Before Robert Brooke of the Bengal Army became Governor of St Helena in 1787, he spent time in his native country of Ireland.  He volunteered to recruit soldiers for the East India Company armies, and then devoted his time to establishing a cotton mill at Prosperous in County Kildare. 

  Recruits (1780) - image courtesy of British Museum

The legality of Brooke recruiting men in Ireland on behalf of the East India Company was questioned in the House of Commons by Sir Lucius O’Brien in February 1778.  By way of reply Brooke wrote a paper justifying his activities. Brooke stated that the Company’s charter allowed it to raise men for the defence of their settlements abroad.  The war against America had forced the government to increase the bounty offered to recruits for the King’s Army, causing a sharp fall in the numbers of men volunteering to serve the Company in India.  Therefore the Company had turned to Ireland for manpower to defend its interests in India ‘which may hereafter prove to be the richest Jewell in the British Crown’.

Brooke countered arguments that Company recruitment would thin the population of Ireland with reasons for allowing the ‘temporary Emigration of the Natives’.  He claimed that ‘Idle and dissolute Mechanics will find that Employment of which they were deprived at Home… the Kingdom will no longer wear a face of poverty.. and Ireland will be purged of a riotous Peasantry, that often pass their Lives in beggary, and generally conclude them in Jail’.  The Irish would fight for the British Crown rather than join French or Spanish forces.

He also defended his methods – he did not send out recruiting parties; he did not beat a drum or give arms to any man; he did not lure men with false representations or ply them with liquor; and he did not rob masters of their apprentices.  Instead he placed a series of advertisements in the Irish press aimed at attracting young men ‘desirous of pushing their fortunes abroad’. 

  Dublin Evening Press 16 December 1779 British Newspaper Archive

Brooke said that many ‘spirited Lads’ had gone to India as soldiers and returned home with ‘ample Fortunes’.  He claimed that war with France and Spain now gave the prospect of speedy success through prize money.  Boys under eighteen had to have their parents’ permission to enlist. The East India Company ships taking the recruits from Dublin were searched for deserters.

The  registers of East India Company recruits embarking for India give a description of those who enlisted in Dublin during Brooke’s campaign.  The vast majority were recorded as being labourers under twenty years of age.  Very young boys joined as drummers: in 1779 John Hewitson aged 11 and Christopher Hewitson aged 12 sailed together for Bengal on the ship Neptune.

Given the very high risk of death from disease or in military action, many of Brooke’s lads would never have made the return journey from India to Ireland.  But perhaps some did find ‘not only a Road to Station and Honour, but to Wealth also’.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
British Newspaper Archive
IOR/H/139 Papers on the recruitment of soldiers for the East India Company in Ireland 1778
IOR/L/MIL/9/90 East India Company embarkation list 1775-1784

 

We have always been both fascinated and saddened by whales finding their way into rivers or being stranded on strange beaches. The beluga whale in the Thames near Gravesend last week is the latest in a long line of chronicled incidents. They have been recorded in print since the sixteenth century, and in manuscript from even earlier. I am researching early modern printed ballads and pamphlets about these ‘strange fish’ that were paraded as exotic marvels, heralded as signs from God or feared as omens. It was only late in the seventeenth century that whales became natural rather than divine wonders. This is a timely moment to share one of my favourite pamphlets.

Strange News from the Deep, BL N.788 

In 1677, a whale became stranded in a river near Colchester in Essex and tragically died. We know this because a pamphlet was printed, probably within days of the whale’s death, which exists today in only three copies. Strange News from the Deep: Being a Full Account of a Large Prodigious Whale, Lately Taken in the River Wivner, within Six Miles of Colchester was printed by one still unidentified “W.H.”. Of the two copies at the British Library, one has a fantastically large woodcut of Jonah being swallowed whole by a whale. This copy once belonged to Sir Hans Sloane (1660-1753), a physician, naturalist and collector whose collection became the foundation of the British Museum, the British Library and the Natural History Museum. The other British Library copy is part of another important collection, albeit one formed a generation later – that of Sir Joseph Banks (1743-1820), the botanist who sailed with Sir James Cook.

