Sikunder Burnes Read online

  This is a shame because Burnes never forgot Montrose, and he had the Montrose Review sent out to him in Bombay, Bhuj and Kabul. He was Montrose through and through. His father, brother and grandfather were all Provost and his mother’s cousin was the minister.

  The Burnes family had lived in north-eastern Scotland for at least 200 years. We know rather a lot about Alexander Burnes’ ancestors because, being also Robert Burns’ ancestors, they are the second most studied family in Scottish history. Alexander’s brother James was to become an obsessive genealogist, for the most curious of reasons.

  At the beginning of the eighteenth century the Burnes family had been tenant farmers on the fertile coastal lands of Earl Marischal Keith; sufficiently well-to-do to intermarry with junior brides of the Keith family.1 Unfortunately, as the hereditary leader of the King’s military forces in Scotland, the Keith raised the standard of Jacobite rebellion in 1715, when Westminster proclaimed the German and unpleasant but Protestant George I as the replacement for the last Stuart monarch, Anne. The Burnes family followed the Stuarts loyally in both 1715 and 1745, and suffered despoilation and deprivation as a result. As Robert Burns put it:

  What they could, they did, and what they had, they lost: with unshaken firmness and unconcealed Political Attachments, they shook hands with Ruin for what they esteemed the cause of their King and their Country.

  Robert Burns’ view of family history tallies exactly with the later manuscript researches of James Burnes, who specifically mentions Robert Burnes of Clochnahill as fighting at Sheriffmuir and Fetteroso.2 Some writers on Robert Burns have dismissed his Jacobite ancestry as romantic speculation. But it is now plainly understood that the majority of Jacobite volunteers were in fact from north-east Scotland rather than the Highlands proper, and were not Roman Catholic.3 Their motivation was primarily nationalist.4 If the Burnes family were not out, who would be? Besides, as chief tenants of Earl Keith, they would have been expected to follow him into the field.

  The diagram shows Alexander Burnes’ relationship to Robert Burns.5

  Alexander’s eldest brother was also a James Burnes (b. 1801). Historians have previously made the relationship between Alexander and Robert closer, claiming Alexander Burnes’ grandfather and Robert Burns’ father as brothers. This seems to have been done by collapsing James Burnes 1750–1837 and James Burnes 1780–1852. This mistake is easily made as father and son worked for thirty years in the family law firm, both were on Montrose town council, and one married a Miss Greig and the other a Miss Gleig.6

  The poet was the first in the family to drop the ‘e’. His father William moved to Ayrshire where the surname was usually spelt ‘Burns’, and that is probably why Robert changed. William had left Angus when his father’s farm at Clochnahill failed and, via Edinburgh, moved to Ayr and life as a landscape gardener and farm improver. Robert Burnes – as his baptism record spells it – the future poet, was born in Alloway on 25 January 1759.7

  On leaving Clochnahill, William’s brother James moved to Montrose, where he worked as a builder and achieved respectability as a member of the town council. His son, also James, studied law in Edinburgh8 and eventually established his own law firm in Montrose, and set his son James on the same path. This James, b. 1780, was a contemporary at Montrose Academy of Joseph Hume and James Mill; after studying law at Edinburgh he became apprenticed to his father and entered the family law firm.

  In 1793 James Burnes (b. 1750), Writer to the Signet, built a house at Bow Butts, a name denoting the archery range. The Burnes house today stands neglected and on the buildings at risk register.9 It is a solid home in a vernacular take on classical architecture. The ceilings are low and the building a little squat, hunkered down against the icy winter blasts on this north-eastern coast. Extended later, in Alexander’s boyhood it had four bedrooms, three reception rooms and a kitchen. In its day, Bow Butts would have been one of the major houses of Montrose.

  I commissioned an architect’s report in 2008 which commences: ‘The house is in a fairly dilapidated state with many areas of water penetration and broken and built-up windows. There is quite a bit of internal damage and mild vandalism and there are many dead pigeons […]’10 Most of the architectural features have been robbed out. All the land with the house was sold, and later buildings have been constructed right up against it. The Provost lamp11 which is recorded as being above the front gate has been removed. The house is not listed for protection.

