Untold lives blog

The struggle for Indian independence from British rule was not only carried on in India, but was eagerly pursued by Indian activists and revolutionaries across the world, particularly in Europe and America.  The India Office Records contains some fascinating files on one such activist, Bhikhaiji Rustom Cama, more often known as Madame Cama.

Stamp of India 1962 depicting Bhikhaiji Cama. Copyrighted work of the Government of India, licensed under the Government Open Data License - India (GODL)

Born in 1861 into a wealthy Parsi family in Bombay, Madame Cama was educated at the Alexandra Parsi Girls School in Bombay, and later married Rustom Cama, a lawyer and son of the prominent Parsi reformer K R Cama.  With her health suffering due to her work as social worker during the 1897 plague epidemic in Bombay, Madame Cama travelled to Britain in 1901.  She would spend the next three decades working tirelessly for Indian freedom from British rule, becoming known as the ‘Mother of Indian Revolution’.  In 1907, Madame Cama moved to Paris, where she was at the centre of a small group of Indian nationalists.  That year she also travelled to Stuttgart for the International Socialist Conference, where she spoke of the poverty of the Indian people due to British rule, and unfurled the National flag of India 'amid loud cheers' as reported in the Manchester Courier.

The India Office was greatly concerned at the influence of Indian activists abroad, and through the intelligence services kept a close eye on their activities.  In 1915, the India Office received a copy of a letter sent to the Foreign Office from the British Political Officer in Basra, along with a specimen of Bande Mataram, the pamphlet published by Madame Cama, found in an Indian soldier’s kit.  In his letter, he asked: 'In view of the existing conditions of war and of close alliance with France, could the French Government be got to arrest Madame Cama and put her away somewhere?'  A note in the file suggested such a move would do more harm than good and pointed out: 'The lady is under close observation, and is not now in a position to tamper with Indian troops'.  By February 1917 more direct action had been taken, with the newspaper Call reporting that 'Madame B. Cama, editor of the "Bande Mataram", a Hindu paper published in Paris, is one of the most important women who have been denied their liberty.  She was interned in Paris at the special request of the British Government'.

Intelligence Report on Indian Communists -  British Library IOR/L/PJ/12/49 f.134

In the 1920s and 1930s, surveillance of Indian activists continued.  Madame Cama appears in several of the files of Indian Political Intelligence, the branch of British Intelligence responsible for monitoring Indian nationalist in the UK, Europe and America, and some examples are given below in the suggestions for further reading. 

Intelligence Report on Indians in Europe - British Library IOR/L/PJ/12/50 f.14

Madame Cama's health had never fully recovered from her social work in 1897, and her work, combined with continual government hostility, strained it further.  As she wrote to the Russian political activist Maxim Gorky in 1912: 'All my time and energy are devoted to my country and her struggle'.  In November 1935, she returned to India, and died shortly afterwards in August 1936.

John O’Brien
India Office Records

Further Reading:
Pamphlets published by Madame Cama of a seditious nature and names of four Indians implicated in sedition, April-May 1915, shelfmark IOR/L/PS/11/91, P 1667/1915.

Indian agitators abroad; containing short accounts of the more important Indian political agitators who have visited Europe and America in recent years, and their sympathisers, compiled in the Criminal Intelligence Office, 1st edition, November 1911 (Simla: Government Monotype Press, 1911), shelfmark IOR/V/27/262/1.

Chowdhury, Bulu Roy, Madame Cama: a short life-sketch (New Delhi: People’s Publishing House, 1977), shelfmark Mss Eur F341/108.

Indian Political Intelligence files at British Library:
IOR/L/PJ/12/49: Indian Communist Party: intelligence reports, 1923-1924 - Madame Cama is mentioned in the papers at folios 134 and 187-190.
IOR/L/PJ/12/50: Indian Communist Party: intelligence reports, 1924-1925 - Madame Cama is mentioned in the papers at folios 12-16.
IOR/L/PJ/12/174: Activities and passport application of Mandayam P Tirumal Acharya, 1926-1933 - Madame Cama is mentioned at folio 12.
IOR/L/PJ/12/219: Activities of Indians and Afghans in Paris: activities, 1924-1925 - Madame Cama is mentioned in the papers at folios 10, 11 and 18.
IOR/L/PJ/12/667: M.I.5. B[lack].L[ist]. Volume XXI (Indian Volume), 1921 - Madame Cama is mentioned in the entry for Sirdar Singhji Revabhai Ranna on page 57.

