Earl of Elgin Shirt in National Archives

This is unconventional. Instead of paper or parchment as you would expect, an item of clothing has been selected from the National Archives’ ‘Objects’ series (reference RH19/81). As you will see in the picture below, even shirts can carry potentially vital information.

In 1860, the Earl of Elgin was sent by the British Government with 15,000 men and 200 ships to enforce the treaty of Tientsin (1858) between Britain and China. This treaty had been agreed as an end to the so-called Opium Wars between the two countries.

However, the Chinese Emperor refused to ratify the treaty and Elgin’s mission was designed to confirm this ratification by force. The advance party, including Elgin’s attaché Henry B. Loch, was captured and held hostage by the Chinese.

They suffered considerably in prison. Handcuffed and beaten with their faces rubbed into the ground, they were kept shackled, under constant threat of execution (some of the party, including a London Times journalist, Bowlby, did not survive). However, during his captivity, Loch was allowed to receive various packages from the British forces encamped near Peking.

Among the items he received was a shirt upon which Hindustani lettering had been stitched. This Indian message gave details of a proposed British attack on the area where Loch was held.

Clearly, Loch, who could read Hindustani (one assumes that his Chinese

captors could not), was to use the information contained in the patterns on the shirt to plan his escape. In fact, a negotiated release was achieved before any escape plan was required.

Almost 50 years later, Loch’s widow received a letter from the man who had sat up one night ‘missing his dinner’ stitching the symbols on the shirt. The Hindustani lettering is still visible on the shirtfront near a side seam.

Both the shirt and the letter are now held in the National Archives of Scotland. This material represents the personal papers of James Loch (1780 – 1855) and Henry Brougham Loch (1827-1900) who were father and son.

Their involvement with the expanding British Empire on several continents produced a wide-ranging collection of manuscript material that gives an insight into the operation of British Foreign policy in the 19th century.

After his dramatic imprisonment in China, Henry went on to become Governor of the Australian colony of Victoria and then the Cape. Lady Loch kindly gifted the collection to the National Archives of Scotland in 1995.

THE VITAL MESSAGE

See photo below