Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official | Page 5

nominated, through the good offices of Lord De Dunstanville, to an
Infantry Cadetship in the Bengal army. On the 24th of March, in the
same year, he sailed from Gravesend in the ship Devonshire, and,
having touched at Madeira and the Cape, reached India towards the
close of the year. He arrived at the cantonment of Dinapore, near Patna,
on the 20th December, and on Christmas Day began his military career
as a cadet. He at once applied himself with exemplary diligence to the
study of the Arabic and Persian languages, and of the religions and
customs of India. Passing in due course through the ordinary early
stages of military life, he was promoted to the rank of ensign on the
23rd September, 1810, and to that of lieutenant on the 16th December,
1814.
Lieutenant Sleeman served in the war with Nepal, which began in 1814
and terminated in 1816. During the campaign he narrowly escaped
death from a violent epidemic fever, which nearly destroyed his
regiment. 'Three hundred of my own regiment,' he observes, 'consisting
of about seven hundred, were obliged to be sent to their homes on sick
leave. The greater number of those who remained continued to suffer,
and a great many died. Of about ten European officers present with my
regiment, seven had the fever and five died of it, almost all in a state of
delirium. I was myself one of the two who survived, and I was for
many days delirious.[1]
The services of Lieutenant Sleeman during the war attracted attention,
and accordingly, in 1816, he was selected to report on certain claims to
prize-money. The report submitted by him in February, 1817, was

accepted as 'able, impartial, and satisfactory'. After the termination of
the war he served with his regiment at Allahabad, and in the
neighbouring district of Partâbgarh, where he laid the foundation of the
intimate knowledge of Oudh affairs displayed in his later writings.
In 1820 he was selected for civil employ, and was appointed Junior
Assistant to the Agent of the Governor-General, administering the
Sâgar and Nerbudda territories. Those territories, which had been
annexed from the Marâthâs two years previously, are now included in
the jurisdiction of the Chief Commissioner of the Central Provinces. In
such a recently-conquered country, where the sale of all widows by
auction for the benefit of the Treasury, and other strange customs still
prevailed, the abilities of an able and zealous young officer had ample
scope. Sleeman, after a brief apprenticeship, received, in 1822, the
independent civil charge of the District of Narsinghpur, in the
Nerbudda valley, and there, for more than two years, 'by far the most
laborious of his life', his whole attention was engrossed in preventing
and remedying the disorders of his District.
Sleeman, during the time that he was in charge of the Narsinghpur
District, had no suspicion that it was a favourite resort of Thugs. A few
years later, in or about 1830, he was astounded to learn that a gang of
Thugs resided in the village of Kandêlî, not four hundred yards from
his court-house, and that the extensive groves of Mandêsar on the Sâgar
road, only one stage distant from his head-quarters, concealed one of
the greatest _bhîls_, or places of murder, in all India. The arrest of
Feringheea, one of the most influential Thug leaders, having given the
key to the secret, his disclosures were followed up by Sleeman with
consummate skill and untiring assiduity. In the years 1831 and 1832 the
reports submitted by him and other officers at last opened the eyes of
the superior authorities and forced them to recognize the fact that the
murderous organization extended over every part of India. Adequate
measures were then taken for the systematic suppression of the evil.
'Thuggee Sleeman' made it the main business of his life to hunt down
the criminals and to extirpate their secret society. He recorded his
experiences in the series of valuable publications described in the
Bibliography. In this brief memoir it is impossible to narrate in detail

the thrilling story of the suppression of Thuggee, and I must be content
to pass on and give in bare outline the main facts of Sleeman's
honourable career.[2]
While at Narsinghpur, Sleeman received on the 24th April, 1824,
brevet rank as Captain. In 1825, he was transferred, and on the 23rd
September of the following year, was gazetted Captain. In 1826, failure
of health compelled him to take leave on medical certificate. In March,
1828, Captain Sleeman assumed civil and executive charge of the
Jabalpur (Jubbulpore) District, from which he was transferred to Sâgar
in January, 1831. While stationed at Jabalpur, he married, on the 21st
June, 1829, Amélie Josephine, the daughter of Count Blondin de
Fontenne, a French nobleman, who, at the sacrifice of a