FOOTNOTES:[1]Mungul Pandy was the first open mutineer executed at Barrackpore in April, from whose name, a common one among this class, the Sepoys came to be called "Pandies" throughout the war, a sobriquet like the "Tommy Atkins" of our soldiers.
FOOTNOTES:
[1]Mungul Pandy was the first open mutineer executed at Barrackpore in April, from whose name, a common one among this class, the Sepoys came to be called "Pandies" throughout the war, a sobriquet like the "Tommy Atkins" of our soldiers.
[1]Mungul Pandy was the first open mutineer executed at Barrackpore in April, from whose name, a common one among this class, the Sepoys came to be called "Pandies" throughout the war, a sobriquet like the "Tommy Atkins" of our soldiers.
CHAPTER III
THE SPREAD OF INSURRECTION
"The Sepoys have come in from Meerut, and are burning everything.... We must shut up," had been the last message flashed from Delhi by a young clerk, who was killed in the act of sending it. This news, kept secret for a few hours by the authorities, was soon startling the English stations, north and west, and was put out of doubt by reports of the fugitives, as they came to spread their dismay from various points. On this side, fortunately, reigned the energy and foresight which had so disastrously failed at Meerut. Lahore, the capital of the Punjaub, swarmed with fierce fanatics, who would willingly have emulated the deeds of their brethren at Meerut and Delhi. In the Cantonments, a few miles off, were four regiments of Sepoys, held in check only by a small force of Europeans. But here Mr. Montgomery, the Commissioner in charge, showed a prompt mastery of the situation. He at once assembled acouncil of the chief civil and military officers; and, not without doubt on the part of some of his advisers, resolved to disarm the dangerous regiments before they should be excited to the revolt they were already conspiring.
Next day, May 12, a ball was to be given at the Cantonments. Lest the Sepoys should take warning, it went on as if nothing were the matter; but many of the dancers must have been in no festive mood, at a scene to recall that famous revelry on the night before Quatre Bras. The officers had their arms at hand in the ball-room. Dancing was kept up till two in the morning; then at early dawn, the whole brigade was turned out on the parade-ground. The native regiments were suddenly ordered to pile arms. They hesitated in obeying; but the thin line of English soldiers confronting them fell back to reveal twelve guns, loaded with grape, behind which the infantry ramrods rang fear into their doubtful hearts. Sullenly they gave up their arms, 2500 Sepoys cowed before not one-fourth their number. At the same time, the fort in the city was made safe by the disarming of its native garrison. Picquets of Europeans were posted at various points, and arrangements made for defence against any sudden rising.
Similar bold and prompt measures to secureother stations, forts, and arsenals of the Punjaub, at once checked the spread of the mutiny in this direction, and afforded a base of operations for its suppression. But, on other sides, it ran through the country like wild-fire—here blazing up into sudden revolt; there smouldering for weeks before it gathered head; at one place crackling out almost as soon as kindled; at another resolutely trampled down by vigilant authority; elsewhere quickly growing to a conflagration that swept over the richest provinces of India, unchaining the fiercest passions of its mixed population, and destroying for a time all landmarks of law and order. Men had to show, then, of what stuff they were made. While some of our countrymen gave way before the danger, or even precipitated it through panic or indecision, others stood fast at their posts, and by proud audacity were able to hold the wavering natives to allegiance, and still to keep hundreds of thousands overawed before the name of English rule. Not seldom was it seen how mere boldness proved the best policy in dealing with a race tamed by centuries of bondage; yet, in too many cases, gallantry, honour, devotion to duty, fell sacrificed under the rage of maddened rebels.
It is impossible here to track the irregular progress of the revolt, or to dwell on its countlessepisodes of heroism and suffering. Pitiable was the lot of all English people in the disturbed districts, most pitiable that of officials who, obliged to expose their own lives from hour to hour, had to fear for wife and child a fate worse than death. At their isolated posts, they heard daily rumours of fresh risings, treasons, massacres, and knew not how soon the same perils might burst upon themselves and their families. For weeks, sometimes, they had to wait in sickening suspense, a handful of whites among crowds of dusky faces, scowling on them more threateningly from day to day, with no guard but men who would be the first to turn their arms upon those whose safety was entrusted to them. To many it must have been a relief when the outbreak came, and they saw clearly how to deal with false friends and open foes. Then, at a season of the Indian year when activity and exposure are hurtful to the health of Europeans, for whom life, through that sweltering heat, seems made only tolerable by elaborate contrivances and the services of obsequious attendants, these sorely-tried people had to fight for their lives, pent-up in some improvised stronghold, wanting perhaps ammunition, or food, or, worst torment in such a climate, water, till relief came, often only in the form of death. Or, again, it might be their chance to fly, sun-scorched,destitute, desperate, skulking like thieves and beggars among a population risen in arms against the power and the creed they represented. It should never be forgotten how certain natives, indeed, showed kindness and pity towards their fallen masters. We have seen that in some cases the mutinous Sepoys let their officers go unhurt; occasionally they risked their own lives to protect English women and children against the fury of their comrades. But one horrible atrocity after another warned the masterful race how little they had now to hope from the love or fear of those from whom they had exacted such flattering servility in quiet times.
Among the natives themselves, the excesses of the Mutiny were hardly less calamitous. Many, if not most, were hurried into it by panic or excitement, or the persuasion of the more designing, and their hearts soon misgave them when they saw the fruit of their wild deeds, still more when they considered the punishment likely to follow. Anarchy, as usual, sprang up behind rebellion. Debtors fell upon their creditors; neighbours fought with neighbours; old feuds were revived; fanaticism and crime ran rampant over the ruins of British justice. Towns were sacked, jails broken open, treasuries plundered. Broken bands of Sepoys and released convictsroamed about the country, murdering and pillaging unchecked. Tribes of hereditary robbers eagerly returned to their old ways, now that our police need no longer be feared. The native police, themselves recruited from the dangerous classes, were frequently the first to set an example of rebellion. Not a few native officials, it should be said, gave honourable proofs of their fidelity, through all risks, while the mass of them behaved like hirelings, or displayed their inward hostility.