Strange News from the Deep, BL N.788

This rare pamphlet describes how a “strange whale” was seen swimming up “the Wivner-River”. Villagers watched as it floundered on the shallow sand banks; its tail “shovelled the sands so high” that they showered over the spectators’ heads and the thrashing of its body caused waves to swell out over the banks. She continued to struggle until the tide went out and left her stranded in the shallow water. In her desperation, the whale broke her tail and her blood dyed the river red. Eventually she died in the water, “being of so large a bulk that the river could not cover her”.

The anonymous author tries to explain why the whale became stranded. He refers to Pliny’s theory that their “unnatural wandrings” are caused by sickness. He then suggests the sheer strength of the tide could’ve hurled the young whale into the river mouth. He then resorts to the traditional beliefs that whales are brought to land as a sign of “insuing judgment” or are a “favourable warning given us by the Almighty”. This opinion is “perhaps the least authentick”.

Image taken from page 84 of Narrative of the Wreck of the “Favourite” on the Island of Desolation: detailing the adventures, sufferings and privations of J. Nunn, an historical account of the Island, and its whale and seal fisheries. Edited by W. B. Clarke, British Library Flickr Commons, https://www.flickr.com/photos/britishlibrary/11012011156/ 

Stranded whales are almost as mysterious today as they were in the early modern period. A recent theory is that the phenomenon may be caused by the same solar surges that affect the northern lights. Others suggest the melting of the Arctic sea ice, the beluga whale being an arctic animal. These whales have become ominous portents once more, only now they warn of climate change rather than divine wrath. Whether they are reported in seventeenth century pamphlets or on Twitter, their plight evokes the same dread, fascination and pity as it has for centuries.

Maddy Smith,

Curator, Printed Heritage Collections

Further reading and references:

Strange news from the deep: being a full account of a large prodigious whale, lately taken in the river Wivner, within six miles of Colchester. Declaring the strange manner of its coming up, and by what unusuall means it was seized upon by the neighbouring inhabitants. Also an account of the like prodigious accidents in general. Printed for W.H. in the year 1677. British Library N.788 and 1257.d.29.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/sep/26/thames-beluga-whale-omen-changing-climate-gravesend

http://estc.bl.uk/R236823

http://estc.bl.uk/R42904 

The Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants was founded in 1875.  It was the brainchild of Jane Elizabeth Senior, the first woman to be appointed as a workhouse inspector.  The Association’s aim was to watch over girls sent out to jobs in London by industrial and poor law schools. The girls were to be provided with advice and assistance in times of difficulty and temptation.

'Though ye have lain among the pots, yet shall ye be as the wings of a dove' - picture by Jessie Wilcox Smith in Scribner’s Magazine P.P.6383.ac.(33), p. 58 Images Online

London Boards of Guardians generally approved of the initiative and some co-operated closely with the Association by handing over the names of the girls and the addresses of their mistresses.  Lady Visitors were recruited to take charge of girls placed out in their neighbourhood – 120 had agreed to help by the end of 1876.  The Lady Visitors sent reports about the girls from time to time to the Association.  In some instances they acted as peacemakers between the servants and their employers, and most mistresses were said to welcome the visits.

The Association opened homes able to provide immediate shelter for girls turned out of their job.  They could not return to the schools after the age of sixteen and often had nowhere to go.  Sometimes girls had not performed their duties well enough to be recommended for another position without a period of probation and training at the homes.  A Laundry Home was opened at Fulham for girls deemed unsuitable for domestic service.

Guidance and friendly care were also offered to other young servant girls not connected to the metropolitan pauper schools but who were friendless or destitute.  Free employment registry offices were set up. Clothing clubs enabled girls to acquire garments suitable for their work, and pay for them in manageable instalments.  The Rector of Christ Church Lisson Grove, a poor parish in Marylebone, wrote in his magazine in 1881: ‘We can send young girls whom we find idling at home to the Office, with the certainty that effectual aid will be given to them; and I have repeatedly found that in this way real and permanent good had been done’.

Girls coming from the workhouse schools were likely to struggle with the transition from an environment ‘where all is done by word of command’ to ‘the happy irregularity of an English household’.  They often found themselves the only servant, ‘expected to learn the ways to the house by intuition, to be able to turn her hand to everything, to be cook, housemaid, nurse, and errand carrier by turns, and sometimes simultaneously’.  It was seen as no wonder some failed and lost their job.  Medals were awarded by the Association to girls who had retained their post for specified periods.

