Alexander Gardner (soldier)

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For the photographer of the same name, see Alexander Gardner (photographer).

Alexander Haughton Campbell Gardner (Gordana Khan) (1785 - 1877) was a soldier and mercenary. He travelled to Afghanistan and Punjab and served in various military positions in the region.

By his own accounts he was born in Wisconsin to a Scottish father and an Anglo-Spanish mother, but it has been alleged that he in reality was Irish, from Congloose. He was trained as an artillery gunner, most likely by the British army, and served most of his life as a mercenary in Central Asia.

Originally, he had tried to secure a position in the Russian Arrny. Failing this, he drifted east and south, into Central Asia. Eventually, he reached Afghanistan and joined the rebel Habibullah Khan fighting against Dost Mahommed Khan. Gardner's wife, a local, and his baby were murdered by Dost Mahommed's forces. Gardner left Afghanistan for Punjab in August 1831, where he was appointed Commandant of Artillery. He served in this position for many years before he was transferred to the service of Maharaja Ranjit Singh, he later promoted to the rank of Colonel by Maharaja Ranjit Singh.

Gardner remained in the service of the Maharajas as they came and went, and witnessed the fall of the Punjab as a sovereign kingdom. This he vividly described in his book The Fall of Sikh Empire (ISBN 81-7116-231-2). In his old age he retired to Jammu then to Srinagar, where he died, well into his 90s.

Gardner's adventures (at least as he recalls them) are recounted in Memoirs of Alexander Gardner Soldier and Traveler Edited by Major Hugh Pearse. see [1] for a summary.

Gardner appears as a major supporting character in the novel Flashman and the Mountain of Light.