CLIVE, (Robert) lord, son of Richard Clive, Esq; of Styche near Drayton in Salop, was born in 1725. Toward the close of the war in 1741, he was sent as a writer in the East India service to Madras; but being fonder of the camp than the compting-house, he soon availed himself of an opportunity to exchange his pen for a pair of colours. He first distinguished himself at the siege of Pondicherry in 1748; acted under major Laurence at the taking of Devi Cotta in Tanjore, who wrote of his military talents in high terms; commanded a small party for the taking of Arcot, and afterward defended that place against the French; and performed many other exploits, which, considering the remoteness of the scene of action, would require a long detail to render sufficiently intelligible. He was, however, in brief, looked upon and acknowledged as the man who first roused his countrymen to spirited action, and raised their reputation in the East: so that when he came over to England in 1753, he was presented, by the court of directors, with a rich sword set with diamonds, as an acknowledgment of past, and an incitement to future, services. Captain Clive returned to India in 1755, as governor of fort St David, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel in the king's troops; when as commander of the company's troops, he, in conjunction with admiral
Watson, reduced Angria the pirate, and became master of Geria, his capital, with all his accumulated treasure. On the loss of Calcutta and the well known barbarity of the foubah Surajah Dowla, they failed to Bengal; where they took fort William, in January 1757; and colonel Clive defeating the foubah's army soon after, accelerated a peace. Surajah Dowla's perfidy, however, soon produced fresh hostilities, which ended in his ruin; he being totally defeated by colonel Clive at the famous battle of Plassey. The next day the conqueror entered Muxadabad in triumph; and placed Jaffier Ally Cawn, one of the principal generals, on the throne: the deposed foubah was soon after taken, and privately put to death by Jaffier's son. Admiral Watson died at Calcutta; but colonel Clive commanded in Bengal the two succeeding years: he was honoured by the Mogul with the dignity of an Omrah of the empire; and was rewarded by the new foubah with a grant of lands, or a jaghire, producing 27,000 l. a-year. In 1760, he returned to England, where he received the unanimous thanks of the company, was elected member of parliament for Shrewsbury, and was raised to an Irish peerage by the title of Lord Clive Baron of Plassey. In 1764, fresh disturbances taking place in Bengal, lord Clive was esteemed the only man qualified to settle them, and was accordingly again appointed to that presidency; after being honoured with the order of the Bath, and with the rank of major-general. When he arrived in India, he exceeded the most sanguine expectation, in restoring tranquillity to the province without striking a blow, and fixed the highest ideas of the British power in the minds of the natives. He returned home in 1767; and, in 1772, when a parliamentary inquiry into the conduct of the East India company was agitated, he entered into an able justification of himself in a masterly speech in the house of commons. He died suddenly towards the close of the year 1774.