Above is a pic of Lt. Colonel James Galbraith, Regimental Colour in hand, alongside Bobbie the regimental dog and some of the other "Last Eleven" survivors of the 66th (Berkshire) Regiment, making their last stand in one of the walled gardens just South of Khig village, a few miles West of the Afghan town of Maiwand.

Friday, May 13, 2011

3rd Scinde Horse

As many of you probably know, Blogger has had some difficulties the past few days, which have prevented users from uploading any new content. I'm glad to see the problem seems to have been solved, at least for now! Better to blog late than never, so I'll get on with the topic at hand...

Recently came across some interesting online visual info. on the 3rd Scinde (or "Sind") Horse.

First up are 2 views of the same sketch from a May, 1879 issue of The Illustrated London News, showing --

THE AFGHAN WAR: ATTACK ON GENERAL BIDDULPH'S REAR-GUARD AT KUSHK-I-NAKHUD--CHARGE OF THE 3RD SIND HORSE.

Here's a view of the sketch with the contemporary text identifying it --


-- and here's a possibly slightly closer view, without the text --



Next up are views of what might possibly be the Regimental standard/cavalry guidon. In all honesty, from the look of it, it's more likely be a replica, but to those of us who would like to have more exact knowledge regarding all aspects of the regiments present at the battle of Maiwand. I've never read of the 3rd Scinde Horse or 3rd Bombay Light Cavalry carrying their standards at the battle, nor have I explicitly read that they did not. We have definite written records of the 66th Foot and 1st Bombay Grenadiers carrying their standards at the battle, but nothing for sure about 30th Bombay Native Infantry (Jacob's Rifles), who may or may not even have possessed any regimental flags at all, as they held the title of a "Rifle" regiment, and such regiments in the British army -- whose traditions the Indian army largely adopted for very obvious reasons -- usually did not.

Anyhow, without further distraction, here are a pair of links to each side of the standard in question:


...and its flip-side:


The pics come from this site, which is dedicated to the memory of Brigadier General John Jacob, CB:


As mentioned above, I'm the first to admit they may well not be the real thing, but they are more to go on regarding the likely appearance of the Regiment's flag, if indeed they carried one, than I've ever had before, which is a good thing in my book. And if by any chance someone who reads this has any information regarding the matter, I'd ask you to please invest a little time to leave a comment and share what you know, and sincerely thank you in advance for doing so!

2 comments:

  1. Hi Mad Guru,

    This is what impresses me about this blog! The level of research and attention to detail is just the ticket IMHO.

    As for the flags? Just go with what you feel is best. Sometimes our best guess is all that we have.

    Darrell.

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  2. Agree completely, Darrell, thanks!

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