Money was raised through subscriptions, donations, legacies, and fund-raising events.  One generous benefactor was Alice de Rothschild, and Octavia Hill wrote a letter to The Times soliciting support.  Other well-wishers made gifts of clothing or provided medical advice.  Group treats were provided such as a trip to London Zoo, or tea at a Lady Visitor’s home.

The Association later became known as the Mabys Association for the Care of Young Girls. It continued until 1943 when the London County Council took over its work.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
Report of the Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants 1875-1886 (shelfmark 8277.s.4.)
Metropolitan Association for Befriending Young Servants (MABYS) 
Sybil Oldfield, Jeanie, an ‘army of one‘: Mrs Nassau Senior, 1828–1877 (2008)

 

The Bunhill Fields Burial Grounds are the final resting place for around 120,000 people including Daniel Defoe, John Bunyan, Susanna Wesley, and William Blake. Previously, Blake’s precise location in the cemetery was unknown but thanks to Carol and Luis Garrido’s investigation, the exact location has been determined. In celebration of the discovery, the Blake Society commissioned a new gravestone, and arranged for an unveiling ceremony 191 years after Blake’s death, on August 12, 2018. Philip Pullman, novelist of His Dark Materials trilogy, and heavy metal frontman of Iron Maiden, Bruce Dickinson, came together, alongside other Blake devotees to celebrate the occasion.
 

William Blake’s grave. Taken by Elizabeth Potter. September 2018.

Another grave to visit for all things Blake, is Robert Blair’s The Grave, a Poem (1808). Blair belonged to what is often called the Graveyard School, a pre-Romantic group of poets in the eighteenth century that wrote about mortality, loss, and the afterworld.  Blake was commissioned to create designs to illustrate Blair’s popular poem for a new edition. Eventually, Blake was ousted from the position as engraver to be replaced by Louis Schivaonetti but twelve of his designs would populate the pages, and later would be Blake’s claim-to-fame in the nineteenth century.

An interesting plate by Blake is The Soul exploring the recesses of the Grave. The design is described in the book as: “The Soul, prior to the dissolution of the Body, exploring through and beyond the tomb, and there discovering the emblems of mortality and of immortality”.  The Soul, embodied as a curious woman holding a candle, ventures into the rocky, cavernous tomb that houses a corpse surrounded by flames. Atop the cave is a young man, with a crescent moon appearing behind and between his legs, bending towards the tomb with a confused, saddened expression.

  The Grave, A Poem by Robert Blair. C.39.k.11.

Scholars Robert N. Essick and Morton D. Paley suggest comparing this design to another contained in The Grave, called Death’s Door. These two images function as opposites – The Soul Exploring conveys restriction and obfuscation, and the Death’s Door revealing the possibilities of regeneration after death. Blake’s departure from gloom and towards the opportunity of immortality and spiritual regeneration is epitomized in the pairing of engravings. As the description of the imagery asserts in The Grave (1808), “these designs, detached from the work they embellish, form of themselves a most interesting poem.”
 

The Grave, A Poem by Robert Blair. C.39.k.11.

 

Elizabeth Potter
PhD Research Placement Student from the University of York

Further reading:
Robert Blair's The Grave illustrated by William Blake: a study with facsimile by Robert N. Essick and Morton D. Paley (1982).

The Notebook of William Blake, page 70.

Carol and Luis Garrido’s efforts to find the exact location of Blake.

 

In this second blogpost relating to the US-UK Fulbright Commission Archive recently acquired by the British Library, Eleanor Casson looks at the newsletters of the British Fulbright Scholars Association (BFSA) and the Alumni of the US-UK Fulbright Commission. For more information about this collection, there is an event on 19 November 2018 called ‘Hidden Histories: Gaps and Silences in the Archive’; tickets are available now.

Over the course of 70 years The Fulbright Commission has administered grants to numerous high-flyers in a wide ranging selection of professions, sectors, and skillsets. Senator Fulbright’s main aim was to produce world leaders through educational and cultural exchange. The US-UK Fulbright Program has been a particularly successful Commission in achieving this aim.

