THE ARMY IN INDIA—(b) THE FALL OF THE COMPANY AND AFTERWARDS—1825–1858

While peace reigned in Europe, as far as our army was concerned, for nearly forty years after Waterloo, our Eastern Empire had meanwhile been growing by war and conquest.

Reference has already been made to the introduction of the percussion musket, but the Afghan war of 1840 was the first campaign in which it was used, the 13th and many other regiments still carrying the “Brown Bess.”

It is curious to note, in referring to this period, what was the opinion of distinguished officers, both as regards the education necessary for an officer and what his expenses should be. Of course these were “piping times of peace” everywhere save in India; and the army, “kept in the background,” took little place in the general life of the nation.

With regard to such education, Sir John Burgoyne considered that the first four rules of arithmetic were sufficient for the young officer, and that with regard to fractions, “it is going a little too far.” He did not think one boy out of fifty could do either “simple equations or a little French,” that not one “educated gentleman” out of fifty could do “a sum of addition or subtraction by logarithms.” He was not of opinion that a knowledge of the theoretical part of the profession was necessary to make a very good subaltern officer, and thought it was not even required “to make a very good commanding officer in the field.” He saw no good in such training. He doubted “if the Duke of Wellington had any very high theoretic knowledge; it is very278 likely that he could not have solved a problem in Euclid, or even worked out a question in simple equations or logarithms.” When the leaders of the army held these views, it is not surprising that the educational standard of the examination for admission to the army was not high. So we find General Wetherall was not “a friend to an examination before an officer enters the army.” He thought the Horse Guards’ principle in looking over the papers of candidates for direct commissions very fair, when “if they find that the questions which a boy cannot pass are not very material, they allow the boy to pass.” But the same officer foreshadows the system that afterwards obtained, for a time, in agreeing with Lord Monck’s view that after the preliminary examination for the commission, he should be sent “for a year or two to the senior department at Sandhurst, before he was put to regimental duties.”

Such was the military domestic life of these years before the Mutiny; and in such a question the change was so gradual that it is hard to say when it really came. After 1858 there were many alterations in the inner life of the army, doubtless; but before then, notwithstanding the much-abused system of purchase, officers lived apparently less extravagantly than they do now. Modern extravagance is due, no doubt, to the general increase of luxury among all classes; but it is curious to read, in an official blue-book of the early fifties, Lieutenant-Colonel Adams’ evidence, in which he states: “Very many men never had a farthing in the regiment which I first joined, when we were quartered at Plymouth with a regiment of the Guards. There were people of all ranks there; there were guardsmen and cavalrymen. Colonel Stewart, the son of the famous philosopher Dugald Stewart, was a man of property. And people not only lived there without a farthing beside their pay, but our establishment was so good that frequently it has been remarked to me by officers of the Guards, ‘All your people are men of property.’ ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘I wish they were, but most of them get nothing beside their pay.’” It is strange to read opinions so much at variance with those of279 the bulk of the officers to-day. He did not think that the poorer men got into debt more readily than those with good allowances, which “stimulated them to keep horses and get into racing.” The whole style of living in the army must have been widely different from what it is now. Sir Howard Douglas’s evidence was: “When I first entered the service, the officers’ mess was very much what the sergeants’ mess is now. Subalterns could live on their pay, and did in every regiment live on their pay.” This statement, however, seems to refer to the days of the Peninsular War, and not to the long peace that followed it. With greater wealth in the country came also among all classes greater luxury, though possibly by slow degrees. General Wetherall, however, though he “knew a great many examples of men who had passed, and had been many years in the army without a shilling besides their pay, and who had saved money upon it,” considered a young officer should have “a minimum of ￡60 and a maximum of ￡100 per annum in addition to his pay.” Colonel Adams gave as his opinion: “You can never get one person out of fifty to enter into any studies whatever when once they have got their commission.” This was the general feeling during the period from 1825 to 1858. There is no doubt that the Crimean War first, and the Mutiny finally, altered much of this; but the change was very gradual none the less.

Turn now to the military history of the time in which these men lived. During the period under review, from 1825 to 1858 and afterwards, there were hostilities in the Levant in 1840–41, at Beirouth, D’Jebaila, Ornagacuan, Sidon, and Acre, under Sir Charles Napier, but these were mainly naval operations, in which the Royal Marines only of the army shared; and a second war occurred in Burmah in 1852, which will be dealt with in a later chapter; as also will the wars with China beginning in 1839, which resulted in the cession of the island of Hong Kong to Great Britain. There were also disturbances at Aden, suppressed by the 5th Foot and the Bombay European Regiment in 1840.

