The Imagining Of A Hero

On 7 January 1858, when the press announced the death of Major-General Sir Henry Havelock, hero of the Relief of Lucknow, there began a period of national mourning on a scale not seen in England for fifty years. ‘Never since the death of Nelson has the removal of any commander been so deeply and universally deplored…. For two days, in every circle from the Palace to the cottage, there was a national lamentation. ’ ¹ As with all claims about national unity and universality, this needs to be qualified; but there can be no doubt that Havelock's contribution to the defeat of the 1857–8 Indian Rebellion (or the ‘Mutiny’, as it is commonly known) earned him a legendary reputation. Among a batch of military commanders to win popular recognition during the Rebellion, only Havelock became ‘a major national hero’: comparisons with the greatest of all British military heroes, Nelson and Wellington, were common even before his death. ² In memorium, the Government agreed to a proposal to erect in Trafalgar Square a full-length statue, paid for by national subscription (see Figure 1). Although the statue stands there to this day, Havelock's name, unlike that of Nelson, has failed to become permanently inscribed in popular memory. Few of the tourists who might laugh at the pigeons perched on Havelock's head before crossing the road to the National Gallery will know who he was, how his name became a ‘household word’ in mid-Victorian England or why it was honoured in this extraordinary way. Nor will many remember that, for two generations of Victorians, he was ‘a paragon to be emulated, who could symbolize “the goal towards which men strove"’. ³