From 1982-2012 The Fulbright Commission had a separate supporting British Fulbright Scholars Association (BFSA), which acted as a charity on behalf of the Commission. It also acted as a central point from which Fulbright Alumni could stay in touch with the work of the Commission and build social and business networks across the Alumni database. This blog takes a look at the copies of the newsletter recently acquired by the British Library as part of the US-UK Fulbright Commission Archive.

The BFSA Newsletter was established in 1983, it was sent out to registered members as a way of keeping the community informed about the activities of The Fulbright Commission and the successes of the numerous alumni. The BFSA received a grant from the US Embassy to produce the newsletter to a high quality and improve alumni engagement.

The newsletter went through various overhauls with changes of name and changes of focus before the BFSA moved away from paper copies and began to distribute the newsletter only online. The multiple BFSA events planned throughout the year were documented in the newsletters, including the May Concerts, BFSA Debates, as well as Annual General Meetings Talks. Amongst the articles and photographs of Fulbright events and fundraising efforts there were snippets of the Fulbright Commission’s community including; birth, marriage, and death announcements.  

The British Fulbright Scholar Association Newsletter, 1983-1988, The British Fulbright Scholar Association: Link, 1989-2000, and The Fulbright Alumni News: Linking the UK and USA, 2001-2012

Alongside the community engagement element of the newsletter there were also thought provoking articles from Fulbright Scholars about their chosen interests and often related to the study they were undertaking with their Fulbright Grant. The BFSA newsletter aimed to engage the audience as well as inform them.

This article found in the Spring 1984 issue No. 2 highlights how little politics can change in 34 years. Article by Professor David Walker

Editors of the newsletter included Mary Hockaday, a journalist who went on to become Controller of BBC World Service English, and award-winning Adeola Solanke, a Nigerian-British playwright and screenwriter. Profile articles were written about well-known and successful alumni including Katherine Whitehorn, journalist and columnist with The Observer. Profile articles were also written for the politicians Lord Bernard Donoughue, Baroness Shirley Williams, and Charles Kennedy about their life experiences. Sir Malcolm Bradbury, the author and academic, wrote a small piece reflecting on his time as a ‘Fulbrighter’ in 1955, as well as imagining Sylvia Plath’s journey and experience travelling the opposite way in the same year.

Eleanor Casson
Cataloguer, Fulbright Archive

 

Indian prisoner-of-war (PoW) experiences during the Second World War varied sharply, depending on where soldiers were taken captive and who their captor was.  Letters archived at the British Library, documented in military censorship reports, reveal how such experiences are inflected by differences in war fronts, military rank, individual agency – and sheer luck.

Men of the 4th Indian Division with a captured German flag at Sidi Omar, North Africa. © IWM (E 6940)

The top priorities for one incarcerated Jemadar are toothpaste and shoes.  Writing to his friend in August 1942, he describes being imprisoned in Libya and then Germany, where has ‘a comfortable time'.  However, ‘we need some other things of daily use such as toothpaste and stockings.  If it is no trouble to you please send me a pair of shoes of No. 9 size’.  The Jemadar also reflects on the emotional charge of receiving letters from home: ‘The whole of that day the memory of India was fresh in our minds'.

Imprisoned in Germany, Sepoy Ajmer Singh, one of the few named soldiers in the censorship reports, writes rather accusingly in July 1943 to Sepoy Jahar Singh in Cairo: ‘I don’t know whether you are getting my mail, but I’ve sent you a lot of letters and had no reply. As prisoners of war we have nothing to take up our minds and we look forward to getting letters, so you must write to me once a month, or better still, once a week'.  Ajmer Singh’s prescriptiveness about epistolary regularity highlights an acute sense of boredom and loneliness.  How is one to pass the time in prison?

