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The Indian Princess

10/6/2016

39 Comments

 
PictureJohn Howard Wakefield 1862
When I was a child, the story in my family was that my siblings and I were descended from an Indian princess. I knew that my father, James Hayter, had been born in India, and lived there until he was seven, but it wasn’t until some years later that I learnt more about my Indian ancestry.  My Aunty Janet and cousin Mary both had a passion for investigating the story of my great-great grandmother.

My father was born in Lonavala, a hill-station near Poona (now known as Pune), in Maharashtra, India,  in 1907, and was sent 'home' in 1914 for a British education at Dollar Academy, Scotland. He boarded with an aunt, and wasn't to see his mother again until after the end of the First World War. A family photograph of that time (see below) includes someone who was perhaps an 'ayah', who may have accompanied the children on the voyage. I read recently that these women were often shamefully abandoned after they outlived their usefulness. I hope this wasn't the case with my family.

PictureDad in Dollar
​My great-great-grandfather John Howard Wakefield  was a Lieutenant Colonel in the Indian Army, and First Cantonment Magistrate in Lahore. He had been born in 1803, into a Quaker family, and was the grandson of Edward Wakefield, London merchant in Gresham St, and Priscilla (Bell) Wakefield, authoress and botanist. One of his brothers was Edward Gibbon Wakefield, a coloniser of New Zealand.

It was said that John Howard  eloped with a young woman he first spied over the fence of an enclosure. It's not always possible to tease out fact from fiction, but it is rumoured that their meeting was the basis of the love story in MM Kaye's The Far Pavilions. He married her in 1831, she converted from Hinduism to Christianity, after being re-named Maria Suffolk.  She was the daughter of Kheru-Jumnu, Hereditary Vizier of Bashahr, and also the ward of the Rana of Kumarsain. I have been told that her father was put to death by the British for his part in the Indian Mutiny (I have recently read The Last Mughal by William Dalrymple, which was very illuminating on the subject of the Mutiny from the Indian viewpoint). Maria died in 1852, ten years before her husband.
​
I am told that John Howard Wakefield persuaded all of his regiment to take the pledge, and go teetotal, and that in 1862, resident by that time in Canonbury Square, Islington, he caught a chill on the way home from a temperance meeting at the Union Chapel on Upper Street and died soon after of pneumonia.
​
Their son, my great-grandfather, was George Edward Wakefield* (East India Company Deputy Commissioner Ludhiania, Punjab ) (1831-1892). One of his daughters was my grandmother Violet Mary Wakefield.

Picture
George Edward Wakefield
​My grandfather, Owen Chilton Goodenough Hayter was a Police Commissioner, in Simla, and he married Violet at Christchurch in Mussoorie circa 1900. They had thirteen children, but only five of them survived to adulthood (according to a Twitter acquaintance, Sanjay Argarwal, the church, the oldest in the Himalayas, is still maintained very nicely.) Eventually  my grandfather retired and they returned to live in England, but not all of Violet's siblings were willing to leave India, and some returned to India at the end of their schooling in the UK, including her brother Jack, who worked as Agent to the Maharajah of Tikari, and his son, Colonel John Felix Wakefield, who spent much of his later life working as Director of an elephant reserve/jungle lodge in Kabini, Kerala.
Picture
George Edward's wife and children
Picture
Owen & Violet's wedding at Christ Church, Mussoorie
Picture
Violet & Owen and household - Dad is 3rd from left, front row
In 1976, Aunty Janet, then around my age now, travelled to India for the first time since her childhood, flying in to Karachi and then taking the train to Hyderabad. She wrote: "Visited Gymkhana Club - just as remembered - and St Thomas Church...in the evening discovered to my great joy the bungalow we lived in, and had tea and delicious carrot sweet with the kind Lt Col's  family (the Najams) who inhabit it now...it was quite eerie going round the bungalow, and I expected to meet my own small self in a solar topee any moment”.

