The William Rees Mogg article about editors of The Times reminded me of a story I came across about the great correspondent William Russell when he was in India to report on how the British army re-established control over the areas which were in rebel hands following the 1857 Mutiny
Russell was one of those men who, though earning what was for those days a fabulous salary, was always short of money. Indeed, in more general terms he was a hopeless manager of his family & domestic life. Knowing that his wife would be unhappy about him going on another prolonged & treacherous assignment abroad – she was ill after all – he simply got round the difficulty by leaving the house late at night without having told her anything about it
He was also a man of mercurial temperament & seemingly inconsistent attitudes. While generally sympathetic to the underdog, he could come out with some outrageously choleric & racist views. So although he railed against the viciousness with which the mutiny was put down, the policy of indiscriminate hangings pour encourager les autres, & the snobbery of the Anglo-Indian colonialists, he could be rude, to say the least, about the natives too. Especially those who had to carry him around in a palanquin after he had suffered an extremely nasty kick in the thigh from a horse
After the retaking of one particular palace, Russell wrote to his editor to complain that he was so short of funds that he could not even afford the paltry amount that one ordinary soldier had asked for a looted treasure. By selling it on to a more wealthy customer, Russell would have been able to make himself a nice little profit
The editor – the great Delane – responded by sending Russell a personal cheque for £10 so that he would not be similarly embarrassed again
