Part 16

=Hodson's Daring Feat.=--But the king and his family had taken refuge in Humayon's Tomb, about 7 miles from the city, and Hodson, the daring Captain of the Light Horse bearing his name, determined to capture him. Taking only fifty men, he essayed one of the most daring feats on record. With his little band he rode along the rebel-infested road to the tomb where, in the gigantic marble dome, the King and his two sons had concealed themselves; for two hours he parleyed with the intermediaries of the decrepit King, undismayed by the thousands of retainers who guarded him. At last the old man, on promise of his life, surrendered, and Hodson marched off before the wondering natives with his royal prisoner. There yet remained the two sons of the King, whose conduct in torturing English prisoners had made them notorious. They had barbarously slaughtered innocent women and hapless children, and Hodson determined that they should also become his prisoners. On September 21st he and his second in command, Macdowell, with 100 men rode off to effect the capture of the princes, who had 6,000 or 7,000 armed followers at their command. Reaching Humayon's Tomb, he demanded their surrender, but they at first refused to submit unless their lives were promised. Hodson calmly refused, and then they came forth with 3,000 armed men. But the daring Hodson interposed his troopers between the bullock-cart in which the princes were riding and the armed men, sent forward the princes with an escort of troopers, and then--calmly ordered the retainers to lay down their arms! Having collected them, Hodson quickly said to Macdowell "We'll go now," and then rode off with his troop. Overtaking the princes, he found that a crowd appeared to be threatening the troopers in charge of the cart, and fearing that he might lose them and that the ends of justice would be defeated, he ordered the princes to strip, and, after stating the nature of the crimes they had committed, shot them with his own hand. Brave, gallant, and daring Hodson was prepared to take the consequences which he fully appreciated, and, convinced that he was right, did not flinch from moral censure any more than he had from physical consequences when he sallied forth with a handful of men to capture the King and his bloodthirsty sons. With the fall of Delhi the back of the mutiny was broken, but it had cost the besiegers a loss of 3,854 killed, wounded, and missing.

=Defence of Lucknow.=--The neighbourhood of Lucknow, however, remained in possession of the mutineers, although over the Residency

"Ever upon the topmost wall our banner of England flew."

For several weeks Lucknow had been in a state of unrest, and then at 9 o'clock on the night of May 30th, 1857, the smouldering fire broke into flame. Sir Henry Lawrence, that stalwart, cool northern Irishman, as just and firm as he was unselfish, had but 700 Europeans in a city of 700,000, of whom 7,000 were sepoys. He did not lose heart, but quickly and steadily made preparations for the defence of the place; he knew he could rely upon the Sikhs and a small number of the sepoys--700 actually remained true to their salt during the siege; he made no error in his calculations, and took few chances. He turned the Residency into a fortress, and generally prepared for the worst, while his sense of humour and his smiling face gave no sign of the stern practical heart within him. He was, as he said, "virtually besieging four regiments--in a quiet way--with 300 Europeans," while he resided "in cantonments guarded by the gentlemen" he was besieging!

On June 30th he decided to "blood" the native troops, and he accordingly sent half a dozen guns with sepoy artillerymen in the little force of just over 800, of whom only 336 were Europeans, to meet the mutinous regiments which were marching upon the city from Eastern Oude. The estimated force was 5,000; it turned out to be 15,000, and when they were encountered at Chinhut the Sikh horsemen bolted, and the artillerymen disabled and deserted their guns. The fates generally went against the bold step that Lawrence had taken. The remnants of the little band had to retire in face of the great moving mass of mutineers; "regiment after regiment of sepoys steadily pursued towards us," and the 32nd who had gone into battle--300 foodless and badly armed men--were reduced to a skeleton, 5 of their officers and 112 men being killed. Lawrence returned with his straggling men to Lucknow; it was one of the few mistakes which the hero of Lucknow made, but he saved the survivors of the desperate fight by a masterly stroke in placing empty guns upon the iron bridge (the ammunition was exhausted), and with gunners standing beside them with lighted port-fires stayed the advance of the victorious sepoys. The time for desperate action had arrived. On July 1st he blew up the Mutchee Bhawan with its 1,000,000 cartridges and 250 barrels of gunpowder, and concentrated upon the Residency, and there for eighty-eight days, with a force of 927 Europeans and 700 sepoys, made one of the most famous defences in history. And there, despite the supreme efforts of the mutineers to shoot it down, the British flag was only temporarily out of position when the staff was shot away, and so

"Ever aloft on the palace roof the old banner of England blew."