The more thoughtful part of the population might well hesitate on which side to declare; some prudently did their best to stand well with both, in case of any event; but those who had much to lose must soon have regretted the firm rule of our Government. On the whole, it may be said that the princes and nobles, where not carried away by ambition or religious zeal, remained more or less loyal to our cause, having better means than the ignorant mob of judging that our power would yet right itself, though crippled by such a sudden storm and staggering like to founder in so troubled waters. But in Oudh and other recently-annexed districts, where the Zemindars and Talookdars, or chief landowners, had often been treated with real harshness in the settlement of revenue, this class naturally proved hostile, yet not more so than the poorpeasants, to whom our rule had rather been a benefit. The latter, indeed, acted in great part less like determined rebels than like foolish school-boys, who, finding themselves all at once rid of a strict pedagogue, had seized the opportunity for a holiday-spell of disorder; as with the Sepoys themselves, defection sometimes seemed a matter of childish impulse, and there would come a moment of infectious excitement, in which the least breath of chance turned them into staunch friends or ruthless foes. Except in Oudh, it may be said, the movement was in general a military mutiny rather than a popular insurrection, while everywhere, of course, the bad characters of the locality took so favourable an occasion for violence.
To gain some clear idea of what was going on over a region that would make a large country in Europe, it seems best to take one narrative as a good example of many. This means somewhat neglecting the rules of proportion required in a regular historical narrative. It will also lead to an overlapping of chapters in the order of time. In any case it must be difficult to arrange orderly the multifarious and entangled episodes of this story; and the plan of our book rather is to present its characteristic outlines in scenes which cannot always be shifted to mark the exact succession of events, but which will roughly exhibit the main stages of the struggle.
Let us, then, dismount from the high horse of history, to follow a representative tale ofPersonal Adventuresby Mr. W. Edwards, Magistrate and Collector at Budaon in Rohilcund, the district lying on the Ganges between Delhi and Oudh. Almost at once after the outbreak at Meerut, his country began to show signs of epidemic lawlessness. Just in time, Mr. Edwards sent his wife and child off to the hill-station of Nainee Tal; then it was ten weeks before he could hear of their safety. A British officer, of course, had nothing for it but to stick to his post, all the more closely now that it was one of danger. The danger soon began to be apparent. What news did reach him was of robbers springing up all round, Sepoys in mutiny, convicts being let loose; and amid this growing disorder, he stood the ruler of more than a million men, with no force to back him but doubtfully loyal natives, and no European officials nearer than Bareilly, the head-quarters of the district, thirty miles off. His best friend was a Sikh servant named Wuzeer Singh, a native Christian, who was to show rare fidelity throughout the most trying circumstances.
At the end of the month, he had the satisfaction of a visit from one of his colleagues, and good news of a small Sepoy force, under an English officer, on its way to help him. But this gleam of hope was soon extinguished. For the last time, on Sunday, May 31st, he assembled at his house a little congregation with whom he was accustomed to hold Christian services. In the middle of the night, a sowar came galloping as for his life, to report that Bareilly was up, that the Sepoys there were in full mutiny, and the roads covered by thousands of scoundrels released from the jail. His brother magistrate at once dashed off to his own post. Mr. Edwards thought it his duty to remain to the last, like the captain of a sinking ship.
In the forenoon a few white men and Eurasians gathered at his house for poor protection. He wished them to disperse, believing that each could better escape separately, while their sticking together would only attract attention; but the others seemed too much overcome by fear to act for themselves, and refused to leave him. The stifling day wore on in anxious rumours. In the afternoon, the native officer in charge of the treasury came to ask Edwards to join the guard there, assuring him with solemn oaths that the men meant to be faithful. He wasabout to start, when Wuzeer Singh earnestly entreated him not to trust them. He took the advice, and afterwards learned that these men had been waiting to murder him. They would not come to his house, for fear the plundering of the treasury might begin in their absence.
About 6 p.m. the mutineers from Bareilly arrived; and tumultuous shouts announced that Sepoys, police, prisoners and all had broken loose at Budaon. Now the magistrate might think of himself, all show of authority being gone. He mounted his wife's horse, that had been standing saddled all day, and rode off, accompanied by two European indigo-planters and a Customs officer. His Eurasian clerk and his family he was obliged to leave, as they had no means of conveyance but a buggy, and the roads were blocked. All he could do for them was to consign them to the care of an influential native who happened to come up; and, as luckily these people were almost as dark as Hindoos, they succeeded in hiding themselves, at all events for a time.
Mr. Edwards had not ridden far when he met a Mohamedan sheikh, who proposed to him to take refuge at his house, some three miles in another direction. He turned with this well-wisher; then, passing his own bungalow again,saw how in ten minutes the plundering of it had already begun, his servants being first at the work. Wuzeer Singh and another faithful follower accompanied him, carrying 150 rupees in their waist-bands; that was all he had in the world but his watch, revolver, a little Testament, and a purse which had just arrived from England as a birthday present, which he kept about him as a dear gift rather than for use. Such a man in the East is not used to carrying money, but trusts his servants to act as purse-bearers, who will not cheat him more than is the custom. A groom had been entrusted with a change of clothes; but he soon disappeared.
When the party reached the house where they had been promised shelter, one of the family came out, respectfully informing their leader that they would not be safe here, but they must go on to a village about eighteen miles off. Mr. Edwards was much annoyed at this inhospitable reception, which afterwards turned out a blessing in disguise, for presently a band of horsemen arrived in search of him, and he would probably have been murdered, if he had not now been on the way to that further refuge.
