COL..JAMES NEIL

    Last week I happened to visit Madras Museum with family.  The Madras Museum is one of the oldest one in India having established in 1851.  It has a good collection of items on different subjects like stone cutting, bronze gallaery, numismatics, anthropology,zoology etc.  Some of the more than 200 year cannons captured in various battles are also on display.  In the Anthropology section I happened to see the bronze statue of Col.James Neil of the East India Company Madras Army. There is a story behind this statue.  Col. James  Neil was born in the year 1810 in Scotland.  Like many of his fellow scottish people he came to India to join East India Company to earn a fortune.  He joined the Madras Army and rose to Colonel.  In the year 1857 the Sepoy Mutiny broke out at Meerut and in the beginning the Mutineers led by Mangal Pandey had a upper had and brutally killed many European soldiers and civilians.  So the Madras Army was called to the north to quell the mutineers.  A battallion led by Col.James Neil was despatched to Delhi.  Neil being a succesful commander quelled the mutiny and butchered many Indians at Allahabad.  In fact he was nicknamed Butcher of Allahabad,  The Mutiny was succesfully defeated by the year 1858 and British crown took over the reins of Indiaa and Neil also lost his life in the war.  The british residents of  Madras erected a statue as a mark of gratitude to him at the Spencers Junction in Mount Road. However in the first quarter of 20th century there was some opposition to his statue and people agitated to remove the statue.  Finally  after the Congress government led by Rajaji was voted to power the statue was removed and had its final resting place in the Museum.