On July 2nd Sir Henry Lawrence was mortally wounded, and died on the 4th; then Brigadier Inglis took command of the troops. During the defence the populace of 3,000 and the troops were harassed by cholera, smallpox, and an indefinable disease, but the spirit of the troops remained undaunted until Jessie Brown's keen Scots ears heard the far-off skirl of the bagpipes of the 78th, Outram's Highlanders--"the saviours of India"--and Havelock, marching into Lucknow on September 25th, reinforced, as well as relieved, the brave garrison which still had, for another six weeks, to hold the Residency against 60,000 mutineers.

The original defenders of the Residency were 535 men of the 32nd, 50 of the 84th, with 89 artillerymen, and 100 British officers whose native regiments had mutinied, and 153 civilians who took up arms to assist the regulars; and these, with 700 sepoys, undeterred by "the terrific and incessant fire by day and night," had for eighty-eight days defied not less than "8,000 men firing at one time into the position."

=Relief of Lucknow.=--Havelock, having rested his men after the advance on Cawnpore, followed up the Náná Sáhib, destroyed his palace and stronghold at Bithoor, and then with his tiny force, which was daily lessening through wounds and disease, marched towards Lucknow. He attacked Oonas _en route_, and passed through it, despite the 15 rebel guns which guarded the only road; pushed past the opposition at Busserut Gunge, but with a loss of 88 officers and men killed and wounded; then in despair, owing to his enfeebled force, Havelock started to return to Cawnpore. On reaching the Ganges the mutineers made a determined attack upon the little force, but the 78th, Ross-shire Buffs, dashed at the enemy's guns, and, as Havelock said, saved themselves and their comrades. Retracing his footsteps, Havelock was not aware that he had unconsciously helped the besieged in Lucknow by drawing off the rebel force to meet him, thus giving the garrison breathing-space in which to strengthen the fortifications and increase its stock of provisions. After a four-days rest the undaunted Havelock again set out for Lucknow with 1,300 men, but again meeting with opposition at Bithoor, and although the enemy was defeated, he decided to return to Cawnpore and await reinforcements. The 5th and 90th Regiments arrived early in September, five companies of men came in to make up for the terrible losses of the 78th, and then Sir James Outram, the "Bayard of India," arrived to take command of the Cawnpore and Dinapore divisions, but chivalrously delegated the command to Havelock "in gratitude for the brilliant deeds of arms achieved by General Havelock and his gallant troops." The relieving force consisted of the 1st Brigade--5th Fusiliers, 84th, and 100 men of the 64th under Brigadier-General Neill; 2nd Brigade--78th Highlanders, 90th (Perthshire) Light Infantry, and Brasyer's Sikhs under Colonel Walter Hamilton of the 78th; 3 batteries of artillery under the dauntless Maude, "Hell-fire Jack" Olpherts, and brave Vincent Eyre; 109 volunteer cavalry and 59 native cavalry under the dashing Barrow.