Till midnight the fugitives rode through by-ways and fields, and villages swarming with armed crowds, who let the Englishmen pass in silence under the convoy of their chief. He took them to a house of his in a small village, where, after thanking heaven for their escape, they lay down to rest on the flat roof. The magistrate, for one, weary and worn out as he was, could hardly close an eye after the excitement of such a day. Early in the morning, they were roused up by the sheikh, who told them they must cross the Ganges at once, as their enemies would soon be in pursuit. So they did, fired at by an excited crowd assembled for the plunder of a neighbouring village, whose bullets luckily did not come near them.
On the other side, they were received by a Mohamedan gentleman, who was the more civil to them, as he heard that two English officials, with a large body of horse, were in the neighbourhood to restore order. Edwards and his party joined their countrymen, but found that the main body of expected troops had mutinied and made for Delhi, while their escort of sixty sowars was in such a doubtful disposition, that they were glad to send most of them off on pretence of guarding a treasury, which these men at once plundered, and dispersed.
With twenty troopers, whose fidelity theyhad to trust, the Englishmen started for Agra, but soon turned back, the road being blocked by mutineers marching to Delhi. They hardly knew which way to take. A party of two hundred Sepoys was reported to be hunting them out. Their escort grew so insolent, that they thought best to dismiss these fellows to go where they pleased; then, for a moment, it seemed as if the troopers were about to fall on them, but after a short consultation turned and rode off. The Englishmen, having been twenty hours on horseback, came back to the village from which they had started.
But they could not be safe here, and after a day's halt determined to separate. The other two civilians made a fresh attempt to push on for Agra. Edwards would not desert his companions, encumbrance as they were to him, for local chiefs, who might be willing to shelter Government officers at some risk, in the hope of getting credit for it on the re-establishment of our power, were unwilling to extend their services to these private persons. He had received a message asking him to come back to Budaon, as the mutineers had left it, and things were comparatively quiet there. He afterwards understood this to be a snare, the Sepoys being much exasperated against him becauseless money had been found in the treasury than they expected. But now he decided to return with the three who shared his fortunes.
They had first to cross the Ganges. On regaining the house of a zemindar, who had been a friendly enough host two days before, they met with a colder reception, for meanwhile this native gentleman had heard the worst news of the spread of mutiny. He agreed to provide them with a boat, but it proved too small to carry their horses across. All they could get out of the zemindar was an evident desire to be rid of them, and he strongly recommended them to make for Furruckabad, sixty miles off, where, he said, no mutiny had taken place. Hearing that the other side of the Ganges was all ablaze with pillage and destruction, they saw nothing for it but to follow this advice.
They set out, then, by night, and passed by several villages without being molested. At daybreak they reached a large place, where they presented themselves to the chief proprietor, who was polite, but would hardly let them into his house, while a brother of his, drunk with opium, seemed disposed to shoot them on the spot. The chief did relax so far as to give them some breakfast, then packed them off under escort of five horsemen to the care ofa neighbour. Before leaving, he insisted on having a certificate that he had treated them well, a suspicious sign; and Wuzeer Singh overheard the escort saying that they were all to be killed. Putting a good face on the chance of having to fight for their lives, they reached a river-side village, where they were promised a boat to take them to Futtehgurh, the English station near Furruckabad. But instead of a boat, about the house in which they waited for it, a crowd of armed men appeared, with such menacing looks, that the Englishmen mounted and rode off, to find their way barred by a body of horse. They turned back. Then the crowd began to fire, and their escort at once galloped away. So did the Englishmen; but one of them, who rode a camel, fell into the hands of the mob and was cut to pieces.
The other three cleared a way for themselves, and rejoined their escort, who looked rather ill-pleased that they had escaped. Their leader, however, had shown some traces of pity, and now on Edwards appealing to him as a husband and a father, he undertook to save their lives if he could, and conducted them back to his master, who seemed sorry for what had happened, but would not keep them in the house beyond nightfall.
Disguised in native dress, their own clothes being burned to conceal all trace of their visit, they set forth again under the charge of two guides, and this time were more fortunate. Riding all night, once chased for their lives, at daybreak they reached the house of Mr. Probyn, Collector of Furruckabad, from whom they had a hearty welcome, but little cheering news.
The Sepoys at Futtehgurh had broken out, then had been brought back to their duty for a time, but could not be depended on. A large number of the Europeans had gone down the Ganges in boats to Cawnpore; others, among them Probyn's wife and children, were sheltered in a fort across the river, belonging to a zemindar named Hurdeo Buksh. Edwards was for going to Cawnpore, but that very day came the news of the rising there. After consultation with the officers at Futtehgurh, he agreed to accompany Probyn to Hurdeo Buksh's fort, where he found a number of acquaintances and colleagues living in great discomfort, and without much show of protection, in the dilapidated defences of this native stronghold.
Uncertainty and doubt reigned among these unfortunate people also. As the colonel of the Sepoy regiment at the station persisted in believing it staunch, and as some hopeful newsfrom Delhi seemed calculated to keep it so, after two or three days most of the refugees returned to Futtehgurh. Probyn, however, preferred to trust his native friend; and Edwards, though the others judged him rash, decided to stay with Hurdeo Buksh. Here he was now joined by the faithful Wuzeer Singh, who had been separated from him in that riot on the river bank, but had lost no time in seeking his master out with the money entrusted to him.
