CHAPTER VII.1824-1825.Battle of Kykloo—Thantabain—Maha Bundoola—Successes of the British—Discomfiture of Maha Bundoola—Campbell marches into the interior—Arrival at Donabew—Repulse—Death of Bundoola—Capture of Donabew.
Battle of Kykloo—Thantabain—Maha Bundoola—Successes of the British—Discomfiture of Maha Bundoola—Campbell marches into the interior—Arrival at Donabew—Repulse—Death of Bundoola—Capture of Donabew.
October began very inauspiciously. Colonel Smith, with about eight hundred men, was detached against Kykloo on the 5th, and at Tadaghee he was successful against a stockade. It was not until he had reached this place that he found the enemy was much stronger than was suspected. The colonel immediately applied for reinforcements, but he obtained only native troops and two Europeans. Two howitzers were sent with the Madras troop, which increased the number of cannon to four. With this force, inadequate enough to anything effectual, Smith arrived before the Burmese stockades at Kykloo on the 7th of October.
The breastworks, which impeded the attack of the principal fortifications, were soon in the hands of the British. The principal stronghold was an intrenchment, with a fortified pagoda. Major Wahab was placed in charge of the storming party. Captain Wilson was directed to assault the stockades in flank; and a division of the 28th native infantry was to carry the pagoda; and Colonel Smith took charge of a reserve parity, to act wherever it was most needed.
On the advance of Major Wahab, a volley was fired from the pagoda; but the stockaded Burmese, who seemed to have been superhumanly cunningfor Burmese, waited until certain destruction might be dealt from their position, when they commenced firing with the greatest precision. Major Wahab and his men were obliged to lie flat on the ground to avoid the peppering. Like ill-fortune attended the efforts of all the other divisions, and on a retreat being sounded, the men took to flight. Theloss on this occasion was twenty-one killed, and seventy-four wounded. However, this reverse was counterbalanced by the success of Major Evans, at Thantabain, where the first minister of state, the Kyee Woongyee, was posted. After skirmishing with the war-boats on the river, the detachment arrived opposite the village, which, after a brisk fire, soon surrendered on the 8th of October. Next morning the principal stockade was attacked, and carried without any opposition. The Burmese having always carried off their dead, it was impossible to find out how many were killed in the encounter; but the place was riddled with shot, and a bungalow in the centre almost destroyed. The detachment returned home without the loss of a man.
Brigadier M’Creagh, too, speedily returned to the charge at Kykloo, and finding the place, he went on, and after doing much damage, he returned to Kykloo and Rangoon. “On their advance,” we are told, “they [the soldiers] had an opportunity of witnessing the barbarous character of the enemy, many of the bodies of the sipahis and pioneers, who fell in the former attack, having been fastened to the trunks of trees, and mutilated by imbecile and savage exasperation.”[301]
In such operations as these, many months passed away. Every successive encounter with the British troops gave the Burmese an additional hint that they must tax their energies to the utmost in order to bring about a tolerable issue. It might now be seen that the choicest troops of the empire must be opposed to the British invaders who had so coolly taken up their quarters among them; and in the secrecy with which they summoned Bundoola, the great general of the age, in their estimation, from Arakhan, they showed much diplomatic genius; for ere Sir A. Campbell knew he was coming, he was at Donabew, and actively employed in concentrating all the available force of Burmah and Laos. It was about the end of August when he left Arakhan, and in November everything was prepared for a vigorous effort. “No pains nor expense were spared to equip this favourite general for the field, and by the approach of the season for active exertions, it was estimated that fifty thousand men were collected for the advance upon Rangoon, who were to exterminatethe invaders, or carry them captives to the capital, where the chiefs were already calculating on the number of slaves who were, from their source of supply, to swell their train. Reports of the return of the Arakhan army soon reached Rangoon, but some period elapsed before any certainty of its movements was obtained. By the end of November, an intercepted despatch from Bundoola, to the governor of Martaban,[302]removed all doubt, and announced the departure of the former from Prome, at the head of a formidable host. His advance was hailed with delight, and preparations were made immediately for his reception.”[303]Gradually and slowly the Burmese posts were stretched close to Rangoon, Dalla, Kemendine, the Shoo Dagon to Puzendown creek, and no opposition was offered to their operations. By the end of December their careful and costly preparations were completed. On our part there was little fear. Determination was the ruling sentiment in every bosom, and extraneously there was also no want of protection by fortifications and shipping.