After an en route visit to Mohenjodaro, Janet flew on to Lahore "where I hoped to get help in tracing great-grandmamma's grave", which she did, via the Anglican Cathedral and the Diocesan Council's records of old burials.  She wrote: "...In the morning I called on the Reverend ...he called for someone to open a room going on the garden ... When the door was opened we were faced with a horrible smell. Don't go in, said the Reverend, "let the air go in first" ... the room had some odd growths hanging like strings from the roof, and one wall was lined with enormous leather-bound volumes in a very bad state of preservation and in no kind of order. They were going to fetch me a chair, and I was prepared to spend the whole morning, perhaps several mornings, searching. But by an extraordinary stroke of luck, the very first volume I picked out at random was an index of graves in the old Taxali Gate Cemetery, and so in less than five minutes I had found what I wanted... the Gate is one of the five gates of the old walled city... when I entered the cemetery my heart sank ... it is enormous ... and most of the gravestones have been knocked about and destroyed ... I walked through, and there it was - a plain slab of red sandstone flat but raised from the ground and in a remarkably good state of preservation, one of the best in the cemetery. Beautiful undefaced lettering."

Then she went on to Simla: "Explored Simla. Climbed Jacko - terribly steep - to Raja of Bushayr's house, which has what must be the most wonderful view in the world.

And on again, "breathtakingly lovely run", to Ranpur. "We climbed to almost 9,000 feet, and then gradually (the run took 6 hours), dropped down into a deep valley  made by the famous River Sutlej. Ranpur , the ideal capital of a small state ... one of the first free schools in India formed by the late Rajah Padam Singh ... on it is inscribed: BETTER UNBORN THAN UNTAUGHT, BETTER UNTAUGHT THAN ILLTAUGHT, and below that, COME AND LEARN GO AND SERVE and SERVE MAN AND SO SERVE GOD". (Note - I have inherited Aunty Janet's love of copying down inscriptions!)."The same Rajah built the new place, in 1926, where I am staying in lonely state ... in the grounds is an ornamental pavilion ... the most ancient building in Bushahr ... over it stands an enormous peeput tree - four or five hundred years old. I wonder whether Great Grandmamma played under it?... Taku Sahib, who is Chairman of the Municipal Council, thinks Great Grandmamma may have come from Pooh, another day's journey from here, and says there is a ninety year old there who is reputed to have talked about a Bushahr girl going off with an English soldier... alas! It is in restricted territory and I could only get a permit to go there in Simla... I'll have to come here again, later in the year next time."

Back in Simla, she "rushed to see Rajah of Bushahr, who said if I tell him the name of the Old Man of Pooh, he'll write to him and try and get some information for me. He said he was sure he'd seen the  name Wakefield on a sword or something."

In Mussoorie, she visited the church where her mother was married, and "Granny's house ... where we used to spend the hot weather ... I remembered how I had built a shrine on the steep bank above it and made a cross out of two bits of dried bamboo, and knelt there and prayed fervently. When I got bored with that I used to scramble down, go into the house, stand on a chair and steal toffee out of a large jar on a high shelf. Then I'd go back to my shrine and pray for forgiveness - and then back for more toffee, and then more prayers!"

I'd love to track down my great-great-grandmother's original home one day, should the opportunity present itself. I learnt today that 'in a step to create one of the largest repositories of Indian genomes, Bangalore-based Medgenome has teamed up with a southeast Asian consortium that has committed to sequence 100,000 Asian genomes. Were it to work to plan this could mean a consolidated storehouse of at least 30,000 Indian genomes'. So maybe one day I'll be meeting one of my distant Himalayan cousins!
 
 *John Howard’s aunt Isabella Wakefield married John Nicholson, Quaker of  County Down, and they had 16 children, the third child Alexander himself being the father of Brigadier-General John Nicholson, Soldier and Administrator, later styled ‘Hero of Delhi’, killed in the Indian Mutiny. He was Deputy Commissioner of Peshawar in 1857 with George Edward Wakefield (1831-1892, East India Company Deputy Commissioner Ludhiana, Punjab ) as an assistant (and also his first cousin, twice removed).
39 Comments
Will Mayall
10/6/2016 02:22:35 pm

Absolutely fantastic! I'll need to read it multiple times to absorb all the fascinating information.

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Judith Johnson link
11/6/2016 12:39:10 am

Thanks Will! I hope the blog may flush out some more information!

