¹ The discovery by Holden Furber in the Danish National Archives in May 1958 of a contemporary French translation led to the finding of the Danish text from which the French derived. Research in Copenhagen was aided by a grant from the American Philosophical Society.

² The Danish factory at Serampore, established in October 1755, was until January 1758 run by J. C. Soetmann (?–1795) assisted by Terkel Windekilde who later on, in 1763, went into the English East India Company's service in Calcutta. Soetmann's career, which began in 1725, also included service in Tranquebar, an expedition to Bengal in 1736, and the establishment of the Danish factory at Calicut at the beginning of the 1750's; see Larsen, Kay, Guvernører, Residenter, Kommandantcr, og Chefer samt enkelte andre fremtraedende Perioner i de tidligere danske Tropekolonier (Copenhagen, 1940), 109–10, 120–21.Google Scholar

³ No trace of this has been found in the Danish National Archives.

⁴ Randfurlie Knox (1730 or 1734–1764). For an account of his career, see Hill, S. C., Major Randjurlie Knox: Dilawar Jang Bahadur (Govt. Printing Office, Patna, 1917)Google Scholar, originally published as an article in The Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Research Society, Vol. III, Part I, (March 1917), 99–163. Wood's narrative definitely proves that Knox was present at Plassey and that his appointment as quarter-master was made prior to the battle, as Mr. Hill inferred but could not prove.

⁵ From the 39th Foot “Primus in Indis” which has emblazoned “Plassey” on its colors since the early nineteenth century. Col. John Adlercron, who commanded this regiment, refused to take it to Bengal when the Madras Council insisted that the troops sent with Admiral Watson in the autumn of 1756 to recapture Calcutta should be commanded by Clive. However, Admiral Watson successfully asserted his authority over the three companies previously attached to his fleet as “marines.” Of these, 9 officers and 215 effective non-commissioned officers and men survived to fight at Plassey. They were combined with 250 Bengal Europeans into one battalion, presumably the one Wood calls “first.” The other battalion consisted of 190 Bombay Europeans and 270 Madras Europeans. Clive had in all 900 Europeans, 100 Eurasian “topasses” (to help serve his eight field-pieces), 2000 Indian sepoys, and 50 sailors detached from Watson's fleet. For the most recent accounts of the role of the 39th Foot in India, see Adcinson, C. T., The Dorsetshire Regiment, (2 vols., Oxford, 1947, privately printed at the University Press)Google Scholar, and Roach, John, “The 39th Regiment of Foot and the East India Company,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, XLI, No. 1 (Sept. 1958), 101–138.Google Scholar

⁶ It is of interest that Wood at this point says nothing of Clive's rushing up to reprimand Kilpatrick for acting without orders, and dien, after taking in the situation, ordering up the support here referred to. Cf. Hill, S. C., Bengal in 1756–1757, I, p. cc.; III, 404.Google Scholar

⁷ Iliad, V, 531–532, as translated by Pope. An investigation in the Royal Library at Copenhagen and in Bibliotheca Danica has brought to light no edition of the Iliad in Danish prior to 1794. Therefore the Danish translator, presumably either Soetmann or Krog, turned Wood's quotation from Pope into Danish verse. Pope took liberties with the original. Homer's lines

α'δομένων ἀνδϱῶν Πλέονες σόοι ήέ Πέøανται øευγόντων δ'οὔτ' ἄϱ χλέος ὄϱνυται οὔτέ τις ἀλχή

read in literal translation: “Of men that shun dishonour, more are saved than slain, but for them that flee is neither glory found nor safety.” (The Iliad of Homer, translated by Andrew Lang, Walter Leaf, and Ernest Myers; London, 1903, p. 98).

