Captain Robert Melville Grindlay FRSA MRAS FZS FRHS FRBS (23 October 1786 – 9 December 1877) was a British soldier, artist, and banker during the 18th and 19th centuries. Born in London, England, he served as an East India Company agent in the Bombay Army, during which time he made a large collection of sketches and drawings of the Indian subcontinent. Upon returning to England he founded the multinational commercial firm Grindlays Bank and various philanthropic initiatives.Geoffrey Jones, British Multinational Banking 1830–1990, (1993)
Early years and family Grindlay was born on 23 October 1786, one of eight children, to The Reverend Dr John Grindlay DCL LLD (1756–1818) and his wife Elizabeth (d.1843) in the village of St. Mary-le-Bone (now Marylebone) near London, and baptised on 17 November of that same year at St Marylebone Parish Church.
His grandparents James (died 1765) and Christina Grindlay (née Govan), attorneys at law, had emigrated to Charleston, South Carolina from Glasgow, Scotland during the early 18th century, after previous generations had resettled in Lanarkshire from the North Midlands. However, his father returned to the United Kingdom and attended Emmanuel College, Cambridge, before taking up various ecclesiastical positions at Oxford Chapel, Marylebone, Bishop's Caundle Church, Dorest, and the Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Horne, Surrey, as well various charitable enterprises, including The Philanthropic Society.
Grindlay was educated in London and left school at the age of 17, having secured a position as a cadet in the Honourable East India Company (HEIC).
Military service Grindlay served in the 7th Bombay Infantry of the Bombay Army, the military arm of the East India Company, from 1804 to 1820. He was made a cadet in 1802 aged 17, following a nomination by E Parry Esq. secured for him by his father, and sailed to India the following year on the maiden voyage of the East Indiaman, the Prince of Wales, in 1803. He became a Lieutenant in 1804, and reached the rank of Captain in 1817, before retiring from the military in 1820 at the age of 34.
During his time in the military, Grindlay held several staff positions in the Bombay Presidency of British India as well as acting Captain of 2nd Battalion of the 7th Bombay Native Infantry, including Secretary of the Committee of Embarkation of Bombay and Aide-de-camp of Sir Evan Nepean, 1st Baronet, the Governor of Bombay.
Grindlay undertook numerous military expeditions while in India, including a diplomatic mission to the court of the Talpur Amirs of Sindh in 1808, which formed part of the prelude to the Amir signature of a treaty of "friendship" with the British in 1809. Having taken an interest in the history and geography of north-western India, he kept a diary of his travels, including the journey from Lukhpat in Cutch, India to Hyderabad in Sindh, Pakistan along the Kori and Narra rivers by way of Sindhri, to meet with Mir Ghulam Ali Talpur, the ruling Amir. Several extracts of his journal were used to form part of the best selling memoir of Captain Sir Alexander Burnes, Travels into Bokhara, first published in 1835.
In 1813, Grindlay was given leave to accompany Mary Elizabeth Frederica Mackenzie, then Lady Hood, on a sketching expedition across Peninsula India. They stopped for two months in Poona, where he drew a number of portraits for Mountstuart Elphinstone, British Envoy to the Court of Kabul, for his report on the expedition to Shah Shuja Durrani, Emir of the Durrani Empire, An Account of the Kingdom of Caubul, and its Dependencies in Persia, Tartary, and India, published in 1815. Grindlay later presented the original aquatints to William Elphinstone, 15th Lord Elphinstone for his biography of Mountstuart following his death in 1859.
Marriage
Grindlay returned to England from India in 1820 and married Maria Susannah Commerell on 20 July 1821 at St Marylebone Parish Church. Maria was the daughter of John William Commerell, of Strood Green near Horsham, a Sheriff of Sussex, whose family originated from Heilbronn in Swabia, Germany, where they were privy councillors and confidents of the Dukes of Württemberg; and his wife, Mary (nee Bosanquet) of Dingestow Court.
The couple established themselves at their principle London home at North Bank, Regent's Park, in the parish of St. Marylebone, and had a son, Robert Melville Grindlay, born on 12 September 1821 and baptised on 24 September 1821 at St Marylebone Parish Church, but who died in infancy later that same year.
Grindlay was uncle-in-law to Sir John Edmund Commerell, Admiral of the Fleet and William Augustus Commerell, a first-class cricketer.
Banking and commerce
Grindlays Bank
After returning to England, Grindlay maintained his influential Anglo-Indian connections and his correspondence with friends and former colleagues. Drawing on his extensive knowledge and experience of the region he undertook a growing number of personal commissions of assistance, to the point where in 1828 he founded Leslie & Grindlay, to provide similar services to the wider public on a permanent business basis. Initially the company arranged passage to and from India for customers and their baggage, but in time added private banking activities to their services, eventually becoming the principle bankers to the Presidency Armies of the East India Company, the British Indian Army, and the business community in India.
