[ By Viscount Combermere? ] 39 sheets of Galley proofs of a long article on 'The Siege of Bhurtpoor', from a series titled 'Operations of the Bengal Army in India and on Foreign Service', from the Calcutta periodical 'The Englishman'.

An extraordinarily-detailed account of 'The Siege of Bhurtpoor', from a series titled 'Operations of the Bengal Army in India and on Foreign Service', utilising a wide variety of sources, both published and unpublished, each quotation meticulously cited in footnotes. On 39 sheets, almost all of them in two columns of small print, mostly roughly 50 x 16 cm, but a few longer, and one sheet of three columns (46 x 28.5 cm, being part of a description of the 'Formation of the Army: and the General &c., Staff.'). Numbered in manuscript 346-385, with 374 not present. Laid down on 56 x 19 cm leaves of brown paper, attached in three bundles, each of the three tied together with blue ribbon. In good condition, aged and worn, with a few of the longer sheets slightly frayed at foot where they overlap their mounts. The first pages of the first and third bundles are headed in a contemporary hand 'Lord Combermere', with the first page of the second bundle headed 'Lord Combermere | 48 Belgrave Sq.' First bundle: 15 sheets numbered in manuscript 346-360. Second bundle: 9 sheets numbered 362-370. Third bundle: 12 sheets numbered 371-381 (lacking 374), 361. The final three sheets, numbered 382-385, are laid down on loose brown-paper mounts. The article is complete (but for sheet 374, which may result from a misnumbering), with the following printed at the end of sheet 384: 'THE CONCLUSION OF THE SIEGE OF BHURTPOOR.' Each of the 39 sections comprises a separate part of the article, each with such headings as 'Continued from yesterday's Englishman' and 'Continued from the Englishman of the 17th April'. Each section annotated with great care, identifying sources and commenting on quotations. An impressive and exhaustive account, covering all the aspects of the siege, under headings including: View of Doorjun Saul's Position; Proclamation; Reconnoitring; Enemy Abandon the Bund; Contemplated Sally; Working Party Murmuring; Want of Tools; Sluice Effectually Stopt [sic]; Hand-Grenades; Gopalgurh; Mining; Misconduct of Hired Bildars; General Nicoll's Trap (Abbatis); Expenditure of Shot; Scaling Ladders Prepared; Chevaux de frise on flank of trench; The Long-Necked Bastion; Ventilating-Bellows; Desertion to the Enemy; Escalade Practice; Springing of the Mines; Major General Reynell's Right Column; Captain Henry Cock's Account; Excitement of European Troops; Capture of Doorjun Saul; The Citadel; Unscientific Notions of Delay. The presence of Combermere's name and London address in a contemporary hand indicates that he was sent these proofs for correction, with a strong possibility that he is the author. Possibly unique: no copy of the original has been traced on either OCLC WorldCat or on COPAC (although the latter does have an entry for an 1838-1839 London supplement titled 'The Englishman and Military Chronicle'). While the series does not appear to have been reprinted, Horace Hayman Wilson, in his 1858 editon of James Mill's 'History of British India' (1858), notes that it woud be 'very desirable to have access [to it] in a more commodious form'.