Foreign Office papers regarding Madame Cama can be found at the UK National Archives, references FO 800/56B.

British Newspaper Archive (also available via Findmypast):
Manchester Courier and Lancashire General Advertiser, 23 August 1907.
India, 30 August 1907.
The Call (London), 01 February 1917.

The Open University, ‘Making Britain, Discover how South Asians shaped the nation, 1870-1950’.

Asians in Britain: 400 years of history, Rozina Visram (London: Pluto Press, 2002).

Discussions about sending girls to New South Wales from the Madras Female Orphan Asylum took place throughout 1841 and 1842.  The Asylum drew up a list of girls willing to emigrate, with details of their ‘Character, Disposition, and Proficiency’.
• Caroline Davey – 13 years 11 months.  Generally quiet and obliging, not far advanced in learning.
• Mary Ann Cardwell – 13 years 7 months, and Caroline Smith – 14 years 11 months.  Both generally quick, but indifferent workers.
• Mary Watts – 15 years 2 months, and Ellen Tooner – 13 years 4 months.  Both generally quiet but not very good-tempered.

On 3 January 1843 the ship Duchess of Kent arrived in Sydney with these five girls travelling in steerage.  There were a number of convicts on board but no objection was raised because a ‘steady and respectable matron’ had been employed to look after the girls in case they might be ‘corrupted’.  Mrs Wooller accompanied the girls for a fee of £35, half paid in advance and half paid on arrival in Australia once the ship’s captain had confirmed that she had discharged her duties properly.  She had recently accompanied the family of Major Cortlandt Taylor from New South Wales to Madras and now wished to return home to Hobart Town.

View of the Female Orphan School, near Parramatta, New South Wales by Joseph Lycett (1825) – image courtesy of State Library Victoria 

The girls were taken initially to the Female Orphan School near Parramatta, and the New South Wales authorities said a report on their ‘disposal’ would be sent after six months.  A letter from Sydney to Madras dated 26 April 1844 explained that the enclosed report from the school matron had been delayed because of a reluctance to give an unfavourable one.  It was said that the girls had been ‘kept in India too long, having apparently acquired confirmed habits of indolence’.  In future, no girls should be sent from Madras above the age of ten or eleven.  The girls’ wages when placed as domestic servants were £5 per annum, increasing by £1 each year to a maximum of £10.

• Caroline Davey – Placed on 7 August 1843 with Mrs Hallen at Prospect as a children’s maid.  Conduct good but sent back to school on 23 August because she had ringworm (not true).  Went in September to Mr Pearse, a farmer at Seven Hills.  Nothing heard of her since.
• Mary Ann Cardwell – Indolent at school, not troubling to learn anything.  Placed with Dr Bell of Windsor on 18 July 1843 as a children’s maid.  Nothing heard of her since.
• Caroline Smith – Sullen and idle.  Went to Mr Mills, schoolmaster at Parramatta, on 25 July 1843 as a children’s maid.  Conduct so bad that she was only kept there two months.  Then sent to Mr Buchanan, a clerk at North Shore, without wages.  Was returned again to the school with ‘a most disgraceful character’.
• Mary Watts – Very good conduct.  Went on 25 July 1843 to live with Dr Smith of 99th Regiment as children’s maid, but returned on 2 December after the baby died.  Went on 4 December to Mr Fletcher, shoemaker in George Street Sydney.
• Ellen Tooner – Still in the school, ‘the worst conducted Girl I ever met with’.  Would learn nothing even though great pains were taken with her.

Here the evidence from India about the girls’ lives  appears to end.  Australian archives might reveal what happened next to the children sent from Madras.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
British Library IOR/F/4/1855/78480 Papers regarding the administration of the Madras Military Female Orphan Asylum - impoverished state of the Orphanage funds - dilapidated state of the buildings - Madras Government grant an immediate subvention of 15,000 rupees from the interest on the Wooley Fund - question of the salaries of the chaplain and medical officer, etc (includes list of past and present girl pupils from 1829 to date, with particulars as to parentage, father's occupation, etc), 1838-1839.
British Library IOR/F/4/1855/78481 Proposal of John Sullivan that boy and girl pupils from the Madras Military Male and Female Orphan Asylums should be sent as apprentices to New South Wales - Madras Government forward the proposal to the New South Wales Government, 1838-1839.
British Library IOR/P/247/68 Madras Public Proceedings, pp.979-981 Consultation 1 March 1842, pp. 1041-1042 Consultation 8 March 1842.
British Library IOR/P/247/67 Madras Public Proceedings, pp.25-29, 563-565 Consultations January 1842.
British Library IOR/P/247/72 Madras Public Proceedings, p.4255 Consultation 9 August 1842.
British Library IOR/P/247/73 Madras Public Proceedings, pp. 4273-4274, 4534-4540 Consultations August 1842.
British Library IOR/P/248/13 Madras Public Proceedings, pp.1521-1524 Consultation 26 April 1844.

