William Baillie

Who was William Baillie?

William Baillie was a lieutenant-colonel in the East India Company's service. He was captured by Hyder Ali in 1780 at the Battle of Pollilur, and died in captivity in Seringapatam.

Records in the India Office show that he entered the army of the East India Company on 18 October 1759 as a lieutenant in the infantry at Madras, and that the dates of his subsequent commissions were as follows: brevet-captain 5 September 1763, substantive captain 2 April 1764, major 12 April 1772, lieutenant-colonel 29 December 1775.

The historian Wilks identifies him with the Captain Baillie who did good service as commandant of one of the three 'English' battalions in the pay of the company, employed under Colonel Joseph Smith, in the operations against Hyder Ali in 1767-8. He was in command at Pondicherry during the destruction of the French works there in 1779, and in 1780 was at the head of a detached force, consisting of two companies of European infantry, two batteries of artillery, and five battalions of native infantry, in the Northern Circars. When Hyder Ali, with an army of 100,000 fighting men, swooped down on the Carnatic by way of the Changama Pass in July of that year, Baillie was ordered to unite his force with the army collecting near Madras under command of Lord Macleod, who was immediately afterwards succeeded by Sir Hector Munro. Moving down with the gigantic camp-following then customary, and, as some writers assert, with many needless delays, Baillie drew near to Madras, defeating a division of the enemy under Hyder's son Tipu Sultan, which attacked him on the march near the village of Perambaukum.