Oddlet: Lakshmibai of Jhansi · 1 min read
Aug 22, 2026
The Best of Them
Her court priest kept a diary of what the widow queen of Jhansi did before breakfast, and the list begins with weightlifting.
Manikarnika Tambe, called Manu, was raised at the court of an exiled Peshwa in Bithur, where the boys studied riding, fencing, archery, musket-loading, and swordsmanship, and so did she. At thirteen she married the Maharaja of Jhansi and became Rani Lakshmibai. At twenty-five she was a widow. Months later the British annexed her kingdom by paperwork.
The English lawyer John Lang came to see her in 1854 and reported back, with the gallant condescension of his trade, that she had a remarkably fine figure and beautiful eyes, though her voice was something between a whine and a croak. He did not stay for the mornings. Her court priest Vishnubhat Godse did, and recorded what the widow queen of Jhansi got up to before breakfast: weightlifting, wrestling, and steeplechasing. Every day.
Four years later, with her ten-year-old adopted son tied to her back, she rode out of a besieged fort at night, covered a hundred miles in a day, regrouped, and took Gwalior. She died in the saddle outside it, aged twenty-nine, in trousers and a turban.
Sir Hugh Rose, the general who finally caught her, filed his official dispatch. She was, he wrote, the bravest and best military leader of the rebels.
He meant of all of them.
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- Wikipedia — Rani of Jhansi — Comprehensive biography: birth name, upbringing at Bithur, marriage 1842, adoption of Damodar Rao 1853, Doctrine of Lapse 1854, siege of Jhansi 1858, escape, Battle of Gwalior, Hugh Rose's assessment, Chauhan poem, INA regiment.
- Wikipedia — Siege of Jhansi — Siege dates 24 March–5 April 1858, Hugh Rose's command, Battle of the Betwa, casualty figures, Rani's escape, Jokhan Bagh massacre context.
- Allen Copsey — Lakshmibai: Mutiny — Detailed Jokhan Bagh account; ~61 British residents killed after surrendering; Rani's letters denying responsibility; Thornton's accusation vs Erskine's corroboration of her account; contested British views of culpability.
- Britannica — Lakshmi Bai — Concise authoritative biography; confirms doctrine of Lapse refusal, joining of the rebellion, death in Gwalior battle June 1858.
- Allen Copsey — Lakshmibai (index) — Most comprehensive single source online; includes original John Lang 1854 description, military details, contemporary British dispatches.
- Wikiquote — Rani of Jhansi
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