CHAPTER V.THE PUNJAUB.
SENT TUMBLING INTO A DITCH—SIR HOUSTON STEWART—ORDERED TO ENGLAND—FEARFUL ACCIDENT ON H.M.S. BELLEISLE—LISBON—CHOLERA—A MAGNIFICENT REGIMENT—THE ‘ULYSSES’—A SCOTCH CAPTAIN—A LONG FAREWELL TO ENGLAND—CAPE PIGEONS—THE ALBATROSS—ARRIVAL IN INDIA—PERPLEXING NEWS—OUR POSITION IN INDIA—SERVANTS—ORDERED TO THE PUNJAUB—AGRA—INSTALLATION OF THE STAR OF INDIA—SHOWERS OF METEORS—DURBAR.
SENT TUMBLING INTO A DITCH—SIR HOUSTON STEWART—ORDERED TO ENGLAND—FEARFUL ACCIDENT ON H.M.S. BELLEISLE—LISBON—CHOLERA—A MAGNIFICENT REGIMENT—THE ‘ULYSSES’—A SCOTCH CAPTAIN—A LONG FAREWELL TO ENGLAND—CAPE PIGEONS—THE ALBATROSS—ARRIVAL IN INDIA—PERPLEXING NEWS—OUR POSITION IN INDIA—SERVANTS—ORDERED TO THE PUNJAUB—AGRA—INSTALLATION OF THE STAR OF INDIA—SHOWERS OF METEORS—DURBAR.
CHAPTER V.
During the siege of Sebastopol, the Connaught Rangers formed one of the left brigade, light division, the other regiments being the 19th and 77th. There was an officer belonging to the 19th who was a pure Scotchman. On being asked why he joined such a thoroughly English regiment as the 19th, he gave as his reason that his father was very old and his writing not distinct, and he had applied for his son to be appointed to the 79th Highlanders, but he had made the 7 so like a 1 that the authorities had gazetted him to the 19th.
When the final attack was made upon Sebastopol, the light division formed the storming party and supports. After running across the intervening ground between the trenches and the Redan, two hundred and eighty yards, and gettinginto the ditch and up on to the salient of the Redan, a check took place, and officers and men got no further. Some time elapsed, all the ammunition was expended, and no more was to be got. The Russians soon found this out, and charged us. The consequence was we were all sent tumbling over into the ditch which we had previously crossed. I fell flat among some poor fellows who never rose again, and my feelings of disgust were great when the above-mentioned officer put his foot—like a fiddle-case—in the centre of my back, and made use of me as a stepping-stone to get out of the ditch. I got out some way or other, and found myself, with many others, hurrying to our trenches, where I arrived in a very tattered condition. The first officer I met was my Scotch friend, who appeared greatly surprised to see me, and greeted me warmly, saying,
‘Maxwell! is that you? I thought you were dead. Have a drink,’ producing a flask, at which I was delighted to have a pull.
The siege was over, another winter had passed in luxury compared with the one that had gone before, summer was coming again, and theSebastopol heights were clothed with flowers, which hid both shot and shell beneath their green leaves. Peace was made, and we were all dreaming of home.
I was paying a visit to Sir Houston Stewart, in his flagship, theHannibal, commanded by my old friend, Sir John Hay. We had a most pleasant party, among whom was Sir Henry Bernard, a genial and agreeable companion. He now lies in his grave in front of Delhi. A man-of-war, theBelleisle, was reported as having arrived, and it was decided that the 88th Regiment should return to England in her. I was ordered to telegraph to the regiment, and next day they embarked. We were all in the greatest spirits. I bid adieu to the kind admiral and all friends in theHannibal, and proceeded on board theBelleisle. A fatigue party of the regiment was engaged at the capstan when a fearful accident happened. I cannot tell what the cause of it was, but I believe the man who watched the chain neglected his duty. I can only state, however, what occurred. All of a sudden the chain ran out with great velocity, round went the capstan, and out flew the bars like porcupinequills. I was standing on the poop, and one of the capstan bars hit me on the face and marked me for life; but, far worse, a soldier, named Burke, who had been all through the siege, was killed outright. Another man had his leg broken, and others were wounded severely. Sir Houston Stewart telegraphed home that the accident had occurred, and that I was all right. I am glad he did so, for my brother had received the telegram, before he read in a Scotch paper that I was killed.
As we sailed away from Kamiesch Bay theHannibalmanned the yards, and the officers and men of the Connaught Rangers loudly cheered farewell as we left the shores of the Crimea for ever. We were towed by H.M.S.Firebrand, commanded by a most agreeable officer, Captain the Honourable Spencer, whom it has never been my fortune to meet since those days.
