1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Stewart, Sir Donald Martin

STEWART, SIR DONALD MARTIN (1824–1900), British field marshal, son of Robert Stewart of Forres, Elginshire, was born at Mount Pleasant, near Forres, on the 1st of March 1824. Educated at schools at Findhorn, Dufftown and Elgin, and at Aberdeen University, he entered the Bengal army in 1840, and served in 1854 and 1855 in the frontier expeditions against the Mohmands, and Afridis Aka and Bari Khel (medal and clasp). In the Indian Mutiny in 1857 Stewart, after a famous ride from Agra to Delhi with despatches, served on the staff at the siege and capture of Delhi and of Lucknow, and afterwards through the campaign in Rohilkhand (medal and two clasps, and brevet-major and lieutenant-colonel). For nine years he was assistant and deputy-adjutant-general of the Bengal army, commanded the Bengal brigade in the Abyssinian expedition in 1867 (medal and C.B.), and became a major-general in 1868. He reorganized the penal settlement of the Andaman Islands, where he was commandant when Lord Mayo was assassinated, and, after holding the Lahore command, was promoted lieutenant-general in 1877, and commanded the Kandahar field force in the Afghan War in 1878 (K.C.B. and thanks of parliament). In 1880 he made a difficult march from Kandahar to Kabul, fighting on the way the battles of Ahmed Khel and Urzu, and held supreme military and civil command in northern Afghanistan. On hearing of the Maiwand disaster, he despatched Sir Frederick Roberts with a division on his celebrated march from Kabul to Kandahar, and himself led the rest of the army back to India by the Khyber Pass (medal with clasp, G.C.B., C.I.E., baronetcy, and thanks of parliament). Promoted general in 1881, he was for five years commander-in-chief in India, and afterwards member of the council of the secretary of state for India until his death. He was made G.C.S.I, in 1885, promoted to be field marshal in 1894, and appointed governor of Chelsea Hospital in 1895. He died at Algiers on the 26th of March 1900.

See G. R. Elsmie, Sir Donald Stewart (1903).