Dodd George
The History of the Indian Revolt and of the Expeditions to Persia, China and Japan 1856-7-8
Before pursuing this narrative, it may be well to say a few words concerning the organisation and functions of this Secret Committee – one of the many anomalies connected with our government of India. Mr Arthur Mills (India in 1858) described the relation between the Secret Committee, the Court of Directors, and the Board of Control, in the following terms: ‘The Court of Directors meets weekly at the East India House for the transaction of business, the ordinary details of which are discharged by three committees – 1. Finance and home; 2. Political and military; 3. Revenue, judicial, and legislative. There is also a “Secret Committee,” with peculiar functions altogether different from those of the three ordinary committees. The office of the Secret Committee is purely ministerial. It receives from India all dispatches on matters with respect to which secrecy is deemed important – including those which relate to war, peace, or negotiations with native powers or states within the limits of the charter, or other states or princes; and forwards such dispatches to the Board of Control. The Secret Committee also transmits to India, after signature, dispatches prepared by that Board, which it is bound to do, under oath, “without disclosing the same.” The Secret Committee is composed, as prescribed by act of parliament, of three directors. The court may elect whom they please; but the chairman, deputy-chairman, and senior member of the court, are almost invariably appointed. The papers of the Secret Committee are in charge of the examiner at the East India House, who is clerk to the committee… There is also a secret department in the Board of Control, for the purpose of carrying on written and oral communications with the Secret Committee of the Court of Directors. The oral communications are for the most part carried on through the president personally; in the written communications he is assisted by a senior clerk, and occasionally by the secretaries of the Board. On the arrival of secret dispatches from India, the copy intended for the Board is sent to the senior clerk in the secret department, who prepares a précis of all the letters and enclosures, which he lays before the president; who thereupon gives him instructions, oral or written, for the preparation of an answer, or sometimes drafts one himself. It is then copied in official form, and transmitted to the Secret Committee of the East India House.’
The secret dispatch, produced by the authority here described, began by expressing a hope146 that, as soon as Lucknow should fall before the conquering arm of Sir Colin Campbell, the governor-general would feel himself sufficiently strong to act towards the natives with the generosity as well as the justice which is congenial to the British character. The subsequent paragraphs laid down the propositions that it would be better, except in aggravated instances, to award punishment such as is usual against enemies captured in regular war, than against rebels and mutineers – the exceptions being those in which the fighting by the insurgents ‘exceeded the licence of legitimate hostilities;’ that the insanity of ten months ought not to blot out the recollection of a hundred years of fidelity; that the punishment of death had been far too frequently awarded; and that the governor-general ought sternly to resist the entreaties of those who would urge him to the adoption of a sanguinary policy.
The 6th of May was the date on which the battle may be said to have begun in parliament, on the policy to be pursued towards Oude. Mr Bright, in the House of Commons, asked the ministers whether there was any authenticity in a certain proclamation concerning Oude, said to have been issued by Viscount Canning; whether, if authentic, it had been issued in accordance with any directions from the home government; and, if not so sanctioned, what steps the government intended to take in relation to it? These questions came upon the House generally by surprise, as indicating a revelation of things hitherto hidden; and it was then for the first time made public, by the minister who replied to these questions – that the government had, three weeks before, received a dispatch containing a copy of the proclamation adverted to; that the matter was immediately taken into consideration by the government; that a secret dispatch had been sent off, stating the views of the government on the matter; and that there would be no objection to produce both the proclamation and the dispatch. This announcement was the forerunner of a storm, in which the passion of party was strongly mixed up. On the 7th, in the House of Lords, the Earl of Ellenborough moved for the production of certain papers, analogous to those ordered by the other House on the preceding night; and then arose a debate whether Viscount Canning had really issued the proclamation he intended; whether it was a proper proclamation to issue; whether it was right that the Earl of Ellenborough should reprimand Viscount Canning in so imperious a way as he was accused of doing; whether the secret dispatch containing that reprimand should have been kept so entirely concealed from the Court of Directors; whether it should have been sent out to Calcutta at the time it was; and whether a so-called secret dispatch ought to make its appearance among parliamentary papers, unrelieved by any comments on it by Viscount Canning. There was unquestionably something strange in the mode of proceeding; for the dispatch, although not made known to the Court of Directors until the morning of the 7th, had been communicated to certain members of both Houses on the 6th. Earl Granville urged that, if the government wished to get rid of Viscount Canning, the usual course might have been adopted for so doing; but that it was neither just nor generous to keep him in office, and yet give publicity to such insulting censure on him. The Earls of Derby and Ellenborough replied that it was not intended to dismiss Viscount Canning, or even to censure him; but to induce him to make such modifications in his proposed proclamation as would render the policy adopted in Oude less severe.
