CHAPTER XXXV.

THE BATTLES OF ALIWAL AND SOBRAON.

1846.

Though the treaty which held the British and Sikh governments in amity provided that the Sikhs should send no troops across the Sutlej, they were permitted to retain certain jaghires, or feudal possessions, on the left bank, one of which comprised the town and fort of Dheerrumcote. Here the enemy had established a magazine of grain; and a small garrison, consisting of mercenaries, chiefly Rohillas and Afghans, were thrown into the place for its protection. But besides that the grain was needed in the British lines, the presence of a hostile garrison on his own side of the stream was an eyesore and an annoyance to the British general; and Major-General Sir Harry Smith was directed with a brigade of infantry and a few guns, to reduce it. He accomplished the service on the 18th of January without loss, or, indeed, sustaining a serious resistance; and was on his way back to camp, when tidings reached the commander-in-chief of a nature not to be dealt lightly with, far less neglected.

It was ascertained that the enemy had detached 20,000 men from their camp at Sobraon against Loodiana. Their objects were represented to be, not only the seizure of that place, but the interruption of the British communications with the rear, and, perhaps, the capture of the battering-train, which was advancing by Busseean; and Sir Harry Smith, being reinforced to the amount of 8000 men, received instructions to counterwork the project. His business was to form a junction with Colonel Godby, who, with one regiment of cavalry, and four of infantry, occupied Loodiana; and then, and not till then, to push the Sikhs, and drive them, if possible, back upon their own country.

Here again, the school in which he had been taught his trade was evidence in the conduct of the commander, who proved in his hour of trial that Peninsular instruction had not been thrown away. The Sikhs had already shut the garrison of Loodiana in; burned a new barrack, and ravaged the surrounding country. A creeping commander now would have been found wanting; but Smith was a man of different mettle, and, pushing rapidly on, a clean march brought him within twenty-five miles of Loodiana, and with the _réveil_, he resumed his movement next morning.

At Buddewal the enemy showed himself, occupying a connected line of villages in front, and covered by a powerful artillery. To gain his object and reach Loodiana, it was necessary for Sir Harry Smith to change his order of march, and while the Sikhs, who had already outflanked him, opened a fire of forty guns on the advancing columns, Smith massed his weak artillery, and under its concentrated and well-directed cannonade, broke into _échelons_, and threatened the Sikh front, the while making a flank movement by his right, protected en _échelon_ by the cavalry. Nothing could be more beautifully and successfully executed than this delicate manœuvre. Sir Harry carried his guns and baggage round the enemy--a small portion only of the latter passing into the temporary possession of the Sikhs.

Colonel Godby, who commanded the invested garrison, having seen the cloud of dust, moved from Loodiana; and marching parallel to the direction which it seemed to take, found himself in due time connected by his patrols with Smith’s advanced guard. Both corps upon this placed themselves with Loodiana in their rear, and the enemy before them; the latter being so circumstanced that the British army lay, as it were, upon one of its flanks. But Smith, though he had thus relieved the town, was unwilling to strike a blow till he could make it decisive. He, therefore, encamped in an attitude of watchfulness, waiting till another brigade should arrive, which, under the command of Colonel Wheeler, was marching from headquarters to reinforce him.

Colonel Wheeler’s march seems to have been conducted with equal diligence and care. He heard of the encounter of the 21st, and of its results; whereupon he abandoned the direct road to Loodiana, and following a circuitous route, went round the enemy’s position, without once coming under fire. He reached Sir Harry Smith’s camp in safety; and, on the 26th, Smith made his preparations to fight a great battle. But it was found, ere the columns were put in motion, that the enemy had abandoned their position at Buddewal, and were withdrawn to an intrenched camp nearer to the river, of which the village of Aliwal was the key, covering the ford by which they had crossed, and on which they depended, in the event of a reverse, as a line of retreat. Operations were accordingly suspended, and such further arrangements set going as the altered state of affairs seemed to require.

On the 27th, Runjoor Singh having been reinforced by Avitabile’s brigade, 4000 Sikh regulars, some cavalry, and twelve guns, found himself, as he had reason to believe, in a condition to deliver battle; and to intercept the Anglo-Indian communications, he advanced towards Ingraon, where, early on the 28th, Sir Harry Smith found himself in position. His right rested on a height, his left on a field intrenchment, while his centre held ground in the immediate front of the village of Aliwal (or Ulleéwal). The Anglo-Indian army amounted to some 12,000 men of all arms; the Sikhs doubled them in numerical strength, and that too was composed of the flower of their army.

The subsequent details of this glorious action may be rapidly described. Smith boldly advanced against the Sikh position, under a heavy cannonade, while the right brigades were getting into line. The advance was splendid--the British cavalry driving the Sikh horsemen on their infantry, forced the left back, capturing several guns, while on the left of the British line the Ayeen brigade (Avitabile’s) were deforced, and the village of Bhoondi, where the right of the Sikhs endeavoured to make a stand, was carried with the bayonet. A general rout ensued, the enemy pressing in confused masses towards the ford, while every attempt they made to rally was anticipated by a charge, and the destruction of the flower of the Sikh army was completed.