⁸ Of the various estimates of die enemy's forces, Clive's own in his letter to the Secret Committee of the East India Company's Court of Directors, July 26, 1757, is presumably the most accurate, namely 15,000 horse, 35,000 foot “with upwards of forty pieces of cannon” (Muir, Ramsay, The Making of British India, London, 1923, p. 53).Google Scholar Orme's figures were 18,000 horse, 50,000 foot, and 50 guns (Orme, Robert, History of the Military transactions of the British Nation in Indostan, London, 1778, II, 173).Google Scholar

⁹ Clive's figures were 22 killed and 50 wounded.

¹⁰ Coote's attempt was unsuccessful. Law escaped to Benares; Coote was ultimately ordered to return from Patna to Murshidabad in September 1757, (Orme, , Military Transactions, II, 189–95).Google Scholar

¹¹ Other accounts speak of the rain lasting an hour or almost an hour and make much of its effect on the nawab's ammunition which was not kept dry. It is therefore of interest that Wood says nothing specific of the British powder's being kept dry while the enemy's was being drenched, but simply states that the British kept up their fire during the respite afforded by a fifteen minute shower.

¹² Cf. Hill, S. C., Bengal in 1756–1757, III, 403Google Scholar.

¹³ Hill, S. C., Bengal in 1756–1757, I, p. cxcv.Google Scholar Plan reproduced from insert in map 11 in Rennell, James, Bengal Atlas, (London, 1779).Google Scholar

¹⁴ O'Ballance, E., “The Battle of Plassey, 1757” Royal United Service Institution Journal, CII (August 1957). 363–371.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁵ Hill, S. C., Randfurlie Knox, p. 16.Google Scholar As Orme did not print any plan in his own work, Mr. Hill infers that Orme, “at first intended to use that prepared by Knox, but, being not wholly satisfied, and being, owing to the death of Clive, unable to verify his conclusions, he deliberately refrained from inserting any map.” The London Magazine plan also appeared in the anonymous Memoirs of the Revolution in Bengal (London, 1760Google Scholar, attributed to William Watts) in what Mr. Hill considered a “slightly more ornamental” form.

¹⁸ This document is accompanied by a rough sketch (also printed in Hill, , Bengal 1756–1757, II, 434Google Scholar) which bears no resemblance to Wood's lost plan, and is not a copy of a sketch bearing Knox's name accompanying the plan bearing Knox's name which Orme used in preparing his plan. Mr. Hill's positive identification of Knox as the author of the London Magazine account of the battle is therefore open to question, since the sketch accompanying the document from which that account was copied cannot be linked to Knox. What is certain is that the London Magazine account is not the original of Wood's narrative. It not only cannot possibly be the English original which was translated into Danish, but it cannot even be a paraphrase of what Wood actually wrote.

¹⁷ Knox possessed considerable skill as a surveyor and map-maker in Bihar in 1761. Governor Vansittart supplied Orme with 94 maps and plans, one of which can positively be identified as Knox's work. See Hill, , Randfurlie Knox, pp. 37, 54.Google Scholar

¹⁸ Rigsarkivet, As. Ko. 1356, Indkommende Brcvbōger, Sept. 1754-ult. Juli 1758; letter-book DDDD beginning Aug. 1, 1757 is the last in this volume.

¹⁹ This is certain because the French text has everywhere left untranslated the Danish word for grove, Lund.

²⁰ H. J. Krog (1720–1796), born in Bergen, Norway, naval officer, formerly in the service of the Dutch East India Company, was appointed governor in 1753, and arrived at Tranquebar from Copenhagen the following year. His term of office, which lasted until 1758, was an eventful time for the Danish factory; cf. Struwe, K. in Vore Gamle Tropekolonier, vol. I (Copenhagen, 1952), pp. 244 ff.Google Scholar and Larsen, Kay, Guvernører, p. 83.Google Scholar