The enemy commenced by attacking Kemendine on the 1st of December, but were repulsed by Major Yates, and Captain Ryers, of H.M.S.Sophia; and though throughout an aggressive skirmishing was carried on, fatiguing our troops considerably, yet the advantage remained on our side. Fire-rafts, sent down in great numbers, had no effect, as our seamen were on the look-out.
From the 1st to the 5th constant sallies were made under able commanders, and many of the posts regained from the enemy. The Burmese showed no want of activity, yet, as a recent writer observes, “little harm was effected by this show of activity; but as the Burman force could no longer be permitted to harass the troops with impunity, and it was not impossible for them to escape from the consequences of a defeat, the commander-in-chief resolved to become the assailant, and terminate the expectations in which they had hitherto been permitted to indulge.”[304]Now, at length, had the time arrived when the primary intentions of the general might be carried out,—now, indeed, was that grand, resistless march to begin which findsno parallel in the history of any nation of modern times save our own. Sallies were continually made,—the men spared no nerve,—the officers no thought,—all was bent upon the grand idea of driving the enemy’s vast army back into me heart of the land whence it had come. First, the Burmese posts at Puzendown were takenau point de l’épéeby Majors Sale and Walker, the latter of whom fell during the contest,—then the division at Dalla was routed by Lieut.-Colonel Farrier and Lieut.-Colonel Parlby. Maha Bundoola himself began to be afraid of the redoubtable “foreigners,” and retired from the active direction of the battle-field, giving up the executive command to Maha Thilwa, formerly governor of Asam, who stockaded his troops four miles to the north at Kokein. Emissaries were now set at work to destroy Rangoon by fire, and half of it was burnt, including the official quarter of the Madras commissariat. It became necessary to dislodge this body, and it was accordingly done under the direction of General Campbell. In fifteen minutes the strong stockades were in the possession of the British, and thus fifteen hundred determined men put to the rout twenty thousand—for such, it appeared, was the enemy’s force—with only the loss of eighteen killed, though many were wounded. During these engagements the greatest terror was excited by theDianasteam-packet, by the aid of which many war-boats were captured. “The Burmans,” concludes Wilson, “no longer dared attempt offensive operations, but restricted themselves to the defence of their positions along the river; and the road was now open to the British army, which, agreeably to the policy that had been enjoined by the events of the war, prepared to dictate the terms of peace, if necessary, within the walls of the capital.”[305]
Maha Bundoola was so dispirited by the events of the last few days, that he retreated to Donabew again, and concentrated his forces at that place. His proud heart was broken, however, and he began to treat with the British residents at Rangoon; however, he would not make any direct advance to the officials, with whom alonea formal peace could be concluded. It was intimated to him that he should pursue such a course, but he returned no answer to the letter, probably feeling reassured by an accession of forces. The country being now clear, it appeared to Sir A. Campbell that an immediate advance should be made into the interior; and the arrival of H. M.’s 47th and some other reinforcements placed him in a position of being able to do so without fear of losing anything behind him. On the 11th of February, after the dispersion of the Burmese garrison in the fort of Syriam, the army was at liberty to move. All fear of insurrection on the part of the conquered provinces was at an end, as the Peguers, the principal inhabitants of the district, had deserted to the side of the British.
The preliminary movement of the army was the dislodgment of the advanced guard of the native army at Thantabain, which was effectually done by Colonel Godwin. This done, the army began its march in three divisions; one, under General Campbell himself, was to proceed by land, and left Rangoon on the 13th of February, 1825; the next went by water up the Irawadi, on the 16th; and the third, under the command of Major Sale, set out for Bassein, which it was proposed first to occupy, on the 17th. Brigadier M’Creagh stayed in garrison with the reserve of feeble or invalid men.
The water-column, after having taken and destroyed several stockades in its way, arrived before Donabew on the 6th of March; Brigadier-General Cotton immediately summoned the garrison to surrender, a summons which was of course useless. A party was then sent to reconnoitre; and though the Burmese poured a heavy fire upon our men, a complete knowledge of the neighbourhood was gained.
