Lieutenant J B Conolly, Political Branch, Bala Hissar, 1842 (colour litho)

Lieutenant J B Conolly, Political Branch, Bala Hissar. Coloured lithograph after Lieutenant Vincent Eyre, Bengal Artillery, 1842 (c). John Balfour Conolly (1815-1842) arrived in India as an ensign in September 1834 and was posted to the 13th Bengal Native Infantry. The following year he transferred to the 42nd Bengal Native Infantry and in 1836 to the 20th Bengal Native Infantry. In September 1838 Conolly was appointed adjutant with Shah Shuja’s 4th Infantry and took part in the 1st Afghan War (1839-1842). Appointed a Military Assistant with the Political Branch in 1840, he also commanded Sir William Hay MacNaghten’s escort. He died of fever at the Bala Hissar fortress on 7 August 1842 while being held hostage in Kabul. From ‘Portraits of the Kabul Prisoners’, a set of pre-publication coloured lithographs later published by John Murray in 1843. The artist’s original drawings were made during his captivity in Afghanistan after the Retreat from Kabul during the 1st Afghan War (1838-1842).