It now becomes necessary to attend to this much-canvassed proclamation itself, before noticing the further debates concerning it.
The proclamation in question, and the explanations bearing on it, were dated at a period when, from the absence of an electric telegraph between England and India, they could not of course be known in the former country. On the 3d of March, while at Allahabad, paying anxious attention to the daily telegrams received from Oude, Viscount Canning sent a proclamation and an explanatory letter to that province, relating to the treatment to be meted out to rebels.147 Although Sir Colin Campbell commanded the army of Oude, and conducted the military operations, Sir James Outram was chief-commissioner of the province; and on his shoulders rested, at that time, all that could be effected in the way of civil government. The proclamation was to be at once a sentence, a warning, and a threat, addressed to the inhabitants of Oude. It announced that Lucknow, after months of anarchy, was now again in British hands; it dwelt on the fact that many of the citizens, even those who had shared the bounty of the government, had joined the insurgents; and it declared, that the day of retribution for evildoers had arrived. It proceeded to name six rajahs, thalookdars, and zemindars, who had remained faithful amid great temptation, and who were not only to retain their estates, but were to receive additional rewards. It promised a proportionate reward to all other chieftains who could prove that they had been loyal. With these exceptions, the whole proprietary right to the soil of Oude was declared to be forfeited to the British crown – subject only to such indulgences as might, as a matter of favour, be conceded to individuals, conditional on their immediate submission to the supreme authority, their surrendering of arms, and their steady assistance in the maintenance of order and discipline; and conditional, also, on their innocence of shedding the blood of Englishmen and Englishwomen in the cruel outrages which had taken place. The stringent and startling clause in this proclamation was that which related to the confiscation: declaring that, with the few specified exceptions, ‘the proprietary right in the soil of the province is confiscated to the British government, which will dispose of that right in such manner as it may seem fitting.’ In the letter to Sir James Outram accompanying this draft of a proclamation, Viscount Canning stated that the proclamation was not to be issued until Lucknow had been fully conquered by Sir Colin Campbell; and that, when so issued, it was to be addressed only to the non-military inhabitants of Oude, without in the slightest degree offering pardon or lenity to rebel sepoys. The proclamation was spoken of as a very indulgent one; seeing that it promised an exemption, almost general, from the penalties of death and imprisonment, to Oudian chieftains and others who had gone against the government; the confiscation of estates was treated as a merciful diminution of punishment, rather than as a severe measure of justice. Sir James Outram was to exercise his judgment as to the mode and the time for issuing the proclamation, in the English, Hindee, and Persian languages. He was supplied with suggestions, rather than strict instructions, how to deal with those Oudians who had been inveterate opponents of the government, but without being concerned in actual murder; how to regard those who had fought in the insurgent ranks, but shewed a willingness to surrender their arms; and how to draw a line between the chieftains on the one hand and their less responsible retainers on the other.
Such being the general character of the proposed proclamation and its accompanying letter, we proceed with the debate.
After the discussions on Friday the 7th of May, the conduct of the government underwent much discussion out of parliament; the supporters of Viscount Canning contending that the publication of the secret dispatch was unfair to that nobleman, even if the dispatch itself were defensible. On the 10th, the Earl of Shaftesbury gave notice of a resolution condemnatory of the publication; and Mr Cardwell gave notice of a similar resolution in the House of Commons. In the course of an irregular discussion, it appeared that the government had not received a single official dispatch from Viscount Canning since that which contained the draft of his proposed proclamation, and they were quite in the dark whether the proclamation had been issued, altered or unaltered. It also became known that the late president of the Board of Control, Mr Vernon Smith, had received a letter from Viscount Canning, stating that the proclamation would require an explanatory dispatch, which he had not had time to prepare.
On the next day, March 11th, parliament was surprised by an announcement that the Earl of Ellenborough, without consulting his colleagues, had resigned into the Queen’s hands his seals of office as president of the Board of Control. Amid the courteous expressions of regret on the part of the other ministers, at losing so important a coadjutor, it soon became evident that the publication of the secret dispatch had emanated from the Earl of Ellenborough, without the knowledge or consent of the Earl of Derby and the cabinet. He found that he had drawn them into trouble; and he resolved to take the whole blame on himself – resigning office to shield others from censure. There was a generosity in this which touched his colleagues. The Earl of Derby candidly admitted that there were parts of the secret dispatch which he could not quite approve, and that the publication of it was indefensible; but that he deeply regretted the resignation of the Earl of Ellenborough.