  James (b. 1750)’s wife, Anne Greig, died in 1796. In 1800 his nineteen-year-old son brought home a seventeen-year-old bride, Elizabeth Gleig, daughter of the Provost of Montrose, to his widowed father’s home, shared also with the groom’s three sisters and brother. None of these married or lived past thirty. They remained in the home, which James and Elizabeth started to crowd further with many children. Alex was to reminisce that his bedroom was the cupboard under the stairs.12

  On 12 February 1801, seven months after her marriage, Elizabeth Gleig gave birth to non-identical twins. They were baptised James and Anne. Anne survived baptism only a few days. James grew up to become a doctor.

  In February 1802 Elizabeth gave birth to another healthy son, named Adam, who was to become the third generation in the family law business. In 1803 Robert arrived; he died aged twenty-two. No children were born to Elizabeth in 1804, but on 16 May 1805 Alexander, our hero, came into the world.

  He was premature and baptised quickly in case he did not survive, but grew into a robust child. He was to have plenty of company; the fifth surviving sibling, David, was just a year younger and their first surviving sister, Anne, brought what must have been a welcome feminine touch to the brood. One year later she had a sister, Elizabeth, to keep her company. The next year, 1810, they were joined by Jane. In 1812 another boy came along, Charles, of whom Alex, seven years older, was extremely fond. It was 1815 before Cecilia joined the family. William was born in 1818, and Edward in 1819.

  So when Alexander left home in 1821 he had eleven living siblings, while his grandfather also lived at home with with his mother and father. His three unmarried aunts, who had lived with them, had all died in their twenties, which gave Alexander early acquaintance with death. Yet another brother, George was born in 1822, though, with the two toddlers, William and Edward, he died the same winter. A final sister, Margaret, born 1824, also only lived a few weeks.

  As Alexander grew up, his father was at the centre of the social life of Montrose. He had married the daughter of the Provost. He joined Montrose burgh council on 11 December 1817, became Chief Magistrate on 23 September 1818 and was himself elected Provost in 1820 and re-elected in 1824.13 Scottish burghs were extremely corrupt and literally self-perpetuating, the only voters for a new council being the councillors. But the Montrose election was the only exception in Scotland for fifty years, the burgh having obtained a royal warrant for election by all burgesses – a much wider but still limited franchise. James Burnes eventually became Justice of the Peace for Forfarshire, and ‘took a leading part in all the agricultural and municipal improvements which were effected in the eastern district of his native county’.14

  Here he is Secretary of the Central Turnpike Trust, meticulously keeping the board minutes and accounts of the project to build a new high road through Angus to Dundee. Here he is Secretary of Montrose Circulating Library, persuading the publisher Constable to provide books at trade prices.15 On 1 February 1799, when the Montrose Loyal Volunteers are raised to fight against any Napoleonic invasion, the General Order commanding their establishment is recorded in the meticulous hand of James Burnes, their newly commissioned adjutant.16 He was Master of St Peter’s Lodge of Freemasons, as had been his father before him.17 Alex Burnes’ family were local movers and shakers.

  James also played a wider political role in electing the town’s Member of Parliament. A single member represented the burghs of Montrose, Arbroath, Forfar and Brechin, and again the only electors were the councillors of each burgh. There was therefore much political
negotiation, fixing and corruption. The town’s democratic sympathies were generally radical, and fifteen-year-old Alexander enthusiastically recorded in his diary the jubilation at the acquittal in 1820 on adultery charges of Queen Caroline: ‘A most brilliant illumination […] on the ground of the glorious triumph the Queen had obtained over her base and abominable accusers.’ Support for the Queen against the King had become a symbol of radical and anti-monarchical feeling.

  The agricultural improvements in which Provost Burnes was involved increased productivity but had profound social effect. In Forfarshire adoption of turnips and clover as rotation crops led to an increase in cattle on previously arable land, raised in the hills to the west then fattened in the lowlands. This led to better manured and more intensively farmed soil and increased grain production. It also meant the end of the run-rig system and the removal of cottars, who lost their smallholdings amidst the inclosure of commonalities. In 1815, fully two-thirds of Scotland was common land, but it was to be grabbed quickly18 by the aristocracy. Lawyers like James Burnes were central to agricultural ‘improvement’, because their role was to dispossess cottars and traditional tenant farmers – who had very little protection under Scots law – and to execute inclosure. The Ramsay family’s Panmure and Dalhousie estates were leading examples of agricultural improvement, and it was chiefly for the Ramsays that James Burnes undertook this work. The Burnes/Ramsay relationship was to extend to India and to Freemasonry and forms a major subject of this book.

