information about the Presentation Order and information about the Sisters who had served it at Church Park that one of the researchers came across a book published last year, Family Romance, by John Lanchester. The author, who has written three novels that reflect his years from Calcutta to Hong Kong, was making his own contribution to biography as history with this family memoir. Central to it is the story of his mother who was born Julia Immaculate Gunnigan in County Mayo, Ireland.

Julia Gunnigan was 24 when she decided to become a nun. Early in 1949, she came out as Sister Eucharia to teach at Church Park, another of the many Irish who contributed significantly to English education throughout the world. But in John Lanchester’s view it was “the great adventure of her life.” The ground reality was that, while teaching English (“brilliantly and charismatically”, according to an old student), she did London University correspondence degrees (B.A. and M.A.) and in 1956-57 was made Principal of Church Park’s Teachers’ Training College. Around this time, her sister Peggie — one of the four Gunnigan girls who became nuns — left the Presentation Order. A year or so later, in October 1958, Sister Eucharia became Julia Gunnigan again, teaching in London. In 1961, she married William Lanchester who worked with the Hong Kong and Shanghai Bank — and much of the rest of their lives were spent in the East, including a spell in Calcutta where she always worried over the possibility of an old Church Park student recognising her.

Her son’s book, through her letters, provides as much of an insight into Church Park and Madras as to her feelings about wanting to be a nun as well as wanting out. They are insights that are sure to enrich the history of Church Park.

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