This will be the proper place in which to notice the celebrated dispatch fraught with such important consequences. On the 24th of March, after Viscount Canning’s proclamation had been penned, but long before any news concerning it could reach England, the Secret Committee wrote to him on the subject of the treatment of the rebels generally. The letter was virtually from the Earl of Ellenborough; although, on account of the absurd system of double government, it professed to emanate from a committee sitting in Leadenhall Street. The general character of this letter was noticed in a recent paragraph, and the letter itself is given in Note G; it may therefore be passed without further notice here. When, on the 12th of April, a draft-copy of Viscount Canning’s proposed proclamation reached England, the Earl of Ellenborough wrote the much-discussed ‘secret dispatch,’ purporting, as before, to come from the Secret Committee of the Court of Directors. A few days elapsed before the writing, and a few more before the forwarding, of this document. The earl148 expressed his apprehension that the proposed proclamation would raise such a ferment in Oude as to render pacification almost impossible. He declared his belief that the mode of settling the land-tenure when the British took possession of Oude had been in many ways unjust, and had been the chief cause of the general and national character of the disaffection in that province. He asserted that the Oudians would view with dismay a proclamation which cut them off, as a nation, from the ownership of land so long cherished by them; and would deem it righteous to battle still more energetically than before against a government which could adopt such a course of policy. He went through a process of argument to shew that the Oudians regretted the dethronement of their native king; that their regret ought to be at least respected; that they had never, as a nation, acknowledged British suzerainty; that they ought not to be treated as rebels in the same sense as the inhabitants of those parts of India which had long been under British control; and that the conflict in which they had engaged should on this account be regarded rather as legitimate war than as rebellion. The haughty and stinging portions of the dispatch were contained in the fifteenth and two following clauses or paragraphs; in which the earl, addressing the greatest British functionary in India, said: ‘Other conquerors, when they have succeeded in overcoming resistance, have excepted a few persons as still deserving of punishment; but have, with a generous policy, extended their clemency to the great body of the people. You have acted upon a different principle. You have reserved a few as deserving of special favour, and you have struck with what they will feel as the severest of punishment the mass of the inhabitants of the country. We cannot but think that the precedents from which you have departed will appear to have been conceived in a spirit of wisdom superior to that which appears in the precedent you have made.’
Such was the celebrated secret dispatch, the writing and promulgation of which led to the resignation of the Earl of Ellenborough. That resignation produced an exciting controversy in and out of parliament. As the offender, the president of the Board of Control, had sacrificed himself, was it necessary or desirable to make the ministry generally responsible for his supposed or alleged misdeeds? Party considerations speedily became mixed up with the discussion of this question. The Whigs had recently been displaced by the Conservatives, under circumstances that occasioned much irritation; and each party availed itself of the India controversy as a handle to be employed against the other. On the one side it was contended that Viscount Canning deserved praise rather than censure, for his untiring attention to the affairs of India during a troubled period; that, even if his proposed proclamation were injudicious, it was not right to publish the secret dispatch relating thereto, until he had explained the reasons for framing his proclamation; and that the ministers ought not to be shielded from blame simply on account of the resignation of their colleague. On the other hand, the ministers endeavoured to shew that this resignation ought to be taken into account; and when this failed, they took up the cause of the Oudians, contending that the inhabitants of that province were in a different category from the other natives of India.
When the great debates on this subject came on in both Houses, on the 14th of May, the ministers dwelt forcibly on the conduct of Mr Vernon Smith, who had received a letter or letters from Viscount Canning, which he ought, in the interests of the public, to have communicated to the government, but which he shewed only to members of his own party. It was urged – and the argument made a great impression both in and out of parliament – that if the Earl of Ellenborough had known of Viscount Canning’s intention to send home an explanation concerning the intent and scope of the proclamation, it might possibly have led to a modification of the secret dispatch, or even to an abandonment of it. In the House of Lords, the case against the government was argued by Lords Shaftesbury, Argyll, Somerset, Cranworth, Grey, Newcastle, and Granville; while the arguments on the other side were maintained by Lords Ellenborough, Derby, Carnarvon, Chelmsford, and Donoughmore. The Earl of Shaftesbury had couched his resolution in such a form149 as he thought was calculated to insure Viscount Canning fair-play whenever his intentions and proceedings should be really known. Without undertaking to defend the proclamation, in the absence of any proof whether that document had or had not undergone modification, he contended that the dispatch passed on the governor-general a cruel and unmerited censure; that this so-called ‘secret’ dispatch was evidently intended by its writer to be a public one, administering rebuke that should be known to all the world; that its publication was perilous, even seditious, inasmuch as it encouraged the people of Oude to persevere in rebellion, and virtually absolved them from all blame for their past conduct. The Earl of Ellenborough, in reply, defended every word of the dispatch; he insisted that it would be impossible to govern India peacefully even for a day, if the proclamation were acted on in its full spirit. He cared not for office; he resigned because he had unintentionally embarrassed his colleagues, not because he regretted any part of his conduct. The Earl of Derby, and other members of the cabinet, described the resolutions as a party manœuvre to overthrow the government; claimed an acquittal on the plea that their colleague had taken all the blame of the publication to himself; and complained that the governor-general had not sent one single letter to the new government, explanatory of his plans and motives. When the debate was ended, the result shewed a very close division – there being contents, 159, non-contents, 168; giving a majority of 9 for ministers.
