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Between 1861 and 1877, Godwin-Austen was employed on survey missions throughout the Himalayas and converted to the Buddhist faith. As such, he is the first known British adherent to Buddhism. In addition to his surveying work, he was also a keen and talented ornithologist and wrote Birds of Assam, describing several species for the first time. However, his real passion lay in the study of molluscs. His book Land and Freshwater Mollusca of India, published in the 1880s, is still the standard reference.
In 1877, his health broken by years in India, Godwin-Austen retired as a lieutenant- colonel and returned to the UK. He was president of the Malacological Society of London and awarded the Royal Geographical Society’s Gold Medal in 1910. His collection of molluscs has been described by the Natural History Museum as ‘the basis of all modern science in the subject.’ Such was his prestige as a mountaineer that he was consulted by expedition leaders planning the early attempts on Everest. Henry Godwin-Austen died on 2nd December 1923. In 1962, during renovations at his old residence in Surrey, Godwin-Austen’s devotional shrine was discovered, the oldest purpose-built Buddhist structure in Britain. Edward Godwin-Austen remained in India, becoming a civil servant and fathering 15 children. In a letter to one of his grandchildren written shortly before Henry’s death, he wrote of Kudji: ‘If there is anything left that I can look back on and love, it is her memory’.
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