²¹ Abraham Pierre Porcher Dcsoulches. The first reference to him in the printed series of documents from the Pondichéry archives is dated Sept. 19, 1737, when as “ci-devant chef à Mazulipatam” he is acquitted of a charge against him by the Procureur du Roi, (Diagou, Gnanou, ed., Arrêts du Conseil Supérieur de Pondichéry, Pondichéry, 1935, I, 35)Google Scholar; in 1748, he is described as a merchant at Pondichéry (ibid. I, 195); by June 15, 1754, he has become a “conseiller au conseil supérieur” (ibid. I, 267). By Aug. 29, 1754 he is “commandant à Karikal,” (Gaudart, Edmond, ed., Catalogue des manuscrits des anciennes archives de l'Inde Française, IV, 21).Google Scholar The last document referring to him is dated Feb. 25, 1757, (ibid., IV, 31). At the time of Plassey, he was therefore nearing the end of a long career in the French East India Company's service.

²² Of this incident, Desoulches' correspondent wrote: “Il est rare que les Heros Francois refusent quelque chose aux Dames, Mr de Bussy lui accordoit ce qu'elle souhaitoit avec cette politesse francoise aussi aimable dans les ecrits que dans les Manières.” Bussy's original letter to Margaret Clive is in Box 23 of the Clive Papers in the India Office Library (Commonwealth Relations Office, London) together with other accounts of the surrender, Admiral Pocock wrote to Clive from Calcutta, July 15, 1757, that the ladies had “an indifferent time at Vizagapatam where it seems your lady was forced into a correspondence with Mons. Bussy … and acquitted herself with address.”

²³ On this matter, there is a most significant letter in box XVII of the Clive Papers in the India Office Library written by Major John Carnac to Clive, dated St. Helena, June 15, 1760: “Col. Draper has diverted me with a droll conversation between him and Orme whom, widi all his sagacity and art, the Colonel soon found out to have no bottom. He expatiated how much you were obliged to him for the Command of the Bengel Expedition, that he had thrown out Adlercron's regiment and cleared all obstacles in your way and consequently diat he had laid the groundwork of your present fortune; he further observed to Mr. Draper that in the history he has drawn out of India he had made you the hero of the piece and had worked up your character to the utmost stretch of fancy.” Carnac goes on to say that Orme was disgrunded that Clive had shown Orme no favors while he had “thrown away” £ 12,000 on Lord Pigot to whom he owed nothing.

²⁴ India Office Library, Clive Papers, box 32, John Perrie to Clive, May 14, 1764.

²⁵ Hill, S. C., Bengal in 1756–1757, I, xcvii, 190Google Scholar, 280, 281, 285.

²⁶ British Museum, Add. MSS. 45, 418. Warren Hastings to David Anderson, Dec. 22, 1817.

²⁷ Wilson, W. J., History of the Madras Army, (5 vols. Madras 1882–89), 118Google Scholar, 122, 191, 239, 262–67. The documents on die court-martial in vols. 34 and 35 of the Orme MSS in the India Office Library add nodiing to Wilson's account in essentials. The proceedings subsequent to the court-martial are in Orme MSS, vol. 40. The court-martial proceedings are recorded on the Madras Military Consultations, Dec. 1769 (India Office Records, Range 251, Vol. 66).

²⁸ India Office Library, Orme MSS, vol. 40, p. I. Laurence Sulivan to Robert Orme, Sept. 20, 1774.

²⁹ India Office Library, Orme MSS, vol. 309, pp. 89, 103, 105.

³⁰ Wilson, W. J., Madras Army, I, 123.Google Scholar

³¹ India Office Library, Clive Papers, box 22, Gaupp, G. T. to Clive, [in French], dated “factorie francoise” June 29, 1757.Google Scholar

³² e. g., Sir Mark Wood, (1747–1829), Surveyor-General and Chief-Engineer in Bengal; John Wood (1811–1871), explorer of the Indus and of the source of the Oxus; Sir Charles Wood, (1800–1885), President of the Board of Control for India 1852–55, Secretary of State for India 1859–66, author of the famous despatch on educational policy; Edward Frederick Lindley Wood, (1881– ), Earl of Halifax, Viceroy of India (as Lord Irwin) 1926–31, later Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, and Ambassador to Washington.