When two days more had passed, a band of mutineers arrived from another station, flushed with massacre, and this was the signal for the Futtehgurh regiment to rise. The Europeans had taken refuge in the fort there; outside its walls all was uproar, villagers and Sepoys fighting for the plunder. Hurdeo Buksh at once assembled his feudal retainers, a thousand in number, and dug out from various hiding places the guns which he had concealed on the English Government ordering these petty chiefs to give up all their ordnance. He explained to his guests that a body of mutineers was coming to attack the fort, led by a false report that the two Collectors had several lakhs of treasure with them. They must at once go into hiding in an out-of-the-way village, as he could not trust his followers to fight for them. The Englishmenwere unwilling to leave even such doubtful shelter as the fort offered, but when this Rajpoot chief gave them his right hand, pledging his honour for their safety, as far as in him lay, they knew he might be trusted, and consented to go.
Carrying their bedding, arms, and the Probyns' four little children, they crossed the Ramgunga, and reached the place where their quarters were to be, a filthy enclosure from which the cattle and goats were cleared out to make room for them. There at least they remained undisturbed; but after a few days were startled by sounds of heavy firing from Futtehgurh, where the Europeans were now being besieged in the fort. Contradictory rumours kept Probyn and Edwards in painful suspense, and when trustworthy news did come it was not assuring. The little force in the fort, some thirty fighting men, with twice that tale of women and children, could not hold out much longer. But several days and nights passed, and still the cannonading went on incessantly.
On the morning of the fifth day there was a sudden silence, which might mean that the attack had been given up, or that the resistance had been overpowered. Some hours later came fresh sounds of quick and irregularfiring from another quarter, further down the river. While our miserable refugees were asking themselves what this portended, a messenger from Hurdeo Buksh came to tell them that the English had during the night evacuated the fort and fled in boats, only to be discovered and pursued, so the shots they now heard must be the death-knells of their wretched countrymen. Still, however, came conflicting stories. At one time the boats were said to be out of range, then to have sunk. The firing ceased, to break out again for an hour towards evening. At last they heard that one boat had escaped to Cawnpore, but that another had grounded, most of the people on board being massacred or drowned.
It would take too long to trace all the further perils of Edwards and the Probyns, who for weeks to come remained hidden in a cow-house for the most part, owing their safety chiefly to the heavy rains, that after a time turned their place of refuge into an island. Their presence here had been betrayed, and the Nawab of Furruckabad kept pressing Hurdeo Buksh to give them up; but on the whole he proved a staunch protector, though more than once he seemed ready to get rid of so compromising guests. At one time, he had started them offby boat for Cawnpore, to certain death, as they believed; at another, they were to fly to Lucknow, disguised as natives, but that plan was frustrated by bad news of how things were going there; then again there was a design of smuggling them off to the hills; and once it was even proposed that they should abandon the children and take to the jungle. They were glad to be allowed to remain in their wretched shelter, where sometimes they durst not show themselves, or the rain kept them close prisoners. Poor Mrs. Probyn's baby wasted away for want of proper nourishment. When it died they had to bury it in the darkness, thankful to find a dry spot on which to dig a grave. Another of the children had the same miserable fate. The whole party grew thin and weak on their poor native fare. Two books they had, which were a great comfort to them, a Bible and a copy ofBrydges on Psalm cix.On the fly-leaf of the latter Edwards wrote a note to his wife at Nainee Tal, and had the joy of hearing from her that she and his child were safe. The natives who carried these communications did so at the risk of their lives; but the severity used to any one caught acting as messenger for the English, did not prevent more than one letter from reaching the refugees.
Their native neighbours, on the whole, were kind, at least not showing any hatred towards them. By and by both Hurdeo Buksh and his dependents began to exhibit more active friendship, a sign of the advance of the English troops to reconquer the districts deluged by rebellion. Finally, at the end of August, their miserable condition was relieved by a message from General Havelock, who had now reached Cawnpore. Thither they set out, running the gauntlet of fresh dangers on the river, and could hardly believe their good fortune when at length they found themselves safe among British bayonets. The whole story is a most moving one, and should be read in full in Mr. Edwards' book, to the interest of which this abridgment by no means does justice, since its object is rather to show the state of the country than to enlarge on individual adventures and sufferings.
One passage in his party's obscure experiences brings us back to the highway of history. More than a month after the fall of Futtehguhr, there had appeared at their refuge a tall, lean, spectral-looking figure, almost naked and dripping with water, in whom Edwards with difficulty recognized a young Mr. Jones, heard of by them as having escaped from the boats to another of Hurdeo Buksh's villages. There he had beenhiding ever since, and now, in his weak state, burst into tears at the sight of a countryman again and the sound of an English voice. From him they learned with horror all the particulars of the massacre that had been enacted within their hearing.
The little garrison of the Futtehgurh citadel had defended themselves till their ammunition was almost exhausted as well as their strength, while the Sepoys had begun to blow down their walls by the explosion of mines. Hampered by women and children, their only way of escape was the Ganges, that flowed by this fort. Early in the morning of July 3 they embarked in three boats to drop down the river. But their flight was soon discovered, and daylight showed them pursued by the bloodthirsty Sepoys. The swift current of the Ganges helped them so well that they might have got off safe but for the shallows that obstruct its channel. One of the boats soon grounded, and its people had to be transferred to another under fire. This second boat in turn, on which Jones now was, stuck fast on another sandbank opposite a village, the inhabitants of which turned out against it with matchlocks; and two guns opened fire from the bank. As the men were repelling this attack, and trying in vain to move off their heavy ark, there drifted down uponthem a boat full of Sepoys, who, after pouring in a deadly volley, boarded the helpless craft. Most of its passengers, not already killed or wounded, jumped overboard. What followed, as related by Jones to Edwards, makes a too true picture of that terrible time.
