21st Horse (Central India Horse)
military unit
The Central India Horse (formerly the 21st King George V's Own Horse, also known as Beatson's Horse) was a regular cavalry regiment of the British Indian Army and is presently part of the Indian Army Armoured Corps.
Formation
The regiment was raised as two irregular cavalry regiments at the outset of the Indian Rebellion of 1857. The first regiment was formed by Captain Henry Otway Mayne on 15 December 1857 and was known initially as Mayne's Horse. Captain Mayne who was from the 6th Madras Light Cavalry and a Brigade Major of the Hyderabad Contingent, raised his regiment with troops from Gwalior Contingent, Malwa Contingent Cavalry and Bhopal Contingent.
The second regiment was known as Beatson's Horse. It was raised between February and September 1858 in Hyderabad by Lieutenant Colonel (later Major-General) William Ferguson Beatson, originally of the Bengal Native Infantry. The troops were from Hyderabad.
They were based at the towns of Augur in Western Malwa and Goona in the state of Gwalior in central India. In 1860, Mayne's Horse was renamed the 1st Regiment, Central India Horse, and Beatson's Horse was renamed the 2nd Regiment, Central India Horse. Mayne's Horse and Beatson's Horse joined to form the Central India Horse in 1860.
“21st Horse (Central India Horse)” enters the record as military unit. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what 21st, Horse and Central can confirm, complicate or overturn.
Why this record matters
“21st Horse (Central India Horse)” is worth following because a concise public description often conceals a longer documentary argument. Here, 21st, Horse and Central provides the most credible route into that argument.
Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 22, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7721913. VIAF identifies the subject as 141888384. The Library of Congress control number is n80019965. 1 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1857, 1858 and 1860.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “21st Horse (Central India Horse)”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow 21st Horse (Central India Horse) primary sources, 21st Horse (Central India Horse) archive and 21st research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “21st Horse (Central India Horse)”?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “21st Horse (Central India Horse)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.