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Sue Ellis (Davidson)
11/6/2016 07:30:13 pm

I too, had heard I was the descendant of an Indian princess. My father, Andrew Davidson, was your dad's cousin. It was his mother who Uncle Jimmie and his siblings spent their time with at Dollar. Your Facebook post was so interesting! I am FB friends with Liz.
Thank you for posting! I met Aunty Janet only twice. I was supposed to spend a summer working at her summer camp in Spain during college but I got a job that was too good to refuse! Thea and I traveled with her one summer in Scotland.
I loved your dad! I remember one particular visit to Dollar when he brought his Bubble car. Somewhere there is a photo of (I think) 8 people stuff into it outside our house on McNabb Street.
My sister Anne suggested we should do the DNA testing to see what we have in our ancestry, but you have found so much!
Thank you again!

Sue

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Judith Johnson link
12/6/2016 10:05:12 am

How great to hear from you!!! And so lovely to read everything you have written. I feel an Indian princess ancestors reunion coming on!

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Sue Ellis/Davidson
12/6/2016 05:26:48 pm

I think I inadvertently unsubscribed!

Maureen Young
13/6/2016 05:34:05 pm

My birthplace was the city of Lucknow known for the Mutiny of 1857 among other things, My husband was born in Allahabad and recently discovered his Indian heritage which dates back to his GreatGrandfather wh0 had a Bengali name and whose occupation was that of a Headmaster of a school in Assam in 1852. He is trying to go back further now .

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Judith Johnson link
16/6/2016 11:17:25 am

Thanks for your interesting comment, Maureen. Great to hear about your family history. So many British people have this background - I spotted a gravestone in Southborough Cemetery recently of a former Headmaster of a school in India. Good luck with the research!

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Maureen Young
29/7/2016 04:21:10 am

Hi Judith - Just seen this comment from you tonight.
I am sure there are many such graves in the UK of folk who lived and worked in India at one time.As far as we know my husbands ancestor passed away in India. Thank you for your comment. By the way what was the name on the Headstone ?

Omer Khan
13/6/2016 09:55:26 pm

Hello. I'm writing from near Lahore, Pakistan. This history , though very interesting, and accurate in places, seems to have certain lacunae that don't fit in with on-ground historical/geographical facts. For one, 'Lanovla' seems to me to be a mispelling as there is no such place anywhere near Lahore. Also, Bashahr or Bushahr was a small princely state in the Himachal area of the Indian Himalayas, which was a Hindu state ruled by Gurkhas from Nepal from 1803-1815 and later taken over by the British government, with a so-called 'Raja' nominally the figurehead and without any powers and/or any ministers or 'vizers' as stated above, let alone a 'Hereditary Vizier', so any claims to being descended from a 'princess' would not be accurate. In effect, the British Assistant Commissioner was the administrator from January 1816 to August 1914, when a full-fledged estate manager , Mr Mitchell, was appointed to run state affairs. As a minor state , or 'jagir', in fact, the Raja was not entitled to use 'His Highness; with his name and titles. Further, there was no such person as a 'Raja of Kumarsain' - Kumarsain is a small village near Simla (Shimla, Himachal Pradesh, India) and it was under a local landowner-headman or 'Thakur' who some people might have mistakenly/exaggeratedly styled a 'Raja', for reasons of their own. Finally, the set of postcards depicted here have nothing to do with Bashahr or Himachal region or Northern India, even. They are simply a set of handmade postcards showing the old/medieval rulers (Muslims) of the Adil Shahi dynasty, of Bijapur (now Vijayapura) in South India. There were many such postcards in India back in the 19th and early 20th c , depicting historical figures. I hope these facts will help improve your own understanding of your ancestry and Indian connection/s. Regards.

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Judith Johnson link
16/6/2016 11:20:25 am

Dear Omer, how kind of you to take the time and trouble to make such a detailed response, which I am most grateful for. As I said, there is often a mix of fact and fiction in the stories which are handed down in our family, and it's very helpful to learn of the information which you've provided. Thank you!

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Omer Khan
26/6/2016 09:44:08 pm

Dear Judith, sorry for the delayed response. Youre most welcome, am happy to be of service. Best wishes in your quest.

