James Augustus Hicky

History glossary

Also called: Hickey · Topic: Print Culture and the Modern World · NCERT: Class 10, Ch 5 "Print Culture and the Modern World"

Meaning

James Augustus Hicky (NCERT spells the name Hickey) was a private Englishman in Calcutta who, from 1780, edited the weekly Bengal Gazette. It is often called the first newspaper printed in India, and the study note treats it as the first real English newspaper. The Governor-General, Warren Hastings, persecuted Hicky because the paper printed gossip about senior East India Company officials.

Why it matters: English printing in India really began with Hicky's paper. His clash with Hastings is the first case in India of a newspaper standing up to the ruling power, and of that power hitting back.

Explanation

Background: why an English newspaper came so late

  • The press reached India in the mid-sixteenth century. It came with Portuguese missionaries at Goa, and they printed in Indian languages first.
  • The English East India Company began importing presses from the late seventeenth century. Yet English printing was slow to take off.
  • Britannica gives three reasons why the Company's presses had little immediate effect [2]:
  • political instability
  • the strength of the old calligraphic (fine handwriting) manuscript culture

  • low demand for printed reading matter

  • William Bolts put up a notice in Calcutta in 1768 saying he would start a press. Nothing came of it, and he left India without printing a paper.

  • So the first real English newspaper came from private English enterprise (a private person's business), not from the government.

The paper: what it was and what it printed

  • Name: the first issue appeared on 29 January 1780, titled Hicky's Bengal Gazette; or, The Original Calcutta General Advertiser [2].
  • Frequency and place: a weekly, printed in Calcutta.
  • Motto: Hicky called it "a commercial paper open to all, but influenced by none".
  • Independence: it was a private paper, free of colonial influence. The Company did not control it.
  • What it carried:
  • Advertisements, including notices for the sale of slaves.
  • Gossip about senior officials of the East India Company.
  • Attacks on Elijah Impey, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Calcutta [2].

The clash with the Company: sequence of events

  • 1780: Hicky starts the paper and soon prints damaging stories about Company officials.
  • Hastings strikes back in two ways:
  • Repression: Governor-General Warren Hastings persecuted Hicky.

  • Counter-propaganda: Hastings encouraged officially sanctioned newspapers (papers allowed and backed by the government). These papers could block bad reports about the Company and build up its image.

  • 1782: Hicky was imprisoned, his types (the metal letters used for printing) were seized, and the paper was shut down [2].

Results

  • The paper ran for only about two years, but it showed that print could expose people in power.
  • The Company learned to answer a hostile press with its own friendly papers, as well as with punishment.
  • This set a pattern. Later, the colonial state censored newspapers through laws such as the Vernacular Press Act, 1878.

Time, place and evidence

  • Period: late eighteenth century, 1780–1782, under East India Company rule in Bengal.
  • Place: Calcutta, the Company's main base in Bengal.
  • Key people:
  • James Augustus Hicky, the editor.
  • Warren Hastings, the Governor-General who persecuted him.

  • Elijah Impey, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Calcutta, whom the paper attacked [2].

  • How we know:

  • NCERT Class 10, Ch 5 "Print Culture and the Modern World" gives the 1780 start, the motto, the slave-sale advertisements, the gossip and Hastings's response.
  • Britannica gives the exact title, the first-issue date (29 January 1780), the attacks on Impey, and Hicky's jailing and the closure in 1782 [2].
  • The surviving issues of the paper itself are the primary evidence.

Don't confuse with

  • Gangadhar Bhattacharya's Bengal Gazette: it has the same name, but it was the first newspaper published by an Indian. Bhattacharya was close to Rammohun Roy. Hicky's paper was English, private English enterprise, from 1780.
  • William Bolts (1768): he only announced a press in Calcutta. He never printed a paper. Hicky actually published one.
  • Officially sanctioned newspapers: these were papers backed by Hastings to defend the Company's image. Hicky's paper was the opposite: independent and critical.
  • Portuguese missionary press at Goa (September 1556): this was the first press in India [2], run for religious work in Indian languages. Hicky's was the first English newspaper, nothing to do with missionaries.

Prelims Hooks

  • Hicky's Bengal Gazette: weekly, Calcutta. First issue 29 January 1780 [2].
  • Motto: "a commercial paper open to all, but influenced by none".
  • Persecutor: Warren Hastings, who also promoted officially sanctioned newspapers.
  • The paper attacked Elijah Impey, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Calcutta [2].
  • 1782: Hicky jailed, his types seized, the paper shut down [2].
  • Chronological order: Goa press (1556) → Bolts's notice (1768) → Hicky's Bengal Gazette (1780) → Vernacular Press Act (1878).

Mains Points

  • This was the first clash in India between the press and the state.
  • A private paper printed gossip about Company officials and the Chief Justice.
  • The state answered with both repression and counter-propaganda: it jailed Hicky and sponsored friendly papers.

  • This foreshadows later censorship, such as the Vernacular Press Act, 1878. It also gave rise to the idea of a free press as a check on power.

  • Print came to India through religion first, and through commerce and private enterprise later.

  • Missionaries had printed in Indian languages since the sixteenth century.
  • The English press lagged for more than two centuries, because of political instability, a strong manuscript culture and low demand [2].

  • When it finally came, it came from a private person, not from the Company.

  • The paper was not liberal in every way. It took advertisements for the sale of slaves, which shows that it reflected the commercial world of colonial Calcutta. Its motto, "open to all, but influenced by none", still announced a new idea in India: a paper independent of rulers.

Related concepts

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Sources

  1. 1Class 10, Ch 5 "Print Culture and the Modern World" (primary)
  2. 2Print revolution in India | History, Impact, & Freedom Movementbritannica.com · tier 3