TheFirebrandremained with us till we arrived at the coast of Portugal, when she left us, owing to cholera being very bad on board her. We touched at Malta and Gibraltar, and anchored at the mouth of the Tagus. As cholera was raging at Lisbon, we were not allowed to land,but Captain Hoskins, our commander, asked me to accompany him in a sail in the cutter to Belem and Lisbon. We paid a visit to a man-of-war lying off the latter place, and met a young artillery officer on his way home from the Crimea. He was in great spirits, and had a dog he had brought with him from Sebastopol. He wanted me to land at Lisbon, and laughed a good deal when I informed him that we were not allowed to do so, owing to the prevalence of cholera. He said he had been often in the town, and was always quite well. We returned, however, to theBelleislewithout landing.
Next morning, before putting to sea, Captain Hoskins received some letters from Lisbon, and startled us very much when he announced the death from cholera of that young officer we had met the day before. In process of time we arrived at Portsmouth. It was home-like to see once more the gay yachts skimming about between Cowes and Ryde; for it was the summer season. We landed, and were ordered to Aldershot, where we had the honour of parading before Her Majesty the Queen—two thousand strong. What a grand regiment might have been pickedout of these splendid men! but most of them were discharged. The Indian Mutiny then broke out, but the best part of these warriors had been sent out of the service, and we bitterly felt their loss.
We came home in July, 1856, and in July, 1857, the Connaught Rangers embarked for India in course of relief.
When the 88th went out to India in 1857, as before mentioned, it was for the usual relief, and not in consequence of the mutiny; for, when we left the shores of Britain on the 9th of July, the terrible facts of the insurrection were unknown to us. I was in command of the left wing, which embarked at Portsmouth on board the good shipUlysses, to proceed round the Cape to Calcutta. TheUlysseswas a fine sailing vessel, chartered by Government to carry troops; her usual passengers being emigrants. The captain was a worthy Scotchman, but his ideas of comfort were limited. The morning we embarked, my brother having come to see me off, I asked him to breakfast on board. There was bread, and tea, and a bowl of boiled eggs, but no milk or butter. My brother took an egg and broke the shell, itwas bad; he took another, it was worse; so he gave it up as a bad job, but the captain encouraged him to go on by saying, ‘Crack awa, crack awa, ye’ll soon come to a good yin.’ I was obliged to make a report to the proper authorities, and the worthy man was enlightened as to the fact that officers of Her Majesty’s regiments in those days were not to be treated like emigrants; and for the future we were fed in a cleaner and more wholesome manner. At Spithead we bade adieu to relations, friends, and acquaintances. And thirteen years passed away before I again looked upon the fair Isle of Wight and England’s shores.
Our honest skipper, although quite unaccustomed to deal with gentlemen passengers, was a very kindly man. Evidently, in his former voyages, he had seen many a disagreeable quarrel among his emigrants, for he was very much afraid of any unpleasantness occurring. I proposed starting a newspaper, to be called theUlysses Gazette, which was to come out every Saturday, in which anyone who pleased might write an article.
The old captain looked alarmed.
‘Ye won’t, colonel, have any pairsonaylities, I hope,’ was his timid remark.
TheGazettecame out, and was a great success. Some of my brother officers established a school on board, which was well attended by the men. We had a very good time, and all the officers were most friendly. I cannot say the same for the soldiers’ wives (there were no ladies on board), who appealed to me sometimes as colonel on subjects regarding which my legal knowledge was not sufficient to instruct or help them.
When our ship came to a certain latitude we were surrounded day and night by Cape pigeons, graceful, white angels they looked in the pale moonlight, but most unpleasant birds when brought on board, as they immediately became vulgarly sick. Albatrosses soared above, and sharks followed us. When we were in the latitude of the Cape, the sea was the finest spectacle I ever saw. It ran mountains high, but it was as if oil had been poured on its surface. Our vessel rose up to the summit of one of those unbroken hills, and then glided down the other side, just to rise up again. It was a wonderful sight.
In the month of November we anchored off the Sandheads, having left England on the 9th of July, and never having sighted land the whole way till we saw the shores of India. We now received the astounding intelligence of all the horrors of the mutiny, and the perplexing news that Delhi was taken. Taken by whom? We had been so long at sea we knew nothing. In a day or two we landed at Calcutta, and our gallant ship, which had brought us safely out, was wrecked on her way home. Fortunately, however, the captain and crew were saved.
When the Connaught Rangers first landed at Calcutta the great shock of the mutiny was being severely felt. Very few of us knew anything about the ways of the country, and we were, so to speak, cast adrift in a foreign land. We had great difficulty in procuring anything. I shall not enlarge on these troubled times. The generation that lived through them is passing away, and with them is fading the intense bitterness that the fearful atrocities of Cawnpore called forth—so utterly forgotten now that I read books that make high-minded remarks on the unforgivingspirit that actuated us in those days. It is better to forget; but the retribution was not too heavy for the crimes committed.