  The most important buildings in the Montrose lives of the Burnes family are still there, and it is instructive to walk around them. In one sense their world was highly circumscribed. Provost Burnes could walk past his home, his legal office, his kirk, his town hall, his Masonic Lodge in under three minutes. At the bottom of the Burnes’ large walled garden was Montrose Academy, where the children went to school, and next to it the links where they used to play.

  Yet in another sense this little world of Montrose was extraordinarily wide. In that three-minute walk, Provost Burnes would pass the homes of the Ouchterlonies, the Craigies, the Ramsays, the Leightons and the Humes. Every one of these families had sons serving as military officers in India. Their residences, behind severe stone exteriors, were ornamented with oriental hardwoods, high ceilings, fancy plaster-work and marble. Their contents were bought with remittances from India and profits from Arctic whalers and Baltic timber, jute and tobacco vessels that lined Montrose’s wharves. In the year of Alex’s birth 142 vessels were registered to Montrose, totalling over 10,000 tons. The town had five shipyards. Young Alex would have run down to see the huge whalers coming in, and joined the crowds that waved out the Baltic brigs which set off as an annual fleet when news arrived that the ice had broken at Riga. Montrose exported the grain and cattle of Angus to Europe and was a centre of Scotland’s booming linen industry. By 1815 Montrose had two steam-powered mills weaving linen from imported flax, as well as a continuing industry in homes and small workshops throughout the town and surrounding countryside. In the period 1818–22 Scotland produced on average over 30 million yards a year of linen cloth. The linen mills of Montrose were some of Scotland’s very first factories.19

  But there was insecurity in the Burnes’ world as well. Montrose had suffered during the Napoleonic period, with the continental system of economic blockade hitting the crucial Baltic trade. Throughout Alex’s childhood, Montrose was the scene of repeated rioting as the hungry poor attempted to stop the loading of grain onto ships for export. In fact the town had a remarkable hundred-year tradition of mobs sacking the excise warehouses.20 In 1813, 200 troops were sent to put down such revolt, and fifty special constables sworn in; finally a full regiment was offered from Stirling.21 Then the great post-war recession after 1815 hit Montrose hard. The years 1817–20 saw a slump in both manufacturing production and commerce. We see some of the effect in surviving correspondence of James Burnes senior – as a lawyer he was involved in action against James Watt,22 bookseller, and James Deuchars, cabinetmaker, both of Montrose and bankrupted in 1817 and 1818 respectively. In depressed times for the entire country, the Burnes family had a large number of mouths to feed.

  In 1825 James Burnes resigned as (honorary) Provost to be appointed Town Clerk. This was a drop in social prestige, but brought a regular salary and we may surmise that the decision is indicative of some financial strain. The year 1825 was one of economic collapse in Scotland, which resulted in the bankruptcy of many professional men, including Sir Walter Scott.

  Montrose may have been small, but at a time when Scotland’s schools were among the best in the world, Montrose Academy had a national reputation.23 When Alex was ten it moved to splendid new neo-classical premises. The town council had voted a very substantial £1,000 to its foundation, and construction had naturally been started with a full Masonic ceremony.24 Alexander was to become one of four Fellows of the Royal Society produced within a generation. But the masters could be sadistic, as one of Alex’s classmates recounted:

  Mr Calvert was the one that we stood most in awe of, for he was a powerful man, and it was no joke to occasion his displeasure […] it was in fact sometimes a reign of terror […] his fun was sometimes worse than his earnest, for he […] thrashed us, at first in a playful mood; but if any had winced under the lash, or lifted up his trousers to save his skin, he would have laid on harder, and sometimes got angry.

