Can anyone help Mr Beaty ?
All good wishes, John R
----- Original Message -----
From: Jeremy Beaty <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Friday, February 23, 2001 1:40 AM
Subject: The Civil and Military Gazette of Lahore
> Francis Henry John BEATY was a reporter on the Civil and Military Gazette
> newspaper in Lahore before and perhaps during Rudyard Kipling's employment
> there between 1882 and 1887. The BEATY family has no records of my great
> grandfather's writings for the Gazette. I would like to search the
archives
> of the Gazette that closed its doors in1963. Would you know, by any
chance,
> where the archival records of Gazette newspapers are stored and if I can
get
> access to them when I am in London in May this year?
>
> It is said (see the excerpt below) that Rudyard took Francis Montague
> Algeron BEATY, Francis Henry's son, as a model for Kim. Other than this
> excerpt I have no evidence of this;
>
> "Quetta was a place that seemed to breed characters larger than life. The
> most famous of them all was Beaty Sahib (Frank Beaty), a crafty giant with
a
> mahogany coloured face and a broad grin which disclosed a single
discoloured
> front tooth. Kipling took him as the model for Kim, and his exploits as
head
> of the Baluchistan Police Force had made him famous all over the frontier.
> His police post had carried no pension but a grateful municipality had
named
> a road in Quetta after him and the Quetta Club found him a job as sports
> secretary when he retired. Now in 1935, the stories of the wicked past,
told
> with gusto and good humour, made him welcome in the cantonment messes
where
> young officers gulped in every word and in return forced drinks on a not
> unwilling story teller."
> Ref. page 18, Thirty Seconds at Quetta (The Story of an Earthquake) by
> Robert Jackson, published in 1960 by Evans Brothers Ltd., London.
>
> Would you have any supporting evidence that Francis Beaty was in fact was
a
> model for the character Kim. Francis M. A. BEATY was born on April 21,
1865
> only nine months before Rudyard's birth. In our family legend it is said
> that not only was Francis a good friend of Rudyard, but that his father
and
> John Lockwood Kipling were friends as well.
>
> I am researching the BEATY ancestry and would any help you can give me.
>
> Thank you so much.
>
> Jeremy & Joy Beaty, Mississauga, Ontario. [log in to unmask]
> http://www.familytreemaker.com/users/b/e/a/Jeremy-G-Beaty
>
|