In this country good or bad servants seem a very minor consideration; not so in India, where comfort is so essentially in the hands of domestics. One of our greatest difficulties in landing was procuring any. All the good servants had vanished, and for some time we were obliged to be satisfied with a very inferior lot. One of my brother officers got a man called Paul, a miserable little man, who was always getting drunk. When we marched to Cawnpore after the capture of Calpee, a great many men of the regiment got fever, and, among other officers, Paul’s master was very ill. The wretched servant got drunk in the bazaar, and was made a prisoner—at least, so it was supposed, for he did not return to his master, and no one knew what had become of him. Time went on and my brother officer got better, andpour passer le tempseither rode or drove into the town of Cawnpore to look at the place still stained with the blood of its victims. Either by chance or from a desire to see the sepoy prisoners, my friend arrived at the kotwallee or guard-housewhere these mutineers were incarcerated, and, to his great dismay, he saw among these ironed rebels a wretched little man, who shouted: ‘Me Paul! me poor Paul!’ Much surprised, he went to the kotwal and asked why the man was among the rebels, but could get no satisfactory reply. On explaining matters that most probably Paul had been locked up for drunkenness, and not rebellion, he got him released, as one of the policemen grimly observed, ‘just in time, for he would have been hanged in to-morrow’s batch.’
Paul left Cawnpore without much delay.
The story of the mutiny has been told over and over again. In time it was stamped out, but for a long period distant murmurings were still heard like those of a thunderstorm fading away. Gradually the air cleared, and Marochetti’s ‘Angel of Peace’ was placed on the Cawnpore Well. Beautiful flowers began to grow in a garden where once women and children were dragged to their death, and writers at home began to publish books to prove that all the horrors, murders, and atrocities were caused by the fault of the white inhabitants of India. So I pass over that sad and nearly forgotten time, and, leaping over severalyears, come to the year 1860, when the 88th Connaught Rangers proceeded to the Punjaub.
In the autumn of 1866 the Connaught Rangers, which I had then the honour to command, was ordered to proceed from Cawnpore, where we had been stationed for some time, to Rawul Pindee in the Punjaub. We were directed to halt, on our way up country, at Agra, to form part of a large camp there, to be assembled for the grand durbar to be held in honour of the installation of the Star of India. All the rajahs, princes, and begums of the empire were to be present, to meet Lord Lawrence, governor-general.
On our arrival at Agra, we found a very large force collected. We were nearly all under canvas, and so also were the princes of India, with their numerous retinues. The governor-general came into Agra the day after our arrival there, and from that hour the cannons of the fort and batteries had a hard time of it. As every prince went to wait on the viceroy a salute was fired, and, according to the number of rounds fired, we inferred the rank of the great man who sallied forth to cross the plain, followed by his marvelloussuite of elephants, carrying gorgeously mounted howdahs, warriors riding on prancing pink-nosed horses, with tails and legs deeply dyed with red, to represent the blood of their enemies, down to the tag-rag and bobtail that are inseparable from the courts of those native princes.
The durbar was a magnificent sight. There we saw gathered together most of the great powers of India; the Begum of Bhopaul, our steady friend, men that had done us good service during our evil times, and others who had done us as little as they could. All had been rewarded, as far as possible, according to their works. Each noble vied with his neighbour in the number and beauty of his ornaments, and the rays of the sun blazed on priceless jewels.
But our stay at Agra was not a period of idleness. Reviews and sham battles kept the troops occupied from hour to hour. I had command of a brigade, and often left my tent before the dawn, when night still darkened all around, and the stars alone lit up the sky. It was during the month of November, and the fall of meteors was constantly to be seen; their appearance as theyfell in dazzling brightness being most startling and sublime. From all parts of the compass they came. First a long stream of light, which reminded me of the ‘bouquets’ the Russians sent us during the siege of Sebastopol, and then a ball of fire, which burst like a rocket, leaving all in darkness again. And so it continued till the sun rose in its splendour, and the air became full of noisy life.
As a variety to our military morning work, there were various large dinners, given by the governor-general and the commander-in-chief. There were dances also. The Rajah of Jeypore entertained us all at a splendid ball, and Scindia illuminated the Taj. We should have enjoyed our halt at Agra very much had not that dreadful curse, cholera, invaded the camp, and caused the loss of several valuable lives. One night my wife alarmed me by assuring me that she felt very ill. The medicine-chest was in our other large tent, where my wife’s maid slept, at some distance from the one we were occupying. I got hold of my bearer, and, writing a note, dispatched him with it to M’Kay, the maid. After somedelay, she appeared, very lightly clad, with my note in her hand, saying, ‘A man had come a long way with this, and wanted the colonel to get it at once.’ Her knowledge of Hindostani was limited, and she had not recognised the bearer.