Clive of India ( Architect of an Empire ) Robert Clive was born in Styche, a small village near the town of Market Drayton in Shropshire. Though he came from an old and well-established family of the shires, his father was a lawyer and had been for many years the local M.P, and was raised in a manor house, he was of common stock. This fact was to return to haunt him later in life. But growing up in rural Shropshire he could never have dreamed of where his life was to take him. From the start Robert was a young man on the make. He was by any definition a tearaway, even a delinquent. Expelled from every school he attended he terrorised the local population. He enjoyed frightening people and organised a local protection racket where he and his adolescent enforcers demanded money from local merchants as the price for not vandalising or burning down their premisses. It would appear that most paid up. He was uncontrollable and his family in their desparation found employment for him with the East India Company. They told him that in India he could make his fortune, the truth was they just wanted rid of him. So in 1744, aged 18, he set sail for India. The life-expectancy of Europeans exiled to India was not high. More than 50% died within a few years of their arrival, and the young Robert could understand why. Starting work as a lowly clerk he worked long hours in extreme heat for poor pay. The tedium and drudgery of it all drove him to distraction, and he was in constant trouble with his employers. A manic-depressive he quickly took to opium as an escape, an addiction he was never to shake off. Bored beyond all belief he resolved to kill himself, he put a pistol to his head and pulled the trigger, the gun failed to go off. He repeated the exercise, again the gun failed to go off. He later said that he believed that this was a sign from God that he was being saved for a reason. So he continued in his post, a poor worker, lazy and irascible, dreaming of riches, and waiting for an opportunity. But fortune was to look down on Robert for his time in India coincided with the outbreak of the War of the Austrian Succession, and opportunity did indeed knock for those audacious enough to take it, and Robert was nothing if not audacious. On 4 September, 1746, Madras was attacked by the French and quickly surrendered. In the lull between the surrender and French occupation of the town however, Clive had organised the escape of himself and his colleagues to the safety of the nearby Fort St David. His bravery was duly noted and he was granted a commission in the East India Company's Army. Following the restoration of peace, however, in 1748, he was returned to the tedium of his office and a sustained bout of depression soon followed. Clive's courage though had not been forgotten, neither had his audacity and willingness to chance his arm, and he was soon to make his mark at the Siege of Arcot in 1751. Though Britain and France were officially at peace they continued to wage war in India by proxy, and Chanda Sahib, an ally of the French had laid siege to the city of Arcot. Clive now pushed himself forward and promised that provided with the means to do so he would raise the siege. The East India Company could not provide him with very much: 200 European troops, 300 Indian Sepoys and 3 cannon. Even so, Clive attacked under the cover of a thunderstorm and took the fort at Arcot. He was then besieged himself for 50 days before being relieved by the arrival of 2,000 Maratha cavalry led by Madina Ali Khan, an ally of the British. Clive's success at Arcot brought to a successful conclusion the campaign in the Carnatic region of India and in the favourable peace that followed British possessions in southern India were recognised. Robert Clive returned to Britain in 1753, a hero. He was even praised in the House of Commons by the then Prime Minister William Pitt as a " heaven-born general." But he could not stay away from India for too long. He was ambitious and there was much money and glory to be had on the Indian sub-continent. Clive returned to India in 1755, no longer a lowly clerk but now as deputy governor of Fort St David. His return also happened to coincide with the accession of Siraj ad Daulah as the new Nawab of Bengal. The newly-crowned Nawab made no attempt to hide his contempt for and hatred of the British, and he was determined to assert control over his own territory. On 20 June,
1755, he attacked and captured the city of Calcutta. By the time of its fall most of its European inhabitants had already fled. Those that remained were taken prisoner. According to one John Zepheniah Holwell, 146 of them were then confined in a tiny cell just 14ft by 18ft with only one small window for air. He wrote " By nine o'clock several had died, and many more were delirious. A frantic cry for water now became general, and one of the guards, more compassionate than his fellows, caused some to be brought to the bars, but in their impatience to receive it nearly all was spilt, and the little drank only seemed to increase their thirst. Self-control was soon lost, those in remote parts of the room struggled to reach the window, and a fearful tumult ensued, in which the the weakest were trampled or pressed to death. They raved, fought, prayed and blasphemed, and many fell exhausted to the floor, where suffocation put an end to their torments." In the heat of an Indian high summer many died from heat exhaustion or were trampled to death in their desparate attempts to find some air. By the time Siraj ad Daulah ordered their release the following morning 123 were dead. We only have Holwell's account for this but even taking into account exaggeration the 'Black Hole of Calcutta' was cruel and brutal. Britain was appalled and demanded