Add Or 4038

Colonel Jacob Petrus (1755-1850) wearing a top hat, blue breeches and a black jacket with an orange collar and cuffs, seated on a veranda smoking a hookah. His sword rests on a footstool. A servant wearing a green flowered jacket stands behind him holding a chowrie.

By a Delhi artist, c.1840.

Inscribed on front in Persian characters:’ shabih-i Karnil Hakub Sahib’ (likeness of Colonel Jacob Sahib); on back of original frame: ‘Colonel Jacob 1840. Commanded’ ‘ Brigade Scindia’s Troops.’.

Opaque water-colour 254 by 203 mm.

Purchased 1978.

Reproduced: ‘Bengal Past and Present’, Jan.-March 1930, vol. 39, 25-28, pl.opp. p.26..

Note: Jacob was born 24th March 1755, the son of Armenian parents, at Delhi. His father, Petrus, was a merchant from Erevan and his mother Joanna a daughter of Elchee Johannes from New Julfa, the Armenian district of Isfahan. Jacob as a young man raised an irregular military corps and attached himself to the Raja of Bharatpur. After three years he fell ill and his soldiers dispersed. In 1780 he entered Scindia’s service under General de Boigne. After the battle of Ujjain he was made a Colonel by Daulat Rao Sindhia and given command of the 1st Brigade consisting of 12 regiments of infantry, 4 of cavalry, and an artillery brigade of 150 guns. His troops served him faithfully as they were paid regularly out of the revenues of three ‘illaqas’ (districts). He himself served Gwalior for 70 years and had a palatial mansion at Naumahalla. He died on 24th June 1850 and was buried in the Armenian cemetery at Gwalior.