Add MS 52275-52275*

Routes taken by the Bombay Division of the Army of the Indus, Nov. 1836-Feb. 1840, with twenty-three annotated maps and plans, and twenty-two ink and watercolour sketches of places mostly in Upper Sind, Baluchistan, and Afhanistan, 1841-1846. Mostly copies.

It has not proved possible to identify 'G P L M' or 'C H C' in Dodwell and Miles, Alphabetical list of officers of the Indian Army . . . 1760-1837, 1837, or the indexes to the Cadet Papers or Cadet Registers held at the India Office Library, the annual Indian Army Lists, or contemporary accounts of the Afghan campaign, but Gore Boland Munbee appears in Dodwell and Miles, op. cit., as having been promoted to Lieutenant in the Bombay Engineers on 1 July 1833. It is possible that the titles of the 'Boodergurh' sketches (ff. 60b, 62b, 64b) and the place names on the maps on ff. 2-7 were written by the same hand. This may suggest that Munbee took the opportunity in the years after the war (the sketches dated and signed by him date from 1846) to compile this album both from sketches made on the spot in person, and from the reminiscences and printed accounts of brother officers; the 'Vol. 5' marked at the foot of the spine may indicate that the volume was once part of a series of similar albums. The ink and pencil sketches on ff. 24, 25-28b bear a strong likeness in colouring to the sketches signed by G.P.L.M., although in each case the title appears to be in the same hand as the sketches signed by Munbee.

The 'Dr. Kirk' mentioned on ff. 13-13b and 52 is probably Rupert Kirk, promoted Assistant Surgeon 24 Nov. 1830, who served in Afghanistan 1839-1840 and who was present at the capture of Ghazni. See Lt.-Col. D. G. Crawford, Roll of the Indian medical service 1615-1930, 1930. Kirk's compilation has not been identified. For further details of 'Lieut. J. Jacob, Bombay Artillery' (f. 14), see Sir P. Cadell, History of the Bombay Army, 1938, pp. 175, 187, 190-1, 194-9. The maps and notes on ff. 16b-18 and 28b are all attributed to one Capt. E[dward] P[aterson] De L'Hoste, Assistant Quarter-Master-General. The 'Surveys in Sind' map on ff. 31-47 has De L'Hoste's routes marked on most sections. A comparison with the manuscript map 'Survey of Lower Scinde', drawn at a scale of 4 miles to the inch, and signed by Lt.-Col. George Campbell, Quarter-Master-General of the Army, in the India Office Library, suggests very strongly that the same hand was responsible for both items, although it is unlikely that De L'Hoste himself was the draughtsman. De L'Hoste appears in Dodwell and Miles, op. cit., as having been promoted to Lieutenant in the Bombay Army on 7 Dec. 1828. He appears on the title-page of a pamphlet, Sinde, a field for Christian and commercial enterprise, published in Bath in 1861 as 'Lieut-Colonel De L'Hoste, late deputy Quarter-Master-General, Bombay Army'. This has a small map of Sind showing De L'Hoste's routes in the area, but with almost no other detail marked. The 'Major Peat' named on ff. 60b and 62b is almost certainly the Capt. Alexander Currie Peat of the Bombay Sappers and Miners who led the mining party which successfully destroyed the Kabul gate at the storming of the fortress of Ghazni, 23 Jul. 1839, and was promoted to the local rank of Major, 17 Sept. 1839. See Cadell, op. cit., p. 173, and J. H. Stocqueler, Memorials of Affghanistan, 1843, pp. 28-42. For another MS. map signed by Peat, see Egerton MS. 3156 U, a view and plan of Kalat. The section of notes on ff. 18b-20b is attributed to 'H. Creed, Lieutt Artilly attachd to Qr Mr Genls Departt'. The pencil sketch on f. 21 also bears his name. Henry Creed was the adjutant and quartermaster of the 1st Battalion, Bombay Infantry, 1840-1841; he retired in 1849 and died in London in 1877. His twin brother Richard, of the 1st Troop, Bombay Horse Artillery was killed at the head of his men after volunteering to lead an attempt to storm the fort at Sibi, 40 miles NE of Dadur on 20 Feb. 1841: see the sketches of the ruins of Sibi on ff. 54-54b. For further details, see Col. F. W. M. Spring, The Bombay Artillery: list of officers who have served in the regiment of Bombay Artillery from its foundation in 1749, 1902; M. H. and E. S. J. Anderson, The Poona Horse (17th Queen Victoria's Own Cavalry), Vol. 1, 1817-1913; pt. 1, 1933, pp. 11-12, and Stocqueler, op. cit., pp. 143-4.

For other manuscript material relating to the First Afghan War, see especially Egerton MS. 3156 A-W, maps relating to the campaign of the Army of the Indus, 1838-1840; also Add. MSS. 36456-36472, 37689-37718, 40128, 40131 D. There are numerous contemporary printed accounts of the First Afghan War, notably W. Hough, A narrative of the march and operations of the Army of the Indus in the expedition to Affghanistan in the years 1837-1838, 1841. Hough has an account of the daily marches and stopping places on the route to Kabul and back, and includes extensive tables in an Appendix, pp. 424-43. Comparison with the account of routes given in the present MS. shows that on the outward march, the contingent of which the author was a member was three to four weeks behind the Headquarters staff until the head of the column was slowed down by the difficulties of the terrain after Quetta. On the return journey, the author of the MS. account left Kabul nearly a month before the HQ staff including Hough. Hough does include however in the Appendix a table of marches (pp. 439-43) for the column of the Bombay Army which returned via Ghazni, Quetta and Kalat, which corresponds closely to the MS. account on ff. 9b-12b. The fullest general account remains J. W. Kaye, History of the war in Afghanistan, 3rd ed., 3 vols., 1874. Place-names have been indexed, where possible, under the modern form of name as given in the Times Atlas, with cross-references from the form in which they appear in this manuscript, and also from the form in which the name appears in Edward Thornton, Gazetteer of the countries adjacent to India on the north-west, 1844, and, A gazetteer of the territories under the government of the East India Company, 1847, if this form is sufficiently different to cause confusion. Purchased from Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co., November 1963.

ff. 77. Ink, watercolours and pencil on paper. Add. MS. 52275, 220 x 170mm. (binding); 'Vol. 5' stamped in gold on the spine. Add. MS. 52275*, 245 x 365mm. laid down on sheet 260 x 380mm.; formerly folded and kept loose in 52275.