The Last of the Children

The increasingly elderly men and women who continued to commemorate Lucknow were now led by Arthur Frederic Dashwood, himself a siege baby, and he continued to keep a list of the remaining survivors. It was viewed by the newspapers as Dashwood’s “kindly hobby to keep in touch with them.” Dashwood himself, being the youngest of them all, said it was the least he could do, as it would seem one of the sprightliest of the children. In 1934, at the age of 86, he noted he could still walk a mile, play a round of golf and a game of billiards and attend race meetings. He felt the siege had, in fact, had no ill effects on him at all, even though his mother had suffered during most of her pregnancy without ” bread, butter or milk”, subsisting mostly on chapattis.

In early 1934, they were:

A.R. Anderson – the son of Captain Anderson, the little boy who cheered when the guns fired on board the ship that was taking him back to England. His mother and infant sister died during the siege.
George A. Campagnac was born at Lucknow in 1848. His father, Charles, had been an active defender and one of the uncovenanted service. After the siege, he relocated his family to Calcutta.
Sir Ralph Couper, Bart, living in Australia, is said, according to one newspaper article, to have been born during the siege. Unfortunately, this does not add up: Mrs Couper was indeed pregnant, and she gave birth to a baby girl during the siege, not a boy, which is documented by Lady Julia Inglis, who was a good friend of Mrs Couper. The poor infant died barely four weeks later and was buried in the Residency cemetery. This particular gentleman was undoubtedly present during the siege along with his sister, Caroline, born in 1854, but officially his name was Ramsay George Henry Couper (later 3rd Baronet Couper), born in 1855. The remaining Couper children were born after the siege. In fact, his brother Charles, born in 1873, was buried in the Lucknow Residency Cemetery in 1881.

Reverend A.R. Edgell, son of Captain R.J. Edgell, was born during the siege.
Frederic Lincoln, still residing in Lucknow. Born in 1855.
Charles Palmer, living in British Columbia, Canada. Son of Colonel Palmer of the 71st. Charles was 10 years old during the siege.
Mrs Blanche Long, the eldest daughter of Lucknow Kavanagh. She married Captain Francis Newland Martin Maynard, Bengal Staff Corps, in 1869; in 1892, she remarried Chaplain John Long of the Firs, Walberton, Sussex, late 10th Royal Hussars, after her first husband died in 1890.
Mrs Kathleen Haynes, the second daughter of Lucknow Kavanagh. She married in India to Frederick H. Haynes, HM’s 21st Hussars, in 1872.
Mrs Price
Mrs Thomson – daughter of Lieutenant Lewin, who was killed during the siege.

However, Mrs Long died in 1934, and her obituary said very little about her but plenty about her father!

Her death was followed closely by that of Frederic Lincoln, who had been a toddler during the siege. His would be the last funeral held in the Lucknow Residency cemetery; as soon as the grave was closed, the siege could well and truly be said to be now over.

The Lucknow children had lived long, full lives. The babies had grown up, become parents themselves, thrived, aged and died. Mrs Haynes died in 1935, and Miss L.M. Casey passed in 1938. Among the last to go were Charles Palmer, Arthur Dashwood and Ralph Couper.

In 1940, Charles Palmer, who, as a young boy, had carried ammunition to his brother-in-law Lieutenant Ousley during the siege, was still as sprightly as ever. At the age of 92, he was “pepping up the war effort in Canada” by forming a group of retired officers to do their bit for the war effort. He died in August 1940, the last man to hold the Lucknow medal for the defence of the Residency.

Arthur Dashwood died at the age of 87 on 26 October 1944. The very last survivor was Sir Ralph Couper, who lived to the age of 94. He died on 14 June 1949, in Melbourne, Australia, the last of the Lucknow children.

_{Sources:
http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk}
https://trove.nla.gov.au/
^{Malcolm Spiers. Lucknow – Families of the Raj. Amazon 2013.}