Dodd George
The History of the Indian Revolt and of the Expeditions to Persia, China and Japan 1856-7-8
After a day of comparative repose on the 18th, a combined movement against the Moosa Bagh was organised on the 19th. This was the last position held by the enemy on the line of the Goomtee, somewhat beyond the extreme northwest limit of the city. Outram moved forward directly against the place; Hope Grant cannonaded it from the left bank; while William Campbell, approaching on the remote side from the Alum Bagh, prevented retreat in that direction. Some said the Begum was there, some the Moulvie or fanatic chieftain; but on this point nothing was known. All that was certain was that several thousand insurgents, driven from other places, had congregated within the buildings and courts of the Moosa Bagh. Outram’s troops started from the Emanbarra on this expedition early in the morning; he himself joined them from Banks’s house, while Sir Colin rode over to see in person how the work was effected. Opposite the Moosa Bagh, which was a large structure surrounded by an enclosed court, was the residence of Ali Nuckee Khan, vizier or prime-minister to the deposed King of Oude; and in other parts of the vicinity were numerous mansions and mosques. If the rebels had held well together, they might have made a stout resistance here, for the buildings contained many elements of strength; but discord reigned; the Begum reproached the thalookdars, the thalookdars the sepoys; while the Moulvie was suspected of an intention to set up as King of Oude on his own account. Outram’s column was to make the direct attack; Hope Grant’s cavalry and horse-artillery were to command certain roads of approach and exit on the river-side; while William Campbell’s cavalry, aided by two or three infantry regiments, were to command the opposite side. The contest can hardly be called a battle or a siege; for as soon as the rebels clearly ascertained that the British were approaching, they abandoned court after court, house after house, and escaped towards the northwest, by the only avenue available. Although they did not fight, they escaped more successfully than Sir Colin had wished or intended. Whether the three movements were not timed in unison, or whether collateral objects engaged the attention of Brigadier Campbell, certain it is that few of the enemy were killed, and that many thousands safely marched or ran out. The open country, covered with enclosures and cornfields, enabled the sepoys better to escape than the British to pursue them. A regiment of Sikhs was sent to occupy the Moosa Bagh; and now was Lucknow still more fully than before in the hands of the commander-in-chief.
On the 20th, further measures were taken, by proclamation and otherwise, to induce the peaceful portion of the inhabitants to return to their homes. This was desirable in every sense. Until the ordinary relations of society were re-introduced, anything like civil government was simply impossible; while, so long as the houses, deserted by their proper inhabitants, served as hiding-places for fanatics and budmashes, the streets were never for an instant safe. Many officers and soldiers were shot by concealed antagonists, long after the great buildings of the city had been conquered. Moreover, the Sikhs and Goorkhas were becoming very unruly. The plunder had acted upon them as an intoxicating indulgence, shaking the steady obedience which they were wont to exhibit when actively engaged against the enemy. Even at a time when Sir Colin was planning which of his generals he could spare, for service elsewhere or for sick-leave, and which regiments should form new columns for active service in other districts – even at such a time it was discovered that bodies of the enemy were lurking in houses near Outram’s head-quarters, bent upon mischief or revenge; and there was much musketry-fire necessary before they could be dislodged. The ‘sick-leave,’ just adverted to, was becoming largely applied for. Many officers, so gallant and untiring as to be untouched by any suspicion of their willingness to shirk danger and hard work, gave in; they had become weakened in body and mind by laborious duties, and needed repose.
The Moulvie, who had held great power within Lucknow, and whose influence was even now not extinguished, commanded a stronghold in the very heart of the city. Sir Edward Lugard was requested to dislodge him on the 21st. This he did after a sharp contest; and Brigadier W. Campbell, with his cavalry, placed himself in such a position, that he was enabled to attack the enemy who were put to flight by Lugard, and to inflict heavy loss on them during a pursuit of six miles. The conquest of the Moulvie’s stronghold had this useful effect among others; that it enabled Sir Colin to expedite the arrangements for the return of such of the inhabitants as were not too deeply steeped in rebellion to render return expedient. Among those who fell on this occasion, on the side of the enemy, was Shirreff-u-Dowlah, the chief-minister of the rebel boy-king, or rather of his mother the Begum; this man had been in collision with the Moulvie, each envious of the other’s authority; and there were those who thought it was by a treacherous blow that he now fell. Even in this, the last contest within the city, the sappers had to be employed; for the Moulvie had so intrenched himself, with many hundred followers, that he could not be dislodged by the force at first sent against him; the engineers were forced to sap under and through some surrounding buildings, before the infantry could obtain command of that in which the Moulvie was lodged.
