History and Membership
The early years of the club, from 1824 to 1858, are detailed in a book by Stephen Wheeler published in 1925, which contains a paragraph on each member of the club up to 1858.
James Grant said of the club in The Great Metropolis (1837) –
| “ | The Oriental Club, corner of Hanover Square, consists of gentlemen who have resided some time in the East. A great majority of its members are persons who are living at home on fortunes they have amassed in India. India and Indian matters form the everlasting topics of their conversation. I have often thought it would be worth the while of some curious person to count the number of times the words Calcutta, Bombay and Madras are pronounced by the members in the course of a day. The admission money to the Oriental Club is twenty pounds, the annual subscription is eight pounds. The number of members is 550. The finances of the Oriental are in a flourishing state, the receipts last year amounted to 5,609l, while the expenditure was only 4,923l, thus leaving a balance in favour of the club of 685l... at this rate they will get more rapidly out of debt than clubs usually do... Nabobs are usually remarkable for the quantity of snuff they take; the account against the club for this article is so small that they must be sparing in the use of it; it only averages 17l. 10s. per annum. Possibly, however, most of the members are in the habit of carrying boxes of their own... | ” |
On 29 July 1844, two heroes of the First Anglo-Afghan War, Sir William Nott and Sir Robert Sale, were elected as members of the club by the Committee as an "extraordinary tribute of respect and anticipating the unanimous sentiment of the Club".
On 12 January 1846, a special meeting at the club in Hanover Square presided over by George Eden, 1st Earl of Auckland, a former Governor-General of India, paid a public tribute to the dying Charles Metcalfe, 1st Baron Metcalfe, which Sir James Weir Hogg described as "a wreath upon his bier".
With the formation of the East India Club in 1849, the link with the Honourable East India Company began to decline.
In 1850, Peter Cunningham wrote in his Hand-Book of London –
| “ | O C, 18, H S, founded 1824, by Sir John Malcolm, and is composed of noblemen and gentlemen who have travelled or resided in Asia, at St Helena, in Egypt, at the Cape of Good Hope, the Mauritius, or at Constantinople; or whose official situations connect them with the administration of our Eastern government abroad or at home. Entrance money, 20l.; annual subscription 8l. The Club possesses some good portraits of Clive, Stringer Lawrence, Sir Eyre Coote, Sir David Ochterloney, Sir G. Pollock, Sir W. Nott, Mountstuart Elphinstone, Henry Pottinger, Duke of Wellington, &c. | ” |
In 1861, the club's Chef de cuisine, Richard Terry, published his book Indian Cookery, stating that his recipes were "gathered, not only from my own knowledge of cookery, but from Native Cooks".
Charles Dickens, Jr., reported in Dickens's Dictionary of London (1879) –
| “ | Oriental Club is "composed of noblemen, M.P.'s, and gentlemen of the first distinction and character." The Committee elect by ballot, twelve are a quorum, and three black balls exclude. Entrance fee, £31; subscription, £8 8s | ” |
In 1889, the words "Noblemen, Members of Parliament and Gentlemen of the first distinction and character" appeared in the club's own Rules and Regulations, and the total number of members was limited to eight hundred.
When Lytton Strachey joined the club in 1922, at the age of forty-two, he wrote to Virginia Woolf –
| “ | Do you know that I have joined the Oriental Club? One becomes 65, with an income of 5,000 a year, directly one enters it... Just the place for me, you see, in my present condition. I pass almost unnoticed with my glazed eyes and white hair, as I sink into a leather chair heavily, with a copy of The Field in hand. Excellent claret, too – one of the best cellars in London, by Jove! | ” |
Stephen Wheeler's 1925 book Annals of the Oriental Club, 1824–1858 also contains a list of the members of the club in the year 1924, with their years of election and their places of residence.
In 1927, R. A. Rye could write of the club's library – "The library of the Oriental Club... contains about 4,700 volumes, mostly on oriental subjects", while in 1928 Louis Napoleon Parker mentioned in his autobiography "...the bald and venerable heads of the members of the Oriental Club, perpetually reading The Morning Post.
In 1934, the novelist Alec Waugh wrote of-
| “ | ...the colonial administrator's renunciation of the pomp of official dignities for the obscurity of a chair beside the fireplace in the Oriental Club. | ” |
Another writer recalling the club in the 1970s says –
| “ | Inside were a motley collection of ageing colonials, ex-Bankers, ex-directors of Commonwealth corporations, retired Tea estate managers from Coorg and Shillong and Darjeeling, the odd Maharajah in a Savile Row suit, and certainly a number of Asians entitled to be addressed as Your Excellencies." | ” |
The Club now says on its web site that it has "moved gently into the 21st century, providing modern facilities". Full membership is open to both Ladies and Gentlemen, proposed and seconded by existing members. Associate membership is open to the spouse or partner of a full member. Within the club there are now eleven specialist Societies for members, for those with an interest in various sports and pastimes (Bridge, Billiards, Chess, Golf, Game Shooting, Music, Racing, Sports, Sailing), Younger Members and the eleventh, formed in 2011, for those interested in Wine.
As of 2011, the membership subscription costs between £240 and £850 per year, with a £120 rate for younger members and £140 for associate members. The entrance fee is an additional £850, but is waived for younger members as well as those over 70 years of age. Members over 65 and of 10 years standing pay a reduced membership fee .
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