Crossing the Ganges on September 19th and 20th, the relieving force of 2,500 men attacked the enemy at Mungulwah on the 21st, and, although an obstinate opposition was met with, defeated the enemy and captured a couple of guns. Pushing forward, drenched by heavy rains for three days and through quagmires of mud, the badly fed little force came upon the enemy, 12,000 men, entrenched on the outskirts of Lucknow at the Alambagh, but after the artillery had opened fire the 78th Highlanders and the Fusiliers rushed the position, and in ten minutes the mutineers were flying in all directions. "The petticoated devils" were too much for them. After a day's rest, leaving 300 sick men to hold the place, the army advanced towards the Residency, and through a storm of shot gallantly rushed the Charbagh bridge, leaving the 78th as a rear-guard to hold it, which they bravely did, although stormed at by rifles and field pieces. The column then pushed on to the Kaiser Bagh, or King's palace, taking in reverse the battery which had been firing on the main body; and then the Highlanders, followed by the Sikhs and Fusiliers, made a desperate effort to reach the Residency. For three-quarters of a mile, with desperate and dauntless courage, the men pressed forward through a street in which from every housetop, door, and window a relentless hail of bullets poured upon them. In this grand advance Brigadier Neill fell, shot through the head, but the troops pushed on, and then through the embrasure by the side of the battered archway of the Baillie Guard they pressed. The picture has often been painted of the big rough-bearded soldiers--those stern but soft-hearted Highlanders--seizing the little children out of their mothers' arms and "kissing them with tears running down their cheeks." The relieving column lost over 700 men by death or wounds, or nearly one in four of its total complement of 3,000.

=Defence Continued.=--As I have stated, the relief of Lucknow was also a reinforcement, and those who relieved the garrison, continued its defence for nearly fifty days, and survived the war, were awarded the clasp for the Defence of Lucknow.

Havelock, having relieved Lucknow, did not deem it advisable to take the risk of escorting the women and children and non-combatants through the thousands of sepoys who still encircled the Residency, so for six weeks the garrison, under Outram, kept the enemy at bay, until Sir Colin Campbell, the cool and daring Scots veteran of the Peninsular War, fresh from the Crimea, who was ready at the age of sixty-five to take up the arduous duties of Commander-in-Chief in India, prepared for the final relief. He landed at Calcutta on August 13th, but through delays, largely occasioned through want of transport, he could not start out on the march to Lucknow until November 9th. Three days later he had under his command 4,700 men, a number of whom had been engaged in the siege of Delhi; detachments of the 4th, 5th, and 23rd Fusiliers; a wing of the 53rd, a number of the 82nd, and the 93rd Highlanders 1,000 strong, 700 wearing the Crimean medal; remnants of the war-worn 8th King's (Liverpool) Regiment; the 75th (now 1st Gordons); a heavy battery Royal Artillery; Bengal Horse and Field Artillery; two squadrons of the 9th Lancers; Hodson's Horse; a squadron each of the 1st, 2nd, and 5th Punjab Cavalry; 2nd and 4th Punjab Infantry; detachments of Bengal and Punjab Sappers and Miners; and the Naval Brigade with 8 guns under Captain Peel.

Sir Colin Campbell arrived at the Alambagh, where Sir James Hope Grant had resolved to await reinforcements, on November 12th, and having determined upon his plan of advance forced his way round the north of the city, pushed the enemy through the Dilkoosha Park, and after taking the Secundrabagh and the Shah Nujeef, entered the Residency, where on the afternoon of November 17th he was shaking hands with Outram and Havelock in front of the Mess House, with bullets and shells pouring around them, for although the relief force had reached the Residency they stood in fear of being themselves besieged. Sir Colin Campbell therefore determined to take the 1,000 sick and wounded men, and 600 women and children, out of the place that had so long protected them from the "devil's work" of the mutineers. On the night of November 19th the work of removal commenced, and by the morning of the 22nd the Residency had been completely evacuated. As Captain R. H. Burgoyne, who was present, states, "Thus was accomplished one of the most difficult and daring achievements ever attempted, for such it must be acknowledged it was, when we consider that with a force scarcely exceeding 4,000 Sir Colin Campbell, opposed by upwards of 40,000 regularly trained soldiers supplied with munitions of war far exceeding ours, and holding one of the strongest positions imaginable, penetrated into their midst, carried one fortified position after another, and finally brought away in safety every living man, woman, and child shut up in the Residency, together with their baggage, treasure, etc.," and "the guns it was thought worth while to keep."

