Part 6

Mr. Robertson, Lieutenant-Governor of the north western frontier, and George Clerk, already mentioned, had counselled from the first prompt measures, not of retreat, but reprisal. At their earnest request Colonel Wild had been moved up to Peshawur with four native infantry regiments, the 30th, 53rd, 60th and 64th, but without guns. It was supposed he could procure them from the Sikhs, and with a great deal of trouble he did manage to procure four ricketty guns, which seemed likely to do as much harm to his own men as to the enemy, and one of which broke down the next day on trial. Reinforcements were coming up, which it was probable would contain artillery, but Wild did not dare to wait. His Sepoys were anxious to advance; the loyalty of the Sikhs was doubtful, and he feared the contamination might spread. On January 15th he commenced operations.

The key of the Khyber Pass, as we have all heard more than once within the last few weeks, is the fortress of Ali Musjid, occupying a strong position some five miles down the pass, and about twenty-five from Peshawur. It had been recently garrisoned by some loyal natives under an English officer, Mackeson; but, straitened for provisions, and hard pressed by the Khyberees, it was doubtful whether the brave little garrison could hold out much longer, and on the night of the 15th the 53rd and 64th Regiments, under Colonel Moseley, were despatched with a goodly supply of bullocks to its relief. The fort was occupied without loss, but the bullocks, save some 50 or 60, had meanwhile disappeared, and there were now more mouths to feed in Ali Musjid and less wherewith to feed them. Wild was to have followed with the other two regiments, his Sikh guns and Sikh allies, on the 19th, but when the time came the latter turned their backs on the Khyber and marched to a man back to Peshawur. The Sepoys met the enemy at the mouth of the pass, but the spirit of disaffection seemed to have spread. After an irresolute and aimless volley they halted in confusion: in vain Wild and his officers called on them to advance; not a man moved; the guns broke down, and one of them, despite the gallant efforts of Henry Lawrence, had to be abandoned. One of our officers was killed, and Wild himself, with several more, was wounded; the retreat was sounded, and the column fell back on Jumrood. The two regiments which held the fort had soon to follow their example. They could have held the post for any time indeed, so far as mere fighting went, but they had no provisions, and the water was poisonous. On the 23rd, then, they evacuated their position, and after a sharp struggle, in which two English officers fell, and some sick and baggage had to be abandoned, made good their way back to their comrades. Such was the state of affairs Pollock found on his arrival at Peshawur.

Despite urgent letters received from Jellalabad the General saw that an immediate advance was impossible. The morale of the defeated Sepoys had fallen very low; the hospitals were crowded with sick and wounded, and there was still an insufficiency of guns. Reinforcements of British dragoons and British artillery were pressing up from the Punjab, and Pollock decided to wait till he could make certain of success. He decided well; nor was the time of waiting lost. He visited the hospitals daily, cheering the sick, and reanimating by his kindness and decision the wavering and disheartened Sepoys. On March 30th the long-desired reinforcements arrived, and orders were at once issued for the advance.

At three o'clock on the morning of April 5th the army moved off from Jumrood to the mouth of the pass. It was divided into three columns; two of these were to crown the heights on either side, while the third, when the hills had been sufficiently cleared, was to advance through the gorge; each column was composed of a mixed force of Europeans and Sepoys; four squadrons of the 3rd Dragoons and eleven pieces of artillery accompanied the centre column. The attack was as successful as it was ingenious. A huge barricade of mud and stones and trunks of trees had been thrown across the mouth of the pass, while the heights on either side swarmed with the wild hill-tribes. So quietly, however, did our flanking columns advance, that they were half-way up the heights before the enemy became aware of the movement. From peak to peak our men, English as well as Sepoys, clambered as agile as the mountaineers themselves, pouring from every spot of vantage a steady and well-directed fire on the disconcerted Khyberees, who had never dreamed that the white-faced infidels could prove more than a match for them in their own fastnesses. Then Pollock with the main column advanced. The Afghans, finding themselves out-flanked on either side, gradually withdrew; the barricade was removed without loss; and the huge line of soldiers, camp-followers, and baggage-waggons passed unopposed on its victorious way to Jellalabad. The dreaded Khyber Pass had been forced with the slightest possible loss of life, and the boastful Afghans beaten at their own tactics. On the 16th Jellalabad was reached. With what intense delight Sale's noble brigade saw once more from their walls the colours of a friendly force may well be imagined. For five weary months the little band had resisted every offer of surrender, and beaten back every assault. In February the fortifications that had been raised and strengthened by Broadfoot with infinite labour were destroyed by an earthquake; and at that very time they learnt that Akbar Khan was advancing on them. The works, however, were restored, and in a dashing sortie, commanded by Dennie, the Afghan chief, with the flower of the Barukzye Horse, was driven from his position without the loss of a single man to the garrison. A few days before Pollock arrived a still more daring enterprise had been attempted. On April 5th another sortie in force was sent out under Dennie, Monteith, and Havelock, which bore down on the Afghan camp, and sent Akbar Khan flying with his 6000 men far away in the direction of Lughman--a dashing exploit, and a complete victory, but dearly won, for it was won at the cost of the gallant Dennie. The meeting between the two armies was, wrote Pollock to a friend, "a sight worth seeing;" according to Mr. Gleig the band of the 13th went out to play the relieving force in, and the entry was performed to the tune of "Oh, but ye've been lang o' coming."

