Lt Col Christopher Baldock

Written by Charles Allen: One of my ancestors, Christopher Baldock (seen here in his cadet’s uniform aged 16, just before he sailed for India in 1795), did very well out of Sriringapatnam. We have a letter from his daughter, part of which reads as follows:

My father was given a “cadetship” in the H. E. I. Company’s Service by his uncle Le Mesurier who was on the Board of Directors. My father was very young when he went to India. He was at the taking of Seringapatam in 1799 being then 18 years old. He was given the medal & £1000 prize money. After the battle he was ordered to go into a tower to guard a part of the vast treasure taken from Tippoo Saib. He told my mother that he stood all night in the very centre of the tower, close all around him were small bags of a sort of calico tied up at the mouth. They reached up to his armpits. He stood there all night trying to keep awake with both arms spread out on the bags. He had barely room to stand in the middle. All the young officers receiving (as it must have been on the field of battle) so much prize money, had nothing better to do than to gamble. My father had already made out what he would do with his share, with all the presents he would send home to his sisters etc etc – One night he went with the others to a neighbouring tent & played [ie gambled with cards]. He had no clear recollection of any thing till the next morning very early still he was awakened by his khansomma, a faithful man whom he kept all the time he was in India. He told this servant to count the money & take some of it. The man counted it & found nearly £2000. My father could not believe this, counted again & found this was so! By a strange turn of luck he had all but doubled his prize money. This gave him such a shock, feeling that he might as well have lost all, that he never again so long as he lived played for high stakes – only at whist for slight sums. The play had been so reckless in the Camp that Sir David Baird put in general orders that not another card should be touched during the campaign.

I have tried to calculate the equivalent of £2000 then in today’s currency and it seems to be something approaching £180,000!