This was the last day of those complicated scenes of tactics and fighting which formed collectively the siege of Lucknow, and which had lasted from the 2d to the 21st of March. Concerning the cavalry expeditions, during the third week of this period, it is pretty evident that they had been fruitless in great results. Sir Hope Grant had cut up a few hundred fugitive rebels in one spot, and intercepted more in another; Brigadier William Campbell had rendered useful service both in and beyond the suburbs of the city; but the proofs were not to be doubted that the mutinied sepoys and rebel volunteers had safely escaped from the city, not merely by thousands, but by tens of thousands; and that they still retained a sufficiency of military organisation to render them annoying and even formidable. When this news reached England, it damped considerably the pleasure afforded by the conquest of Lucknow. The nation asked, but asked without the probability of receiving a reply, whether the enemy had in this particular foiled a part of the commander-in-chief’s plan; and whether the governor-general shared the opinions of the commander concerning the plan of strategy, and the consequences resulting from it?
The losses suffered by the British army during the operations at Lucknow, though necessarily considerable, were small in comparison with those which would have been borne if artillery had not been so largely used. Sir Colin from the first determined that shells and balls should do as much of the dread work as possible, clearing away or breaching the enemy’s defence-works before he sent in his infantry to close quarters. During the entire series of operations, from the 2d to the 21st of March, he had 19 officers killed and 48 wounded. The whole of the generals and brigadiers escaped untouched; and there were only two officers among the wounded so high in military rank as lieutenant-colonel. The killed and wounded among the troops generally were about 1100. The enemy’s loss could hardly have been less than 4000. One of the deaths most regretted during these operations was that of Major Hodson; who, as the commander of ‘Hodson’s Horse,’ and as the captor of the King of Delhi, had been prominently engaged in the Indian wars. It was on the day marked by the conquest of the Begum Kothee that he fell. Having no especial duty on that day, and hearing that Brigadier Napier was busily engaged in engineering operations connected with the attack on that palace, he rode over to him, and joined in that storming attack which Sir Colin characterised as ‘the sternest struggle which occurred during the siege.’ Hodson, while assisting in clearing the court-yards and buildings near the palace of parties of the enemy lurking there, was shot by a sepoy. His orderly, a large powerful Sikh, carried him in his arms to a spot beyond the reach of shot, whence he was carried in a dooly to Banks’s house, where surgical aid could be obtained. Some of his own irregular troopers cried over him like children. The shot had passed through the liver, and he died after a night of great agony. A spot was chosen for his grave near a tope of bamboos behind the Martinière. Sir Colin and his staff attended the funeral, at which the old chief was much affected; he had highly valued Hodson, and did not allow many hours to elapse before he wrote a graceful and feeling letter to the widow of the deceased officer. As soon as possible a telegraphic message was sent to bring down Captain Daly, the commandant of the famous corps of Guides; he was every way fitted to command a similar body of irregular cavalry, ‘Hodson’s Horse.’
No sooner was the city of Lucknow clearly and unequivocally in the hands of Sir Colin Campbell, than he completely broke up the lately formidable ‘army of Oude.’ The troops had nothing more immediately to do at that spot; while their services were urgently needed elsewhere. With regret did the soldiers leave a place where such extraordinary gains had fallen to the lot of some among their number; or, more correctly, this regret endured only until the very stringent regulations put an effectual stop to all plundering. The regiments were reorganised into brigades and divisions; new brigadiers were appointed in lieu of those on ‘sick-leave;’ and a dispersion of the army commenced.