Trove newspapers e.g. Sydney Morning Herald 4 January 1843.
Findmypast for baptisms, marriages and burials from the India Office Records.
FIBIS wiki.

Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 1
Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 2

On 22 February 1841 the first group of boys from the Madras Military Male Orphan Asylum arrived safely in New South Wales on board the Sesostris.  The Sydney Monitor and Commercial Advertiser wrote: ‘Seven youths, all of whom have been taught trades. have arrived from Madras, to the care of the Government of this Colony.  These youthful immigrants, all of whom are natives of Madras, are said to have been reared in one of the public Orphan Schools.  They promise to be excellent mechanics, and are very intelligent.  Those who have arrived are tailors, carpenters, and printers’.

New South Wales - View of Sydney, from the east side of the cove by John Heaviside Clark (1810) BL flickr

The boys were kept at the Orphan School for two or three months so they could adjust to the climate before being apprenticed.  The New South Wales government promised that great care would be taken to find suitable masters for them, and the East India Company directors in London were keen for the Madras authorities to obtain reports from Australia on the boys.

A report on the Sesostris boys was sent in February 1844.
• James Marlow was apprenticed to Alexander Martin of the Cowpastures as a farmer.  He was generally well-behaved although somewhat sullen, and was becoming a useful worker.
• Christopher Connors, Samuel Hobart and John Harris were apprenticed as shoemakers to William Mackie, J. Fletcher and James Scott respectively.  All were diligent and well-behaved.
• William Bird was apprenticed as gardener to Henry Cox. a magistrate residing at Penrith.  Cox had no reason to be dissatisfied with William, who displayed ‘no symptom of vice in his disposition’.
• James Barry (named as John in the report) had been apprenticed to Captain G. B. Christmas as a miller who stated that the boy’s behaviour was very bad at first but now greatly improved.  His weak constitution and small size prevented him from being employed in the mill at present and he was on light work until he gained strength.
• James Mackin was apprenticed to Mr Urquhart as a coachbuilder.  His initial stubborn disposition had improved and he was making good progress.

In October 1842 the New South Wales government reported on the boys who had arrived in December 1841 in the British Sovereign (also called Royal Sovereign in the records).
• Matthew Thornhill and Edward Wallace had been apprenticed to the Government Printer in Sydney.  Both were doing well, especially Matthew who was already able to work as a compositor.  Edward was not so advanced so he was still attending the Protestant Parochial School of St James every morning.
• Matthew and James Bradshaw were apprenticed to Robert Dawson, a magistrate living four miles from Sydney.  Matthew was a gardener and James a house servant.  At first, Matthew had tried being a tailor but had not made much progress.  James had a skull fracture before arriving in Sydney and so a house job had seemed best for him.  Both boys were free from any vicious habits, but rather dull and indolent.  The Australians believed that their indolence could be attributed to early habits contracted in India.
• James Callaghan had poor sight so he had been kept in the Male Orphan School of New South Wales.  He was now considered fit for apprenticeship and would be placed once a suitable master was found.

Our next post will tell the story of the girl emigrants from the Madras Female Orphan Asylum.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
British Library IOR/F/4/1855/78481 Proposal of John Sullivan that boy and girl pupils from the Madras Military Male and Female Orphan Asylums should be sent as apprentices to New South Wales - Madras Government forward the proposal to the New South Wales Government, 1838-1839.
British Library IOR/F/4/1916/82082 Seven boys of the Madras Military Male Orphan Asylum are at their own request sent to New South Wales to be apprenticed under the Government of that colony - the Madras Government provides them with a passage to Sydney, [1834]-1841.
British Library IOR/E/4/956 pp.798-802 Letter from London to Fort St George in the Public Department, 8 December 1841.
British Library IOR/E/4/958 pp.566-567 Letter from London to Fort St George in the Public Department , 21 September 1842.
British Library IOR/P/248/5 Madras Public Proceedings, pp.1911-1916 Consultation 13 June 1843.
Trove e.g. The Sydney Monitor and Commercial Advertiser 26 February 1841.
Findmypast for baptisms, marriages and burials from the India Office Records.
FIBIS wiki.

Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 1
Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 3

In the late 1830s both the Madras Military Male Orphan Asylum and Madras Female Orphan Asylum were experiencing difficulty finding employment for children old enough to leave the institution.  The Madras Government approached the authorities in New South Wales outlining a scheme for sending children to be apprenticed there.  It was said that the Asylum pupils’ superior education and the care bestowed on their morals might make them a valuable acquisition to the colony, especially the girls.

South east view of Fort St George, Madras by Thomas Daniell,  from Oriental Scenery. Twenty four views in Hindoostan,Tab.599.a.(2), plate VII  (1797) British Library Images Online

The New South Wales authorities agreed on condition that the children would be at least twelve years of age and of ‘pure European descent’.  They were to be sent to Sydney free of charge and would be apprenticed in the same way as children from local orphan schools.  Apprenticeships lasted until 21 for males and until 21 or marriage for females.  Masters or mistresses had to provide sufficient and suitable food, clothing and bedding, and make payments into the Savings Bank of New South Wales which were handed to the apprentice, with accrued interest, at the end of their term.  When practicable, apprentices had to attend divine service at least once every Sunday.  Particular attention was to be given to the apprentice’s morals.  Justices were to investigate complaints about ill-treatment by masters, lack of provisions etc, as well as misdemeanours by apprentices.

The Madras Military Male Orphan Asylum compiled a list in August 1840 of seven boys willing to emigrate who met the criteria set by New South Wales.

• Samuel Hobart, aged 14 years 3 months, son of Matthew, Sergeant Major of Artillery and Ann.  He could read and was learning to write, cypher, and make shoes.
• James Marlow, aged 13 years 7 months, son of Edward, Private HM 45th Foot, and Catharine.  He was learning to read and write, and could make shoes.
• John Harris, aged 12 years and 7 months, son of Hugh, Sergeant HM 41st Foot, and Jane.  John could read, write and cypher well, and was employed at the Asylum Press as a printer.
• James McKin or MacKin, aged 13 years 7 months, son of Thomas, Private HM 48th Foot, and Mary.  He was able to read, write and cypher tolerably well.
• Christopher Connors, aged 12 years 6 months, son of Daniel, Private HM 54th Foot.
• William Bird, aged 12 years 5 months, son of William, Sergeant Major HM 54th Foot.
• James Barry, aged 12 years, son of Patrick, Gunner Veteran Battalion, and Anne.
Connors, Bird and Barry could all read, write and cypher well.

The terms of emigration and apprenticeship were explained carefully to these boys.  They arrived in Sydney in the Sesostris in February 1841.

Five more lads from the Asylum ‘anxious to emigrate’ took their passage in the British Sovereign (or Royal Sovereign) which arrived in Sydney in December 1841.

• Matthew Thornhill, born October 1827, son of Matthew, Commissariat Department, and Julia.
• Matthew and James Bradshaw, born 1827 and 1829, sons of Matthew, Private HM 41st Foot, and Ann.
• James Callaghan, born 1828, son of Patrick Callaghan, Hospital Sergeant, and Louisa.
• Edward Wallace.

Our next post will tell the story of what happened to these twelve boys when they arrived in New South Wales.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
IOR/F/4/1855/78481 Proposal of John Sullivan that boy and girl pupils from the Madras Military Male and Female Orphan Asylums should be sent as apprentices to New South Wales - Madras Government forward the proposal to the New South Wales Government, 1838-1839.
IOR/F/4/1916/82082 Seven boys of the Madras Military Male Orphan Asylum are at their own request sent to New South Wales to be apprenticed under the Government of that colony - the Madras Government provides them with a passage to Sydney, [1834]-1841.
Findmypast for baptisms, marriages and burials from the India Office Records.
Trove for Australian newspaper reports.
FIBIS wiki.

Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 2
Emigration of children from the Madras Orphan Asylums to New South Wales – Part 3

The extraordinary escape from Botany Bay of nine transportees in an open boat has been narrated many times.  Mary Broad was the only woman who escaped on this boat in March 1791, travelling for 69 days, before reaching Kupang in Timor, with her two children and husband, William Bryant, who led and organised their escape.

Hamoaze, Plymouth where Mary Broad was held in the Dunkirk prison hulk before being transported with the First Fleet. 

Painting of The Hamoaze and Dock, Plymouth, Devon by Coplestone Warre Bampfylde. Image courtesy of Royal Albert Memorial Museum & Art Gallery.

Mary’s husband and children died before she was returned to London in 1792.  James Boswell took up the case of the five returned transportees, and advocated their release from prison.  It is thanks to Boswell that Mary Broad’s family origins in Cornwall can be identified here.

Boswell's papers noted that Mary Broad’s ‘aged’ father was living in Cornwall.  He met Mary's younger sister Dolly Broad.  Boswell corresponded with Mary's married sister Elizabeth Puckey.  And her husband, Edward Puckey, a tailor in Fowey, who wrote to Boswell about an anticipated Broad family inheritance, which was a Pope family legacy.

Using this information, Mary Broad can be historically identified as the granddaughter of Prudence Pope, who married Josiah Broad.  Mary’s father was their eldest son William Broad, who was aged 84 in 1793, when Mary was aged 28.  Mary’s mother was William’s wife Dorothy Guilleff, who died aged 50 in 1778, when Mary was aged 13.  And William and Dorothy Broad’s daughters were Elizabeth (baptised 1756), Mary (baptised 1765), and Dorothy (baptised 1769).

Josiah and Prudence Broad, and most of their adult children, lived in the neighbouring Cornish parishes of St Neot or Braddock.  William and his brother Matthew Broad described themselves as ‘colliers’, and obtained leases to coppice woodland.  It may have been the profits from this trade which enabled William Broad to obtain a farm.  In the 1760s, William Broad moved his family between parishes within a few miles of Fowey.  Mary’s christening in 1765 was at Lanlivery, and Dorothy’s in 1769 was at St Veep.  By the late 1770s, some family members were present in Fowey, where the elder Dorothy Broad died in 1778, and Elizabeth married Edward Puckey in 1779.

1805 Map of Fowey river and parishes by Robert Dawson British Library Online Gallery

In the 1930s, the Boswell scholar Frederick A. Pottle sought to identify Mary Broad's family origins.  Through the assistance of members of the Old Cornwall Society, the Fowey and Lostwithiel parish registers were searched for her baptism.  This led to the suggestion that her parents had been a mariner William and his wife Grace Broad, who also had a daughter named Mary.  Judith Cook later acknowledged that there were many inconsistencies and gaps between the evidence related to this family and Boswell’s account.  William and Grace Broad did not have daughters named Dorothy or Elizabeth, and they had left Cornwall before Mary Broad returned home in 1794.

Members of Mary Broad's extended family as identified here can be found in other historical records, including the Clift family letters.  She was not the only member of her family to be accused or convicted of assault.  And it is possible to see her influence and legacy in the decisions of James and William Puckey, the nephews of Edward Puckey, to travel from Cornwall to Tahiti, New South Wales, and New Zealand.

Dr Charlotte MacKenzie
Independent researcher
@HistoryCornwall

Further reading
Tim Causer (ed), Memorandoms by James Martin (2017)
Charlotte MacKenzie, Mary Broad the documentary (2021)

The Boxer Rebellion (1899-1900) began as an uprising against foreign influence in China and resulted in fighting between Chinese forces and an eight-nation alliance, which included Britain and Germany.  Following the conflict, troops from the foreign coalition occupied areas in northern China for over a year, during which time looting and acts of violence were common.

In 1920, the British Foreign Office was informed that an individual had approached German officials offering - for a price - evidence of such looting carried out by Indian Army personnel.  The individual believed this would interest the German government as the Treaty of Versailles required them to return looted items, and such evidence might give them some political benefit.  The Germans declined to purchase it, but its existence prompted the British to investigate the matter.

The evidence comprised communications between officers in the 16th Cavalry and inspired a flurry of correspondence between India and the UK.  Reading these, we can determine the sequence of events.

