William Fullerton (died 22 October 1805) was a Scottish surgeon who served the

East India Company The East India Company (EIC) was an English, and later British, joint-stock company founded in 1600 and dissolved in 1874. It was formed to trade in the Indian Ocean region, initially with the East Indies (the Indian subcontinent and Southea ...

Bengal Bengal ( ; bn, বাংলা/বঙ্গ, translit=Bānglā/Bôngô, ) is a geopolitical, cultural and historical region in South Asia, specifically in the eastern part of the Indian subcontinent at the apex of the Bay of Bengal, predom ...

and

Bihar Bihar (; ) is a state in eastern India. It is the 2nd largest state by population in 2019, 12th largest by area of , and 14th largest by GDP in 2021. Bihar borders Uttar Pradesh to its west, Nepal to the north, the northern part of West Be ...

from 1744 to 1766. He is best known for his close ties with local people, their languages and for surviving the 1763 attack by the order of

Nawab Nawab (Balochi language, Balochi: نواب; ar, نواب; bn, নবাব/নওয়াব; hi, नवाब; Punjabi language, Punjabi : ਨਵਾਬ; Persian language, Persian, Punjabi language, Punjabi , Sindhi language, Sindhi, Urd ...

Mir Qasim Mir Qasim ( bn, মীর কাশিম; died 8 May 1777) was the Nawab of Bengal from 1760 to 1763. He was installed as Nawab with the support of the British East India Company, replacing Mir Jafar, his father-in-law, who had himself been su ...

of Bengal, against the British.

Early life

William Fullerton was born in

Symington, South Ayrshire Symington is a conservation village in South Ayrshire, Scotland. It is located in Symington parish, covering , and lies close to the A77 road from Ayr to Glasgow. Its church, built in 1160, remains one of the finest examples of a Norman church i ...

. His year of birth is unknown.

Career

Fullerton entered the service of the East India Company and went to Bengal in approximately 1744. He was appointed Second Surgeon at Fort William on 3 July 1751 and remained in the post for ten years. He was present at the

siege of Calcutta The siege of Calcutta was a battle between the Nawab of Bengal and the Kingdom of Great Britain, British East India Company on 20 June 1756. The Nawab of Bengal, Siraj ud-Daulah, aimed to seize Calcutta to punish the company for the unauthoris ...

and had escaped down the river, avoiding incarceration in the

Black Hole of Calcutta The Black Hole of Calcutta was a dungeon in Fort William, Calcutta, measuring , in which troops of Siraj-ud-Daulah, the Nawab of Bengal, held British prisoners of war on the night of 20 June 1756. John Zephaniah Holwell, one of the British p ...

.Rosemary Crill, Kapil Jariwala, ''The Indian Portrait, 1560–1860'', Mapin Publishing Pvt Ltd, 2010, p.146 On 8 December 1757 he was elected Mayor of Calcutta for a year. He was reported to have made good money whilst in Bengal, including an award of £30,000 as compensation for suffering caused in the siege of Calcutta. In 1760 he transferred to

. Fullerton was a member of a small Company force which was assisting the

Nawab of Bengal The Nawab of Bengal ( bn, বাংলার নবাব) was the hereditary ruler of Bengal Subah in Mughal India. In the early 18th-century, the Nawab of Bengal was the ''de facto'' independent ruler of the three regions of Bengal, Bihar, ...

in a conflict with

Shah Alam Shah Alam () is a city and the state capital of Selangor, Malaysia and situated within the Petaling District and a small portion of the neighbouring Klang District. Shah Alam replaced Kuala Lumpur as the capital city of the state of Selangor in ...

. He was present at the Battle of Mohsinpur and was the only surviving European officer. On the death of his fellow officers he assumed command and led a retreat to Patna where he played a significant role in the town's defence. After the conflict, he returned to Bengal and resigned his post. He intended to return to Britain but instead returned to his post as surgeon at Patna in 1763. Fullerton was part of the Company's force that was captured by Mir Qasim near Manji in 1763. He was held captive at Patna, and present at the

Patna massacre of 1763 The Patna massacre of 1763 was the killing of 45 members of the East India Company, mainly English, on 6 October 1763, in Patna, India, on the order of Nawab Mir Qasim. These men had been imprisoned by Mir Qasim since William Ellis' failed attempt t ...

. Through intercession from Sayyid Ghulam Husain Tabatabai who regarded him as an intimate friend, Mir Kasam spared his life. He was the only European to escape unharmed from the massacre. Following his release he was placed under house arrest in Patna, until under the guise of visiting the Dutch factory, he hired a boat to take him across the

Ganges The Ganges ( ) (in India: Ganga ( ); in Bangladesh: Padma ( )). "The Ganges Basin, known in India as the Ganga and in Bangladesh as the Padma, is an international river to which India, Bangladesh, Nepal and China are the riparian states." is ...

river to Hajipur where some Company troops were present. After tensions with Mir Kasam subsided, Fullerton remained in Patna for a further two years. He was later accused of misrepresenting a letter written by Nand Kumar to Raja Balwant Singh of

Benares Varanasi (; ; also Banaras or Benares (; ), and Kashi.) is a city on the Ganges river in northern India that has a central place in the traditions of pilgrimage, death, and mourning in the Hindu world. * * * * The city has a syncretic tr ...

suggesting a plot to overthrow Company rule in Bihar and requesting help. An inquiry was held by the Company council in Calcutta and he was censored for misconduct. In protest Fullerton tendered his resignation on 21 March 1765 and sailed for England on the Ponsborne.

Death

Fullerton died in Scotland on 22 October 1805.

Early life

Career

Death

References

Further reading