It is impossible to read Sir Colin Campbell’s mention of Jung Bahadoor without feeling that he estimated at a small price the value of the services yielded by the Nepaulese leader. Whether it was that the arrival of the Goorkha army was delayed beyond the date when the greatest services might have been rendered, or that Sir Colin found it embarrassing to issue orders to one who was little less than a king, it is plain that not much was effected by Jung Bahadoor during the operations at Lucknow. He came when the siege was half over; he departed a fortnight afterwards; and although the commander-in-chief said in a courteous dispatch: ‘I found the utmost willingness on his part to accede to any desire of mine during the progress of the siege; and from the first his Highness was pleased to justify his words that he was happy to be serving under my command’ – although these were the words used, there was an absence of any reference to special deeds of conquest. It was a pretty general opinion among the officers that the nine thousand soldiers of the Nepaulese army were far inferior in military qualities to those Goorkhas who had for many years formed two or three regiments in the Bengal army. When the looting in the city began, Jung Bahadoor’s Goorkhas could scarcely be held in any control; like the Sikhs, they were wild with oriental excitement, and Sir Colin was more anxious concerning them than his own European troops. Viscount Canning, who was in intimate correspondence with the commander-in-chief through the medium of the electric telegraph, exchanged opinions with him in terms known only to themselves; but the announcement made public was to the effect that the governor-general solicited the aid of the Goorkha troops in the neighbourhood of Allahabad, and invited Jung Bahadoor to a personal conference with him at that city. It was during the last week in March that the Nepaulese allies quitted Lucknow, and marched off towards the Oude frontier.
Of the troops which remained at Lucknow, after the departure of some of the brigades, it need only be said in this place that they began to experience the heat of an Indian equinox, which, though much less than that of summer, is nevertheless severely felt by Europeans. A letter from an assistant-surgeon in the division lately commanded by Brigadier Franks, conveyed a good impression of camp-troubles at such a time.139
When the governor-general wrote the usual thanks and compliments after the conquest of Lucknow, he adverted very properly to the previous operations, which, though not conquests in the ordinary sense of the term, had won so much fame for Inglis, Havelock, Neill, Outram, and Campbell; and then after mentioning some of the most obvious facts connected with the siege,140 praised all those whom Sir Colin had pointed out as being worthy of praise. Concerning the proclamation which Lord Canning issued, or proposed to issue, to the natives of Oude, it will be convenient to defer notice of it to a future chapter; when attention will be called to the important debates in the imperial legislature relating to that subject.
Here this chapter may suitably end. It was designed as a medium for the remarkable episode of the final conquest of Lucknow in the month of March; and will be best kept free from all topics relating to other parts of India.
Note
Lucknow Proclamations.– When Sir Colin Campbell had effectually conquered Lucknow, and had gathered information concerning the proceedings of the rebels since the preceding month of November, it was found that no means had been left untried to madden the populace into a death-struggle with the British. Among other methods, printed proclamations were posted up in all the police stations, not only in Lucknow, but in many other parts of Oude.
One of these proclamations, addressed to the Mohammedans, ran thus:
‘God says in the Koran: “Do not enter into the friendship of Jews and Christians; those who are their friends are of them – that is, the friends of Christians are Christians, and friends of Jews are Jews. God never shews his way to infidels.”
‘By this it is evident that to befriend Christians, is irreligious. Those who are their friends are not Mohammedans; therefore all the Mohammedan fraternity should with all their hearts be deadly enemies to the Christians, and never befriend them in any way; otherwise, all will lose their religion, and become infidels.
‘Some people, weak in faith and worldly, think that if they offend the Christians, they will fall their victims when their rule is re-established. God says of these people: “Look in the hearts of these unbelievers, who are anxious to seek the friendship of Christians through fear of receiving injury,” to remove their doubts and assure their wavering mind. It is also said that “God will shortly give us victory, or will do something by which our enemies will be ashamed of themselves.” The Mussulmans should therefore always hope, and never believe that the Christians will be victorious and injure them; but, on the contrary, should hope to gain the victory and destroy all Christians.
‘If all the Mohammedans join and remain firm to their faith, they would no doubt gain victory over the Christians, because God says that the victory is due to the faithful from Him; but if they become cowards and infirm to their religion, and do not sacrifice their private interest for the public good, the Europeans will be victorious, and, having subdued the Mohammedans, they will disarm, hang, shoot, or blow them away, seize upon their women and children, disgrace, dishonour, and christianise them, dig up their houses and carry off their property; they will also burn religious and sacred books, destroy the musjids, and efface the name of Islam from the world.