Still there was plenty yet to be done, if only the English soldiers might be allowed to do it. At first it seemed doubtful whether Lord Ellenborough, who had succeeded Lord Auckland in February, would be more willing to sanction a forward movement than was his predecessor. On his first landing, no one could have been more eager than he to avenge the humiliation of Cabul, but as he went up the country his opinions began to suffer a change. Soojah had been murdered about the very time that the Khyber Pass was forced, by the treachery of a son of Zemaun Khan (a faithful friend to the English, by whose good offices the English captives were still living in safety, if not in comfort); his son Futteh Jung had been nominally appointed to succeed him, but his government was no more than a farce. Jealous of each other, and jealous particularly of the rising power of Akbar Khan, it was plain that the Afghan Sirdars would never rest till the strength and popularity of Dost Mahomed was once more among them to restore and maintain order. Was it not better to accept the inevitable, to withdraw our troops, now that it could be done with comparative honour, and to leave the country to its own king and its own devices? It was doubtful how much longer the brave Nott could maintain himself in Candahar, and the force that had been sent out from Sindh under England to relieve him had been beaten back at the Kojuck Pass; Ghuznee, after a stubborn resistance, had fallen, and the British officers sent prisoners to Cabul. Lord Ellenborough cannot be blamed for hesitating at such a crisis; but the urgent prayers of Pollock, Nott, and Outram at last prevailed, and orders were given that the military commanders might use their own discretion, while they were at the same time warned that failure meant the inevitable fall of the British Empire in the East. The responsibility was gladly taken, and the advance commenced which was to retrieve, as far as it was possible to retrieve, the shame of all former failure.

The advance was an unbroken series of victories. England, reinforced with some British troops, had moved out again from Quettah, cleared the Kojuck Pass, and joined Nott at Candahar. With a force now raised to a strength equal to that which lay at Jellalabad, Nott, resolute to "retire to India" by way of Ghuznee and Cabul, lost no time in setting to work. Dividing his troops, he took with him the 40th and 41st Regiments of the Line, and the "beautiful Sepoy" Regiments that had stood by him so well, and despatched the rest back to India in charge of England, in whose hands also he placed Prince Timour, whom, after his father's death it was alike dangerous to take to Cabul or to leave at Candahar. About the same time Pollock, with 8000 men of all arms, including the 31st Regiment of the Line and the 3rd Dragoons, moved out from Jellalabad on the Khoord-Cabul Pass, that blood-stained theatre of an awful tragedy. The enemy were in force at Jugdulluck, but Pollock, employing the same tactics that had been so efficacious among the Khyber hills, sent out flanking parties to clear the heights, while from below his guns kept up a hot fire of shells on their position. The Ghilzyes fought bravely, but they could not stand against the English troops in open fight, and with as little loss as in his first engagement Pollock led his men into the pass. Seven miles within, in the little valley of Tezeen, Akbar Khan, with 16,000 of his best troops, resolved to make one last throw for victory. He threw and lost. While the English Dragoons met and broke the charge of the Afghan horse, the English infantry, gallantly seconded by the Sepoys and Ghoorkahs, pressed up the heights under a heavy fire. Sale himself led the advanced column; Monteith and Broadfoot and McCaskill followed. Not a shot was fired by the stormers; thick and fast flew the bullets among them from the long Afghan jazails, but not an English musket answered. The work was done with the bayonet, and driven from crag to crag by that "beautiful weapon" alone, the enemy fled in confusion, till amid the ringing cheers of the whole British force the British flag waved on the highest pinnacle of the pass. This was Akbar Khan's last attempt; leaving his troops to shift for themselves, he fled northward to the Ghoreebund Valley; Pollock, over the crumbling skeletons of the comrades whom he had so worthily avenged, led his men in triumph to Cabul, and the British ensign once more flew from the heights of the Bala Hissar.