"The water was up to their waists, and the current running very strong; the bottom was shifting sand, which made it most difficult to maintain a footing, and several of those who took to the river were at once swept off and drowned. Jones himself had scarcely got into the water when he was hit by a musket ball, which grazed the right shoulder, without damaging the bone. At the same moment he saw Major Robertson, who was standing in the stream supporting his wife with one arm and carrying his little child in the other, wounded by a musket ball in the thigh. Mrs. Robertson was washed out of her husband's grasp and immediately drowned. Robertson then put the child on his shoulder and swam away down the stream. Jones, finding that he could do no more good, wounded as he was, determined to try to save his own life by swimming down the river, hoping to reach the leading boat. As he struck out from the boat, he saw poor Mr. Fisher, the chaplain, almost in the same position as Robertson, holding hislittle son, a beautiful boy eight or nine years old, in one arm, while with the other he supported his wife. Mrs. Fisher was swaying about in the stream almost insensible, and her husband could with great difficulty retain his footing.
"When Jones had got clear of the boat, he continued alternately swimming and floating for five or six miles, when just as it was growing dusk, he saw the leading boat anchored for the night. He reached it, much exhausted by swimming, and by the pain of his wound and of his back; which, as he was naked to the waist, had been blistered and made raw by the scorching sun. On being taken on board, he found that the only casualty which had occurred to this party since leaving Futtehguhr, was the death of one of the Miss Goldies, who had been killed by a grape shot from one of the guns on the bank near Singheerampore.
"Mrs. Lowis—who had maintained her fortitude throughout, and was indefatigable during the siege in preparing tea and refreshment for the men—immediately got him some brandy and water and food, and he was then able to acquaint them with the miserable fate of his own party, of whom he supposed himself to be the sole survivor. The boat remained anchored in the same spot all night. Towards morning a voicewas heard from the bank, hailing the boat. It proved to be that of Mr. Fisher, who, though badly wounded in the thigh, had managed by swimming a portion of the way, then landing and walking along the bank, to overtake the boat. He was helped on board more dead than alive, and raved about his poor wife and son, both of whom were drowned.
"At dawn they weighed anchor and proceeded down the stream; but very slowly, as there was no pilot or skilful steersman on board, and only the exhausted officers as rowers. Towards evening they became so exhausted that they made for a village on the Oudh side of the Ganges, in hopes of being able to procure some milk for the children and food for themselves. The villagers brought supplies, and did not show any ill-will or attempt to attack the party.
"The boat was so crowded with its freight of from seventy to eighty human beings, that Jones could find no space to lie down and sleep; he therefore determined, as he was quite exhausted, to go on shore and endeavour to get some rest. A villager brought him a charpoy, on which he lay down and fell fast asleep. He was roused by a summons from Colonel Smith to rejoin the boat, as they were on the point of starting; but finding himself very stiff and scarcely ableto move, he determined to remain where he was, as he thought he might as well die on shore as in the boat: in either case he regarded death as inevitable. He therefore sent back a message that he could not come, and begged to be left behind. Colonel Smith after this sent him two more urgent requests to join the boat, which at length departed without him. He slept till morning, when a poor Brahmin took pity on him and permitted him to remain in a little shed, where he was partially sheltered from the sun. There he remained unmolested by the villagers, and protected by the Brahmin, until he was permitted to join us."
In the absence of other surgery, Jones had a happy thought for treating his wound, which else might have killed him by mortification. He got a little puppy to lick it morning and evening, then it at once began to improve. But he was still in a sorry state when, wading and swimming all night over the inundated country, he managed to join Edwards' party.
Two of his companions, who had also escaped alive, were hidden in other villages without being able to communicate with each other. Three unhappy ladies and a child had been taken back captive to Futtehguhr. There, three weeks later, by order of the Nawab, who playedthe tyrant here for a time, they were blown away from guns or shot down by grape, along with some scores of native Christians, on whom the Sepoys thus wreaked the infuriation of their defeat by Havelock's troops. The first boat's crew had gained Cawnpore, only to be involved in its still more awful tragedy.
Before coming to that part of the story, let us turn from the provinces now deluged by rebellion, to see what was being done elsewhere to make head against such a torrent.
CHAPTER IV
THE CONFLAGRATION
On the second day after the rising at Meerut, Calcutta had been electrified by a telegram from Agra. The central government seemed at first hardly to realize the gravity of the crisis. But when further bad news came in, Lord Canning recognized that our Indian Empire was at stake, and began to act with an energy, in which his character and his inexperience of Indian affairs had made him hitherto wanting; and if to some he seemed still deficient in grasp of such perilous affairs, it may be said of him that he never lost his head, as did others whose counsels were more vehement. He looked around for every European soldier within reach; he called for aid on Madras and Ceylon; he ordered the troops returning from the war happily ended in Persia, to be sent at once to Calcutta; he took upon himself the responsibility of arresting an expedition on its way from England to make war in China, butnow more urgently needed for the rescue of India. Weeks must pass, however, before he could assemble a force fit to cope with the mutiny, while every English bayonet was demanded at a dozen points nearer the capital, and the Government knew not how far to trust its embarrassing native army.
All was confusion, suspicion, and doubt, when the first measures of precaution suggested by the danger might prove the very means of inflaming it. The practical question, anxiously debated in so many cases, was whether or no to disarm the Sepoys, at the risk of hurrying other detachments into mutiny, and imperilling the lives of English people, helpless in their hands. Most officers of Sepoy regiments, indeed, refused to believe that their own men could be untrue, and indignantly protested against their being disarmed—a blind confidence often repaid by death at the hands of these very men, when their turn came to break loose from the bonds of discipline. But one treacherous tragedy after another decided the doubt, sometimes too late; and where it was still thought well to accept the Sepoys' professions of loyalty, they were vigilantly guarded by English soldiers, who thus could not be spared to march against the open mutineers.
