William Brydon
William Brydon | |
---|---|
Born | London, England | 10 October 1811
Died | 20 March 1873 near Nigg, Highland, Scotland | (aged 61)
Buried | Rosemarkie churchyard |
Allegiance | United Kingdom |
Rank | Assistant surgeon |
Unit | Bengal Army |
Battles/wars | |
Awards | Companion of the Order of the Bath |
Alma mater | |
Relations | Major General Donald Macintyre (brother-in-law) |
William Brydon
Early life
Brydon was born in London of Scottish descent. He studied medicine at University College London and at the University of Edinburgh.[1] He subsequently was appointed as a surgeon in the Bengal Army of the British East India Company.
Retreat from Kabul
In 1841 William Brydon was posted to Afghanistan as the assistant surgeon[2] of Shah Shuja's Contingent—a British officered infantry force recruited in India to provide protection for the British-backed ruler in Kabul. This mercenary unit formed part of a combined British and Indian army which occupied the city in August 1839.[3]
In January 1842, following the killing of the two British representatives there, it was decided to withdraw the British force in Kabul. The nearest British garrison was in Jalalabad, 90 miles (140 km) away, and the army would need to go through mountain passes with the January snow hindering them.[4]
Under the command of
By the fourth day of the retreat Brydon's regiment had virtually ceased to exist though he himself was fortunate enough to have found some food abandoned by Lady Macnaghten—the wife of the British envoy murdered in Kabul.
Surgeon Brydon was one of twelve mounted officers who had become separated from the remnants of the main column before the final stand at Gandamak. This small group had ridden to Futtehabad, but half had been killed there while six escaped. All but Brydon were killed, one by one, further along the road as their horses became exhausted.[7] Both Brydon and his pony were wounded in the course of encounters with small Afghan parties. On the afternoon of 13 January 1842, the British troops in Jalalabad, watching for their comrades of the Kabul garrison, saw a single figure ride up to the town walls. It was Brydon. Part of his skull had been sheared off by an Afghan sword, and he survived the blow because he had stuffed a copy of Blackwood's Magazine into his hat to fight the intense cold weather. The magazine took most of the blow, saving the doctor's life.[8]
Brydon became widely, if inaccurately, known as being the only survivor of the entire army.[9] In fact, he was not the only European to survive the retreat; about 115 British officers, soldiers, wives and children were captured or taken as hostages and survived to be subsequently released.[10] Included, was the wife of Sir Robert Sale, Lady Sale, though not Elphinstone, who died in captivity. Nor was Brydon the only European to survive the trek from Kabul to Jalalabad without spending time in captivity; by Brydon's own account, and that of others,[11] a "Greek merchant", a Mr Baness, also made it to Jalalabad, arriving two days after Brydon but surviving for only one day.[12] In addition a small number of Indian sepoys reached Jalalabad on foot over the subsequent weeks. One sepoy, havildar Sita Ram,[13] escaped from Afghanistan after 21 months of slavery and rejoined his former regiment at Delhi.[14] About 2,000 sepoys and an unrecorded number of camp followers were eventually found in Kabul and brought back to India by Pollock's "Army of Retribution" following their occupation of the city.[15]
The episode was made the subject of a famous painting by the Victorian artist Lady Butler, who portrayed Brydon approaching the gates of the Jalalabad fort perched on his exhausted horse which, according to Brydon, collapsed and died when put in a stable after arrival in the city.[15] The painting is titled Remnants of an Army (see separate article).
Subsequent career and death
Upon recovering from his wound Brydon resumed his duties as a regimental surgeon with the "Army of Retribution" under General Pollock, which briefly reoccupied Kabul in September 1842. He narrowly escaped death from an enemy shell during this campaign.[16]
Brydon fought in the Second Anglo-Burmese War of 1852, when Rangoon was taken.[17]
At the time of the
Brydon died at his home Westfield near
References
- Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, September 2004.
- ^ ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ISBN 0-333-45672-6
- ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ISBN 0-85045-275-9
- ^ "Article in theaustralian.news.com". Archived from the original on 14 July 2006. Retrieved 24 August 2006.
- ^ "Transcripts from CNN". 7 February 2001. Retrieved 24 August 2006.
- ISBN 0-7126-6528-5
- ^ Malleson, Major George Bruve. A Journal of the Disasters in Affghanistan, 1841–2. pp. 385–396.
- ^ Sale, Lady Florentia. A Journal of the Disasters in Affghanistan, 1841–2. p. 106.
- ^ Sita Ram, like William Brydon, had accepted secondment from the regular Bengal Army to serve with Shah Shuja's Contingent in Afghanistan
- ISBN 0-333-45672-6
- ^ ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ISBN 978-1-4088-1830-5.
- ^ a b Obituary, 14 May (1932). "Brydon's daughter, Mrs Walter Scott". The Irish Times.
{{cite news}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - ^ "No. 22201". The London Gazette. 16 November 1858. p. 4855.
- ISBN 978-1-898416-74-6 [page needed]
External links
- An article about William Brydon's report of the massacre[usurped]
- "The first Anglo-Afghan War : Dr Brydon's report of the British defeat". Archived from the original on 11 August 2014.
- Elizabeth Butler (Lady Butler) The Remnants of an Army 1879, Henry Tate Collection
- Peter McLoughlin. "William Brydon – A Lecture to the History Group". Archived from the original on 26 July 2011.