On September 15th Pollock reached Cabul, and on the 17th he was joined by Nott. After a slight check to the cavalry of his advanced guard, at an early period of his march, the latter's success had been as complete as Pollock's. At Ghoaine he had utterly routed a superior force of the enemy under Shumshoodeen Khan. Ghuznee had been evacuated before even our preparations for the assault were completed; the works were dismantled and blown up, the town and citadel fired, and the famous sandal-wood "gates of Somnauth," which, according to Afghan tradition, had adorned their famous Sultan's tomb for upwards of eight centuries, carried off in accordance with Lord Ellenborough's expressed desire. At Syderabad, where in the previous November Woodburn and his men had been treacherously massacred, Shumshoodeen turned again; the stand was stubborn and for a while the issue seemed doubtful; but the news of the defeat at Tezeen had spread, the Afghans lost heart, and abandoning their position left the way for Nott clear into Cabul.

The honour of the British arms was at last complete; 15,000 British troops were encamped in the Afghan capital, and from every quarter round submission was pouring in. Ameen-oollah Khan, who held out to the last, had been utterly routed in the Kohistan by a force under McCaskill, and Akbar Khan had also intimated his wish to treat for terms. The miserable Futteh Jung, who had already once been forced to fly for his life, was formally installed on his throne, but as formally warned that he was to expect no further aid or protection. The prospect before him was too much for his weak and timorous mind, and, in truth, it was far from a pleasant one; after a few days' nominal rule, he voluntarily resigned a crown which he would never have been able to keep, and Shahpoor, a high-spirited young boy of the Suddozye House, was seated in his stead.

Two things had yet to be done. The captives were to be recovered, and some unmistakeable mark of British retribution was to be stamped on Cabul.

Before Akbar Khan took the field for the last time he had despatched all the English hostages, together with the prisoners from Ghuznee, towards the Bamean frontier, under Saleh Mohamed. Pollock immediately on reaching Cabul had sent Sir Richmond Shakespeare, with a party of horse in hot haste after them, and subsequently a stronger force under Sale. Before, however, the rescue arrived the prisoners had effected their own deliverance through the medium of Saleh Mohamed's cupidity. On a promise, duly drawn up and signed by Pottinger, Lawrence and three others, of a heavy bribe, the Afghan had consented to escort them not to Turkestan and slavery, as had been intended, but back to the English camp, and it was at Kaloo, on their way down to Cabul, that, after more than eight months' daily expectation of death, they once more found themselves among English friends and safe under the English flag. Despite the many hardships and anxieties they had undergone, their health, even of the women and children, had been marvellously preserved, and their condition had, on the whole, been far better than any they could have hoped for when they exchanged the certain dangers of the retreat for the uncertain security of Akbar Khan's word. Two only of the little band that had turned their backs on the miseries of the Khoord-Cabul Pass were missing when they rode into Sale's camp, amid the cheers of the men and a salute of welcome from the guns. John Conolly, mourned by all who knew him, had died at Cabul a few days before the march for Bamean began, and in the previous April, after Pollock's victory had heralded the triumph which was to atone for the disasters that the British arms had experienced under his command, poor Elphinstone, after days of intense suffering in body and mind, and bewailing to the last that he had not been permitted to die with his men, passed away amid the affectionate sympathy of all his fellow-prisoners. His body was sent down to Jellalabad, and there interred with military honours in the presence of his victorious successor.

To set the seal of our triumph on Cabul it was determined to destroy the great Bazaar, where the mutilated body of Macnaghten had been exposed to the insults of his murderers. It had been first intended to demolish the citadel, but the Suddozye chiefs pleaded so earnestly for this last remnant of their royalty, that Pollock consented to spare it. During two days, October 9th and 10th, the work of destruction went on, and though every precaution was taken to prevent any farther loss beyond that ordered, and particularly any excess on the part of our soldiers, many suffered, and there was much excess. On the 11th the homeward march began. Futteh Jung had implored the safe conduct of the British from a kingdom where he was no king, and from subjects with whom his life was not worth an hour's purchase, and with him went for the second time into exile his blind old grandfather Zemaun Shah. By the Khoord-Cabul and Khyber Passes, the scenes of so much misery and such grievous humiliation, the victorious army returned in triumph to Hindostan, and ere Ferozepore was reached they heard that the last of the Suddozye line had fled, that Akbar Khan had seized the throne in trust for his father, and that Dost Mahomed himself was even then on his way through the Punjab to resume his old dominion. And so the English army left secure on the throne of Afghanistan the dynasty they had spent so many millions of treasure and so many thousands of lives to overthrow.

LONDON: GILBERT AND RIVINGTON, PRINTERS, ST. JOHN'S SQUARE, E.C.

Transcriber's Notes

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

Inconsistent hyphenation fixed.

P. 22: He proceded to Teheran -> He proceeded to Teheran.

Pp. 19 (twice), 57: Dost Mohamed -> Dost Mahomed.

P. 30: to be be applied -> to be applied.

P. 32: five brigades of of infantry -> five brigades of infantry.

P. 33: Burnes with with him -> Burnes with him.

P. 51: you own terms -> your own terms.

P. 85: salutatations were exchanged -> salutations were exchanged.