Forbes, James, 1749–1819, James Forbes letter, Surat, 1775 March 11, copied between 1794 and 1800
- Call Number:
- Folio A 2023 69
- Holdings:
- Accessible by appointment in the Study Room [Request]
- Creator:
- Forbes, James, 1749–1819
- Title(s):
- James Forbes letter, Surat, 1775 March 11
- Date:
- copied between 1794 and 1800
- Classification:
- Archives and Manuscripts
- Series:
- Series I: A voyage from England to Bombay with descriptions in Asia, Africa, and South America
- Part of Collection:
- volume 7, page 63-66
- Provenance:
- Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
- Conditions Governing Access:
- The materials are open for research.
- Conditions Governing Use:
- The collection is the physical property of the Yale Center for British Art. Literary rights, including copyright, belong to the authors or their legal heirs and assigns. For further information, consult the Curator of Rare Books and Manuscripts.
- Scope and Content:
- Forbes follows his lengthy story of intrigue and murder with a short update from the field. Rather than finding the armies of Ragobah (Raghunathrao, 1734-1783) encamped and preparing for battle, Forbes and the British force find Ragobah already defeated, his army dispersed, his power gone. He is a fugitive. The remainder of the letter explains the circumstances of this drastic turn of events. The forces arrayed against Ragobah—whom Forbes refers to as the Confederacy—immediately launched an attack on his army. Their victory was far from predetermined: rather, at a key moment of the battle, the Arab mercenaries under Ragobah’s command refused to fight for lack of payment. Unable to recover from this loss of personnel, Ragobah immediately retreated. He could not, however, find shelter with the nawab at Cambay (now Khambhat), given the nawab’s ignorance of the Ragobah’s agreement with the English. Instead, he deposited some of his valuables with the company resident at Cambay, Charles Malet—a figure himself important in encouraging and supporting early English artists, like James Wales and Thomas Daniell, in India—before fleeing to Surat. The valuables were kept as security for the expenses incurred by the company in supporting Ragobah. At Surat, Ragobah met with the nawab, exchanging gifts in a setting of “much oriental magnificence.” Forbes gives a brief description of the ceremonies, before concluding the letter. Portions of this text appear in <title>Oriental Memoirs</title>, volume 2, chapter 16.
- Physical Description:
- 4 pages
- Genre:
- Correspondence , Botanical illustrations, Ornithological illustrations, Travel sketches, Maps, Watercolors (paintings), Drawings (visual works), Engravings (prints), and Portraits
- Subject Terms:
- Forbes, James, 1749-1819. Descriptive letters and drawingsForbes, James, 1749-1819. Oriental memoirs
- Associated Places:
- EnglandItalyScotlandWales
- Associated People/Groups:
- East India CompanyForbes, James, 1749-1819
- Finding Aid Title:
- James Forbes archive
- Collection PDF:
- https://ead-pdfs.library.yale.edu/11734.pdf
- Archival Object:
- https://archives.yale.edu/repositories/3/archival_objects/3199695
- Metadata Cloud URL:
- https://metadata-api.library.yale.edu/metadatacloud/api/aspace/repositories/3/archival_objects/3199695?mediaType=json&include-notes=1&include-all-subjects=1