The maharajah's box: an exotic tale of espinage, exotic intrigue, and illicit love in the days of the raj

Campbell retraces the extraordinary life of Maharajah Duleep Singh, last emperor of the Sikhs and King of the Punjab before it was annexed by the British in 1849. Intrigued by the discovery of an unclaimed Swiss bank account in the name of Singh's daughter Catherine in 1997, the author set out to discover what untold wealth the safe-deposit box might hold. During the course of his quest, he uncovered an even greater treasure: an intriguing tale of romance, conspiracy, and espionage. Hoping to regain his throne, Singh attempted to orchestrate an elaborate rebellion against England involving an intricate web of agents and stretching over several continents. Chock-full of spies, conspiracies, and forbidden passions, this virtuoso feat of historical detection reads like fiction. Margaret Flanagan.

On the list of unclaimed bank accounts the Swiss Bankers Association published in 1997, one leapt out at British journalist Campbell. It belonged to an Indian princess, the deceased daughter of Maharajah Duleep Singh, the last king of the Punjab, spiritual home of the Sikhs. When the British Empire annexed the territory in 1849, Singh, a small child then, was forced to turn over his wealth (including the famed Koh-i-Noor diamond) and his kingdom. Brought to England, he converted to Christianity, charmed Queen Victoria (she later became godmother to Singh's son) and led the life of an English country gentleman. In middle age, however, spurred by a prophecy, he sought to reclaim his throne. He abandoned his family and set off on an ill-fated mission to overthrow the British government in India, cultivating along the way an international conspiracy whose players ran the gamut from Irish revolutionaries to Russian ultranationalists. While the depth of research devoted to Singh's troubled life is commendable, Campbell includes so much archival material that he further confuses what is already a complex and murky tale, and sometimes buries the maharajah beneath the load of information. Occasional authorial intrusions and Campbell's failure to distinguish among the numerous foreign personalities further blur the narrative. While Singh's rebellious legend persists today in certain quarters, in the end, Campbell fails to make the reader truly care about this sad and rather obscure historical figure. 37 b&w photos. (July) Forecast: The elegant sepia-toned cover and the racy subtitle will draw in the casual browser, though both are slightly misleading: the cover features Singh's daughter, Princess Catherine, who hardly appears in the tale, and the latter owes more to marketing strategy than it does to accurate description. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

From British journalist Campbell, an intricate, fascinating look at some long-forgotten episodes in the quest by European powers to control India. In August 1997, the Swiss Bankers Association issued a list naming some 1,800 holders of dormant accounts. Paging through the list on a computer in his newspaper's office, Campbell's eye was caught by one of those names: "Duleep Singh, Catherine (Princess), last heard of in 1942 living in Penn, Bucks." On the hunt for a story, the journalist had the bright idea of creating news by reuniting the Singh family with its inheritance-inasmuch as the original Duleep Singh had given the fabulous Koh-i-Noor diamond to Queen Victoria, it stood to reason that the Swiss safe-deposit box contained jewels, or gold, or at the very least the deed to some rich property. Campbell's quest took him down dozens of blind alleys, each knee-deep in red herrings, always leading back to the mysterious Maharajah Duleep Singh, "last king of the Sikhs," who lived out his days in the second half of the 19th century as an exile in the Suffolk countryside, having lost his beloved Punjab through a combination of his own perfidy and England's imperial machinations. The story is populated by characters that could only have come from the Victorian era's large cast of eccentrics: the Maharajah himself, at once betrayed and traitorous; the mysterious General Carroll-Teviss, "a Philadelphia-born soldier of fortune who served a succession of popes, beys, and kings"; Levantine-Russian secret agents; and August Theodor Schoefft, "a cheroot-smoking Hungarian," among them. Campbell's investigation takes in imperial intrigues, intra-clan rivalries, intrafamilial homicides, mystical prophecies, and the long-thwarted dreams of Sikh independence as it delivers a satisfying if sometimes confusing story complicated enough to have come from the pen of le Carre. And what did the box contain? You'll need to read this absorbing detective story to find out.

Campbell retraces the extraordinary life of Maharajah Duleep Singh, last emperor of the Sikhs and King of the Punjab before it was annexed by the British in 1849. Intrigued by the discovery of an unclaimed Swiss bank account in the name of Singh's daughter Catherine in 1997, the author set out to discover what untold wealth the safe-deposit box might hold. During the course of his quest, he uncovered an even greater treasure: an intriguing tale of romance, conspiracy, and espionage. Hoping to regain his throne, Singh attempted to orchestrate an elaborate rebellion against England involving an intricate web of agents and stretching over several continents. Chock-full of spies, conspiracies, and forbidden passions, this virtuoso feat of historical detection reads like fiction. ((Reviewed June 1 & 15, 2002)) Copyright 2002 Booklist Reviews

On the list of unclaimed bank accounts the Swiss Bankers Association published in 1997, one leapt out at British journalist Campbell. It belonged to an Indian princess, the deceased daughter of Maharajah Duleep Singh, the last king of the Punjab, spiritual home of the Sikhs. When the British Empire annexed the territory in 1849, Singh, a small child then, was forced to turn over his wealth (including the famed Koh-i-Noor diamond) and his kingdom. Brought to England, he converted to Christianity, charmed Queen Victoria (she later became godmother to Singh's son) and led the life of an English country gentleman. In middle age, however, spurred by a prophecy, he sought to reclaim his throne. He abandoned his family and set off on an ill-fated mission to overthrow the British government in India, cultivating along the way an international conspiracy whose players ran the gamut from Irish revolutionaries to Russian ultranationalists. While the depth of research devoted to Singh's troubled life is commendable, Campbell includes so much archival material that he further confuses what is already a complex and murky tale, and sometimes buries the maharajah beneath the load of information. Occasional authorial intrusions and Campbell's failure to distinguish among the numerous foreign personalities further blur the narrative. While Singh's rebellious legend persists today in certain quarters, in the end, Campbell fails to make the reader truly care about this sad and rather obscure historical figure. 37 b&w photos. (July) Forecast: The elegant sepia-toned cover and the racy subtitle will draw in the casual browser, though both are slightly misleading: the cover features Singh's daughter, Princess Catherine, who hardly appears in the tale, and the latter owes more to marketing strategy than it does to accurate description. Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.