Major-General Charles Stuart

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Major-General Charles Stuart was born in Ireland in about 1758, the son of Thomas Smyth (eldest son of Charles Smyth (1694-1783), MP for Limerick, and Elizabeth, daughter of Sir Thomas Prendergast, 1st Bt.). In his teens he went to India, where he remained for the rest of his life, embracing the Hindu culture and earning himself the name "Hindoo Stuart".

Major V. C. P. Hodson's biography of Bengal Army officers mentions that Stuart "had studied the language, manners and customs of the natives of this country with so much enthusiasm, his intimacy with them ... obtained for him the name of Hindoo Stuart".

He is frequently mentioned in William Dalrymple's book White Mughals (2002). Stuart adopted several Hindu customs, including bathing in the Ganges at Calcutta every morning, amassing a collection of deities as well as Indian clothes. He even encouraged European ladies in India to adopt the sari and Indian sepoys to wear full moustaches on parade.

In his book Vindication of the Hindoos (1808), he criticised the work of European missionaries in India, claiming that "Hinduism little needs the meliorating hand of Christianity to render its votaries a sufficiently correct and moral people for all the useful purposes of a civilized society".

Stuart died on 31 March 1828 and is buried at the South Park Street cemetery in Calcutta, a Christian cemetery, although the grave takes the form of a Hindu temple and Stuart is buried with a number of idols.

His collection of sculptures forms the basis of the British Museum's Oriental Collection.

Major-General Charles Stuart was the uncle of the diplomat Major Robert Stuart.