Paralyzed by want of trustworthy troops, LordCanning could do little at present but give his lieutenants in the North-West leave to act as they thought best—leave which they were fain in any case to take, the rebellion soon cutting them off from communication with the seat of Government. But there, most fortunately, were found men fit to deal with the emergency, and to create resources in what to some might have seemed a hopeless situation. At the season when the Mutiny broke out, English officials who can leave their posts willingly take refuge at the cool hill-stations of the Himalayas. General Anson, the Commander-in-Chief, had betaken himself to Simla, the principal of these sanatoriums, lying north of Delhi and of the military station at Umballa. Here the alarming news came to cut short his holiday. Naturally reluctant to believe the worst, he yet could not but order a concentration of troops at Umballa, where he arrived in the course of three or four days.
A more masterful spirit was already at work upon the scene of action, if not by his personal presence, through the zealous colleagues inspired by his teaching and example as a ruler of men. Sir John Lawrence, Chief Commissioner of the Punjaub, had also been recalled on his way to the hills, to find himself practically independent governor of that side of India. At once risingto the emergency, as soon as he had taken the first measures, already anticipated indeed by his deputies, for the safety of his own province, he saw that the one thing to be aimed at was the recovery of Delhi, the very name of which would be a tower of strength to the mutineers. The Commander-in-Chief's eyes were mainly open to the difficulties of such an enterprise; and the staff, fettered by red-tape, cried out upon the impossibility of advancing in the unprepared state of his army. Lawrence never ceased to urge that, with or without guns and stores, everything must be risked to strike an immediate blow at Delhi, which might check the spread of rebellion by restoring our lost prestige. His tireless subordinates did the impossible in collecting supplies and means of transport. Anson, urged to the same effect by the Governor-General as by Lawrence, doubtfully agreed to lose no time in carrying out their policy of a march on Delhi. This is not the only instance throughout the Indian Mutiny where the hesitations and weakness of military men were happily overruled by the resolute counsels of civilians. The ordinary precautions of warfare had often to be disregarded in the struggle now at hand.
The difficulties, indeed, might well have seemedappalling. At Umballa itself, an abortive attempt at mutiny had taken place on the fatal 10th. General Anson, who, like some other Queen's officers, had hitherto been apt to despise the Sepoys, now went to the other extreme in flattering them, and let their officers hamper him by a promise that they should not be disarmed. At his back, the fashionable station of Simla was thrown into panic by a disturbance among the Goorkhas posted there. Hundreds of English people fled to the woods and mountains in terror, till it was found that the Goorkhas could easily be brought to reason. They luckily showed no fellow-feeling with the Bengal Sepoys; and soldiers from this warlike mountain race served us well throughout the Mutiny. The native princes of the neighbourhood also gave timely help of their troops and by furnishing supplies.
Within a fortnight were gathered at Umballa three English infantry regiments, the 9th Lancers, and twelve field-guns, with one regiment and one squadron of natives whom it was not safe to leave behind. Carts had been collected by the hundred, camels and elephants by the thousand, and a numerous train of camp-followers, without whom an Indian army can hardly move. Ammunition was brought up from the arsenal at Philour, one of the Punjaub strongholds, securedjust in time to prevent it falling into treacherous hands. A siege-train, hastily prepared here, had to be escorted by Sepoys, who might at any moment break into revolt. The Sutlej, swollen with melting snows, threatened to break down the bridge by which communication was kept up with this important point; and, not two hours after the train had passed, the bridge in fact gave way. Then there were delays through unmanageable bullocks ploughing over heavy sands and roads deluged by rain. The first day's labour of twenty hours brought the train only seven miles on its long route.
Without waiting for it, on May 25, Anson advanced to Kurnaul, the rallying-point of the Delhi fugitives. But cholera, a feller foe than the Sepoy, had already attacked his soldiers. One of the first victims was the Commander-in-Chief, who died on the 27th, broken by ill-health and the burden of a task too heavy for him. Another kind of General, it was said by impatient critics, would have been in Delhi a week before. But this was easier to say than to do, and certainly the destruction of his small and ill-provided army, hurled forward without due precaution, might have proved the loss of India.
Anson was succeeded in command by SirHenry Barnard, an officer of Crimean distinction, who had been only a few weeks in India. His first acts showed no want of energy. Leaving the siege-train to follow at its slow pace, he moved upon Delhi at the end of the month, his men marching eagerly under the fierce June sun, in burning desire to avenge the slaughter of their country-people. And now began those cruel reprisals by which our victory was so darkly stained. Angry suspicion was all the evidence needed to condemn the natives, guilty and innocent alike, who, after a hasty show of trial, were often mocked and tortured before execution at the hands of Christians turned into savages. The Sepoy regiment which marched with the column from Umballa had to be sent away, to protect them against the suspicious resentment of their English comrades, as much as in anticipation of the treachery which soon displayed itself among them.
A few days' march brought together the main body and Brigadier Wilson's force from Meerut, which had lain there shamefully inactive for three weeks, but now did much to retrieve its character by two encounters under such a burning sun that the exhausted soldiers could not follow up their victory. The whole army numbered little over three thousand Englishmen, with whomBarnard pushed forward to where, five miles north of Delhi, a horde of mutineers lay waiting to dispute his advance, strongly posted at Budlee-ka-Serai.
Here on June 8th was fought the first important battle of the war. Nothing could resist this handful of British soldiers, terrible in their vengeful passion. Blinded by the glare, now choked by dust, now wading knee-deep in water, through all obstacles, the infantry dashed up to the rebel guns; the Lancers, having made a stealthy circuit, charged upon the enemy's rear; the field artillery took them in the flank; and they fled in confusion, pressed hard by the eager though jaded victors. On the Ridge without the city the Sepoys made another stand, but were again swept back from this strong position. After sixteen hours' marching and fighting, under a sun whose rays were almost as fatal as bullets, the English soldiers encamped among the burned quarters of the Cantonment, and from the Ridge beheld the domes and minarets of that famous city, which already they looked upon as regained.
