Thomas Legge : Short Biography

Thomas Legge was born in Dobaghadee, County Down around 1762. His father was  sucessful businessman who worked in shipping, yet Thomas had no desire to enter in the family business. At the age of about 16 in 1778, Thomas ran away on board a British warship bound for India. However his time at sea taught him that a life in the navy was not for him. As soon as the ship docked in India, Thomas absconded. He spent the next few years travelling Northern India by foot, supporting himself by begging along the way. He eventually found employment as a mercenary under a Scotsman named Majoy Sangster. Thomas learned a great deal from his Scottish mentor about the construction of weapons before setting off on his journey once more. 

He travelled extensively, eventually finding himself in Kabul, Afghanistan where he utilised his military skills to train soldiers in combat and arms production. This became the pattern for Thomas, he would travel to a new place, apply his knowledge of weapons and combat to make money, then after a few years move on again. After more than two decades of this transient lifestyle, Thomas felt that it was once again time for a change of pace. He came to Jaipur, a place which he had spent some time in his early years in India. He married the great granddaughter of a famous Portugese astrologer named Favier de Silva. He climbed the rungs of the social ladder in Jaipur. He became a skilled healer and studied extensively in the areas of alchemy and divination. His military skillls were once again called upon when he was appointed to a commanding role in the Jaipur army. 

This new appointment would turn out to be Thomas' undoing. He was gravely injured in an attack on a rebel stronghold. His leg was severely damaged by a pike and he was not expected to survive the festering wound. He was sent to the camp of a man named Colonel Todd for treatment and it was to Todd himself that Thomas recounted the extraordinary tale of his remarkable life. Yet Todd noted that Thomas' grip on reality was loose to say the least and that he was afflicted by madness as he described having discovered the Garden of Eden on his travels, though such delusions may have been brought on by the wound to his leg. 

Thomas returned to Jaipur, though he was far from fully recovered and shortly afterwards left society for a solitary existence in an abandoned tomb in the mountains. He discarded his clothes and declared himself a Fakir, surviving on the kindness of passing strangers. He was discovered in a pitiful state by a European woman who tried to nurse him back to health but to no avail.

Thomas Legge's extraordinary life came to an end when he died in 1808 and it is thought that he may have been buried in the same tomb which had been his home in his final days.