Memoir of William Watts McNair

Memoir of William Watts
McNair

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Title: Memoir of William Watts McNair
Author: J. E. Howard
Release Date: December 4, 2003 [EBook #10382]
Language: English
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Memoir of WILLIAM WATTS McNAIR, Late of "Connaught House"
Mussooree, Of the INDIAN SURVEY DEPARTMENT, The First
European Explorer of Kafiristan.

BY J.E. HOWARD.

INSCRIBED TO THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY OF
LONDON, IN REMEMBRANCE OF A LIFE MADE HAPPIER BY
ITS RECOGNITION OF RARE AND MODEST WORTH.

MEMOIR.
William Watts McNair, who was born on the 13th September, 1849,
joined the great Indian Survey Department in September, 1867, when
he was only eighteen years old, and served the Government of Her
Majesty the Queen and Empress of India faithfully unto the day of his
death, on the 13th of August, 1889. In the official proceedings or notes
of the Surveyor-General of India, for August, 1889, will be found the
following more than merely formal notice of the services of the
deceased officer of a great but scarcely sufficiently recognised
scientific department of the magnificent Indian Empire of Her Majesty
the Queen-Empress. "The Surveyor-General deeply regrets to announce
the death of Mr. W.W. McNair, Surveyor, 3rd grade, from fever
contracted at Quetta while attached to the Baluchistan Survey Party. He
was granted leave to proceed to Mussooree, where he died on 13th
August. Mr. McNair joined the department on the 1st September, 1867,
and was posted to the Rajputana Topographical Party. The first twelve
years of his service were passed on topographical duty with this party
under Major G. Strahan, R.E., and in the Mysore Party under Majors G.
Strahan and H.R. Thuillier, R.E. From the very first he showed special
aptitude as a plane-tabler, and was soon recognised in the department
as an accomplished surveyor. In the autumn of 1879 he was selected to
accompany the Khyber Column of the Afghan Field Force, and was
present with that force during the severe fighting that occurred before
Kabul in the winter of 1879-80, and the subsequent defence of Sharpur.
Whilst in Afghanistan he mapped a very large portion of hitherto
unknown country, including the Lughman Valley and approaches to
Kafiristan, and the Logar and Wardak Valleys to the south of Kabul.
He explored the Adrak-Badrak Pass with a native escort, and made

himself acquainted with the route from Kabul to Jalalabad, viâ
Lughman, which was explored by no other European officer. At the
close of the war he was attached to the Kohat Survey, under Major
Holdich, R.E., and was specially employed in the risky work of
mapping the frontier line from Kohat to Bannu, including a wide strip
of trans-frontier country, and much of the hitherto unmapped Tochi
Valley. On the break-up of the Kohat Survey he was temporarily
employed on geodetic work in one of the Astronomical parties, but was
re-transferred to the frontier when the Baluchistan parties were formed.
His chief work in connection with Baluchistan has been carrying a
first-class series of triangles from the Indus, at Dehra Grhazi Khan to
Quetta, which occupied him to the close of his career. His ability as an
observer, his readiness of resource under unusual difficulties, and his
power of attaching the frontier people to him personally, have been just
as conspicuous throughout this duty as were his energy and success as a
geographical topographer. Apart from his departmental career, he has
won a lasting name as an explorer by his adventurous journey to
Kafiristan in 1883, when on leave. It may be fairly claimed for him that
he was the first European officer who set foot in that impracticable
country, and he is still the best authority on many of the routes leading
to it. His services to geographical science were recognised by the Royal
Geographical Society, who awarded him the Murchison grant, and
there can be little doubt that a distinguished career was still before him
when he was suddenly cut off in the prime of his life."
To those who know what an Indian Department means, such language
of eulogy, no less truthful than graceful, from so respected a
functionary as the Surveyor-General of India, who knew Mr. McNair
personally, will carry a weight far beyond the official recognition of
that deceased officer's worth to his department. The comparative