Soldiers of the 4th Indian Division decorate the side of their lorry 'Khyber Pass to Hellfire Pass'.  'Hellfire Pass' was the nickname for the strategically important Halfaya Pass in Egypt, fortified by the Germans and which the British attacked, unsuccessfully, during Operation Battleaxe. © IWM (E 3660)

This significance of emotional connections established by textual exchanges is emphasised by an Indian sepoy in December 1942: ‘We were prisoners of Germany when our British forces reached Benghazi.  Germans left all prisoners and ran away. Now we are quite well and safe.  We suffered a lot for five months and did not receive any letter from home’.  He also reveals the physical and psychological cost of incarceration: ‘Our work was very hard starting at 5 am and finished at 7 pm…We were loading and unloading ammunition and petrol from the ships, for their advance line.  Once we refused to do that kind of work saying that it was against our King and country.  They said that if we disobey their orders, we will be shot down’.

Such terrible conditions of imprisonment continue to be detailed in a letter by a ‘Hindu bearer’ to his mother: ‘Dear mother, I was taken prisoner … in the month of June… I cannot describe how atrociously we prisoners were treated by the Germans.  We were given half a pint of water and one 8oz biscuit.  This was all our daily meal.  We were employed on odd jobs, fatigues from early morning till it was dark.  We were beaten and kicked by the Germans…We have suffered such a lot which, if I write down will pierce your heart’.

It is from such PoWs that Indian revolutionary Subhas Chandra Bose started recruitment in Germany in 1941 and Southeast Asia in 1943 for the Azad Hind Fauj, which offered armed resistance to British colonial rule in undivided India.

Diya Gupta
PhD researcher, Department of English, King’s College London
Find out more in this short film. 

Further reading:
Middle East Military Censorship Reports: Fortnightly Summaries Covering Indian Troops -
August 1942-April 1943, IOR/L/PJ/12/654
April 1943-October 1943, IOR/L/PJ/12/655
November 1943-January 1944, IOR/L/PJ/12/578

‘We become crazy as lunatics’: Responding to the Bengal famine in Indian letters from the Second World War 

The ‘Kashmir of Europe’ and other exoticisms: Indian soldiers’ tales of travel in the Second World War 

Exploring emotional worlds: Indian soldiers’ letters from the Second World War

 

Every April the stockholders of the East India Company elected 24 men to serve as directors for the following year.  Two were then chosen by the directors to be Chairman and Deputy.  These ‘merchant- statesmen’ had responsibility for governing a vast overseas empire as well as dealing with administrative minutiae such as petitions from home staff.  What was a typical working day for an East India Company director in the early 19th century? 

Joseph C Stadler, East India House 1817 - P1389 Images Online

The Court of Directors met at East India House in Leadenhall Street in the City of London to take ‘cognizance of all matters of record relating to the Company’.  Thirteen directors had to be present to form a quorum.  One Court had to be held every week, but the directors often met two, three, or more times.  Proceedings generally started at 11am or midday, sometimes at 10am.  They usually broke up between 6pm and 7pm, although sittings might go on until 10pm. There were fines for non-attendance. During a sitting, some directors might go off to other parts of East India House whilst unimportant matters were being dealt with, but if something was brought forward for discussion, all directors were recalled to the Court before business continued.

  Thomas Hosmer Shepherd, The Court Room, East India House c.1820  - WD 2465 Images Online

Court meetings started with the reading of all papers received since the last session. Dispatches from India were read in Court before being sent to the different departments at East India House, but the vast body of consultations copied back to London were merely referred to and read as necessary. Lengthy debates often took place. Matters were either dealt with immediately or referred to one of the specialised committees of directors. There were sixteen committees in 1813: Buying, College, Correspondence, Government Troops and Stores, House, Law Suits, Library, Military Fund, Military Seminary, Preventing the Growth of Private Trade, Private Trade, Secrecy, Secret, Shipping, Treasury, and Warehouses.

The Court then adjourned and the committees of directors convened.  About 5pm the Court came back together to consider reports from the committees and make final decisions. The Court also swore in captains and officers of Company ships, and saw civil and military servants returning to India.

Chair used by the Chairman of the Court of Directors manufactured c.1730 - Foster 905 Images Online

Directors took turns at presiding over sales at East India House, and committees often sat on days when the Court was not meeting.  With very few exceptions, the Chairman and Deputy attended East India House every morning, and frequently were there until late in the day: ‘their constant attention is indispensable, from the frequent communication with Ministers and the Government Offices’. They often had to go to the west end of town on government business.  

