One hundred and fifty years ago, Major General Sir Henry Havelock, heading a small force, pierced the Siege at the Residency of Lucknow only to be surrounded by mutineers. It was 1857 and the mutineers were fighting India’s first war of Independence.

Now a great grandson of Havelock, Mark Havelock Allan will revisit the Residency to relive the Mutiny among the ruins and also to remember those who lost their lives during the Siege. Twenty other British will be visiting Kanpur, Bithoor and Lucknow, to connect themselves to events in 1857 as part of a package that’s being promoted as ‘The Great Indian Mutiny’.

In an interview over e-mail, Allan said he planned to “rediscover the route which my great-great grandfather’s small army took in 1857”.

The group will hold a short religious service on the premises of the Residency on September 25, the day relief had reached the Residency for the first time.

The Mutiny tourism concept, developed over the last two years by various British companies like Palanquin and Battlefield Tours is being implemented in India by Tornos India.

Visitors will have the option of going through the tour operator’s research base on British graves and ask for those belonging to their loved ones to be looked after, free of cost. Allan is looking forward to visiting Havelock’s simple grave that lies near the ruins of the erstwhile Alambagh Fort in Lucknow.

“These are not mere leisure trips but educational tours, where people will want to see what they have so far studied in books. So, we need to have Mutiny specialists. We have taken care that we give the Indian version of the Mutiny as well,” says Prateek Hira CEO of Tornos.

The tourists are also to look up Mutiny markers in Gwalior, Jhansi and Calcutta.