Royalty in Trouble

[mckha489]

I have, it is correctly transcribed.

[Tom Fitton]

Scungchie. Sounds like an anglicised word

I’d really like to find out where this Scungchie word comes from or what it refers to.

Have you seen the actual text of the newspaper or just a transcription? Often words get mangled in the process.

I’ve seen it, yes, I was the one who transcribed it.

[Mike in Cumbria]

I may be wrong, but to me, the article sounds tongue in cheek.  I can't find any instance of the term, but "the well-known Fort scungchie" sounds as if it might be describing someone who is a habitual drunkard or has mental health problems, in which case it's possible the claimed link to royalty may have been only in Albert's imagination.

It makes a lot of sense if you read it as a tongue in cheek report.

[Tom Fitton]

I may be wrong, but to me, the article sounds tongue in cheek.  I can't find any instance of the term, but "the well-known Fort scungchie" sounds as if it might be describing someone who is a habitual drunkard or has mental health problems, in which case it's possible the claimed link to royalty may have been only in Albert's imagination.

It makes a lot of sense if you read it as a tongue in cheek report.

Yeah, just a shame that they couldn’t be bothered to report it more accurately for people like me to review 157 years later.

[Isabel H]

I'm sorry my take on it has dampened your excitement, but please don't be despondent. It's still an interesting article showing the day to day (probably very frustrating) policing matters that Butters had to deal with as well as the more glamorous aspects of his career, and it all adds to the overall picture.

I wonder if a genuine "person of high lineage" would have needed to be escorted to the bank to open an account, or have needed the constable to take care of the bank book for him?  I suspect Albert was a local character, and the judge was playing along with his delusions of grandeur.  The report may have been intended to amuse readers with an account of someone well-known to them.

 

[Redroger]

I may be wrong, but to me, the article sounds tongue in cheek.  I can't find any instance of the term, but "the well-known Fort scungchie" sounds as if it might be describing someone who is a habitual drunkard or has mental health problems, in which case it's possible the claimed link to royalty may have been only in Albert's imagination.

I had not heard the term before, but could it be an Indian corruption of the term scrounger?

[bbart]

Perhaps this is the same Albert?

Snippet from the Bombay Gazette 25 March 1865 about a large gala and firework display, which left Albert unhappy.

Moderator Comment: Copyright image removed

[Mike in Cumbria]

Perhaps this is the same Albert?

Snippet from the Bombay Gazette 25 March 1865 about a large gala and firework display, which left Albert unhappy.

"The well-known mendicant, Albert" - it certainly sounds like the same person. Good find.

You might already know this, but Fort is a district in Bombay. So, "a well known Fort Scungchie" makes sense if a Scungchie is a beggar or a drunkard, as Albert seems to have been.

[ThrelfallYorky]

"Scuzzie"? meaning a bit disgusting, unclean, scruffy?