Thomas Hosmer Shepherd, General Court Room, East India House, c.1820 - WD 2466 Images Online

In return for their services, directors enjoyed patronage rights over certain civil and military appointments as well as a salary, fixed in 1793 at £300 per annum for directors and £500 each for the Chairman and Deputy.  In 1814, the General Court of Proprietors voted an increase: £1200 for the Chairman, £1000 for his Deputy, and £500 for directors (£700 for those on the Secret Committee or Committee of Correspondence).  Not all stockholders approved of the pay rise: the vote was 51 in favour, 21 against.

Margaret Makepeace
Lead Curator, East India Company Records

Further reading:
Proceedings of the Select Committee appointed by the General Court of Proprietors, on the 6th October 1813, to consider and report upon the expediency of augmenting the allowances to the Directors for their attendance upon the business of the Company … (London, 1814)

 

In March 1917, British forces captured the Vilayet [province] of Baghdad and took over the city from the Ottomans. Soon many administrative changes took place in the city, among which was the administration of the civil post office. One particular issue raised during the process was a supply of Ottoman stamps that was found in Baghdad. Before leaving Basra and other towns, the Ottoman forces either removed or burned their stamp supplies; however, they did not manage to do the same in Baghdad. The British forces decided to make use of these spoils of war instead of simply trashing them.

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 272

They proposed issuing the stamps with an overprint ‘Baghdad under/in British Occupation’. Bradbury, Wilkinson & Co. Ltd of London, the firm that once printed the Ottoman stamps, was asked to provide lists of the stamps and their values before reissuing them.

Seeing that the stamps were of various designs and values, questions were raised about where exactly to place the overprint, and whether to overprint all the stamps or only a selection of them. A certain stamp that caught the attention was a two hundred piastres stamp which bore the portrait of Sultan Beşinci Mehmet Reşat (Muhammad Rashad V, reigned 1909-1918). There were concerns about overprinting his portrait.

Stamp of the Ottoman Empire, 1914- Sultan Mehmed V - Wikimedia Commons

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 153

Instructions came from the Foreign Secretary Arthur James Balfour that the stamp was not essential for revenue purposes and, that it ‘would appear politically desirable to omit it from the series’. It was therefore excluded from the overprinted reissue.

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 141

The rest of the stamps were reissued with the overprint on their frames, thereby preserving the image and the writing that appear in the centre of each stamp. Examples of these are as follows:

A green and cream stamp portraying a lighthouse, an Ottoman tuğrâ (tughra) in the left top corner, and the value of 10 paras (1/2 anna) in the three other corners.

  The British Library, Philatelic Collections, The Imperial War Museum's Stamp Collection

 

A blue and white stamp, portraying the Blue Mosque (Sultan Ahmet Camii), an Ottoman tuğrâ in the top, and the value of 1 qurush (2.5 ana) in the bottom corners.

The British Library, Philatelic Collections, The Imperial War Museum's Stamp Collection

The collection also included postal stationery, for example:   

A reply postcard with a circular green stamp/watermark portraying the star and crescent emblem of the Ottoman Empire, and the Sultan’s tuğrâ within the star. The phrase ‘Ottoman Postage’ appears on the stamp both in Ottoman Turkish and in French. The stamp’s value is ten paras (1/2 anna).
 
  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 58

 

A reply postcard with a circular red stamp/watermark, with exactly the same features of the green stamp, and the value of twenty paras (1 anna).

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 60

News of the overprinted stamps soon reached Buckingham Palace and the newly established Imperial/National War Museum. King George V asked for a set of four of each variety for his personal collection.

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 271

 

The Museum displayed its acquired set at the Imperial War Exhibition, held at Burlington House in 1918.

  IOR/L/PS/10/670, f 78

Truly, the ‘Baghdad in British Occupation’ overprinted stamps are but a representation of a crucial episode of Baghdad’s history. These stamps tell the story of Baghdad, as control of the city passed from the Ottoman to the British Empire.

Ula Zeir
Content Specialist/ Arabic Language
British Library Qatar Foundation Partnership Programme

Further reading:
IOR/L/PS/10/670 File 1323/1917 Pt 1 'Mesopotamia: Postage Stamps'
1918 Imperial War Exhibition
The British Library, Philatelic Collections, The Imperial War Museum's Stamp Collection