vengeance, and Robert Clive was the man to provide it. Clive's reputation was such that he was immediately put in effective command of operations to recapture Calcutta, and put the Nawab firmly in his place. Again with only minimal land forces, just 2,000 infantry and 14 artillery pieces, but this time supported by the ships of Admiral Charles Watson, Clive attacked and defeated the 50,000 strong army of the Nawab, who abandoned Calcutta on 5 February, 1757. Siraj ad Daulah, however, remained unperturbed by the humiliation of Calcutta and soon renewed his war with the British this time with the support of the French. Robert Clive, in the meantime had not been idle. He had been in negotiations with Mir Jafar, the commander of Siraj ad Daulah's army, who was opposed to his alliance with the French and was a man of unnaloyed ambition. It was agreed that Clive would consent to Mir Jafar being made Nawab of Bengal in recognition for his support of any coming conflict. In return Mir Jafar would make substantial payments totalling hundreds of thousands of pounds in compensation to the East India Company, its army, numerous individuals, and Clive himself. This duplicitous secret treaty shrouded in mystery and lies has been used again and again as an example of Clive's greed and unscrupulousness. The Battle of Plassey, 23 June, 1757 Once long and tiresome negotiations between the representatives of the East India Company and Siraj ad Daulah had all but broken down and a renewal of hostilities were inevitable, Clive immediately took the initiative. He advanced his army, taking his Europeans troops down the River Hooghly in boats (the Sepoys were made to march) and set up his headquarters in a hunting lodge among the mango groves of Plassey, after first securing the water supply. Yet again, his forces were slight, 1,100 European troops, with 2,100 Indian Sepoys and 9 cannon.Ranged against him was the massive army of Siraj ad Daulah, 50,000 infantry, 18,000 cavalry, and 53 cannon manned by French gunners. For the first time in his life Clive demurred. To attack such an overwhelming force would be tantamount to madness. He held a council of his officers. It was held, he said, to decide " whether in our present situation without assistance, it would be prudent to attack the Nawab, or whether we should wait to be joined by some (other) power." A vote was taken and Clive supported the 9 who voted for delay against the 7, led by Admiral Eyre Coote, who voted for an immediate attack. Sometime during the night Clive changed his mind. Some say the decision came to him in a dream, others that he was concerned for his reputation as a man of dash and reckless courage who had raised the Siege of Arcot and recaptured Calcutta both against overwhelming odds, or, perhaps, he trusted in Mir Jafar. Whatever, on the morning of 23 June, 1757, he engaged the forces of Siraj ad Daulah. In swelteringly hot temperatures with a haze hanging over the battlefield both armies manouevred and artillery salvos were exchanged but very little actual fighting was done. Late in the day Mir Jafar led his forces from the field, on seeing this the remainder of the Nawab's army disintegrated. Robert Clive had won one of the most decisive battles in world history for the loss of just 22 Sepoys killed and 50 wounded. It was the beggining of British control of the Indian subContinent, the creation of the Raj, and the Jewel in the Crown of the burgeoning British Empire.
Though there was much work and hard fighting still to be done. After the victory at Plassey, Clive, now as Governor, continued to consolidate and advance British rule in Bengal and beyond.Yet even at the age of just 35, he was suffering from constantly failing health and his bouts of depression were becoming increasingly frequent. In 1760, he returned to England. He had accrued for himself a personal fortune estimated at more than ÂŁ300,000. Accolades were showered upon him, he was the great British hero, he was praised in Parliament, received at Court, and made Baron Clive of Plassey. In his absence, however, the efficient administration he had left in India had become mired in corruption and sleaze. In April, 1765, he again set sail for India. Upon his arrival the first thing he learned was that Mir Jafar had died and left him ÂŁ70,000 in his will. It was then ironic that one of his first acts upon his return was to ban the acceptance of gifts by civil servants from native Indians. His remit was to eliminate the corruption that so marred British rule in India. He reformed the army, stamped out smuggling, and tried to reduce the extortionate rates of taxation levied on the peasantry. With the exception of the army he was not entirely sucessful. In February, 1767, he left India for the last time. Upon his return to England he found that his glory had turned to criticism, that his fame, vast wealth, and new found status, had induced feelings of envy and mistrust. That a man of no background should rise so high flew in the face of the established social order. From 1772 on, he was forced to defend himself against attacks from many of the great and the good of the country. He was pilloried in the press for his greed, placed under investigation and made to answer for his actions and behaviour. Cross-examined in Parliament about the vast wealth he had acquired he replied, " By God . . . I am astonished at my own moderation." Despite being cleared of all charges, the hounding of Clive by so many of those he had previously thought of as friends, their jealousy, snobbery, and lack of gratitude, had taken its toll. His depression returned and he was suffering from acute abdominal pains. On 22 November, 1774, he was found dead at his home in Berkeley Square, London. He had slit his own throat.