But before the Crimean War there were important280 campaigns fought in the Indian Peninsula which had important results. These were the first wars with the Afghans, that with the Ameers of Scinde, and the two Sikh campaigns. The first of these, that with Afghanistan, was induced by causes somewhat similar to those which caused a recrudescence of hostilities many years later. What were called Russian intrigues were at work, or supposed to be. At anyrate, a Russian agent appeared at Cabul, and a demand was made for his dismissal. The fear, which has not yet died out, that in Russia’s natural extension into Central Asia, if only as a counterpoise to our own antagonistic influence at Constantinople and in the Balkan Peninsula, where she wished her own influence to be supreme, there was a danger to our rule in India, was held then as now. It is clear, therefore, that in those days, as in these, we, at the bottom of us, are not at all satisfied that our rule has really linked these Eastern people to us. We rule only; we neither absorb nor are absorbed. The Russians do the former, and therein lies their strength. They are by origin Asiatics, and in going back to their birthplace, they retain the power England can never have. As barbaric hordes they invaded Eastern Europe. Checked there by the higher civilisation of the West, they have learned to impose on their natural Asiatic savagery the Western veneer. “Scratch the Russian and you find the Tartar, the Central Asian, beneath.” They are new to Europe, these Russians. They, after the Turks, are the last of the invading Aryan waves. Stopped by the Western peoples, they have turned, like a river, backward to their source. Religious rancour is far less keen with them anywhere West or East, but especially East. Ali Khan, the rebel Samarcand nomad, settles down quite quietly with his fellows to become the decorated “Colonel Alikhanoff” of the Russian army, who helped, in some degree, to create the “Pendjeh incident.” Why not? They are both from the same stock, and separated by but a small interval of time.

Russia would have absorbed India; we have only conquered it. Every native officer is subordinate to the281 white soldier of the British “Raj.” Russia would have made them her equals. We have won the Empire by the sword, and must govern it thereby. We have colonised elsewhere, and even intermarried. In India we do neither. All the professions of native chieftains in India must be taken just for what every sensible man takes them. To love conquerors? Never! We English would never do so, however righteous the government of the alien power that held the reins might be. Given the best foreign government that could be devised over England, and there is not one man with the spirit of his forefathers in him that would not rise, when the time came, in open and avowed insurrection.

These points are worth considering before we deal at all with the wars that have led to the extension of the Empire, preceded the Mutiny, of which more hereafter, and have culminated in superficial peace. Bokhara and Samarcand, other Central Asian khanates, are part and parcel of the army and strength of the legions of the White Czar. Certainly; they are, after all, as before remarked, of the same racial stock.

Indian rajahs and princelets, potentates and ryots, are still the subject beings of the white who rules them, but does not mix with them. Instinctively, it would seem, England recognised a danger from Russia, but did not see what was at the bottom of it, nor her own helplessness to prevent it. When the first Afghan war broke out, Russia proper and India were very far apart. Foolish politicians laughed when soldiers, wiser men than they, men who are part of the story of the army, looked and talked gravely. Unwise civilians jeered in the House of Commons at the idea of the Russian frontier and ours ever being conterminous. Soldiers can jeer now at these very stupid people. The frontiers that never were to be, never could be, touching, are touching, and between the Russian Empire and our own Indian possessions is the buffer state of Afghanistan, the prize of the highest bidder or of the strongest power when the time comes.

The whole Eastern Question is grave, so long as we forget that we are not liked and can only keep what our forefathers282 won by bravery, and their grandchildren cannot hold by talk and whining; so long as we forget that all the tall talk and all the missionary talk is only so much wasted breath, so long must it be worth while, in studying the story of the army, to view gravely the one most dangerous frontier in all our vast possessions,—the strip of land which lies between Russia the earnest and England the supine; to that one bit of terra firma that, not careless politicians, but their guards and national police, the soldiers, look on gravely and seriously. In Afghan territory the ultimate danger lies.

So this dread of Russia was really the cause of the coercive expedition despatched in 1839; but the ostensible cause was different, and is characteristic of the methods which have led to our gradually obtaining supreme power in Hindostan. A domestic quarrel had arisen as to the succession to the Afghan throne which Dost Mahomed Khan, assumed to incline towards Russia, had seized, and which Shah Sujah, a son of the late monarch, also claimed. Thus primarily war was undertaken, to nominally place on the throne a prince unpopular and bad, and whose tenure of authority therefore only lasted just as long as he had British bayonets at his back.

There was little serious opposition in the first phase of the campaign. The advance was made by way of Quettah and the Bolan on Candahar. The Khan of Khelat foresaw the difficulty that was to come. He knew that Dost Mahomed was a man of ability and resource, and that his rival was the reverse. “You have brought an army into the country” he remarked to Burnes, “but how do you propose to take it back again?” The so-called native army, which was supposed to accompany Sujah and which was paid by us, did not contain a single Afghan, and was, though native, purely alien. The hill tribes assailed the columns in the mountain defiles, as might have been expected, and whenever they were taken, they were shot or hanged, no quarter being given!57 This must be taken into serious consideration when we blame the Afghans for the dreadful revenge, later283 on, came. The losses in men and animals in crossing the mountain barrier had been already heavy. The supplies were so insufficient that the men were on half, the camp followers on quarter, rations. Still, Candahar fell without resistance, Ghazni was stormed by the 13th Light Infantry and Bengal Europeans, and an uninterrupted march to Cabul was followed by the peaceful occupation of the city. But the capital of the unfortunate Khan of Khelat was taken by the 2nd and 17th Foot, and the Khan himself slain. Finally another column, under Wade, forced the Khyber Pass, took Jellalabad, and the conquest of the country seemed complete. But no European could venture far outside the camps or out of the range of British guns. In 1841 the Khyber Pass was virtually closed by the insurgent tribes. Sale, with the 13th and some Sepoy troops, was sent to clear it, and was shut up in Jellalabad in October of that year; and when the bitter winter came, and the garrison of Cabul, which had been reinforced by the 44th Foot, attempted to return to India, the whole force was either destroyed or made prisoners. Only one man, Dr. Brydon, escaped alive to Jellalabad, to relate the awful tale. The whole details of the termination of the first occupation of Cabul are both dreadful and humiliating. All told, some twenty thousand human beings actually perished in the retreat. Thus, with Sale shut up in Jellalabad, Ghazni retaken by the Afghans and its garrison butchered, and Nott in Candahar, the new year 1842 dawned.

