Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c55.s8: § 8. George Thomas, his early history

Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c55.s8

Language: English

§ 8. George Thomas, his early history

v4.c55.s8.1

Of all the European military adventurers in India George Thomas lived a life of the most romantic interest, marked by the brilliancy and briefness of a meteor.†

∗ One large body of Sikh raiders, 14,000 strong, under Sāhib Singh of Patiālā, reached Hardwār, where on 10th April 1796, the last day of the great Kumbh fair, they suddenly looted and massacred the pilgrims. Some five hundred Hindu monks and merchants were put to the sword, many others were drowned in their attempt to escape across that swift current. A battalion of Oudh sepoys under an English captain, named Murray, who happened to be present there arrested the advance of the Sikh horse, who retired next day, plundering all that they found on the way. Gupta, ii. 262-268.

v4.c55.s8.3

† It is now possible to reconstruct the story of George Thomas's life in Northern India with accuracy of details and dates and to correct the narratives of W. Francklin and Louis Ferdinand Smith, who depended on the faded memory of an unlettered soldier--and may we add, his Irish brag?--or the romance woven a generation after his death by the Eurasian family of Skinner. L. F. Smith, though a contemporary and a practised writer, belonged to his enemy's camp and knew only the events of the last years of Thomas. A correspondent's letters from Lucknow, published in the *Asiatic Annual Register* for 1802, (Characters, pp. 55-57) probably written by L. F. Smith, are useful on a few points. But we now possess contemporary evidence of unimpeachable authenticity, namely, (i) the despatches of the Maratha Resident at Delhi, (ii) the news-letters written to the British Resident with Sindhia by his agents in the camps of Thomas and his opponents and incorporated in the Resident's letters to the Governor General, and (iii) weekly (sometimes daily) reports of occurrences in the Delhi Emperor's Court and the news from various places that came to that capital. These last are found in Persian manuscripts called *ākhbārāt*. It is therefore necessary to make heavy corrections in Francklin and

v4.c55.s8.4

Born of very poor Irish parents in Tipperary about 1756, he received no education and enlisted as a common sailor. On his ship touching at Madras about 1782, he deserted it and took to the roving life of a soldier of fortune under the wild jungle chiefs of the south known as poligars. He next served as a gunner in the Nizam's army, but tiring of this work in six months, he made his way on foot to Delhi (c. 1787), and was there taken into the European corps of Begam Samru.

v4.c55.s8.5

His tall manly form, wild courage, inborn power of command, and Irish humour and generosity, soon won the Begam's confidence and, it is said, her love also. After testing his capacity in the Emperor's campaign against Najaf Quli Khan (Ch. 36 § 7) and in many an encounter with the rebel peasantry, she made him collector of the sub-division of Tappal (32 miles n.w. of Aligarh) in her jāgir, which had a revenue of Rs. 70,000, and even married him to one of her adopted daughters,—evidently the child of some European officer in her corps. As a district magistrate, Thomas strongly suppressed law-breakers, scared away Sikh raiders, and nearly doubled the revenue collection of Tappal. Then came his dismissal.

v4.c55.s8.6

According to the story told by him, he had advised his mistress to economise by dismissing some of the useless French adventurers in her service. This set the French party at Sardhānā against him, and their leader Le Vasseau with whom the Begam was over head and ears in love convinced her that Thomas's real aim was to deprive her of her true friends and then carve an independent principality for himself out of her estate. The Marātha Resident at Delhi, however, reported that the Begam had dismissed Thomas for wenching (baté-bāzi). The Irish youth must have wearied of the faded charms of the old hag and consoled himself among the younger beauties of her large

v4.c55.s8.7

Smith and their modern derivatives, such as Atkinson's N. W. P. Gazetteer, volumes ii & iii, Herbert Compton's Particular Account, and Keene's Hindustan under the Free-lances.

v4.c55.s8.8

mestizo household. So, she dismissed him. But he refused to yield Tappal, and was attacked there, taken, and confined, (c. Sep. 1791.) Released at the intercession of Shāh Nizāmuddin (Mahādji's agent at the imperial court), Thomas made his way to Anupshahar, the northernmost British cantonment, and set up as a private captain of mercenaries on a small scale.