The firing began about ten in the morning; by one o’clock in the day the Sikh army was broken and routed, the ground covered with its wreck, and the Sutlej choked with the dead and the dying. The whole of the artillery, fifty-seven guns, fell into the hands of the victors, and the booty was immense; but the victors had neither time nor inclination to dwell upon their triumphs. There was no further danger to be apprehended here. Of the 24,000 men who, in the morning, threatened Loodiana, scarcely as many hundreds held together; and these, after a brief show of rally on the opposite bank, melted away and disappeared entirely. Having bivouacked that night, therefore, on the field which he had won, and sent in the wounded, with the captured guns, under sufficient escort, to Loodiana, Sir Harry Smith, with the bulk of his division, took the road to headquarters; and, in the afternoon of the 8th of February, came into position on the right of the main army, which was his established post.

In this most glorious battle, the Anglo-Indian army had 151 men killed, 413 wounded, and 25 missing--a loss comparatively small.

The immediate consequences of the victory of Aliwal, was the evacuation of the left bank of the Sutlej by the enemy. The Sikhs had sustained three terrible defeats; they had lost an enormous quantity of military _matériel_, 150 guns, and none could presume to estimate the number of their best and bravest troops who had been placed _hors de combat_. In hundreds the slaughtered and drowned victims at Aliwal floated to Sobraon with the stream; but still with a _tête de pont_ to secure their bridge communications with the right bank and the reserve there, formidable intrenchments, armed with seventy heavy guns, and 30,000 of their best troops (the Khalsa), they determined to defend them, boldly held their ground, and dared another battle.

On being rejoined by Sir Harry Smith’s division, and having received his siege-train and a supply of ammunition from Delhi, the commander-in-chief and the governor-general determined to force the Sikh position. Unopposed they gained possession of Little Sobraon and Kodeewalla, and both the field batteries and heavy guns were planted to throw a concentrated fire upon the intrenchments occupied by the enemy. Close to the river bank, Dick’s division was stationed to assault the Sikh right, while another brigade was held in reserve behind the village of Kodeewalla. In the centre, Gilbert’s division was formed, either for attack or support, its right flank appuied on the village of Little Sobraon. Smith’s division took ground near the village of Guttah, with its right inclining towards the Sutlej; Cureton’s brigade observed the ford at Hurree, and held Lal Singh’s horsemen in check; the remainder of the cavalry, under Major-General Thackwell, acting in reserve.

The British batteries opened a lively cannonade soon after sunrise, but guns in field position have little chance of silencing artillery covered by strong redoubts. At nine, the attack commenced by Stacy’s brigade of Dick’s division, advancing against the enemy’s intrenchments. The crushing fire of the Sikh guns would have arrested the advance of any but most daring regiments, but the brigadier pressed gallantly on, and while the British bayonet met the Mussulman sabre the camp was carried. The sappers broke openings in the intrenching mounds, through which, although in single files, the cavalry pushed, reformed, and charged. The Sikh gunners were sabred in their batteries, while the entire of the infantry and every disposable gun were promptly brought into action by Sir Hugh Gough.

The Sikh fire became more feeble, their best battalions unsteady, and the British pressed boldly on. Wavering troops rarely withstand a struggle when the bayonet comes into play, and the Khalsas broke entirely, and hurried from the field to the river and bridge. But the hour of retributive vengeance had arrived, and the waters of the Sutlej offered small protection to the fugitives. The stream had risen, the fords were unsafe, and flying from the fire of the horse-artillery, which had opened on the mobbed fugitives with grape shot, hundreds fell under this murderous cannonade, while thousands found a grave in the no longer friendly waters of their native rivers, until it almost excited the compassion of an irritated enemy.

At every point the intrenchments were carried. The horse artillery galloped through, and both they and the batteries opened such a fire upon the broken enemy as swept them away by ranks. “The fire of the Sikhs,” says the commander-in-chief, “first slackened, and then nearly ceased; and the victors then pressing them on every side, precipitated them over the bridge into the Sutlej, which a sudden rise of seven inches had rendered hardly fordable. The awful slaughter, confusion, and dismay were such as would have excited compassion in the hearts of their conquerors, if the Khalsa troops had not, in the early part of the action, sullied their gallantry by slaughtering and barbarously mangling every wounded soldier whom, in the vicissitudes of attack, the fortune of war left at their mercy.

At Sobraon, the final blow which extinguished the military power of the Sikhs, was delivered. Sixty-seven pieces of artillery, two hundred camel-guns, standards, tumbrils, ammunition, camp equipage--in a word, all that forms the _matériel_ of an army in the field, fell into the hands of the victors. In native armies, no regular returns of the killed and wounded are made out, but the Sikh losses were computed at 8000 men, and the amount was not exaggerated.

On the bloody height of Sobraon the Sikh war virtually terminated, for, on that evening, the Anglo-Indian army commenced their march upon Lahore. Frightfully defeated, and humbled to the dust, the once haughty chiefs sent vakeels to implore mercy from the conqueror. The ambassadors, however, were refused an audience, and it was intimated that the British generals would condescend to treat with none except the Maharajah in person.

Trembling for his capital, which nothing but abject submission now could save, the youthful monarch, attended by Rajah Goolab Singh, repaired to the British camp. Stringent terms were most justly exacted, and while the rich district between the Sutlej and the Beeas, and what were termed “the Protected States,” were ceded for ever to Britain, a million and a half sterling was agreed to by the Sikh durbar, as compensation for the expenditure of the war, while the Punjaub should remain in military occupation until the full amount should be discharged.