Read White Mughals Online

Authors: William Dalrymple

White Mughals (80 page)

BOOK: White Mughals
9.08Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads
63
OIOC, Mss Eur F228/11, p.287, 25 November, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
64
OIOC, Mss Eur F228/10, p.4, 7 August 1797, James Kirkpatrick in Hyderabad to William Kirkpatrick.
65
For the spy in the Residency
daftar
see OIOC, F228/11, p.192, 5 August 1799.
66
OIOC, Mountstuart Elphinstone Papers, Mss Eur F88, Box13/16[b], Elphinstone’s diary, f.93, 25 August 1801.
67
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.75, 26 September, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
68
OIOC, ‘Capt GE Westmacott’s Ms Travels in India’, Mss Eur C29, f.289, 24 December 1833.
69
Compton, op. cit., p.379. See also Bayly,
Empire and Information
, op. cit., p.146.
70
Kirkpatrick, ‘A View of the State of the Deccan’, op. cit., f.48.
71
John W. Kaye,
The Life and Correspondence of Sir John Malcolm GCB
(2 vols, London, 1856), Vol. 1, p.78n.
72
This information comes from a sheet, ‘Finglas Family Records’, kindly lent to me by Bilkiz Aladin and given to her by one of Finglas’s descendants. There is some dispute as to when Finglas entered Hyderabadi service, with some secondary authorities assigning him a role at Khardla in 1795. This appears to be an error: no primary source mentions him in Hyderabad before 1797, and it seems likely that he came to the city with Aristu Jah after his return from captivity. See also Kirkpatrick, ‘A View of the State of the Deccan’, op. cit., f.50.
73
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.121, 11 November, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
74
Ibid.
75
For Gardner’s American childhood see Narindar Saroop,
A Squire of Hindoostan
(New Delhi, 1983). For James’s view of him see OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.72, 27 September 1798.
76
See
The Dictionary of American Biography
and Compton, op. cit., p.340.
77
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.19, 22 August 1798, James Kirkpatrick to Ulthoff.
78
Compton, op. cit., pp.354, 340.
79
Ibid., p.382.
80
See Saksena, op. cit., p.288; also John Lall,
Begam Samru: Fading Portrait in a Gilded Frame
(Delhi, 1997), p.127.
81
OIOC, Sutherland Papers, Mss Eur D547, p.8, 1801, Pohlmann to Sutherland.
82
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/11, p.75, 26 September 1798, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
83
OIOC, Sutherland Papers, Mss Eur D547, p.35, undated.
84
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/12, p.166, 31 August.
85
Wellesley, op. cit., Vol. 1, p.209. See also Jac Weller,
Wellington in India
(London, 1972), pp.24-5.
86
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.75, 26 September, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
87
Quoted by Andrew Roberts in
Napoleon and Wellington
(London, 2001), pp.16-17. The second quotation in fact dates from 1812, when Napoleon was flirting with launching a second Eastern expedition; but no doubt reflects the ease with which he saw India falling into his hands on the earlier expedition.
88
Quoted in Sir John Malcolm,
Political History of India
(2 vols, London, 1826), Vol. 1, p.310.
89
Louis Bourquien, ‘An Autobiographical Memoir of Louis Bourquien translated from the French by J.P. Thompson’, in
Journal of the Punjab Historical Society
, Vol. IX, Pt 7, 1923, p.50. For the proposal to land a French force at Cuttack see Iris Butler,
The Eldest Brother
(London, 1973), p.311.
90
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.92, 6 October, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
91
For Malcolm see Butler, op. cit., p.157 and J.W. Kaye, op. cit., Vol. 1, Chapter 5. Captain Malcolm was later knighted, and is better known as Sir John Malcolm. James later accused him of exaggerating his role in the disarming of the French troops. See OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/59, p.6, 16 August 1803 to Petrie.
92
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.98, 9 October, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
93
Ibid., p.110, 16 October, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
94
For the mutiny, see OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/11, p.325. For the bullock traces see OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.87, 4 October, 22 February 1799.