The company was first based in Birchin Lane, off Lombard Street in London and began by acting as agents to help secure the travel arrangements of its clientele, to and from India, procuring sea passages, clearing and shipping baggage, as well as providing advisory services including extensive kit lists, route maps and costings for East India Company employees and British officials. Expansion saw the business open other offices in the City of London (Cornhill and Bishopsgate) and Westminster (Whitehall and St James's Square).
Under the guidance and direction of Grindlay, these services shifted over time towards financial operations, including banking, insurance, savings and encashment of cheques and drafts, and operational expansion to include the Indian subcontinent, the Middle East and elements of Africa and Southeast Asia. During this same period various partner additions, mergers, and acquisitions resulted in the firm undergoing several name changes, being styled Grindlay, Christian & Matthews from 1839, Grindlay & Co from 1843, Grindlay & Co Ltd from 1924 and Grindlays Bank Ltd in 1947, until its merger with the National Bank of India in 1958 when it became National and Grindlays Bank.
By 1842, when Grindlay retired, the firm had become "the most distinguished bankers and agents to the civil and military officials of the business community and the British army in India".
Timeline Key events during the tenure of Captain Grindlay:
1828 – Grindlay established Leslie & Grindlay in Birchin Lane, London (which included a reading room, where travellers could meet and discuss the latest developments in India) 1830 – Leslie left the firm 1830 – Firm headquarters moved to 16 Cornhill Street, London (next to The Royal Exchange) 1835 – Additional offices and West End reading room opened at 8 St. Martins Place, London (adjacent to St Martin-in-the-Fields and Trafalgar Square) 1839 – Restyled as Grindlay, Christian & Matthews after Grindlay took on additional partners 1842 – Grindlay retires from the firm aged 56
East India Company Grindlay was a major "proprietor of East India stock" with a significant stake and considerable influence in the East India Company during the 19th century. He was a central actor in the debating and eventual approval of the Saint Helena Act 1833, being named alongside 27 other stockholders, Members of Parliament, and company directors and chairman, including William Wigram, William Astell, Richard Twining, Sir Charles Mills, Sir Francis Molyneux Ommanney, George Lyall, Sir James Rivett-Carnac and Sir Richard Jenkins, in formal East India House communications.
The Act provided a 20-year extension of the royal charter granted to the East India Company, allowing it to maintain its political and administrative duties in India, but with a number of additional provisions which continued the successive reduction in the company's commercial rights and trading monopolies, seen in the charters of 1793, 1813, 1833 and 1853.
Freemasonry On 20 May 1836, Grindlay was initiated into the Freemasons and registered as a member of the United Grand Lodge of England, continuing the association of the Grindlay family with the fraternal organisation and their collective charitable contributions and public works.
Artist and author
Artist and draftsman
Grindlay kept a detailed personal journal of his time in India, and made numerous sketches and paintings of his travels across the Indian subcontinent. Widely regarded as a "gifted amateur artist", he sketched hundreds of landscapes in Gujarat, the Deccan, and along the coast, with 24 of his works featuring in over 75 publications, and now held across 439 separate library holdings (as of 2021). These include the works of Captain Sir Alexander Burnes, Mountstuart Elphinstone, and Lieutenant-General Sir Henry Pottinger, 1st Baronet and his Travels in Beloochistan and Sinde, first published in 1816, along with many others.
The most famous and comprehensive of these collected works is the best selling Scenery, Costumes and Architecture chiefly on the Western Side of India. This series was first published in 6 parts comprising 6 plates each, 36 in total, hand-coloured aquatints with accompanying explanatory descriptions and annotations in 1830 by Smith, Elder & Co, having been started by Rudolph Ackermann in 1826. On completion of the serial issues, the book was also released as a whole by Smith, Elder & Co and issued in one or two volumes, folio copies of which have sold for upwards of £25,000.00. The majority of his published works are engravings of original sketches then overpainted with oils. Reviews of Scenery, Costumes and Architecture chiefly on the Western Side of India in The Byron Gallery (1833):"If there has been any foundation for the complaint, that the splendid scenery and gorgeous architecture of India have never yet been adequately [portrayed] by the pencil, it will vanish when this work shall be known, which certainly equals, if it does not transcend, any antecedent production of the graphic art. This work bids fair, not merely to establish the fame of Captain Grindlay, but to do honour to the British arts" – Asiatic Journal
"Captain Grindlay gives by this specimen of his labours, ample proof of genius, talent, and industry, exercised to high advantage during his service in the 'farther East;' the work will be appreciated as it deserves and admired for the fidelity as well as the spirit with which the scenes are brought before the eye. It embraces scenes and subjects from the Mahratta country to the banks of the Indus, and is as varied as it is undoubtedly beautiful. This splendid publication will be highly acceptable to all persons interested in Indian subjects and fully deserves the patronage already bestowed upon it" – Oriental Herald
"The fidelity of the representations is very striking; and all the plates are most acceptable, as illustrating an extremely interesting and important country, hitherto little known either literary or graphic means. The variety of views and the handsome style in which executed, will, together with the descriptions, recommend this only to persons connected with India, but the British public generally and collectors in the arts Literary Gazette" – Literary Gazette