The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1894-02-07
KING OF NO KINGDOM.
The ROMANTIC LIFE OF MAHARAJAH
DHULEEP SINGH.

Removed to England With an Allowance.
Tried to Stir Up the Sikhs Again. but
Was Nipped and Forgiven by the Queen.
A decade ago Maharajah Dhuleep
Singh, who died in Paris recently,
was a well known figure in London,
whose photograph was on sale in the
shop windows. He was born in 1888,
the son of R%unjeet Singh. the lion of
the Punjab.' that doughty East Indian
sovereign who was the founder of the
Sikh kingdom and the cause of SO much
trouble to England. There have been
two Sikh wars in the last half century
in which the relatives of Dhuleep
when a Sikh army of so, 600 men in
vaded the queens Indian empire and
fought four pitched battles, the final
result being the retreat of the invaders
across tie Sutlej and the surrender of
Lahore to the British. BY the terms
of the peace Dhuleep Singh, the infant
son of RunJeet, was recognized as rajah.
The second Sikh war broke out in
1S4S, but 1t proved to be short lived,
TIE bIlllSu forces uIlutI LtIu 'OuSu
succeeding in destroying the Sikh army
and in anneHing Punjab to the queens
possessions. AS a result of this way
young Dhulecp Singh received an allow
ance of CSC. 600 from his conquerors.
He, with his mother, moved to Eng
land, became a Christian, and on his
estate in Suffolk cultivated the habits
of an English gentlemen. He was an
intimate friend Of the Prince of Wales,
who used annually to spend part of the
shooting season at Dhuleep's country
home.
The maharaiah' s first wife was a lit
tie Syrian maid whom he met in Cairo
in 1864, when on his way back from
Bonn bay, where he had gone to take
back to its native soil the body of his
mother that it might be there cremated.
The maharanee died in 1897, and a cou-
pie of years later-in 1889 he married
in Paris Miss Ada Douglas Wetherill.
Dhuleep watched closely the advance
of Russia into Asia. and when he
thought the proper time had come he
renounced Christianity and issued a
manifesto to the Sikh nation claiming
the throne of his father. But his re-
nunCiatiOn of the creed Of Bahia Nanuk
and his suspected illegitimate birth-it
was asserted by the Sikhs themselves
that he was the son of his mother
through an intrigue with one of the ra-
jah's water carriers-had long since es-
tranged the feelings of the people, and
if it had been possible to create u Sikh
rebellion in the Land of the Five Rivers
there were other princes better able than
this maharajah to lead such an enter
prise.
The British made short work of his
pretensions. He was travelling with
leisurely dignity on his great mission
in a p. & O. steamer, when at Alden he
was informed that a return passage had
been secured for him, and that he
would not be permitted to land in In
dia. A Sikh rebellion would have been
a serious matter for England, for neve
We're the British forces more evenly
fought than on the battlefields of Mool,
tan. Chillianwallah and Ghuznee.
There We're at that time about Il
regiments of Sikhs in the Indian army,
acknowledged by British officers to be
the finest in the service. and III most OF
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