# Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900/Lord, Percival Barton

​LORD, PERCIVAL BARTON (1808–1840), diplomatic agent, born at Cork in 1808, was son of John Lord, chaplain to an institution founded at Mitchelstown, co. Cork, by the Kingston family for the relief of decayed gentlewomen. After being taught by his father, he went to Dublin University, where he graduated B.A. in 1829 and M.B. in 1832. From Dublin he removed to Edinburgh, where he zealously pursued anatomical and physiological studies, and acted as resident superintendent of a hospital during an epidemic of cholera. After completing his course in Edinburgh he came to London, and contributed some valuable medical reviews to the ‘Athenæum,’ notably two on consumption in the numbers for 15 and 22 March 1834, which were copied by medical journals on the continent and in America.
On 23 Nov. 1834 Lord was appointed assistant surgeon in the service of the East India Company, and proceeded to Bombay. On the voyage he studied Persian. He was appointed to the native cavalry in Guzerat, and afterwards accompanied, as surgeon, the embassy (the ‘commercial mission’) which was sent under Sir Alexander Burnes to Cabul. At Cabul he won the friendship of Dost Mahomed Khan and other Afghan chiefs; and his fame reached the ears of Murad Beg, the dreaded emir of Kunduz, who sent a mission to request his attendance on his brother, then threatened with blindness. Accordingly late in November 1837 Lord penetrated into Tartary through the mountains of the Hindoo Koosh. He found the case of Murad Beg's brother hopeless; but he embodied valuable observations in a report to the government, which met with the highest approbation. Lord was consequently, 1 Oct. 1838, named political assistant to William Hay Macnaghten [q. v.], the envoy despatched to Cabul, and was sent to Peshawur to collect and arm all the natives who were ready to fight in behalf of Shah Shoojah, whom the English government had determined to place on the throne of Afghanistan instead of Dost Mahomed. At Peshawur he wrote to his mother, ‘he was busied in casting cannon, forging muskets, raising troops, horse and foot, talking, persuading, threatening, bullying, and bribing.’ In the three days' fighting at the Khyber Pass, July 1839, on the road to Cabul, Lord acted as aide-de-camp to Colonel Wade, and received the public thanks of the governor-general. In September 1839 he was despatched from Cabul to the Uzbek frontier to gain information about Dost Mahomed's movements, and furnished what Kaye describes as ‘exaggerated stories’ of the success of Dost Mahomed among the petty chiefs of the Hindoo Koosh, and of a great movement which was about to be made for the re-establishment of Dost Mahomed (War in Afghanistan, ii. 12). Upon this Macnaghten, feeling doubtful of Shah Shoojah's safety, made a requisition to Sir John Keane for a stronger military force, and ‘turned Lord's story to account in the furtherance of his own views.’ Lord passed the winter of 1839–40 in the caves of Bameean. Ten days after the English victory over Dost Mahomed and his ally, the walee of Khooloom, at Bameean, 18 Sept. 1840 [cf. Dennie, William Henry], Lord was sent to superintend the negotiations with the states of Turkestan, and managed to detach the walee from his alliance with Dost, and to conciliate all the Uzbek states as far as the Oxus. The favourable impression which Lord was known to have previously made on Dost Mahomed Khan led the authorities to send Lord with the military division, which was sent to intercept and capture that chief, in the valley of Purwandurrah; but unhappily Dost Mahomed Khan defeated the English troops at Purwan on 2 Nov. 1840, and in the action Lord was killed. Lord was author of: 1. ‘Popular Physiology,’ 8vo, London, 1834; 3rd edit. 1855. 2. ‘Algiers, with Notices of the neighbouring States of Barbary,’ 2 vols. 12mo, London, 1835, a useful compilation. In December 1835 he addressed an interesting letter to Sir Alexander Johnston, vice-president of the Royal Asiatic Society, on the town and trade of Cambay, which was printed in the society's ‘Journal,’ vol. iii. p. lxxvii. During his journeys in Central Asia Lord made a regular series of observations, the publication of which his death prevented.
[Athenæum, 1841, pp. 36, 287, 428; Gent. Mag. 1841, pt. i. pp. 320–1; East India Reg. 1841, 2nd ed. p. 105; Kaye's Hist. of the War in Afghanistan, vol. ii.; Taylor's Univ. of Dublin, p. 528.]
G. G.