“The fortified post of Donabew was of considerable extent and breadth, situated on the right bank of the Irawadi, and commanding its whole channel. The main-work was a stockade parallelogram of one thousand by seven hundred yards, which was a little withdrawn from the bed of the river, on a bank rising above its level. The river face mounted fifty pieces of ordnance, of various sizes. The approach to the main structure from the south was defended by two outworks, one about four hundred yards lower down the river, and another about three hundred yards below it. Each was constructed ofsquare beams of timber, provided with platforms, and pierced for cannon, and was strengthened by an exterior fosse, the outer edge of which was guarded with sharp-pointed timbers, planted obliquely, and a thick abatis of felled trees and brushwood. The lowest outwork was a square of about two hundred yards, with a pagoda in the centre; the highest, of an irregular shape, running along the bank of a rivulet flowing into the main stream; both works were occupied with strong parties of the enemy.”[306]The first stockade was attacked by the six hundred men yet at General Cotton’s disposal (the rest being in garrison, or with the flotilla), and was gained by the loss of twenty of our men. The faithless Burmese fled, leaving two hundred and eighty of their comrades in the hands of the enemy. But at the second stockade, a determined resistance met the fatigued troops, already clogged and weakened by the care of the numerous prisoners. A destructive fire was opened on them, and the only safe course was in flight, or, as it is named to “ears polite,” in a retreat. General Cotton, therefore, receded to Yoong-yoon, where he awaited the answer to his account of the proceedings from General Campbell, who, in the mean time, had arrived at Yuadit, twenty-six miles above Tharawa. That answer was delivered by the general himself, who joined Cotton before Donabew by the 27th of March, after much vexation and toil.[307]Operations were immediately commenced; and notwithstanding numerous sorties (on one occasion, Bundoola himself headed his seventeen elephants and infantry), they advanced their works, and fatal were the effects of the mortars and bombs that were thrown into the thickly-peopled inclosure. The feeling of fear grew strong with the Burmese; and on the evening of the 31st, a soldier brought a laconic letter from Bundoola, couched in these terms:—“In war we find each other’s force; the two countries are at war for nothing, and we know not each other’s minds!”[308]It seemed from what the soldier knew of the matter, which was very little, that the Burmese general desired peace. Very doubtful is the authenticity of this letter, when compared with the spiritedreply seat to General Willoughby Cotton’s summons of surrender. “We are each fighting for our country, and you will find me as steady in defending mine, as you in maintaining the honour of yours. If you wish to see Donabew, come as friends, and I will show it you. If you come as enemies,Land!”[309]
On the 1st of April the batteries opened, and by the 2nd the enemy had decamped. It was discovered that Bundoola had met his death on the preceding day, by the bursting of a shell. All the courage of the Burmese warriors had fled with his departing spirit. The greatest general, since the golden days of Alompra, the devoted to Buddha; he had won his way to the most responsible position in the king’s service, only to be singled out, as it were, by some supernatural power, as the victim of the fireballs of the persevering islanders of the far-off ocean. No wonder, then, that the superstitious Burmese, on beholding the fate of their commander, gave themselves up for lost. What a mysterious power the English seemed to have of singling out the head of their army, and destroying him! So they fled, and the British became masters of Donabew, where they found much welcome supply of corn and military stores. Notwithstanding the momentary panic of the Avan government, it soon regained its customary arrogance. TheEdinburgh Reviewhas some remarks, which, though rather premature for our progress in the history, I shall here introduce.
“But blood and treasure might be still more unprofitably expended. The ignorance and arrogance of the court of Ava are almost beyond occidental credence. When its favourite general, Bundoola, invaded Chittagong, our southernmost district, at the commencement of the last war, he brought with him golden fetters to bind Lord Amherst withal; and had orders, after he had taken Calcutta, to march on to take London! Defeat after defeat seemed to produce little sobering effect upon the drunkenness of Indo-Chinese pride; the officers who were flying before our army in its advance upon the capital, and who must have felt the utter hopelessness of the contest, were obliged, as their intercepted letters vouched, to account in the most absurd manner for their inability to stop us; andthe unfortunate wretch who commanded the troops that made the last stand against us, at a place called Pagahm Mew, was trampled to death by elephants on his return with the news of his defeat. It was not until our army arrived within three days’ march of the capital that the king’s eyes appeared to be opened to any rational sense of his perilous situation; and there was evidence enough, before we evacuated the country, that the effect even of such severe discipline as the exaction of a million sterling towards the expenses of the war, and the cession of some of his most valued provinces, was not likely to be permanent.”[310]