Far more exciting and influential was the debate in the Commons on the same night. From the day when Mr Cardwell gave notice of his resolutions, the case was regarded as a serious one for the ministers; seeing that he was a distinguished member of an independent party in the House, and would be able to bring a large accession to the regular opposition votes. The very fact of the Earl of Ellenborough having resigned, seemed to afford proof that the publication of the dispatch, if not the writing of it, was disapproved by some of the ministers, and would weaken them in the approaching debate. Mr Cardwell’s resolutions,150 like those of the Earl of Shaftesbury, did not bind the House to any approval of the much-talked-of proclamation, whether issued or unissued; they related only to the unfairness of the dispatch in the absence of further news from India, and to the still greater unfairness of making the reproof contained in that dispatch patent to all the world. The members of the Whig opposition, and all who sided with them in the debate, adhered pretty closely to this line of argument; but the ministers and their supporters travelled much further. They felt that the only justification for the dispatch and its publication was to be found in the proclamation; and they therefore gave the proclamation as black a character as it could well receive. Viscount Canning was abused in round terms as a tyrant and spoliator; and those who supported him were accused of being influenced purely by factious motives in bringing forward the resolutions. The attack against the government was maintained by Mr Cardwell, Lord John Russell, Mr Vernon Smith, Mr Lowe, Colonel Sykes, and others, and resisted by the solicitor-general, Lord Stanley, Mr Baillie, &c. The debate was adjourned to the 17th, when it became evident that many of the independent members intended to support the government – partly because they disapproved of the Canning proclamation; partly because they suspected the Whigs of an intention to make this Indian question a stepping-stone to a return to office; and partly because they condemned the conduct of the late president of the Board of Control, in withholding Canning’s letter. This last-named circumstance told very seriously against the Whig party; the Conservatives made the most of it, and won over many adherents from among the independent members. Again was the debate adjourned, to the 18th. It now became still more evident that the division-list would present an aspect far different from that at first expected; the prophesied majority for the resolutions gradually fell, and the ministers began to look confidently to a decision in their favour. A new element had entered into the case. If the Derby ministry would have resigned office when beaten, there was a sufficient number of independent members ready to carry the motion against them; but as there was a threat of a dissolution, and as many seats would be endangered by a general election, self-interest became mixed up with patriotism. Another adjournment took place, to the 20th, on which day the House was addressed by Sir James Graham, Mr Bright, Sir R. Bethell, Mr Labouchere, and other members of influence. The current of debate set in very much in favour of the government. It transpired that many eminent men in India – including Sir James Outram, Sir John Lawrence, General Mansfield, and General Franks – had all in various ways expressed an opinion that Lord Canning’s proclamation, if issued in the form originally intended, would be productive of some mischief in Oude.