95
J.W. Kaye, op. cit., Vol. 1, p.75.
96
Rt Hon. S.R. Lushington,
The Life and Services of Lord George Harris GCB
(London, 1840), p.233.
97
Ibid., p.235.
98
J.W. Kaye, op. cit., Vol. 1, p.78.
99
Ibid., p.78n.
100
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/10, p.195, 25 December, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
101
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/7, p.7, 17 October, William Kirkpatrick to Wrangham.
102
The date of Mehdi Yar Khan’s death is not known, but he is never referred to in the records of the 1790s, so presumably had died sometime before. His family and his marriage to Sharaf un-Nissa are discussed in the
Nagaristan i-Asafiya
under the entry for Aqil ud-Daula. It is possible that Sharaf un-Nissa never left Bâqar Ali’s
deorhi
, and that Mehdi Yar Khan came to live with Bâqar Ali Khan: Karen Leonard’s work on the Kayasths of Hyderabad has shown that high-status men would arrange their daughters’ marriages with promising and ambitious younger men who would then enter the household as in-married sons-in-law,
khana damad
. Syliva Vatuk has told me in correspondence that she has found the same pattern among the high-status Muslim families she has worked upon. This would help explain why it was Bâqar Ali Khan who arranged his granddaughters’ marriages rather than Mehdi Yar Khan’s male relations, and especially his elder brother, Mir Asadullah.
103
‘Report of an Examination …’, op. cit., p.364.
104
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/11, p.2, Hyderabad, 2 January 1799, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
105
This account comes from a translation of Sharaf un-Nissa’s letter to her granddaughter Kitty Kirkpatrick, in the private archive of her descendants.
106
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, F228/96, ‘Account of the marriage of Sharpun Nisa Begam with Colonel Kirkpatrick called Hashmat Jang, Resident, Hyderabad’. This document was apparently compiled by a
munshi
working for Trevor Plowden, Resident in the early 1890s, after Plowden was asked for information about the romance by Edward Strachey, who was writing his 1893 article for
Blackwood’s Magazine
, op. cit. In the event, the information arrived a year after Strachey’s article had been published. The anonymous
munshi
states that he got the information from Khair un-Nissa’s cousins and an elderly slave girl of Sharif un-Nissa, all of whom were still alive in Hyderabad at the time. It seems generally reliable, with the single major error of calling Khair un-Nissa by her mother’s name throughout.
CHAPTER 4
1
Shushtari, op. cit., pp.36, 56.
2
Ibid., pp.82-5, 121-130.
3
Khan,
Gulzar i-Asafiya
, pp.305-15. Also Mohammed Sirajuddin Talib,
Mir Alam
, Chapter 1, passim.
4
Kirkpatrick, ‘A View of the State of the Deccan’, op. cit., f.45.
5
Khan,
Gulzar i-Asafiya
, pp.305-15.
6
Delhi National Archives, Hyderabad Residency Records, Vol. 57, pp.256-7, Henry Russell to Hastings, 29 November 1819. Also Henry Russell quoted in Talib, op. cit., pp.183-90.
7
Makhan Lal,
Tarikh i-Yadgar i-Makhan Lal
(Hyderabad, 1300 AH/AD1883), p.54. Durdanah Begum was ‘from the house of Mir Jafar Ali Khan, son of Benazir Jung’.
8
Abdul Raheem Khan,
Tarikh i-Nizam
(Hyderabad, AH1330/AD1912), pp.68-9; Anon.,
Riyaaz e-Muqtaria Salthanath Asafia
, p.57; Khan,
Gulzar i-Asafiya
, pp.305-15.
9
Shushtari, op. cit., p.485.
10
Ibid., p.427.
11
Ibid., p.153.
12
Ibid., p.257.
13
Ibid., pp.11, 270.
14
Ibid., p.342.
15
Ibid.
16
Ibid.
17
Ibid., p.309.
18
Stephen Blake, ‘Contributors to the Urban Landscape: Women Builders in Safavid Isfahan and Mughal Shahjehanabad’, in Hambly, op. cit., p.407.
19
Asiya Begum, ‘Society and Culture under the Bijapur Sultans’ (unpublished Ph.D., University of Mysore, 1983), pp.62-3. There are numerous depictions of Chand Bibi on horseback, many of them from Hyderabad, including one from the collection of Henry Russell now in the India Office Library: OIOC Add Or. 3849.
20
See for example the fascinating comparison in scale of patronage between Mughal and Saffavid women in Blake, op. cit., pp.407-28.
21
Zinat Kausar,
Muslim Women in Mediaeval India
(Patna, 1992), p.145.
22
For Jahanara see Blake, op. cit., p.416. For Gulbadan see Gulbadan Begum,