But not next day, as they had fondly hoped, nor next week, nor for weary months, were they to pass the high red wall and heavy bastions that defiantly confronted them. Even had those walls lain flat as Jericho's, it were madness tohave thrown some couple of thousand bayonets into the narrow crooked streets of a city swarming with fanatical foemen, besides a Sepoy garrison many times the number of the assailants. Open still on all sides but one, Delhi was the rendezvous of bands of mutineers flocking into it from various quarters; from first to last it is said to have held forty thousand of them—a strange reversal of the rules of war, which require that a besieging force shall at least outnumber the besieged! Still, in the first few days, Barnard did entertain the notion of carrying the place by acoup de main, but allowed himself to be dissuaded, to the disgust of certain ardent and youthful spirits.
There was then nothing for it but to remain camped behind the Ridge, awaiting reinforcements and the coming up of the siege-train. In this position, the rear defended by a canal, and with a wall of rocky heights in front, our army was practically besieged rather than besieging. Their field artillery could make little impression on the walls, nearly a mile off, while the enemy's heavier guns sent shot among them night and day. So great was the want of ammunition that two annas apiece were offered for cannon balls, which natives risked their lives in picking up to be fired back into the city—balls which sometimescould hardly be handled by Europeans in the burning heat. Sunstroke struck them down as by lightning; half the officers of one regiment were thus disabled in a single day. The over-tasked force had often to fight all day and to watch all night. The enemy used his superiority of numbers by continual harassing attacks, in front, in flank, and at last in the rear. The day was a remarkable one which passed without fighting. In six weeks, twenty combats were counted. On the 23rd of June, the Centenary of Plassey, a particularly formidable assault was made, and repulsed after a long day's fighting, to the discouragement of the Sepoys, whom false prophecies had led to believe that this date was to be fatal to us. Now, as always, the skulking foe could never stand to face British bayonets in the open; but their stealthy onsets were favoured by the wilderness of tangled ravines, gardens, walls, ruins, tombs, thickets, and deserted houses, which gave them cover right up to our entrenchments.
Through the losses of these continual encounters, as well as through disease and exposure, our scanty force would soon have melted away, if reinforcements had not begun to come in towards the end of June. But now also came the rainy season, multiplying the ravages of fever and cholera. Poor General Barnard was so worn outby the strain of his almost hopeless task that he could neither eat nor sleep. Early in July he died, like his predecessor, of cholera. General Reed took up the command, but at the end of a week, finding the burden too heavy for his feeble health, gave it over to Brigadier Wilson, who at one time had almost retired in despair, and would probably have done so if not cheered and strengthened by one who, at a distance, was all along the moving spirit of this marvellous siege.
Sir John Lawrence it is, with his lieutenants, Montgomery, Herbert Edwardes, Neville Chamberlain, John Nicholson, who are on all hands hailed as foremost among the saviours of our Indian empire. The Punjaub, where Lawrence bore rule at this crisis, home of the warlike Sikhs, might have been judged our weakest point, yet he turned it into a source of strength. Our latest and hardest conquest as it was, conquerors and conquered had learned to respect one another as worthy foemen, while its manly population bore a contemptuous ill-will towards the rebel Sepoys, and, themselves divided between Sikh and Moslem, did not readily find common cause to make against the English. From this mingled population, Lawrence quickly began to enlist excellent soldiers, weeding out also the Punjaub Sepoys from the ranks of their East-country comrades,to form the nucleus of new corps. Punjaubees, Afghans, Pathans, all the most martial and restless spirits of the frontier, eagerly came forward for our service; and thus the very men from whom we had most to fear became serviceable allies in the time of need.
The old Sepoy regiments were for the most part disarmed one by one, some of them disbanded, as opportunity or suspicion counselled, yet not till more than one had made attempts at mutiny that ended ill for themselves. Lawrence, earnest in urging mercy when the time came for it, was resolute in trampling out the early sparks of disaffection. Forty mutinous Sepoys at once were blown away from the mouths of guns. The dangerous districts were scoured by a movable column under Nicholson, a man worshipped almost as a god by his Sikh followers. The Afghan frontier had also to be watched, lest old enemies there should take this chance of falling upon us from behind when our hands were so full of fighting in front. And at the same time it was necessary to keep a careful eye upon our new levies, lest they in turn should grow too formidable.
Fortunate it was that the neighbouring native princes proved friendly, lending the aid of their troops to keep the peace, or giving more substantial assistance to the representative of that power which they had learned to look upon as paramount. Lawrence, governing a population of twenty millions, cut off from communication with his superiors, was made by force of circumstances dictator of Northern India. Not for nearly three months did a message from Calcutta reach him by the circuitous way of Bombay. The generals in the field, though owing him no formal obedience, gave in to the energy of his character and the weight of his experience. The well-provided arsenals and magazines of the Punjaub, saved from the hands of the mutineers by his vigorous action, became now the base of supplies against Delhi. Thither he kept forwarding a continual stream of stores, transport, men and money, which he had to raise by somewhat forced loans among the rich natives. Thus, in spite of a painful ailment, in spite of his longing for home and rest, he throughout masterfully maintained the British prestige within his own boundaries, while ever pressing on the capture of Delhi, as the blow which would paralyze rebellion all over India. When the great enterprise seemed on the point of failure, as a last resource he sent Nicholson's column to the front, leaving himself with only four thousand European soldiers scattered among the millions of the Punjaub, for whom thatone man's strong hand was equal to a host of fighters.
Still the siege of Delhi dragged on its costly length. We must leave it for the meanwhile to see what thrilling and momentous scenes were being enacted in other parts of India, and to follow the preparations made for attacking the mutiny from the further side.