‘If the Mohammedans have any shame, they should all join and prepare themselves to kill the Christians without minding any one who says to the contrary; they should also know that no one dies before his time, and when the time comes, nothing can save them. Thousands of men are carried off by cholera and other pestilence; but it is not known whether they die in their senses, and be faithful to their own religion.
‘To be killed in a war against Christians is a proof of obtaining martyrdom. All good Mohammedans pray for such a death; therefore, every one should sacrifice his life for such a reward. Every one is to die assuredly, and those Mohammedans who would spare themselves now will be sorry on their death for their neglect.
‘As it is the duty of all men and women to oppose, kill, and expel the Europeans for deeds committed by them at Delhi, Jhujur, Rewaree, and the Doab, all the Mohammedans should discharge their duty with a willing heart; if they neglect, and the Europeans overpower them, they will be disarmed, hung, and treated like the inhabitants of other unfortunate countries, and will have nothing but regret and sorrow for their lot. Wherefore this notice is given to warn the public.’
Another proclamation, addressed principally to zemindars and Hindoos in general, but to Mohammedans also, was couched in the following terms:
‘All the Hindoos and Mohammedans know that man loves four things most: 1, his religion and caste; 2, his honour; 3, his own and his kinsmen’s lives; 4, his property. All these four are well protected under native rulers; no one interferes with any one’s religion; every one enjoys his respectability according to his caste and wealth. All the respectable people – Syad, Shaikh, Mogul, and Patan, among Mohammedans; and Brahmins, Chatrees, Bys, and Kaeths, among the Hindoos – are respected according to their castes. No low-caste people like chumars, dhanook, and passees, can be equal to and address them disrespectfully. No one’s life or property is taken unless for some heinous crime.
‘The British are quite against these four things – they want to spoil every one’s caste, and wish both the Mohammedans and Hindoos to become Christians. Thousands have turned renegades, and many will become so yet; both the nobles and low caste are equal in their eyes; they disgrace the nobles in the presence of the ignoble; they arrest or summon to their courts the gentry, nawabs, and rajahs at the instance of a chumar, and disgrace them; wherever they go they hang the respectable people, kill their women and children; their troops dishonour the women, and dig up and carry off their buried property. They do not kill the mahajuns, but dishonour their women, and carry off their money. They disarm the people wherever they go, and when the people are disarmed, they hang, shoot, or blow them away.
‘In some places, they deceive the landholders by promising them remittance of revenue, or lessen the amount of their lease; their object is that when their government is settled, and every one becomes their subject, they can readily, according to their wish, hang, disgrace, or christianise them. Some of the foolish landholders have been deceived, but those who are wise and careful do not fall into their snares.
‘Therefore, all the Hindoos and Mohammedans who wish to save their religion, honour, life, and property, are warned to join the government forces, and not to be deceived by the British.
‘The passees (low-caste servants) should also know that the chowkeedaree (office of watchmen) is their hereditary right, but the British appoint burkundauzes in their posts, and deprive them of their rights; they should therefore kill and plunder the British and their followers, and annoy them by committing robbery and thefts in their camp.’
CHAPTER XXVI.
MINOR EVENTS IN MARCH
Having briefly narrated in the last chapter the progress of Sir Colin Campbell’s army in Oude, from the beginning towards the close of March; it now becomes expedient to watch the operations of those military officers who, during the same month, were engaged in services in other parts of India. The achievements were not so great in magnitude or notoriety, but they do not the less require to be noticed: seeing that they illustrate the state of feeling among the native population, the fluctuations of fortune among the rebels, and the struggles of British officers amid great difficulties.
As in former chapters, there will be a convenience in beginning with the Calcutta regions, and transferring attention successively to the west, northwest, and southwest.