=The Secundrabagh.=--The storming of the Secundrabagh is full of heroic deeds. "There never was a bolder feat of arms," stated Sir Colin Campbell in his dispatch. There seven companies of the 93rd, as the 4th Punjabis halted for a moment when their British officers were shot down, raced ahead of their Sikh comrades, and Lance-Corporal Dunlay gained his V.C. for being one of the first through the breaches and supporting Captain Burroughs, who had been wounded, against superior numbers of the enemy. There also Lieutenant Kirke Ffrench and Private Irwin of the 53rd, and Private J. Smith of the 1st Madras Fusiliers, gained the V.C. for being among the first to enter the Secundrabagh by the gateway. When the roll of the 93rd was called after the storming, it was found that 8 officers had been wounded, 28 non-commissioned officers and men killed, and 71 wounded. At the Shah Nujeef, a domed mosque, the enemy withstood a heavy cannonade by Captain Peel's naval siege train, and the field battery with some mortars for three hours, when "it was stormed in the boldest possible manner by the 93rd Highlanders under Brigadier Hope," while Captain Peel took his guns forward with such daring that had it not been for the withering fire of the Highlanders the naval brigade would have suffered considerable loss. As Sir Colin Campbell stated in his dispatch, it should not be forgotten that the heroes of the relief of Lucknow had made the longest forced marches, some from Agra, some from Allahabad, and had undergone great fatigues and privations in pressing forward for the attainment of this great object.

=No Bar for Cawnpore.=--On the afternoon of November 20th Sir Colin Campbell, with his great convoy, arrived at the Alambagh, and encamped on the open space his force had occupied before advancing on Lucknow. Three days after the march was resumed, and as he advanced towards Cawnpore the sounds of firing were heard, and he learned that the Gwalior contingent, 10,000 strong, under Tantia Topi--the only leader the mutiny produced--had joined with the force of the Náná Sáhib in attacking Major-General Windham (Redan Windham). Leaving the convoy in charge of the rear-guard, Sir Colin hurried forward with the main column, which, despite its fatigued condition, footsore and hungry, pressed onward to the assistance of their comrades at Cawnpore, fighting their way forward until on December 6th the city was taken, the rebel armies split in twain, and the portion under Tantia Topi driven across the Jumna, and that with the Náná across the Ganges. This was a general's battle. With a force of about 5,000 men, Sir Colin Campbell had not only defeated an army of 25,000 well-trained men, but had captured all their baggage and 32 guns. It is noteworthy that in order to take part in this battle the 42nd, Black Watch, marched 80 miles in fifty-six hours, no mean feat in a tropical climate. Actions were fought at Kâla Muddee, and Futteghur--where the 53rd spontaneously charged the enemy and captured several guns--and having occupied the latter place Sir Colin made arrangements for the retaking of Lucknow.

=Lucknow.=--To retake Lucknow, which Sir Colin Campbell had evacuated on relieving the city, a splendidly equipped army was organised to march upon the place under the Commander-in-Chief. On March 2nd, 1858, he advanced with about 18,700 men, to be later strengthened by Brigadier Frank's column and the Nepaulese under Jung Bahadoor. Approaching Lucknow by the Dilkoosha Park, the rebel pickets retired before the 42nd and 93rd Highlanders, who swept the rebels from their works in front of the Martinière, and the British troops took possession of the palace and the Mahomed Bagh. On the morning of March 9th the Martinière was assaulted. The Punjabis, with the 42nd Highlanders, took the rebels in flank, the 93rd Highlanders in skirmishing order advanced at the double, supported by the 90th, and as they approached the Martinière the mutineers bolted, and took refuge in their entrenchments across the canal.

On the 11th the Begum's palace (Begum Kotee), sheltering 5,000 sepoys, was stormed, the regiments rushing forward under "a perfect storm of musketry," but "not a man wavered." The rebels had cunningly devised "every obstacle that could be opposed to the stormers," but the 93rd and the 4th Punjab Rifles were not deterred, and they fired their muskets and plied their bayonets for two hours, until, with the aid of a party of the 42nd, the enemy was forced to disperse, and the Begum Kotee, the key of the position, was won after the most sanguinary fight in the siege of Lucknow, nearly 1,000 rebels being killed. In this fight Adjutant (later Lieutenant-Colonel) McBean, an Inverness ploughman who rose from the ranks to the command of the 93rd, gained the V.C. for his intrepid conduct in forcing his way through the breach and killing eleven of the enemy with his own hands. Here the 93rd lost a captain, a lieutenant, and 13 men killed, and 45 men wounded, several dying afterwards of their wounds. Here, also, the dauntless Major Hodson, of Hodson's Horse, met his death. Some of the flying sepoys had taken refuge in the rooms abutting on a narrow lane, and Sergeant Forbes Mitchell, of the 93rd Highlanders, records that Hodson, sabre in hand, demanded of him "Where are the rebels?" The sergeant pointed to the door of a room, and Hodson, shouting "Come on!" heedless of Mitchell's entreaties to wait, made a step forward and was shot through the body.