The Temple of Heaven, Peking from The Earth and its Inhabitants. The European section of the Universal Geography by E. Reclus. Edited by E. G. Ravenstein (London, 1878).
 BL flickr

During the occupation of Peking (modern Beijing), two golden bells were taken from the Temple of Heaven by Indian Army officers; one was taken by C. E. Thornton of the 16th Cavalry from what was subsequently described as a rubbish heap.  The commanding officer gave permission for the bells to be taken back to India as regimental trophies, where the 16th kept theirs as mess decoration.  In 1906, while Thornton was on leave for medical reasons, other officers in the regiment voted to sell the bell.  Thornton objected, claiming that as ‘finder’ he had sole rights over the bell.  The dispute prompted Thornton to contact lawyers and the bank where the bell was temporarily stored, and the whole affair was made public.  Ultimately, the British government decided that as the bells were found in ‘rubbish’ and as commanding officers had given permission for their removal, no looting had taken place.

In 1927, Mr H. Beechey started sending letters insisting on the restoration of either the bells or their value to the Temple of Heaven.  Beechey was persistent; he sent multiple letters to the Foreign Office, various politicians, the Prime Minister, and even the King-Emperor George V himself.

The recipients of his letters were dismissive of such demands; however, newspaper articles from the time suggest the general public was not.  In 1921, the Daily Express reported demands raised by Chinese voices in London for the value of the bells to be restored to the Temple.  Articles continued to appear in various papers over the next decade, but eventually the public lost interest in the story.

In 1994, there were reports in online publications of a bell returned by the Indian Government to the Temple of Heaven, one of sixteen that were taken by British troops during the Boxer Rebellion.  Whether the bells mentioned in file IOR L/MIL/7/16819 were part of this set is unclear, but perhaps there are other files in the India Office Records, waiting to be discovered, that could add to the story.

Djurdja Brankovic
Student of librarianship, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology

Further reading:
British Newspaper Archive -Daily Express, 15 July 1921
New York Herald, 3 January 1926
IOR L/MIL/7/16819 Collection 402/153 Alleged looting of golden bells from Temple of Heaven, Peking (Beijing) by British officers of Indian Army, 1920-1927.

A recent post on this blog introduced James Jackson, Royal Navy seaman, whose letters to his family in England have been acquired by the India Office Private Papers.  We left James aboard the HMS Suffolk sailing to India.

On 30 September 1794, James wrote from Madras Roads.  He says that they had a ‘tolerable pleasant voyage of 4 months and 9 days…but the monsoons or winter months are now very near coming on – we yesterday was drove from our anchor to sea in violent weather but are here again all well’.  Of India he says: ‘I find this country very hot but I think it pleasanter than Europe’, although he is unimpressed by the lack of good meat: ‘the beef is not bigger than your small calves of a twelvemonths growth, the sheep are also very diminutive and pigs like rats – all skin and bone’.

Letter written by James Jackson from Madras Roads. 30 September 1794 - Mss Eur F756 f.8

His sixth letter is dated 20 August 1795 and gives news of the British invasion of Ceylon.  He says they have been laying siege to Trincomalee for three weeks, ‘I cannot say how long they may hold it out with us – but we are determined to be victorious – it is the most valuable island the Dutch have in this country and nearly as large as England’.  The British were stopping all vessels that came to Ceylon so that the Dutch could get no supplies: ‘there is a strange vessel in sight of us now and I am going in our boat to board her’.  He also reports on the sinking of the British ship HMS Diomede, ‘but by the endeavours of all people on board the other ships here at that time – her men was saved but the loss was great happening at this critical time’.  He mentions that his brother William was well when last he heard in July, but he does not expect to see him on this voyage.

Letter written by James Jackson 19 March 1796 on board the Suffolk in the East Indies - Mss Eur F756 f.14

James’s last letter is dated 19 March 1796, on board the Suffolk in the East Indies.  He describes the British attacks on Amboyna (‘this island was full of cloves and other spices and their warehouses were all full’) and Banda (‘the nutmegs on this island alone are valued at two hundred thousand pounds sterling’) in the Dutch-held Molucca islands.  He expected the British ships to sail for Europe about Christmas, but the war had taken its toll: ‘we have not much above half our compliment of men, we have buried a great many indeed’, and he was worried about the lack of fresh provisions ‘as we are all upon very short allowance of victuals - what we have is badly salted - the country is very hot and unhealthy for Europeans in this part which is near the Pacific Ocean’.  However, he is hopeful ‘if our Agents for our prize money do us the least justice in nature we shall be pretty well and decently paid for our troubles’.  James concludes his letter by looking forward to meeting his family again in England.

