About this Item
Rare first edition; a London printing followed in 1841. This copy has an appealing provenance, having been presented by the Boston-born China merchant Henry Parkman Sturgis to George Frend of the 31st Foot while on board the East Indiaman Larkins, the inscription dated 14 January 1841. We trace just one appearance in auction records and copies in seven institutional libraries. Obtaining an East India Company cadetship in 1805, Hough (1789-1865) served in the Nepal War (1814-16), Third Maratha War (1817-18), and as judge advocate of the Bengal Column of the Army of the Indus; he was an "authority on military law" (Stanley, p. 38 note). His Political and Military Events in British India (1853) became the standard textbook on Company rule; he also wrote Hints Regarding the Reorganisation of the Bengal Army (1857). His detailed and attractively illustrated eye-witness account covers the initial successes of the First Afghan War (1839-42): Kandahar fell without a fight and Kabul followed after the formidable citadel at Ghazni was stormed and taken. Luckily for Hough, he was put on the invalid list and sent to Calcutta, thus missing the destruction of the British forces on their disastrous retreat. In addition to recounting the campaign, Hough's descriptions of the towns and cities through which he passed have been praised as "among the most professional of those set down at this time" (Trousdale, p. 86). Provenance: George Frend (1815-1901) was born in Tipperary and joined the 31st as an ensign in 1835; his regiment was part of Sir George Pollock's Army of Retribution that captured Kabul in 1842. Sturgis (1806-1869) co-founded the Manila trading house of Russell, Sturgis & Co. Bruce 4473; Wilber 328 (listing the London edition only). Peter Stanley, White Mutiny: British Military Culture in India, 1825-1875, 1998; William B. Trousdale, Kandahar in the Nineteenth Century, 2021. Octavo (225 x 137 mm). Folding map frontispiece (with hand-coloured highlights in blue and yellow) by Lt. A. M. Becher, lithographed by G. H. Stapleton and printed by the Harmonic Lithographic Press, 3 plates by Lt. H. T. Combe, lithographed by J. Bennett of Calcutta and printed by T. Black of the Asiatic Lithographic Press; errata slip tipped in at p. iv. Contemporary green diaper-grain cloth, spine lettered in gilt between paired thick-and-thin fillets, untrimmed. Spine slightly sunned, a few abrasions to covers, corners worn, inner hinge cracked to cords at gutter of title page but sound, some toning and dust-soiling internally, map foxed and toned at crease: a very good copy.
Seller Inventory # 180540
Contact seller
Report this item
