India

From Sawiki

On the 19th of September the great invasion of India began. Sicknesshad reduced Major Frederick Tucker's pary to just four. Captain Henry Bullard and Lieutenants Arthur Norman and Mary Thompson with Tucker himself comprised the entire invasion force that disembarked from the S.S. Ancona at the Apollo Bunder, Bombay landing stage.

They marched from the dockside, Tucker bearing the "Blood and Fire" banner, Bullard blowing lustily on his cornet, Norman, an ex-blacksmith, pounding his drum like an anvil, and Mary Thompson joyously jingling a tambourine. The following day, when they opened fire in a large tent in Bombay city centre, a mighty throng flocked to see these strange newcomers.

The next day the commissioner of Bombay banned all Salvation Army open air meetings and parades. Undismayed, that same evening Major Tucker led a parade through Bombay's streets, and was promptly arrested. Found guilty of causing a breach of the peace he refused to pay the fine imposed by the magistrate. An order was made for distraint on his goods, but Police Superintendent Harry Brewin, a secret sympathiser, purchased them at auction and handed them back to Tucker.

On the 20th of October 1882 Major Tucker and his officers were arrested for the third time and faced the prospect of a six month jail sentence. Only Tucker's unrivalled knowledge of Indian law saved the day and the case was dismissed. More arrests followed, even a month's jail sentence, but by February 1883 the weight of official opinion had swung in favour of the Salvationists and the Army won the right to sing and pray in the streets.

Fakir Singh, the lion of God.

Efforts to win high caste Indians were a dismal failure. Every recruit won was already a professing Christian. Seeing the caste system as the main problem, the Salvationists set out to win the souls of India's sixty million outcasts. To win these people Major Tucker decided that he and his soldiers, now reinforced from Britain, must embrace the life the outcasts led.

Their uniform became the fakir's saffron robes of renunciation, boots gave way to bare feet and they also took Indian names. Frederick Tucker became Fakir Singh, the lion of God. No sacrifice was too great in the quest for souls. To reach the Tamils of Southern India the men shaved their heads Tomil fashion.

No one found it strange that the Salvationists begged their food from door to door. To respond to a fakir's appeal in India counts as a deed of high merit. Slowly at first, then with great rapidity, converts were won and the work of the Salvation Army spread throughout this vast land. Medical work originated at Nagercoil in 1896 and work among the then Criminal Tribes began in 1908 at the invitation of the Indian Government. The Salvation Army in India is now organised into six territories.

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