Judith Johnson link
26/6/2016 01:13:52 pm

Hallo again Omer. I've been to see my 92 year old mother today,and found her very clear--minded, so asked her again about my father's birthplace. I had it wrong! It was Lonavala, a former hill-station near Pune (or Poona as it was known at that time!. Hooray! One fact cleared up. Thanks again for your notes. I shall now correct my blog. Best wishes, Judith

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Omer Khan
26/6/2016 09:45:36 pm

Oh great! Long life and good health to your respected mother.
That's great, at least you were able to establish/clarify one basic fact. Best wishes again, Omer

Surbhi Agarwal
29/7/2016 03:05:52 am

Hello
I just read your Family account of Mussoorie and the wedding picture at Christ Church. Please could you tell me the name of the house mentioned near the Church where your Family spent their summers? Also Mussoorie Heritage Centre is creating an Archival bank for future researchers and academicians. If you would like to contribute any material for the Centre then I will be most grateful.

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Jarmila Piero
1/5/2017 01:03:18 pm

Wow, what a rich family history. I have experienced the same feeling as your aunt, walking through the house I used to live in as a child. I wish you well in finding more information.

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Judith Johnson
17/6/2017 10:35:13 am

Many thanks for your kind comment, Jarmila!

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Penelope Wakefield
13/6/2017 09:28:16 pm

My Father was James Hayter's cousin. Edward Alan Wakefield. I saw him on Are you being served on T V also in my Fair Lady

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Judith Johnson
17/6/2017 10:36:40 am

Hi Penelope and thank you for posting in the blog - great to hear from another Wakefield relative! Cousinly best wishes! Judith

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Sarah (Sally) Nee Wakefield
10/4/2018 01:52:51 pm

Hello Judith
We are second cousins! My grandfather was Jack, brother to Violet.
My father, John Felix, is mentioned in your blog. I have a copy of the photograph of the Wakefield siblings you have included in your write-up.
I only discovered your blog looking up something else! Sally

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Judith Johnson link
24/4/2018 05:29:05 am

Hi Sally thanks for your comment. Thanks too for using contact form.Great to hear from you, and it would be great to have a Wakefield get-together sometime! You and Penelope et al!

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Jack Hayter
22/4/2018 03:31:22 am

Lovely stuff.
Omer Khan's kindly corrections are so good too. Of course we can imagine the class conscious British would have "bigged up" the status of a local born bride. The daughter of a landowner or mayor could quite easily have ended up being described as having been born a "princess"...especially back in English drawing rooms!

Given the nature of those times, and some of the scrapes his brothers got into, John Wakefield seems to have been a decent chap and the marriage a happy one. I have passed this on to my son who is making plans to visit Himachal Pradesh later this year.

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Judith Johnson link
24/4/2018 05:30:29 am

Thanks Jack, glad you liked the blog! Love to hear from your son too, as and when!

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Noreen Lavender
27/6/2018 03:42:41 am

Hello Judith I came across your blog whilst searching for further information on the Wakefield I was researching my connection to the family is through Edward Wakefield 1749 - 1854 who was married to Pricilla Bell I have quite a large tree on ancestry with records & pictures I have found I would like to add some of your pictures from you blog with your permission Bell is the connection to my mothers father's, side of the family you have a very informative site

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Judith Johnson link
27/6/2018 10:30:46 am

Hello Noreen, very pleased to hear from you. Thanks for your kind words re the site, and for being courteous enough to ask for permission to add some of the photos to your family tree. You are more than welcome, and I'd love to have sight of your tree sometime myself so I can add to my Wakefield family! All best wishes, Judith

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noreen
29/6/2018 09:46:19 am

hello again Judith I unsubscribed in error. My tree is on ancestry it is called Noreen~1trial FBK_2008-03-06_ autobackup_autobackup thank you for sharing

noreen
29/6/2018 09:46:48 am

hello again Judith I unsubscribed in error. My tree is on ancestry it is called Noreen~1trial FBK_2008-03-06_ autobackup_autobackup thank you for sharing

John Smith
28/1/2019 04:28:04 am

Hello Judith
I found your blog whilst researching my family tree. My great great grandfather George Lloyd Ashburham Kelly was born in Lahore in 1838 and died in Ludhiana on 4 December 1870. He was the District Superintendant of Police in Ludhiana and his death was reported by the Secretary of the Government of the Punjab to the Secretary of the Government of India on a "return of deaths of European Uncovenanted Officers in the Punjab for the month of December 1870". Given the dates that your George Edward Wakefield was Deputy Commissioner of Ludhiana, their paths must surely have crossed! I'm trying to find out where ex-pats were buried in Ludhiana. The churches there were overseen by a church in Jalhandar, just up the road, and a Chaplain from Jalandhar recorded the burial of George Kelly in a Register of Burials for "Loodianah" which shows that the burial was conducted by "S Cowan, Office of the Deputy Commissioner". If you have any idea which church the British might have used in Ludhiana, I'd love to know. It's fascinating once you start researching, isn't it? Kind regards, John.

