The Black Hole of Calcutta

Guest Post by Harry

The English started the East India Company and the Persians came and took over Delhi and took all of its riches back to Persia. They also burned Delhi. The English thought the Persians were going to attack the East India Company so they built a fort called Fort Calcutta. The Indians thought the English were trying to attack the Indians so they banded with the French and they took over Fort Calcutta in four days. They threw the prisoners, 145 men and one woman, into the Black Hole of Calcutta which was the dungeon. 120 prisoners died in the night because of suffocation. They didn’t have any water or food. The English sent a big army and beat the Indians but the Indians didn’t do anything. Then Siraj, the king of the territory was killed and his Chief General, Mir Jafir, was made the king of that territory. India had fallen to the shopkeepers.

This is the project we did about the Black Hole of Calcutta.

This is me and Sam counting M&Ms. They represent the people standing in the Black Hole of Calcutta. The tape is the Black Hole.

These are all the prisoners standing in the Black Hole of Calcutta.

The peanut M&Ms are the people sitting in the Black Hole. We couldn't fit all of the sitting people, so we had to take some out and replaced them with the regular M&Ms, or the standing people.

This is the final picture. We got 120 people sitting and 46 standing in the Black Hole of Calcutta.

(Mom's note: the cheery colors of the m&ms are kind of odd, considering the topic, aren't they. Especially the Easter ones. )