Maharaja Duleep Singh (1838-93) at Osborne

Photograph of Maharaja Duleep Singh, standing and looking to his left. He wears a turban and bead necklace. Singh poses on the terrace of Osborne House, photographed by Dr Ernst Becker, Prince Albert’s librarian.

Duleep Singh (1838-93) was the last Maharaja of the Sikh Empire. The youngest son of Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1780-1839), Duleep Singh was declared Maharaja of the Punjab at the age of five in 1843. His mother, Maharani Jind Kaur (1817-63), acted as regent until 1847 when she was exiled and separated from her nine-year-old son by the British Resident. Following the British annexation of the Punjab in the Second Anglo-Sikh War, Duleep Singh was forced in 1849 to renounce all claims of sovereignty in exchange for a British government pension of £40,000 per year. He converted to Christianity in 1853 and arrived in England in 1854.

Singh was received by Queen Victoria at Buckingham Palace on 1 July 1854. After their first meeting, the Queen described the young Maharaja in her journal as ‘16 & extremely handsome... [he] has a pretty, graceful & dignified manner. He was beautifully dressed & covered with diamonds’. Singh quickly became a close friend of the royal family, visiting them at Osborne that summer, where he continued to make a favourable impression on the Queen.

Singh was not permitted any contact with his mother by the British authorities until 1861, when he was finally allowed to see Jin Kaur in Kolkata and travel together to England.

Duleep Singh eventually became disaffected and embittered with the British, reverted to his former faith, Sikhism, and launched a renewed claim on the Punjab. Although he had plans to return to India, he died in France in 1893, having latterly achieved a reconciliation with Queen Victoria.

The photographer, Dr Ernst Becker, took up his appointment as librarian to Prince Albert and assistant tutor to Princes Albert Edward and Alfred in May 1851. Becker learnt photography in March 1852 from Captain Alexander de Courcy Scott, so that he could teach Prince Albert who showed interest in the new medium. Becker encouraged and facilitated the Royal Family’s interest in photography and acted on their behalf to purchase cameras, lenses, chemicals and all the necessary equipment. He was a founding member of the Photographic Society of London in 1853.