'Ruins of the Temple of Everlasting Fire, Kangras City', 1905 (c)

Photograph, India, 1905 (c).

A photograph of the ruins of what is probably the Jwalamukhi Devi Temple in Kangra.

The Kangra region in Himachal Pradesh was hit by a major earthquake on 4 April 1905. The earthquake destroyed tens of thousands of buildings and is reported to have killed around 20,000 people. A detachment of the 23rd Sikh Pioneers was sent to Kangra to help with relief and the reconstruction of infrastructure.

The modern temple site is still a major draw for pilgrims who come to worship the Hindu deity Jwalamukhi, or Jwala Ji, thought to be manifested by the flames that can be seen in fissures in the natural rock.

From an album of 88 photographs compiled by Captain (later Lieutenant Colonel) William Arthur Henry Bird OBE, 23rd Sikh Pioneers, 1905-1920 (c).

Bird was born 6 November 1884 and was commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant in 1904. He served with the 23rd Sikh Pioneers, rising to the rank of Lieutenant-Colonel. He served in Aden and Somaliland in 1914-1915. He retired from the Army in 1933, and died in 1950, in Cuckfield, West Sussex.