John O’Brien
India Office Records

Further Reading:
Papers of the Jackson Family, 1784-1843, British Library shelfmark: Mss Eur F756.
HMS Suffolk 

The Levant Company clerk John Sanderson had arrived in Istanbul on 12 March 1592.  However, something had changed in the behaviours and manners of the English residents since his first being there.  Sanderson wrote that there had been a ‘great alteration; frome serving God devoutly and drinking puer water, nowe to badness stoutly and much wine (the witts hater).’  In Sanderson’s absence the embassy had been taken over by Edward Barton and Sanderson now had to decide whether to move in with him.  Despite his reservations, the benefits – and probably also savings– were too great to forego Barton’s offer.

Title page of John Sanderson's commonplace book British Library Lansdowne MS 241

Born in 1560 John Sanderson is a rare example of an early modern man of trade who wrote a record of his life.  His miscellaneous commonplace book is held in the British Library manuscript collection (BL Lansdowne MS 241).  His short ‘autobiography’, entitled by its author ‘a record of the birthe and fortunes of John Sanderson, alias Bedic’, noted down not only Sanderson’s illnesses, fortunes and misfortunes, but also and very keenly, his many judgments (‘censures’) about other people.  And there were loads of them.

Reading Sanderson’s account, anyone who has ever been stuck in a riotous house-share with horrible house-mates will soon start to feel sympathy.  Sanderson claims that the ambassador Barton ‘vexed me to my very soule,’ although his foremost adversary seems to have been William Aldrich, who Sanderson claims to have ‘stealingly’ struck him.  After Sanderson struck him back the ambassador Barton himself ‘laid his fists one my face for so doinge, and confined me to my chamber.’  After all these fisticuffs Barton sent a stern letter to Sanderson’s room, threatening to deport him back home to England.  After the altercation Aldrich refused to dine in the same table with Sanderson and complained that he ‘outlooked him'.  Ill-will continued for some time, although the ambassador eventually tried to make amends by gifting Sanderson ‘a redd velvett goune wch the Gran Sigr had vested him with before he kiste his hand'.  Additional proof of this reconciliation was that Sanderson later acted as the ambassador’s deputy when Barton famously, and somewhat notoriously, accompanied the Ottoman sultan Mehmet III to his wars in Hungary.  However, the scuffles continued between Sanderson, Aldrich, and the steward of the house.

Based on his writings, Sanderson was a keen observer of the faults of other people.  He listed all the names or sometimes the initials of his ‘frenemies’, saying that ‘many other agreevances and discontents passed whilst I was ther, in comp of Bushell, Aldrich, Mons, Wragg, Rivers, Babington’...  The animosities between Sanderson and the two Aldrich brothers, William and Jonas, were explained by the different ‘conditions and qualities’ of the men, whereas the differences between Sanderson and Barton were probably due to breaching social hierarchies and trying to police Barton’s behaviour too much (possibly due to toxic masculine bravado).  Sanderson gave all these men derogatory nicknames ranging from ‘wicked athiesticall knave’ to ‘poysoner’ and ‘whoremonger’ and continued to record their deaths with no small amount of glee.

The selected texts from this old ledger volume bought by Sanderson’s father were edited by William Foster, the then president of the Hakluyt Society and published in 1931.  You can find this fascinating manuscript as part of the Lansdowne collection.

Dr Eva Johanna Holmberg
Academy Research Fellow, Department of Philosophy, History, and Art Studies, University of Helsinki
([email protected])

Further reading:
British Library Lansdowne MS 241.
The Travels of John Sanderson in the Levant 1584-1602. Ed. by William Foster. Hakluyt Society 2nd Series ; No 67. London: Hakluyt Society, 1931.
Eva Johanna Holmberg, ‘‘Passages recollected by memory’: Remembering the Levant Company in seventeenth-century merchants’ life writing’, in Trading Companies and Travel Knowledge in the Early Modern World. Routledge, 2021. p. 211-239 (Hakluyt Society Studies in the History of Travel; Vol. 1).

This blog post is the second in a collaborative series with Medieval and Early Modern Orients (MEMOs).  On the last Monday of every month, both Untold Lives and MEMOs' own blog will feature a post written by a member of the MEMOs team, showcasing their research in the British Library collections.  Follow the conversation on Twitter with the hashtag #BLMEMOS.