Battle of Fatehpur (1799)

01Arrears and adventurers

Jaipur owed tribute to Daulatrao Scindia, and Vaman Rao, one of his officers, was told to collect what he could. He had no army fit for the task, so he paid George Thomas, the former sailor who had carved out a small state at Hansi, to march with him. They entered Shekhawati, took small payments from frightened districts, and pushed on too far from their base.

02The filled-in wells

Maharaja Sawai Pratap Singh sent his army under Rora Ramji Khawas with the Rajawat, Nathawat and Khangarot thakurs. The people around Fatehpur filled in their wells, and Thomas’s men reached the town after a long march over deep sand. Accounts differ on the detail. Thomas’s biographers praise his stand, while Jaipur’s chroniclers and Compton describe a defeat and a hard retreat. Either way the invaders could not hold their ground without water, and they left Jaipur’s land.

Dynasty · 1731–1948 CEScindias (Shinde) of GwaliorRanoji Shinde rose as a commander under Bajirao I and was given northern Malwa. His son Mahadji, who survived Panipat, became the master of Delhi and the most powerful Indian ruler of the 1780s; the house later ruled Gwalior until 1948.Read →