The Royal Pavilion as a Vision of Empire

‘Everything is such as one would not see even in a dream. One should regard it as fairyland. The heart cannot be satiated with seeing the sights, for there is no other place like this in the world. It is as if one were in the next world… I have never been so happy in my life as I am here.’

Subedar-Major Sardar Bahadur Gugan (6th Jats), early 1915

‘I never lose an opportunity of impressing on all who are working in these hospitals that great political issues are involved in making the stay of these Indians as agreeable as possible.’

Sir Walter Lawrence, Commissioner of India Hospitals, report to Lord Kitchener, early 1915

Consider this…

Three Indian Military Hospitals in Brighton:

• Kitchener (2000 beds)

• York Place Schools (600)

• Royal Pavilion (722)

… so why?

Royal Pavilion and Museums online collections have 173 photographs and artworks relating to the Indian Hospitals in Brighton….

…. yet only 29 of these depict anything other than the Pavilion!

The media

• Photographs

• Postcards

• Artworks

• Books

• Film

• Magic lantern slides

• Newspaper coverage

Postcards

Paintings

Charles Burleigh, Music Room of the Royal Pavilion as an Indian Hospital, 1915

Newspaper coverage

Brighton, Hove and South Sussex Graphic, 30 January 1915

Commemorative book

Film

• The Royal Pavilion was more than a hospital: it was a media spectacle.

• This spectacle helped establish a worthy vision of the British Empire, just as the Empire faced its greatest crisis.

Why was this vision of Empire so important?

1. Legitimacy of Empire was part of the language of political debate in the First World War

Why was this vision of Empire so important?

2. Vulnerability of India

‘While we hold on to India, we are a first-rate power. If we lose India, we will decline to a third-rate power. This is the value of India’

Lord Curzon, Viceroy 1899-1905

The Indian Mutiny

• Began in 1857 with mutiny amongst Bengali soldiers

• Inspired by rumour that troops would be forced to use animal fats to grease their rifle cartridges

• Gathered momentum and captured political discontent with East India Company rule

• Almost forced the British from India. Led to demise of East India Company and creation of direct rule through the Raj

• Ended attempts by British policy makers to ‘Westernise’ India

Why was this Vision of Empire so important?

3. Importance of Indian Army to war effort

• 1.3 million Indians served in World War One

• Indian Corps was of critical importance in early months of war on Western Front

• By the end of 1914, Indian Corps made up 20% of British Expeditionary Force in France and Flanders

• Of the 35 miles of front held by the BEF, 8 of these held by Indian Corps troops

• Most Indian nationalists supported the war: Mohandas Gandhi actively recruited Indians to the cause

• Threat of Muslim rebellion in India, particularly after the Ottoman Empire entered the war

• There was a need to reinforce moral position of British rule in India

How was this vision created?

• Royal benevolence

• Paternalism

• ‘Virtual India’

• Promotion of the ‘martial races’

Sir Walter Roper Lawrence

• Senior civil servant in India• Served as Lord Curzon’s

Private Secretary 1898 – 1903

• Former columnist on Indian affairs for The Times

• Had organised royal tour of India for Prince of Wales 1905-6

• Friend of George V and wrote several speeches for him

• Appointed Commissioner for Indian Hospitals by Kitchener in November 1914

Why was the Pavilion chosen?

‘ We are pushing along at highest pressure with the difficult problem of making a hospital out of this most unsuitable building.’

Col. J McLeod, Commanding officer of Royal Pavilion hospital, in letter to Sir Walter

Lawrence, 3 Dec 1914

• Indian architecture was not as important for the Indians as many believe. Rarely commented on by the sepoys in their letters

• Status as a royal palace was far more important

‘Our hospital is in the place where the king used to have his throne … Men in hospital are tended like flowers, and the King and Queen sometimes come to visit them.’

Isar Singh, 59th Rifles, to a friend in the 50th Punjabis, India, 1st May 1915

The Myth…

The Pavilion’s use was personally requested by King George V

… The Truth

It was cheap

‘I suggested to Lord Kitchener that… I should be allowed to take up two large hotels in Brighton. He gave me permission and on the 21st [November 1914] I went down to Brighton. I saw the local authorities there, and instead of taking up hotels, which are unsuitable and costly, I secured from the Corporation of Brighton the buildings of the Pavilion and the Dome.’

Sir Walter Lawrence, Commissioner for Indian Hospitals, in letter to Viceroy Lord Hardinge,

18 March 1915

‘ I tried to bring out that the Pavilion was a Royal Palace and that the initiation of all that was done came from the King. To bring the Corporation… more prominently into it I thought would confuse things in the eyes of India.’

Col. J McLeod, Commanding Officer of Royal Pavilion

hospital, in letter to Sir Walter Lawrence,

30 March 1915

Charles Phelp, ‘Brighton Gives of her best for our Wounded Indian Soldiers - Bravo Otter’, Brighton and Hove Society, 3 Dec 1914

Paternalism

‘ Practically we regard them as spoilt children just now…to whom all sorts and conditions of men bring congratulations and greetings, and little gifts’

‘..it remains only to wish that the King himself could be there and see this beautiful childlike faith in his fatherly solicitude for his soldiers’.

The Times, 2 January 1915

‘Virtual India’

• Nine separate kitchens • Separate water taps for Muslims and

Hindus• Signs in Hindi and Urdu• ‘Untouchables’ used as orderlies• Sikh gurdwara set up in the grounds• Hindus and Sikhs cremated at a ghat on the

Downs• Muslims buried in a specially created

cemetery in Woking

Brighton, Hove and South Sussex Graphic, July 1915

Sequestered

Two fears:

1. Women

2. Christians

‘I have seen vernacular translations of the gospels at the Pavilion, and I have orders that these should be strictly excluded’

‘Questions arise every day with clergymen and missionaries who wish to be admitted to the hospitals… if it is abroad that any attempt has been made to proselytise men who are sick or wounded, there would be great trouble’

Sir Walter Lawrence in a report to Lord Kitchener, early 1915

The Martial Races

• Emerged in 1880s and promoted by Lord Roberts

• Mixture of fashionable Social Darwinism and local military traditions

• Favoured those who had supported the British during the Indian Mutiny

• Part of a ‘divide and rule’ strategy

• Concentrated on rural communities: educated men and townspeople excluded

• Influenced recruitment until 1930s

Punjabi Muslims

Pathans

Gurkhas

Sikhs

Dogras

Jats

Legacy

• November 1915: Majority of Indian Corps withdrawn from Western Front

• Jan 1916: Pavilion closed as military hospital• Mar/Apr 1916: Pavilion opened to public. Over

10,000 visitors in less than a week. Revenues collected for ‘Mayor’s charities’

• Spring 1916: Pavilion became hospital for limbless British men

‘I know that when you come here many of you have sad feelings. You think that life is not going to be much good to you any longer; but when you come on to Roehampton and see the fellows walking about with their artificial legs and using their artificial arms, and when you know what good work they are able to do in the workshops – many have become skilled workers instead of unskilled, as they were before the war… You will be filled with hope… For hope welcomes all who enter here!’

Viscountess Falmouth, quoted in Brighton Herald, 26 August 1916

In Memorium

‘It is befitting that we should remember, and that future generations should not forget, that our Indian comrades came when our need was highest, free men – volunteering soldiers – who were true to their salt – and gave their lives in a quarrel of which it was enough for them to know that the enemy were the foes of their Sahibs, their Empire, and their King.’

Speech by the Prince of Wales at the unveiling of the Chattri, 1 February 1921