Rev Frederick FARRER [32467]

  General Notes:

Frederick writing on his experiences in India as a priest for the East India Co.

The Rev. Frederic Farrer, M.A., Rector of Bourton on-the-Hill, Moreton-in-Marsh, Diocese of Gloucester.
The Rev. Frederic Farrer graduated at Cambridge from St. John's College, B.A. in 1849 and M.A. in 1861. He was ordained Deacon in 1849, and Priest 1851, by the Bishop of Ely. On the 26th of August 1852, while serving a parish in Suffolk, he was appointed to his Bengal Chaplaincy.
To begin "ab ovo,". writes Mr. Farrer, it may not be without interest that on the day on which I presented myself at the India House; in Leadenhall Street to receive my official appointment I was specially warned by the Chairman (Sir James Hogg) not to take any part in missionary work amongst the sepoys and others. Take this in connection with what Herbert Edwardes, whom I afterwards met in the Punjab, was in the habit of declaring in his own vehement style both in conversation and on platforms, that the mutiny was in a great measure owing to our wicked reticence about our religion.
He used to say that to the Asiatic his religion is the Alpha and Omega of his existence, not a thing to be ashamed of and hidden away rather a thing to glory in and boast of. Therefore when a powerful race of conquerors who brought with them their literature, their arts, their peculiar habits of life making no secret or mystery of them, but had no word to say about their religion, the conclusion drawn both by Hindoos and Mahomedans was that this was some crafty trick of the English that they might suddenly, and by some underhand means, turn the whole population into Christians. The electric telegraph (new then), the greased cartridge, everything in the way of civilization and improvement was some crafty plot against the old religions of the country. So that the good old Chairman, a man of piety I believe, in forbidding any interference with the native religions was according to Edwardes giving a helping hand to the mutiny. . . . . . .
The Calcutta Review, Vol.121 page 251
<https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.20888/page/n251>

Frederick married Georgina Anne BENNETT [32465] [MRIN: 11592], daughter of Rev William James Early BENNETT MA [32460] and Mary Concetta FRANKLIN [32461], in Jun 1852 in Frome SOM. (Georgina Anne BENNETT [32465] was born on 7 Aug 1831 in St Mary le Bone LND and died on 4 Oct 1856 in India.)

Frederick next married Maria Elizabeth BARRON [32468] [MRIN: 11593] in 1869. (Maria Elizabeth BARRON [32468] died on 27 Apr 1929.)