  We were always glad of a visit from Provost Burnes, for when he looked in it was always with a smiling face […] if we had any fear, it always left us when the Provost made his appearance, and we felt happy25

  To a modern eye, there is a psycho-sexual motive here, particularly in the ‘playful’ beatings. Another teacher, Rintoul, was so feared that the boys held a bonfire to celebrate his death.

  Burnes was a bright but not a brilliant child. He read widely and participated enthusiastically in the school debating society. He lived a healthy, outdoor life and did not hang back from rough and tumble games with his friends. He recalled to his old friend David Mitchell: ‘[w]e went to the North Water […] to catch podlies [coalfish] at the pier or use our skatchets [ice skates] at the Cruizers.’ Mitchell remembered a rumbustious playmate: ‘He was a rough boy at school, often running with his bootlaces untied, and falling over in the chase, as well as the foremost in bold adventures.’ Burnes was more prominent at play than in class: ‘I never got a prize in my life’ he reminded Mitchell, who remarked, ‘Having known him so well as a school companion and playmate, his brilliant career in India struck me with surprise.’26

  CHAPTER TWO

  A Rape in Herat

  In 1818, while Alexander ran and played on the links of Montrose, a young princess was raped 4,500 miles away in Herat, Afghanistan. That rape reignited a blood feud between Afghanistan’s two most important families, and was to have a profound effect on the destiny of young Alexander.

  Shah Mahmoud of Afghanistan was angered by his half-brother Prince Firozuddin, the Governor of Herat, a beautiful city in a rich and fertile province and the subject of a dispute between the Persian and Afghan monarchies, united for almost two centuries, but no more. Firozuddin had agreed to resume Herat’s lapsed tribute payment to the Shah of Persia. Mahmoud, who had gained, lost and regained his throne by war, each time deposing a half brother, feared Firozuddin’s alliance with Persia may be a preparation for an attempt on his throne of Kabul.

  Mahmoud, of the Dourani royal family, the Saduzais, owed his throne to the support of Afghanistan’s militarily strongest family, the Barakzais. Their leader, Futth Khan, was his Wazir (Prime Minister), and Supreme Commander of the royal armies.1 Futth Khan, with his younger brother Sirdar Dost Mohammed Khan was despatched with an army ostensibly to support Prince Firozuddin, with whom the breach was not open, by dispersing Persian forces around Herat.

  Futth and Dost Mohammed defeated the Persian forces in a hard-fought battle, in which Futth was injured, and Mohammed distinguished himself. Mohammed then entered Herat with his Kohi
stani forces, largely ethnically Tajik. These were billeted on the nobility, and at dawn seized their hosts, while Mohammed captured Firozuddin and massacred the palace guard before his eyes. The city was then given up to wholesale rape and pillage.

  Dost Mohammed took the royal valuables as his share. He stormed into the zenana (royal harem) to loot the jewels. And then he went too far – he raped a royal princess, one thing the senior aristocracy of Afghanistan did not do.

  This was not anything to do with respect for non-combatants. When Mahmoud’s immediate predecessor, Shah Shuja came to power, he took revenge on Mullah Aushik, a powerful Shinwari chieftain who had on behalf of Mahmoud captured and blinded Shuja’s elder and only full brother, Shah Zeman. This included strapping all Aushik’s wives and children across cannon mouths and blowing them into pieces.2 Aushik himself was strapped to a chair and had gunpowder poured down a tube into his stomach until it overflowed from his mouth, which was then ignited by firing burning cotton wads at him from a pistol. The great Koh-i-Noor diamond, now the glory of the British crown, was recovered from a crack in Aushik’s dungeon, where Zeman had hidden it just before his blinding.3

  The rape of a royal woman was different. It broke the Pushtun-wali – the Pathan code of conduct – in a way that startled Dost Mohammed’s peers.

  Mohammed may have been carried away by lust after his wrenching off her jewels left the young Princess naked:

  He commenced to plunder and to gain possession of all the jewels, gold, and treasure […] and committed an unparalleled deed by taking off the jewelled band which fastened the trowsers of the wife of Prince Malik Qasim […] and treated her rudely in other ways. The pillaged lady was the sister of Kam Ran, to whom she sent her profaned robe.4