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Judith Johnson link
12/2/2019 02:43:11 am

Hello John - my apologies for delay in responding to your most interesting comments, but I have been very ill with flu, now recovering! I agree that the research is fascinating! I'm afraid I don't have a lead for you on your query, but I can tell you there are some very informative and helpful people in that area who are on Twitter, and if you have a fossick around you might locate some of them! (see some of comments above).

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Katharina link
24/4/2019 12:00:09 pm

Thank you for this blog, I am also related to the Indian lady. And I know her original name - it was Dschamilu Keeroo. She changed her name to Mary Suffolk and then her daughter Lucy Wakefield 's grandson was my grandfather (Hugo von Moy de Sons, who fell off a horse at the age of about 38 and died). Thank you so much for all of the information that you have given - this is such an interesting story. My mother says the rumor is that Mary and Howard flew by night in secret back to England...
Regards, Katharina

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Judith Johnson link
28/4/2019 06:05:38 am

Hi Katharina, and thanks so much for your comment. Thrilled to hear from a Wakefield relative! I have some photos scanned in of Lucy Von Moy and her children. I'd love to be in touch with you via email if that's OK? If so, you can use my contact form, or I could use the email which you entered when you commented.

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Katharina
29/4/2019 01:31:47 pm

Yes, please contact me! I would love that.

simon kendall of Cumbers Farm Liss Hampshire GU33 7LL link
10/12/2019 02:45:43 pm

Hello again Judith. I just read another[?] of your fascinating blogs and find it all so addictive. In the film the Sound of Music, the home of the von Trapps is actually the famous Water Palace in Salzburg. But, I believe that is/was in reality the home of the von Moy family, the direct descendants of John Howard and his lovely lady, Maria.?

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Judith Johnson link
16/12/2019 12:43:47 pm

Hello Simpon, and thank you for your kind words. Yes, I believe that is so!

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Judith Johnson
16/12/2019 12:45:21 pm

I was pleased to find a photograph of Lucy, who would be my great great great aunt, on the National Portrait Gallery website: https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/person/mp145375/lucy-katherine-ne-wakefield-countess-radolinska-later-princess-von-radolin

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Rosemary MacMullen
15/3/2020 09:14:16 am

I was prompted to go on a cruise to India after reading family records Caroline sent. Sitting on deck at sunset I thought of my mother, Marjorie Hayter sailing home as a nine year old and planned to write about the story of the Indian princess. You have done this brilliantlly, Judith and now we have a name at last. I didn't know about the Salzburg home. Mum had wonderful memories of her childhood.

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Judith Johnson link
30/3/2020 02:02:52 pm

Thanks for your comment, Rosemary. Glad you enjoyed the blog!

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Gerard Evans
6/7/2020 08:14:12 am

Dear Judith,
I am coming to your family story rather late in the day but recent thoughts about your father, Jimmy, have led me here. From the above I have just worked out that my great-grandmother on my mother's side, Emma Wrigley (née Hayter) was your grandfather Owen Chilton's sister. Jimmy used to come and see us occasionally in Cheshire when I was a young boy and I remember his always being introduced as one of Mum's cousins. I seem to remember he had an extraordinary trick of standing on his head which impressed us all mightily. Can that be right? Do please get in touch if you would like to hear more. Best wishes, Gerard Evans

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Judith Johnson link
13/7/2020 10:29:28 am

Hello Gerard

How nice to hear from another extended family member I've never met! Thank you for taking the time to leave your very interesting comment. Yes, that was indeed Dad's party trick!

I would love to get in touch, and will hope to do so via email once large current lockdown projects are done! In the meantime if you go to my Pen Portraits page you'll find some pics and a biog of Dad which might interest you:
http://www.judithjohnson.co.uk/pen-portraits.html

All best wishes and stay well, Judith

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TS California link
24/3/2021 11:51:03 pm

Hello mate nice blog

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    Lifelong bookworm, love writing too. Have been a theatrical agent and reflexologist among other things, attitude to life summed up by Walt Whitman's MIRACLES.

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