The Anglo-Indian capital was shorn of somewhat of its splendour during the spring months, by the absence of the governor-general at Allahabad; but in truth this was a secondary matter; for it was not a time for levees, gaieties, or vice-regal presentations and splendour. Calcutta experienced a panic so late in the history of the mutiny as the 3d of March – one of many to which a somewhat excitable population had been exposed. A telegraphic message was received from Barrackpore, to the effect that the sepoys of two native regiments at that station – the 2d and the 23d B. N. I. – were deserting in bodies of ten or twelve; and that the deserters were supposed to be making their way to Calcutta. The officers of the volunteer guards were at once requested to send pickets to certain unprotected buildings in Calcutta. Very speedily these pickets were told off; cavalry patrolled the streets all night; the artillerymen remained watchful within the fort; and the English troops present were kept under arms. The rumour proved to have been greatly exaggerated, and the suspected danger passed away – but not without causing much trepidation among the unwarlike portion of the Calcutta community.
So numerous were the European troops that arrived at Calcutta during the winter, and so obvious the necessity for increasing the strength of that branch of the army in India, that preparations were made for accommodating them within easy reach of the capital. Barrackpore, although well supplied with sepoy lines, had never held European troops in large number. It was now resolved, instead of building new European barracks at that place, to increase those at Chinsura. This town, about twenty miles from Calcutta, on the banks of the Hoogly, had already a fine European barrack and military hospital, in a very healthy spot. About the month of March, many hundred men were set to work, to increase the barrack accommodation to a level with the wants of five thousand European troops, and to raze all the buildings within five hundred yards on all sides, to form parade-grounds, &c.
In the regions north and east of Calcutta, the materials for rebellion were pretty nearly exhausted. There had from the first been only a small amount of disturbance in those districts; and it became gradually evident that the town and village population were desirous of continuing their peaceful avocations, uninterrupted by mutinous sepoys or fanatical Mohammedans.
It was in many ways fortunate that the recently acquired province of Pegu had remained peaceful during the dangerous periods of the mutiny. Had revolt or treason been at work in that quarter, the embarrassment of the government would have been seriously aggravated. Disturbances, it is true, did take place; but they were not of such magnitude as to give occasion for alarm. This was mainly owing to the policy of the King of Burmah. We had taken from him a rich province, a slice out of his empire, by a mingled course of war and politics; and he was no more likely to be content with that result than any other defeated monarch. But he was a shrewd observant man; he measured the power of England, and saw reason to believe that he would weaken rather than strengthen himself by any hostility at this time. There were not wanting those near him who urged him to a different policy. Burmah, like other countries, had its war-party, who kept up a spirit of bitterness towards the British. This party was headed by the king’s brother, and by many of the old dispossessed Burman officials of Pegu. There is reason to believe that, had the strength of the rebels in Oude remained much longer unbroken, the King of Burmah might have been drawn or driven into hostility in spite of himself. Whenever news came over from the opposite side of the Bay of Bengal, the Mohammedans resident in Burmah made the most of such parts of it as indicated a decline of the English ‘raj,’ and gave strength to a feeling among the Burmese which the king might not much longer have been able to resist. In the early part of 1857 there were four European regiments in Pegu; but the urgent demands from India had led to the withdrawal of all these, except a wing of the 2d Madras Europeans at Toungoo, and a few of H.M. 29th at Thayetmyo; and even of native Madras troops in Pegu, the number was but small. There was a time, in the autumn of that year, when the war-party might have wrought serious mischief to British interests; but when steam-frigates, corvettes, gun-boats, and regiments from various quarters began to shew themselves at Rangoon or in the Irrawaddy, or were known to be passing up the Bay towards Calcutta, the chances were altered. Instead of fighting, the king did a much wiser thing, whether from humane or from politic motives – he subscribed ten thousand rupees towards the Mutiny Relief Fund.
West and southwest of Calcutta, in a part of India very imperfectly known to Europeans, tranquillity was occasionally disturbed, not so much by mutinous sepoys, as by ambitious chieftains desirous of strengthening themselves in a time of anarchy and uncertain allegiance. In the region around Chyabassa, many petty occurrences from time to time kept the few Europeans in anxiety. There were not many rebel sepoys in that quarter, it is true; but, on the other hand, there were few troops of any kind to aid Captain Moncrieff, the senior assistant-commissioner. A semi-savage tribe, called Coles or Koles, infested the neighbourhood. On the 25th of March, three thousand of these Coles, with a medley of guns, muskets, and native weapons of all kinds, assembled at Chuckerderpore, where Moncrieff had a small camp of marines and two guns; they were, however, dispersed by a mere handful of men, and three of their guns taken. This district was kept in an agitated state mainly by the machinations of a turbulent chieftain, the Rajah of Porahat.
