ABSTRACT
Born in the British heartland of Chowringhee, in Calcutta, Lionel Trotter spent the first four years of his life in India before being sent to England. He was educated at Charterhouse school and the University of Oxford, then joined the army in India in 1847. Trotter himself remained in the hills, but the same ‘vague longing for vengeance’ is apparent in the Mutiny poetry included in East and West. ‘Righteous Vengeance for Innocent Blood’ and ‘The Year of Woe’ are drawn from the deep pool of factual and apocryphal narratives surrounding the conflicts in Delhi and Lucknow, and the traumatic accounts of the fate of British women in Kanpur. Trotter went on sick leave in 1858, and left the army on half-pay in 1862. Having acquired some experience of writing for periodicals including the Agra Messenger and Saunders’ Magazine, he now became a frequent contributor to the Universal Review, Dublin University Magazine, the New Review, and other publications.
