Sir Charles Alexander Gordon

author

Sir Charles Alexander Gordon

1821–1899

A Victorian army surgeon and medical writer, he turned decades of service in India, China, West Africa, and wartime Europe into vivid firsthand books. His work blends memoir, travel, and public health, offering a rare view of the nineteenth-century British Empire from a doctor's perspective.

1 Audiobook

Recollections of Thirty-nine Years in the Army Gwalior and the Battle of Maharajpore, 1843; the Gold Coast of Africa, 1847-48; the Indian Mutiny, 1857-58; the expedition to China, 1860-61; the Siege of Paris, 1870-71; etc.

Recollections of Thirty-nine Years in the Army Gwalior and the Battle of Maharajpore, 1843; the Gold Coast of Africa, 1847-48; the Indian Mutiny, 1857-58; the expedition to China, 1860-61; the Siege of Paris, 1870-71; etc.

by Sir Charles Alexander Gordon

About the author

Born in Aberdeen in 1821, Sir Charles Alexander Gordon trained in medicine before joining the Army Medical Department. He went on to serve for many years across the British Empire and beyond, building a career as a military surgeon, physician, and writer.

His service took him to India, the Gold Coast of West Africa, China, and later to Paris during the Franco-German War. Alongside his medical duties, he wrote extensively about army life, sanitation, climate, and disease, as well as memoirs drawn from his own experiences in campaigns and military hospitals.

Gordon is especially remembered for books such as Recollections of Thirty-nine Years in the Army, which gathers episodes from a remarkably wide-ranging career. He was later appointed Honorary Physician to Queen Victoria and was knighted, reflecting the high regard in which his medical and military work was held.