How Lady Curzon saved the rhino - Rediff.com
https://www.rediff.com/news/2005/feb/22spec1.htm
Feb 21, 2005 - Most Indians may remember Lord George Curzon as the man who sowed ... Nicholas Moseley (Lord Ravensdale) and his wife Lady Verity. ... the Viceroy of British India, to take urgent steps to save the rhino, .... Write us a letter.
Description
Mary Victoria Curzon, Baroness Curzon of Kedleston, CI was a British peeress of American background who was Vicereine of India, as the wife of Lord Curzon of Kedleston, Viceroy of India. As Vicereine of India, she held the highest official title in the Indian Empire that a woman could hold. Wikipedia
Born: 27 May 1870, Chicago, Illinois, United States
Died: 18 July 1906, Carlton House Terrace, St James's, United Kingdom
Spouse: George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston (m. 1895–1906)
Mary Curzon, Baroness Curzon of Kedleston - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Curzon,_Baroness_Curzon_of_Kedleston
Mary
Victoria Curzon, Baroness Curzon of Kedleston, CI was a British peeress
of American ... In 1901 Charles Turner first raised the "Lady Curzon" rose in her honor, which was a hybrid (R. macrantha x R. rugosa Rubra). It has a soft iridescent ...
Other names: Vicereine of India
Resting place: Chapel by George Frederick Bo...
Years active: 1888–1906
Nationality: American-British
Junagadh State and its Lions: Conservation in Princely India, 1879 ...
Jun 26, 2009 - Conservation in Princely India, during the British period, was brought on by ... since this period saw the lion being saved from almost certain annihilation. .... was declared a Reserved Forest to protect the greater one horned rhinoceros in 1908. .... In the event, Curzon did not go to the Gir, he returned from ...
The Great Numbers Game and Lord Curzon
The declining number of lions was a cause for grave concern for Junagadh State stimulating early attempts to estimate just how many lions were left in the wild. The first such attempt was made by Major-General William Rice who had hunted lions there around the 1850s. According to him, there were less than 300 lions left in the Gir (Rice 1884:144). Thirty years later, the Kathiawar Gazetteer of 1884 stated that 'there were probably no more than ten or a dozen lions left in the whole Gir forest' (Edwards and Fraser 1907: 172). This statement was obviously a gross exaggeration, for the same year saw Col. J.W. Watson's authoritative statistical account of Junagadh State which records lions 'as most famous of wild animals' of the region and describes them in some detail. The report does not state that they were about to be wiped out or they numbered barely a dozen (Watson 1884: 6-7). Junagadh soon took up the enumeration process itself and came up with a figure of 31 in 1893 (Rashid and David 1992:94). It is strange that Fenton who had experienced the Chappanyo Kal of 1899-1900 in Saurashtra does not mention any alarmist figures for lion population. He states simply that these animals were only to be found in the Gir by that time. There is no doubt that both the figures of 12 and 31 were quite inaccurate. In fact Edwards and Fraser, the authors of the 'authorised' account of Junagadh State, call the number of 12 lions very misleading. They go on to quote Major H.G. Carnegie Political Agent of Halar in 1905, who had estimated a population to be between 60 and 70 whereas the Junagadh administration believed that there were 'at least 100 lions' left at that time (Edwards and Fraser 1907: 172-73). It is pertinent to note that this was among the lowest estimated populations of a large vertebrate in the Empire. All these figures were little more than guesses, but the fact that they were made at all, is evidence of the concern over the increasing rarity of the species.
There was logic to the game of numbers. Though Junagadh routinely underplayed the size of lion population to keep British officers and ambitious princes from making their shikar a habit, there is no doubt that their numbers had declined a great deal. While it spurred Junagadh to give it protection it also stopped even a Viceroy from hunting them. In 1900 Lord Curzon was to visit the State. A viceregal visit to a native state was a great honour for the latter and no expense was spared to make it a success. In Junagadh, a lion shoot was de rigueur for the Viceroy just as say a tiger shoot in Gwalior or a good tusker in Mysore or a duck shoot in Bharatput was. Curzon had heard there were very few lions left. His source of information remains unclear to this day: it was certainly not his host, Junagadh State. There was, however, a newspaper report from Bombay which said that the lions' condition was precarious and that they should be allowed to remain free in their last retreat undisturbed by 'Viceroy or Vandal' (Mosse 1957). In the event, Curzon did not go to the Gir, he returned from Junagadh and urged the Nawab to give these animals strict protection. Rasulkhanji's disappointment at being unable to 'offer' a lion was evident in his letter to the viceroy. On 27 November, 1900 he wrote:
'I cannot but observe here that I fully appreciated and admired your noble consideration in abandoning the lion shooting. Your Excellency's giving up the idea has greatly disappointed me.
The cry raised on this side of India that the lions were almost extinct in the Gir forest and the shooting would help in the final extermination of the animal was far from correct …
I propose however to approach your Excellency later on with the request to favour me with a shooting excursion in the Gir before your Excellency's departure from India' (GA, file No. 49, 1901).
The implications of this letter are clear. The Nawab and his administration would provide protection, but the lion would be available for raisons d'etat. It is also a clear indication that though they were few, lions were not about to become extinct.
By the the 1930s, some 350 US heiresses had married into the British ... The future Baroness Curzon fell in love with George instantly: on the day they met, she ...
Jan 15, 2005 - The Indian rehabilitation of the long-reviled Curzon family name has begun. ... Curzon (the American heiress Mary Leiter before her marriage) who ... At her home in London yesterday, Mrs Dutta said: "Curzon loved Calcutta.
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