The Secundrabagh (Alexander's Garden) was again taken, this time with comparatively little opposition, two companies of Highlanders being conspicuous by the alacrity with which, on being faced by a wall, they obeyed Sir Colin Campbell's command to "Tear off the tiles, and in at the roof!" The Imambarrah was next stormed, and Brasyer's Sikhs rushed the Kaiser Bagh, or King's palace; the different smaller points of defence were carried, the mutineers scattered in all directions, and the outworks of the city were soon in the possession of the besiegers. It only remained to take the city itself, and this was effected by a combined effort on the part of Sir James Outram, Sir James Hope Grant and Brigadier Campbell, and after a stiff fight on March 21st Lucknow was again under the British flag. The defeat of the retreating mutineers by Sir Hope Grant about 12 miles out of the city removed all fears for its safety.

=Central India.=--Between January and June 1858 a number of engagements were fought, for which the clasp inscribed Central India was awarded. The troops under Sir Hugh Rose (afterwards Lord Straithnairn) had cannonaded the fort of Rathghur for a couple of days, and then on January 28th, after a section of the mutineers had made an attack on the rear of the British camp, took the place by storm. Three days after they thrashed a force near Baroda, and then pressed on to the relief of Saugor, where a number of Europeans with their wives and families had been besieged for six months. Sir Hugh's force relieved the fort on February 3rd, 1858. Major-General Whitlock, with the Madras column, had started on the same errand, and in pushing his way onward to the goal had cleared the Jubbulpore district. On March 17th Brigadier Stuart took the fort of Chandairee with the 86th Queen's and 26th Bombay Native Infantry, and then with Sir Hugh Rose proceeded to the investment of Jhansi, where the mutineers had shot down some of their officers in cold blood, and treacherously murdered others. On March 21st the army appeared before the place, but had hardly done so when it was discovered that the remnants of the Gwalior contingent, under Tantia Topi, which had retreated from Cawnpore, and had gathered strength in its march, were advancing upon Jhansi from Kalpee. Sir Hugh Rose gave the enemy no time to think, but turning his troops about charged the rebel hordes with such vigour that it is estimated 2,000 of them were killed. The effect of this punishment so impressed the Ranee, and the garrison of 12,000 men in Jhansi, that the bulk of them fled during the night, and next day, after a considerable amount of opposition, the British troops occupied the place. In the pursuit of the rebels about 1,500 were killed, their guns, ammunition, and baggage falling into the victors' hands. In this affair, in which Lieutenant Leith won the V.C., were engaged the 14th Dragoons (who lost, out of 243, 5 killed and 24 wounded); 207 Native Cavalry; 208 of the 86th Queen's; 226 3rd Bombay Fusiliers; 298 of the 14th, and 400 of the 25th Bombay Native Infantry.

=Kotah.=--General Roberts, in order to deal with the mutineers who had murdered the Resident, Major Burton, and his two sons, pushed past all opposition in Rajpootana, and in spite of great hardships advanced against Kotah, and on March 30th, under the leadership of the 72nd the troops poured through the Kittenpole Gate, which had been blown up by the Engineers; and after terrific fighting, in which Lieutenant Cameron of the 72nd gained his V.C., the mutineers gave way, and by the evening Kotah, with its 70 guns, was denuded of mutineers. The force engaged included 250 of the 72nd Highlanders; 500 of the 83rd; 250 of the 95th; a like number of the 10th and 13th Bengal Native Infantry; a number of Sappers, and a detachment of the 8th Hussars.