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The Last Mughal: The Fall of a Dynasty, Delhi, 1857 | 
| Author: William Dalrymple
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
Category: Book
List Price: £8.99
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Avg. Customer Rating:  24 reviews
Sales Rank: 5183
Media: Paperback
Edition: New edition
Pages: 608
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1.2
Dimensions (in): 7.7 x 5 x 1.3
ISBN: 0747587264
EAN: 9780747587262
ASIN: 0747587264
Publication Date: April 2, 2007
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| Customer Reviews: Read 19 more reviews...
 A must read September 3, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Dalrymple produces fantastically readable books and this history of 1857 is no exception. This, is perhaps one of the few histories written I English that attempts to use Urdu sources (the other notable book that does so is Amaresh Misra's War of Civilisations). However, Dalrymple doesn't make as extensive use of Urdu and Persian sources as he could have and he is over reliant on Ghalib and one or two others to portray the social history of the mutiny. However the book is still a wonderful read bursting with information and it attempts to portray a balanced view of the events. Dalrymple interweaves contemporary sources with his text masterfully and his inclusion and discussion of some of the poetry of the time makes for a most welcome distraction. Similarly the chapter where he discusses pre-mutiny Delhi is perhaps the most powerful, at least to any Indian Muslim, and it is almost unbearable to think of the city that we have now lost.
This is by no means a full account of the mutiny, the book concentrates mainly on events in Delhi and the life of the last Emperor. However it is a most welcome addition to the mutiny literature and required reading for anyone with even a casual interest in the history of India.
Superb picture of Mughal Delhi and its destruction in 1857 August 8, 2008
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
This magnificent book is based on Persian and Urdu documents in India's National Archives. It vividly portrays Mughal Delhi and its destruction in 1857. The last Mughal Emperor, Bahadur Shah Zafar II (1775-1862), was at the heart of a court of great brilliance, home of `the greatest literary renaissance in modern Indian history'. Architectural historian James Ferguson called his palace `the most splendid palace in the world'.
Dalrymple shows that the Uprising resulted from the Raj's growing racism and hatred, its `steady crescendo of insensitivity'. Its arrogant schemes to impose Evangelical Christianity and Christian laws on India `ushered in the most obnoxious phase of colonialism'.
The uprising was `along distinct class lines', with workers to the fore. It was the most serious armed challenge to imperialism in the 19th century, posed to the world's greatest military power. Dalrymple notes the rebels' military, strategic, administrative, logistical and financial failings and their war crimes. But the accusations of rape by the rebels were false: the official inquiry found not a single case of rape; the only mass rapes were by British soldiers after the reconquest of Delhi.
He reveals for the first time `the full scale of the viciousness and brutality of the British response', as detailed in the records of the revived British administration. "The orders were to shoot every soul. ... It was literally murder ... Heaven knows I feel no pity ..." wrote British officer Edward Vibart. Colonel A. R. D. Mackenzie boasted that we "exterminated them as men kill snakes wherever they meet them." After killing three unarmed captive princes, Captain William Hodson wrote to his sister, "I am not cruel, but I confess I did enjoy the opportunity of ridding the earth of these wretches."
Lieutenant Charles Griffiths wrote of John Clifford, the former collector of Gurgaon, "He shook my hands, saying that he had put to death all he had come across, not excepting women and children, and from his excited manner and the appearance of his dress - which was covered with blood stains - I quite believe he told the truth." Governor-General Lord Canning told Queen Victoria that the British forces displayed `a rabid and indiscriminate vindictiveness'.
Palmerston said that Delhi should be deleted from the map, `levelled to the ground'. British forces sacked, looted and emptied Delhi and massacred great swathes of its people. Much of the palace and its surrounding areas were razed. Most of its leading inhabitants were killed or transported to die in the Raj's new Andaman Islands camp for 10,000 prisoners. As far as the Mughal elite were concerned, the British response was `approaching a genocide' and `would today be classified as grisly war crimes'.
Dalrymple sums up, "That massacre of the inhabitants of Delhi, commanded and justified in the eyes of Victorian Evangelicals by their reading of the Christian scriptures. ... `In the city no one's life was safe,' wrote Muin ud-Din Husain Khan. `All able-bodied men who were seen were taken for rebels and shot.' Ghalib, who had disliked the sepoys from the beginning, was now no less horrified by the barbarity of the returning British. `The victors killed all whom they found on the streets,' he wrote in Dastanbuy. `When the angry lions entered the town, they killed the helpless and weak and they burned their houses. Mass slaughter was rampant and streets were filled with horror. It may be that such atrocities always occur after conquest.'"
 The Last Mughal's Pollyanna January 23, 2008
4 out of 15 found this review helpful
The first rule of history is not to take sides, one that William Dalrymple breaks almost on the first page.
Attempting to replace the existing foreign ruling class of India with themselves, the British caused resentment that boiled over in 1857 into a full scale uprising. As the British and their Indian allies tried to put down the uprising both sides were the victims of, and the perpetrators of massacres, and both had their heroes and their villains.
Sadly Dalrymple undermines his detailed research by almost ignoring the massacres of Europeans and Christian converts and the culpability of the Mughal court in them while reporting in detail any British wrongdoing.
This is a good book ruined by the author's prejudices.
the last mughal January 23, 2008
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
I have now read every single book ever published by William Dalrymple. I would be hard put to name a favourite as each one of them is something of a masterpiece in its own right. The Last Mughal must rate among the very best of Dalrymple's work and indeed must rank as one of the finest on the Indian Mutiny of 1857. Most accounts of the Mutiny are centred around the British forces gathered outside the walls of Delhi. This book gives a unique insight into what was happening inside the walls in the weeks and months leading up to the British invasion and the aftermath.
Dalrymple's writing of history is, in a sense, unique. The Last Mughal reads like a rivetting thriller without ever compromising on fact or scholarship. The author has a profound appreciation of his subject. For anyone with even a passing interest in Indian or British colonial history, a must read.
Bahadur Shah Zafar January 12, 2008
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
"Kitna Budnaseeb Hai Zafar Dafan Ke Liye
Do Guj Jameen Bhi na Mili KUey Yaar Mein"
when i started to read this book , these 2 lines haunted me as if Zafar kept on talking from his grave. a very well written book. this is my second book written by william dalrymaple.i feel so connected to the author, to his work.thank you Mr. Dalrymaple for giving us this masterpiece.
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