Humayun Nama
, trans. Annette S. Beveridge as
The History of Humayun by Princess Rose-Body
(London, 1902).
23
Saqi Must’ad Khan, Maasir i-Alamgiri, trans. by Jadunath Sarkar as
The History of the Emperor Aurangzeb-Alamgir 1658-1707
(Calcutta, 1946), p.322.
24
Shushtari, op. cit., p.342.
25
Parkes, op. cit., Vol. 1, pp.417-18. For the contemporary Mughal practice of providing girls to Indian rulers as a means of preferment, see Michael H. Fisher, ‘Women and the Feminine in the Court and High Culture of Awadh, 1722-1856’, in Hambly, op. cit., pp.500-1.
26
Husain,
Scent in the Islamic Garden
, op. cit., pp.27, 40, 127.
27
Niccolao Manucci,
Storia do Mogor, or Mogul India, 1653-1708
(London, 1907), Vol. 1, p.218. For extra-marital relations in the Mughal
mahal
see K. Sajun Lal,
The Mughal Harem
(New Delhi, 1988), pp.180-2.
28
From a conversation with Dr Zeb un-Nissa Haidar. The records are now in the Andhra Pradesh archives.
29
Dargah Quli Khan (trans. Chander Shekhar),
The Muraqqa’ e-Dehli
(New Delhi, 1989). For Ad Begum, p.107; for Nur Bai, p.110.
30
That Mah Laqa was Mir Alam’s mistress is confirmed by James Kirkpatrick in his letters: see for example OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, Eur Mss F228/11, p.269, Hyderabad, 12 October 1799.
31
Shushtari, op. cit., p.157.
32
See her entry in the
Tazkirah e-Niswan e-Hind
(The Biography of Indian Women), by Fasih-ud-Din Balkhi (Patna, 1956).
33
For Mah Laqa’s poetry in the Nawab of Avadh’s library see A. Sprenger,
Catalogue of Arabic, Persian and Hindustany Manuscripts of the libraries of the King of Oudh 1854
; for Mah Laqa’s status in the durbar see Dr Zeb un-Nissa Haidar, ‘A Comprehensive Study of the Daftar i-Dar ul Insha 1762-1803’ (unpublished Ph.D., Osmania University, 1978), p.114.
34
Rahat Azmi,
Mah e-laqa
(Hyderabad, 1998), pp.34, 48-9.
35
Jagdish Mittal, ‘Paintings of the Hyderabad School’, in
Marg
, 16, 1962-63, p.44.
36
See Delhi National Archives, Secret Despatches, 1800, p.2491, Fort William, 10 May 1800, No. 3, ‘Intelligence from Azim ul Omrah’s Household’.
37
Tamkin Kazmi,
Aristu Jah
, p.38, quoting the
Tarikh i-Saltanat i-Khudadad
, p.39.
38
At least so Arthur Wellesley was told by Mir Alam; Wellington, ‘Memorandum of Conversations … Dummul 26th Sept 1800’, op. cit.
39
Quoted in Butler, op. cit., p.166.
40
Ibid., p.170.
41
Talib, op. cit., p.6.
42
Denys Forrest in
Tiger of Mysore: The Life and Death of Tipu Sultan
(London, 1970), pp.227-8.
43
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, Mss Eur F228/11, p.10, 8 January 1799, James Kirkpatrick to William Kirkpatrick.
44
Organising the carriage bullocks and sheep for feeding the army was one of Kirkpatrick’s main concerns at this period. See OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, Mss Eur F228/11, pp.14, 15, 28 etc.
45
Wellesley’s remark quoted by Moon, op. cit., p.286; the subsistence remark quoted by Buddle, op. cit.
46
For Colonel Bowser see ‘Report of an Examination … ’, op. cit., pp.362, 364.
47
OIOC, Kirkpatrick Papers, Mss Eur F228/83, Hyderabad, 23 May 1800.
48
Ibid.
49
Fyze’s
sanad
is in the OIOC, Persian Mss IO 4440. Mildred Archer in her magisterial
India and British Portraiture
, op. cit., wrongly states that Fyze was from the Delhi royal house. That she, and her sister Nur Begum, were the daughters of a Persian captain of cavalry is clear from numerous references in the de Boigne archive, Chambéry.
50
Bengal Wills 1825; OIOC L/AG/34/29/37, pp.185-205.
51
For Mubarak Begum’s background see the Mubarak Bagh Papers in the archives of the Delhi Commissioners Office, DCO F5/1861. Here it is recorded that ‘Mubarik ul Nissa was originally a girl of Brahmin parentage, who was brought from Poona in the Deckan by one Mosst. Chumpa, and presented or sold by the said Chumpa to Genl. Ochterlony when twelve years of age. Mosst. Mubarik ul Nissa from that time resided in Genl. Ochterlony’s house, and Mosst. Chumpa resided with her there, being known by the name of Banbahi.’
BOOK: White Mughals
9.08Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

Other books

Set in Stone by Linda Newbery
Sin With Cuffs by Carver, Rhonda Lee
Assignment - Ankara by Edward S. Aarons
For Desire Alone by Jess Michaels
Crushed by Sara Shepard
Stranger in Right Field by Matt Christopher, Bert Dodson