Calcutta was in a state of bewildered dismay, not to be calmed by official hopes for a speedy end to the insurrection, and soon increasing daily with worse and worse news from up-country. From Allighur, from Muttra, from Bareilly, from Moradabad, from Jhansi, from other points, one after another, came sickening tales of revolt and massacre, which would not lose in the telling. The only news of other places was an ominous silence. The great stations of Agra, Cawnpore, and Lucknow were presently cut off by a raging sea of rebellion. Rohilcund, old nursery of warriors, was overflowed, and the Doab, that fertile region between the Jumna and the Ganges, down whose thickly peopled valleys poured the irresistible flood of disorder. The tide rose to the sacred cities of Allahabad and Benares. Beyond, there were risings in Rajpootana. At Gwalior, the Maharajah's Sepoy contingent, after a time, broke away to play a considerable part incoming battles. Everywhere regiments, believed faithful, were going off like the guns of a burning ship.
The leaven of agitation naturally spread into the two other Presidencies, where the English officials could have no quiet rest till the danger in Bengal should be over. But the organization of the Madras and Bombay armies was not so dangerous for their rulers. Here men of various creeds and castes were more thoroughly mixed together in the ranks, which in Bengal had been allowed to consist too much of fellow-believers, and of cliques of the same family, caste or locality, turning every company into a clan animated by a common feeling apart from that of soldierly duty; nor, outside of Bengal, were the regiments permitted to be accompanied by squalid fakirs, to keep alive their superstitious zeal.
When Patna and Dinapore gave signs of commotion, not four hundred miles from Calcutta, the people of the capital might well look to see peril at their doors. They loudly accused Lord Canning as wanting to the exigency. He certainly seemed to go too far in trying to allay alarm by putting a calm face upon his inward anxiety. He forbore, as long as possible, to show distrust of the Sepoys in Eastern Bengal; he hesitated about accepting a contingent of Goorkhasoffered him from Nepaul; he delayed in letting the inhabitants arm for their own defence. Not for a month did he allow them to form volunteer corps, and at the same time was forced to disarm the Sepoys at the neighbouring stations of Dum-Dum and Barrackpore. But rumours of what the Sepoys there had intended were already at work, producing a panic through Calcutta, where one Sunday in the middle of June a great part of the Europeans and Eurasians hastened to barricade themselves in their houses, or fled to the fort and the shipping for refuge from an imaginary foe, while the poor natives lay hid, trembling on their own account, expecting quite as groundlessly to be massacred by the white soldiers. The ludicrous terror of this "Panic Sunday" will long be remembered as a joke against the Calcutta people, who only towards evening began to see they had nothing to fear. Next day their restored confidence was strengthened by the arrest of the King of Oudh, who held a quasi-state in his palace near the city, and whose retainers were believed to have been plotting, with the now harmless Sepoys at the neighbouring stations, for a great Christian massacre.
A day or two later, Sir Patrick Grant, Commander of the Madras army, arrived to assume command in Bengal. He did not feel himselfequal to taking the field in person, but made the fortunate choice of Brigadier-General Havelock to advance against the rebels, as soon as there should be an army ready to lead. The officer, who during the last months of his life was to burst forth as a popular hero, had passed obscurely a long life of eastern military service. In India, indeed, he was well known for the earnest piety which had leavened the ranks of his comrades. "Havelock's Saints," a name given in mockery, became a title of honour, when it was found that the little band among whom he preached and prayed so zealously were the best and most trustworthy soldiers of the regiment. By his superiors he had been recognized as a brave and intelligent officer; and he had served creditably in Burma, in Afghanistan, in the Punjaub, and in Persia, without attracting much public notice or rising to high command. Now, at length, this saintly veteran, all his life a careful student of the art of war, had the chance to show what he was as a general; but not till June 25 could he leave Calcutta, picking up as he went the scattered fragments of his force, which had been pushed on to meet immediate needs of succour.
A month earlier, Neill with the 1st Madras Fusiliers had gone on as forerunner of the helpthat would by and by be pouring in to the rescue of our imperilled countrymen. As far as Allahabad he could travel by railway, yet he did not arrive there for nearly three weeks, delayed through turning aside to repress mutiny at Benares, and by making grim examples to teach the cowering natives that the Britishrajwas still to be feared. At Allahabad he found his presence sorely needed by a handful of Europeans shut up in the fort along with a band of hardly controllable Sikhs. The mutiny here had been marked by painful as well as curious features. The Sepoys at first showed themselves enthusiastically loyal, giving every sign of affection to their officers, then rose against them in a sudden fit of cruel fury, immediately after volunteering, with apparent heartiness, to march against their comrades at Delhi. Seven or eight boy-ensigns were murdered by the regiment they had just joined. The rebels bombarded the locomotives on the new railway, which they took for mysterious engines of warfare. There were the usual sickening massacres of women and children. A general destruction had reigned without check, in which helpless Hindoo pilgrims came off almost as ill as the Christians at the hands of a Mohamedan mob. This short triumph ofdisorder was with terrible and too little discriminating justice chastised by Neill, stern Scotchman that he was. What between the mutineers and the British soldiery, the inhabitants of the district had cause to rue these troubles; and again our civilization was disgraced by a blind fury of vengeance. Neill was more successful in restoring order among the populace than in restraining his own soldiers, who gave way to excesses of drink that fatally nursed the seeds of cholera, when not a man could be spared from the trying task before them.[2]
By the end of June, Havelock reached Allahabad, to take the head of an army that hardly numbered two thousand fighters. Nineteen officers and men made all his cavalry. But such news here met him, he could not lose a day in flinging this small force among myriads of bitter foes, at whose mercy lay the lives of many Christian women and children. Yet it was no horde of undisciplined savages from whom he must wrest those hapless captives.Throughout the war, our troops had to face, at enormous odds of number, ranks trained and armed by ourselves, supplied from our own captured stores, and in a large degree led by the establishment of native officers whom we had taught how battles should be won. Never perhaps has it been so well proved, as by the result of this apparently unequal conflict, what advantage lies in pride and strength of race!