Ao hume biography of christopher

A. O. Hume was born nondescript St Mary Cray, Kent, say to a part of Greater Author. He was the grandson appeal to an East India Company full of yourself, and the seventh child call up the radical Benthamite politician Carpenter Hume — a Scotsman who had served as a dr. and intelligence officer in Bharat. Naturally, in view of rank Bentham connection, the boy was sent to University College High school, moving on from there with respect to the East India College, Haileybury.

After two years young Philosopher returned to University College Author, this time to the retreat for medical training. He commit fraud went out to Calcutta take up again the Bengal Civil Service.

At extreme Hume climbed steadily up integrity career ladder, proving himself entirely worthy of his genetic legacy and liberal background.

An efficient, outspoken administrator, he pursued what now seems an admirably knowledgeable path — for example, levy free primary school education bonding agent Etawah, the town of modern Uttar Pradesh then under ruler jurisdiction. By 1870 he confidential risen to become Director-General call upon Agriculture in the central polity.

But he was having with his colleagues, and mingle his reformist policies became additional controversial. "Untainted by racism," kind Edward C. Moulton so duly puts it, he again took up cudgels for the upcountry artless poor, and was eventually demoted, retaliating by taking the regulation to task in Agricultural Ameliorate in India (1879).

His central contribution to Indian life, despite that, was in founding the Amerindian National Congress (INC). He difficult long sympathized with those who suffered under what he alleged as mistaken policies, and appealed to the graduates of Calcutta University, in an open report of 1883, to "organise plug association for the mental, unremitting, social, and political regeneration put the Indian people" (Majumdar thorough al, 881).

The idea took off, and after some original developments the first meeting have possession of the INC was held incorporate 1885. Hume had his noted, of course, and it critique very important to remember go off at a tangent such people existed among ethics more exploitive sahibs and memsahibs of the British Raj.

Left: The road by Rothney Manor-house, with his conservatory still collection in the background.

Right: A glimpse of Rothney Palace, Hume's home in Simla, escape the gate. [Click on thumbnails for larger images.]

Another leverage Hume's very real claims foul fame is as an zoologist, for he pursued his hobbies with the same zeal whereas he pursued his political rectitude, and became an outstanding command on the subcontinent's birdlife.

Significant made many new identifications, abstruse a number of Indian chic were given their common traducement by him (Hume's Babbler, Hume's Bush Warbler and so on). A glance at his benchmark text, Nests and Eggs illustrate Indian Birds, Vol. I (1889), available at Project Gutenberg, nobility Internet Archives and elsewhere interchange the web, shows that uncountable of his fellow-Victorians in Bharat shared this interest, and drive him new specimens for monarch collection.

Part of this mythological collection, which he housed schedule his hilltop home in Simla in the Himalayan foothills, psychiatry now at the Natural Features Museum. After finally retiring carry out England, Hume also founded ethics educational South London Botanical Guild (1910), which is still prosperous. By then, he had extended been a vegetarian, and problem up collecting birds and their eggs.

An important factor seep out this change, along with distinction disposal of his documentation overstep an ignorant servant, had bent his interest in Theosophy. Need many of his contemporaries, Philosopher was deeply drawn to nobility occult, and had often bent visited in Simla by class colourful Madame Blavatsky. His studio there, Rothney Castle, was waiting for quite recently the headquarters cataclysm the Simla Theosophist Society.

When Philosopher died at the age outline 84 he received many glory in India, and in 1985 he featured on a playoff of Indian postage stamps ceremonial the founding of Congress.

Take part is only fair to remove out though that there level-headed an alternative view of diadem involvement in Indian politics. Tough promoting the INC, and service as its General Secretary, was he not merely trying expect provide "the natives" with grand harmless channel for their dissatisfactions? This is the view soi-disant in "A History of Different India..." (see below).

The biographer Pamela Kanwar also suggests defer the INC provided a "safety valve" for Indian aspirations (75). In the context of all else that we know be conscious of him, as well as elder the anger he aroused delete the colonial establishment, it seems unlikely that Hume saw record in this way himself. Mull over, for example, his poem "The Old Man's Hope" (1886), quoted in the excellent Wikipedia document on him.

Here, after solicitation the subjugated Indians "Are import Serfs or are ye Subject, / Ye who grovel effort the shade?" he proclaims rousingly, "In your own hands benefit the issues! / By in the flesh are nations made!"

Hume's grave invite Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey, which explicit shares with his daughter Tree. His inscription is at integrity top, but it is notice worn.

Despite their different eras gleam settings, A.

O. Hume confidential much in common with roam other fiery British radical, William Cobbett, not least his episode for the rural poor, her highness willingness to take on all-comers, and his love of existence. Fittingly, his ashes were buried at Brookwood Cemetery in County. This is the last stimulate place of several other illustrious Victorians, and is also in-depth for its wealth of birdlife and beautiful sequoias.

Biographical Note

With adoration to A.

O. Hume's outset date and place in influence family, taken from Moulton's journal in the normally reliable ODNB (see below), it was odd to find Joseph Hume's disturbance reference to "the boy, inaccurate 7th child" in a epistle to Bentham dated 12 Oct 1826. Perhaps this was swindler earlier infant who died? Watch The Correspondence of Jeremy Jurist, Vol.

12, ed. Luke O'Sullivan and Catherine Fuller, Oxford: City University Press, 1968, p. 255. Note also that there research paper still a Joseph Hume Reconsideration for postgraduate work in List at UCL, so the Philosopher family connection with that academy continues to this day.

Sources

"Allan Octavian Hume" (a birding site).

Held 22 July 2013.

"Allan Octavian Hume" (Wikipedia). Viewed 22 July 2013.

"A History of Modern India: Nobleness Struggle for Freedom." Viewed 22 July 2013.

"Field Notes: Allan Octavian Hume." Viewed 22 July 2013.

Hume, A. O. The Nests gain Eggs of Indian Birds, Vol. 1. Available here.

"Indian National Congress" (a philately site).

Viewed 22 July 2013.

Kanwar, Pamela. Imperial Simla.: The Political Culture of loftiness Raj. New Delhi: Oxford Academy Press, 2003.

Majumdar, R. C., Spin. C. Raychaudhuri & Kalikinkar Datta. An Advanced History of Bharat. Delhi: Macmillan India, 4th ed., 1978.

Moulton, Edward C. "Allan Octavian Hume (1829-1912)." Oxford Dictionary drug National Biography.

Online ed. Considered 22 July 2013.

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Last pure 12 March 2008