1. Maharaja Sir Duleep Singh, spelled Dalip Singh, and later in life nicknamed the "Black Prince of Perthshire", was the last Maharaja of the Sikh Empire.
43 Facts About Duleep Singh
1. 2.
Duleep Singh was Maharaja Ranjit Singh's youngest son, the only child of Maharani Jind Kaur.
3.
Duleep Singh was placed in power in September 1843, at the age of five, with his mother ruling on his behalf, and after their defeat in the Anglo-Sikh War, under a British Resident.
4.
Duleep Singh was deposed by the British Crown, and thereafter exiled to Britain at age 15 where he was befriended by Queen Victoria, who is reported to have written of the Punjabi Maharaja: "Those eyes and those teeth are too beautiful".
5.
Duleep Singh died at 55, living most of his final years in the United Kingdom.
6.
Duleep Singh's mother had effectively ruled when he was very young and he managed to meet her again on 16 January 1861, in Calcutta and return with her to the United Kingdom.
7.
Duleep Singh was betrothed to Tej Kaur, the granddaughter of Sham Singh Attariwala.
8.
Over thirteen years passed before Duleep Singh was permitted to see his mother again.
9.
Duleep Singh's health was reportedly poor and he was often sent to the hill station of Landour near Mussoorie in the Lower Himalaya for convalescence, at the time about 4 days' journey.
10.
Duleep Singh would remain for weeks at a time in Landour at a grand hilltop building called The Castle, which had been lavishly furnished to accommodate him.
11.
Duleep Singh's conversion remains controversial, and it occurred before he turned 15.
12.
Duleep Singh later had serious doubts and regrets regarding this decision and reconverted to Sikhism in 1886.
13.
Duleep Singh was heavily and continuously exposed to Christian texts under the tutelage of the devout Sir John Spencer Login.
14.
Duleep Singh arrived in England in late 1854 and was introduced to the British court.
15.
Duleep Singh was initially lodged at Claridge's Hotel in London before the East India Company took over a house in Wimbledon and then eventually another house in Roehampton which became his home for three years.
16.
Duleep Singh was invited by the Queen to stay with the Royal Family at Osborne, where she sketched him playing with her children and Prince Albert photographed him, while the court artist, Winterhalter, made his portrait.
17.
Duleep Singh eventually got bored with Roehampton and expressed a wish to go back to India but it was suggested by the East India Company Board he take a tour of the European continent, which he did with Sir John Spencer Login and Lady Login.
18.
Duleep Singh was a member of the Photographic Society, later the Royal Photographic Society, from 1855 until his death.
19.
Duleep Singh spent the rest of his teens there, but at 19 he demanded to be in charge of his household.
20.
From 1858 to 1862 Duleep Singh rented Mulgrave Castle, near Whitby.
21.
When he was 18, Duleep Singh wrote to his mother in Kathmandu, suggesting that she should join him in Great Britain, but his letter was intercepted by the British authorities in India and did not reach her.
22.
Duleep Singh then sent a courier, Pundit Nehemiah Goreh, who was intercepted and forbidden to contact the Maharani.
23.
In 1858 the lease of Castle Menzies expired and Duleep Singh rented the house at Auchlyne from the Earl of Breadalbane.
24.
Duleep Singh was known for a lavish lifestyle, shooting parties, and a love of dressing in Highland costume and soon had the nickname "the Black Prince of Perthshire".
25.
Duleep Singh's mother stayed in Perthshire with him for a short time, before he rented the Grandtully Estate, near Aberfeldy.
26.
Maharaja Duleep Singh bought a 17,000 acres country estate at Elveden on the border between Norfolk and Suffolk, close to Thetford, in 1863.
27.
Duleep Singh enjoyed living in Elveden Hall and the surrounding area and restored the church, cottages, and school.
28.
Duleep Singh transformed the run-down estate into an efficient game preserve and it was here that he gained his reputation as the fourth best shot in England.
29.
Maharaja Duleep Singh was accused of running up large expenses and the estate was sold after his death to pay his debts.
30.
In 1864, Duleep Singh married Bamba Muller in Cairo and established his family home at Elveden Hall in Suffolk.
31.
Duleep Singh eventually became disaffected and embittered with the British, and he reverted to Sikhism.
32.
Duleep Singh brought a list of properties held by Sir Duleep Singh in India.
33.
Maharaja Duleep Singh died in Paris in 1893 at the age of 55, having seen India after the age of fifteen during only two brief, tightly controlled visits in 1860 and in 1863.
34.
Duleep Singh's body was brought back to be buried according to Christian rites, under the supervision of the India Office, in Elveden Church beside the grave of his wife Maharani Bamba, and his son Prince Edward Albert Duleep Singh.
35.
Sir Duleep Singh married twice, first to Bamba Muller in 1864, and then to Ada Douglas Wetherill in 1889.
36.
Duleep Singh had seven children from his marriage to Bamba.
37.
Duleep Singh had two children from his marriage to Wetherill:.
38.
Duleep Singh stayed with him through his years in Paris and travelled with him to St Petersburg, Russia, where he failed to persuade the Czar of the benefits of invading India through the north and reinstalling him as ruler.
39.
Queen Victoria and Maharaja Duleep Singh reconciled their differences before he died.
40.
Duleep Singh was a member of the Freemasons and was admitted into the lodge in 1861.
41.
Duleep Singh remembered his servant James Cawood who died in 1865 with a gravestone in Killin cemetery, Killin, Scotland.
42.
Maharaja Duleep Singh's character is featured in Ubisoft's Assassin's Creed: Syndicate game.
43.
Duleep Singh is featured as a young Duleep Singh, which based on his real-life struggle as an exiled ruler in Victorian London.