Call of Empire: From the Highlands to Hindostan

493 Pages·2017·6.488 MB·English

by  Alexander Charles Baillie

call of empire

Call of Empire
From the Highlands to Hindostan
alexander charles baillie
McGill- Queen’s University Press
Montreal & Kingston London Chicago
• •
© Alexander Charles Baillie 2017
ISBN 978-0-7735-5124-4 (cloth)
ISBN 978-0-7735-5206-7 (ePDF)
ISBN 978-0-7735-5207-4 (ePub)
Legal deposit fourth quarter 2017
Bibliothèque nationale du Québec
Printed in Canada on acid-free paper that is 100% ancient forest free
(100% post-consumer recycled), processed chlorine free
McGill-Queen’s University Press acknowledges the support of the Canada
Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the
financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book
Fund for our publishing activities.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Baillie, Alexander Charles, 1939–, author
Call of empire: from the Highlands to Hindostan / Alexander Charles Baillie.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Issued in print and electronic formats.
ISBN 978-0-7735-5124-4 (cloth). – ISBN 978-0-7735-5206-7 (ePDF). –
ISBN 978-0-7735-5207-4 (ePub)
1. East India Company.  2. Baillie family.  3. British – India – History –
18th century.  4. British – India – History – 19th century.  5. Great Britain –
Colonies – India – History – 19th century.  6.  Great Britain – Colonies –
India – History – 18th century.  7. India – Economic conditions – 18th century. 
8. India – Economic conditions – 19th century.  9. India – Ethnic relations –
History – 18th century.  10. India – Ethnic relations – History – 19th century. 
11. India – History, Military – 18th century.  12. India – History, Military –
19th century.  I. Title.
DS463.B35 2017 954.02'9 C2017-904054-5
C2017-904055-3
This book was typeset by Marquis Interscript in 10.5 / 13 Sabon.
For my grandchildren

Contents
Preface ix
Maps, Illustrations, and Family Trees xiii, 201
1 Culloden’s Children 3
2 No Great Mischief 18
3 Eastward Ho! 31
4 Baillie-ki-Paltan 47
5 Brothers in Arms 68
6 Affairs of the Heart 83
7 A Council of Incompetents 106
8 Command at Pondicherry 138
9 Disaster 154
10 Imprisonment and Death at Seringapatam 176
11 Homeward Bound 211
12 Brain Fever in Baghdad 229
13 Estrangement 251
14 John of Leys and the Acquisition of Bundelcund 264
15 Margaret and the Anglo-Indian Elmores 288
16 The Resident at Lucknow 300
17 Dismissal 313
18 Retribution 334
viii Contents
19 Dissolution 350
Epilogue 361
Colonial and Current Place Names 367
Cast of Supporting Characters 369
Glossary of Anglo-Indian and Scottish Terms 409
Notes 413
Bibliography 443
Index 451
Preface
By some act of serendipity, a chest that had lain in oblivion for almost a
century and a half in the Inverness Library appeared at the Highland
Archive Centre in 2002. The staff of the centre had yet to examine, in any
detail, the contents of the chest when my son Jonathan, who was com-
pleting his doctorate at Imperial College, London, wandered onto the
premises to enquire as to the existence of any materials on the Baillies of
Leys or Dunain. Fiona MacLeod, the senior archivist, recalled that a
recently received chest contained Baillie correspondence and directed
Jonathan to it. Since we were reasonably familiar with our family history
as a result of my uncle Donald Baillie’s extensive genealogical research,
Jonathan approached the ancient chest with keen anticipation. Nor was
he disappointed. The letters were indeed those of five generations of our
Dunain and Leys ancestors. Moreover, the chest contained in excess of
two thousand letters and a good many of them were written to or from
various family members in India.
Excited by the promise of this treasure trove, Jonathan and I lost no
time in engaging a local researcher, Sandra Bardwell, to summarize and
classify the correspondence. The sheer number of letters meant that her
task would be long and laborious. Upon completion of the project in
2003, Sandra stoked our mounting enthusiasm by reporting that, in her
opinion, the contents of the chest dating from 1720 to 1869 constituted
the most comprehensive collection of Highland correspondence from
that era.
This discovery, together with a considerable collection of family letters
and other material in the National Archives of Scotland, the University of
Cambridge, and the Oriental and India Office Collection of the British
Library, was the genesis of my determination to document the lives of my