Mariophile: The Early Days of the Estate and Country Retreat of the College General

THE COLLEGE GENERAL, off Jalan Cengal, is a venerable Catholic seminary emphasising a prayerful and secluded life for its students—and it rarely opens its doors to the public. Last year, I visited with a group of Penang Heritage Trust members, and was greeted by the Rector, Very Rev. Fr. Simon Labrooy, a man with a large moustache and a calm demeanour. Two seminarians (priests in training) were appointed to be our guides. As we climbed a set of stone steps, the anticipation heightened. On our right was the chapel, while on our left, Mariophile’s elegant bungalow caught our eye, standing stately on the lawn with an old decorative cannon in front.

Scant prior research—almost all based on secondary English sources—indicates that the bungalow and chapel were built in the early 1800s. Local oral sources provide a muddled narrative, suggesting that the College General was granted the land in the early 1800s, and that the area was once a stockade with a cannon placed there by Captain Light himself in 1785 with the help of villagers who later called it Bukit Meriam (Cannon Hill). However, both French missionary documents and British East India Company records paint a different picture. This article, primarily based on French primary sources, is an excerpt from a draft chapter of my forthcoming book on Penang’s North Coast.