This, therefore, will be a convenient place in which to notice the officially recorded opinions of Outram on the subject – the only ones which were presented before the House in a formal and undoubted manner. The documents received from India shewed that Sir James entertained many misgivings concerning the proclamation and its probable tendency. The proclamation and its accompanying letter being sent to him from Allahabad, he replied on the 8th, in a communication151 pointing out to Viscount Canning the paragraphs which appeared to him mischievous. He declared his belief that there were not a dozen landowners throughout the whole of Oude who had not in some way or other assisted the rebels during the past struggle; and that, therefore, there would be hardly any exceptions to the sweeping confiscation proposed by the governor-general. He asserted most distinctly his conviction that, as soon as the proclamation should be made public, nearly all the chiefs and thalookdars would retire to their domains, and prepare for a desperate resistance. He expressed an opinion that the landowners had been very unjustly treated in the land-settlement after the annexation; that, apart from this, their sympathy with the rebels was an exceedingly natural feeling, under the peculiar circumstances of Oude; that it was not until the mutiny was many weeks old that they turned against us; that they ought to be regarded rather as honourable enemies than as rebels; that they would be converted into relentless enemies if their lands were confiscated, maintaining a guerrilla war which would ‘involve the loss of thousands of Europeans by battle, disease, and exposure;’ but that if their lands were insured to them, they would probably be more attached to British rule than ever they had yet been. It is evident that Sir James Outram had already discussed this subject with the governor-general, for he apologises for ‘once more’ urging his views upon his lordship. A brief reply152 was immediately sent to this letter, proposing a very slight increase of leniency in the treatment of the landowners, but leaving the general spirit of the proclamation untouched. Later in the month, the governor-general replied more at length to the arguments of Sir James. He admitted153 that the inhabitants of Oude were far differently placed from those of Bengal and the Northwest Provinces, in respect to allegiance to the British crown; both because the annexation had been recent, and because it had been no voluntary act on the part of the Oudians. But he would not admit that, on those grounds, the rebel thalookdars should be treated so indulgently as Outram proposed. He urged that exemption from death, transportation, and imprisonment, was a great boon, sufficiently marking the treatment of the Oudians from that of other natives. Without entering on the question whether the settlement of the land-claims had been unjust, he offered his reasons for thinking that that matter had not had much to do with the complicity of the thalookdars in the rebellion. He attributed this complicity mainly to ‘the repugnance which they feel to suffer any restraint of their hitherto arbitrary powers over those about them; to a diminution of their importance by being brought under equal laws; and to the obligation of disbanding their armed followers, and of living a peaceful and orderly life.’ He maintained that if Sir James’s suggestion were acted on, the rebels would be treated, not merely as honourable enemies, but as enemies who had won the day; and that this would be accepted by the natives as a confession of fear and weakness, encouraging them to regard rebellion as likely to be a profitable game. In short, Viscount Canning insisted on his proclamation being maintained in its chief features.
It was impossible that such a letter as that of Sir James Outram could fail, when made known, to exert a considerable influence in the House of Commons. The resemblance between it and the Earl of Ellenborough’s dispatch was very close, except in relation to discourteous and haughty language, which Outram neither did nor could use. On the 21st of May, after five nights’ debate, marked by speeches from almost all the eminent men in the House, the contest ended in a kind of drawn battle. Influenced by a great variety of motives, the opponents of the government urged upon Mr Cardwell the withdrawal of his resolutions. They did not wish to be compelled to vote. Some had been impressed by the recorded opinion of Outram, and the rumoured opinions of Lawrence and other eminent men in India; some disliked party tactics, even against their opponents; some were afraid of a general election, if their votes should lead to a dissolution of parliament. All the leaders of the Whig party joined in a wish to withdraw the resolutions; and this was done. The affair had, however, been so managed throughout as to give a good deal of triumph to the Conservative government, and to strengthen that government for the rest of the session.
What was the ultimate fate of the much-condemned proclamation, will remain to be shewn in a later page. Two further documents relating to this matter are given in Notes I and K.
Notes
The official documents referred to in this chapter are of so much importance, in reference to the political history of the Indian Revolt, and to the opinions entertained by public men concerning the feelings of the natives, that it may be well to present the chief of them in full. Owing to the length of time necessary for the transmission of letters between England and India, two or more of these documents were crossing the ocean at the same time, in opposite directions, and therefore could not exactly partake of the nature of question and answer. We shall attempt no other classification than that of placing in one group the documents written in India; and in another those written in London – observing, in each group, the order of dates.
A
The first document here given is a letter dictated by Viscount Canning when at Allahabad, and signed by his secretary, Mr Edmonstone. It was addressed to Sir James Outram, in his capacity of chief-commissioner of Oude, and was written at a time when the fall of Lucknow was soon expected:
‘Allahabad, March 3, 1858.
‘Sir – I am directed by the Right Honourable the Governor-general, to enclose to you a copy of a proclamation which is to be issued by the chief-commissioner at Lucknow, as soon as the British troops under His Excellency the Commander-in-chief shall have possession or command of the city.
‘2. This proclamation is addressed to the chiefs and inhabitants of Oude only, and not to the sepoys.
‘3. The governor-general has not considered it desirable that this proclamation should appear until the capital is either actually in our hands or lying at our mercy. He believes that any proclamation put forth in Oude in a liberal and forgiving spirit would be open to misconstruction, and capable of perversion, if not preceded by a manifestation of our power; and that this would be especially the case at Lucknow – which, although it has recently been the scene of unparalleled heroism and daring, and of one of the most brilliant and successful feats of arms which British India has ever witnessed – is still sedulously represented by the rebels as being beyond our power to take or to hold.