Let us advance, however, to those regions where the audacity of the insurgents was more seriously felt – the regions of the Middle Ganges and the Lower Jumna. The Lower Ganges, between Calcutta and Dinapoor, remained peacefully in the hands of cultivators and traders, who were glad enough to be free from the visitations of fighting-men; but from Dinapoor upwards the sources of discordance were numerous. A few mutineers lurked about, aided by a much larger proportion of desperate characters, who took service under chieftains (mostly Mohammedan) bent upon increasing their own power at the expense of the British.
The Azimghur district, nearly north of Benares, became in March the scene of a conflict which certainly gave a triumph for a time to the enemy, although it was favourable to the British in the first instance. This conflict took place on the 21st at Atrowlia, between a body of insurgents on the one side, and a small force under Colonel Millman of H.M. 37th, commandant of the Azimghur field-force. Being in camp at Koelsa, he received information from Mr Davies, magistrate of Azimghur, that a considerable body of mutineers was in the neighbourhood of Atrowlia, a place about twenty-five miles from that city. The colonel immediately set out, with about 260 infantry, cavalry, and gunners, and two pieces of ordnance – his troops being British and Madrasses. At daybreak on the 22d, he espied the enemy – chiefly sepoys of the Dinapoor brigade, who had followed the fortunes of Koer Singh – posted in several topes of mango-trees. His infantry of the 37th, his Madras cavalry under Colonel Cumberlege, and his two guns, speedily discomfited the enemy and put them to flight; but his day’s work was not ended. While his men were halting in the neighbourhood of Atrowlia, and breakfast was being prepared among the topes of trees, news was suddenly brought that the rebels were advancing in great force. Millman, immediately proceeding with some skirmishers to ascertain their strength, found them strongly posted behind a mud-wall, in the midst of topes of trees and sugar-canes. He sent back orders for his troops to advance; but the enemy increased in number so rapidly, that he could not contend against them; he retired slowly from Atrowlia to his camp at Koelsa, followed by the enemy, who fired at a distance, and endeavoured to turn his flanks. He made one dash with his cavalry; but news, or at least a rumour, reaching the camp, that no fewer than 5000 rebels were approaching, such a panic was created among his camp-followers, that many of the hackery-drivers left their carts, and all the cooks ran away. The colonel, perplexed both by his foes and his camp-followers, and conscious that his camp was untenable in case of a night-attack, and that adequate supplies would be wanting for his men – deemed it expedient to retreat to Azimghur, which he did the same day. He was compelled to abandon a portion of his tents and baggage, which fell into the hands of the enemy.
This was a vexatious and serious discomfiture. It told unfavourably in two directions; for while it paralysed the exertions of the few British officers and troops in that region, it afforded to the rebels an excuse for vaunting abroad their prowess and success. The natives, inexplicable in character to Europeans, were often incredulous to rumours of defeat among their own countrymen; but rumours on the other side spread among them with astounding rapidity, encouraging them to schemes of resistance which they might possibly otherwise have avoided.
It was a natural consequence of the withdrawal from Atrowlia, and the retreat to Azimghur, that the last-named station should itself become imperiled; for a wide range of country was thus left wholly at the mercy of Koer Singh and his associates. The British in Azimghur proceeded to intrench themselves within the jail, which was surrounded by a deep ditch; and every man was set to work to strengthen the fortifications. The rebels gradually approached, to the number of four or five thousand; and then the small garrison was fairly besieged – all the rest of the city being in the hands of the insurgents. A messenger was despatched to Benares on the 26th, to announce the state of affairs; but all that the authorities at that place could do, on the spur of the moment, was to send fifty dragoons in carts, drawn by bullocks and pushed on by coolies. A telegraphic message was at the same time sent to Allahabad; consequent upon which a wing of H.M. 13th foot, and the depôt of the 2d, started off to Benares, for service at that place or at Azimghur. There was a rumour that Koer Singh intended to attack Ghazeepore or Benares, or both, on his way from Azimghur to Arrah; and this rumour led to much entreaty for aid to the threatened stations.