To restore a prestige damaged as much by general incapacity as by loss, the army of relief, or of “vengeance,” as some call it, though it is difficult to see the fitness of the term, was formed at Peshawur under Pollock. We had, for political reasons, invaded a territory inhabited by barbarous tribes on the flimsiest of excuses. We had begun the slaughtering “without quarter” the hill tribes who defended their native passes; we had tried to force on an unwilling nation the man they hated, and who was backed by what they hated even more, a Christian army. But “what in the officer is but a choleric word, is, in the soldier, rank blasphemy;”284 what is patriotism in one case is on the part of others unjustifiable and unwarrantable rebellion. Even Lord Ellenborough thought the war a folly which might even prove a crime. But the great god “Prestige” had been invoked, and Pollock marched. He had, as European troops, the 3rd Light Dragoons, with the 9th and 31st Foot. With Nott were still the 40th and 41st. Pollock again forced the Khyber and relieved Jellalabad, but had to halt there for some months to organise his transport. Sale’s defence had been magnificent. For five months he had defended a ruined fortress racked by earthquake. So short of regimental officers for duty was the 13th Foot that sergeants were generally employed, and hence arose the custom in the regiment of the sergeants wearing the sash on the right shoulder, the same as the officers.58 Shah Sujah was assassinated. Nott defeated the investing Afghan army outside Candahar, and marched on Cabul with 7000 men; while Pollock and Sale, after some stiff fighting in the Jugdulluck and Tezeen passes, also advanced, and the collected armies reoccupied Cabul.

Shortly after, when the prisoners taken in the retreat had been released, the army returned to India, leaving Afghanistan just as they had found it, but with a dreadful and increased legacy of hate behind.

The only thing of note we brought back were the sacred gates of Somnath, which the Mahomedan invaders had taken back with them after a successful foray some centuries previous; but the coup fell flat, and nobody was gratified!

Now arose the “tail of the Afghan storm.” The Ameers of Scinde had openly favoured our enemies in the recent war. They were defiant, at least, and covertly hostile. What better cause could there be for war? Besides, they were undoubtedly tyrannical, and alien to the Hindus they governed, or misgoverned. The Beloochees formed their army and were ruthless. A Beloochee might slay with impunity either Hindu or Scindee; there was no redress. Like Conqueror William, they had laid waste285 vast areas to form hunting grounds; they did not favour commerce, though they were quite ready to rob the merchant of his gains. In this case, at least, it may be deemed that the end justified the means. European methods of government and justice have converted what was a poverty-stricken district into one of comparative plenty.

To Sir Charles Napier was entrusted the conduct of the war. There had been a British Residency at Hyderabad, the capital, and here Outram, the Resident, was attacked on the 15th February 1843, as soon as Napier had crossed the Indus and interposed between the Northern and Southern Ameers, and taken the fortress of Emaum Ghur. To meet the field army the British force was a mere handful, and counted but 2600 men all told, with 12 guns, and with but one European regiment, the 22nd, to stiffen the rest. Against him, in position at Meanee, were 30,000 infantry, 5000 cavalry, and 15 guns, well posted behind the Fulaillee river, and with the flanks resting on woods. But Napier knew the value of the initiative, and trusted to drill and discipline against numbers, and his confidence was fully justified. The enemy fought with the utmost stubbornness. The battle opened by the British along the river bank firing at 100 yards, and by the Beloochees with their matchlocks at 15 yards! When the 22nd crowned the bank, “they staggered back in amazement at the forest of swords waving in their front. Thick as standing corn and gorgeous as a field of flowers stood the Beloochees in their many-coloured garments and turbans; they filled the broad, deep bed of the ravine, they clustered on both banks, and covered the plain beyond. Guarding their heads with their large dark shields, they shook their sharp swords, beaming in the sun, their shouts rolling like a peal of thunder, as with frantic gestures they dashed forward, with demoniac strength and ferocity, full against the front of the 22nd. But with shouts as loud and shrieks as wild and fierce as theirs, and hearts as big and arms as strong, the Irish soldiers met them with the queen286 of weapons, the musket, and sent their foremost masses rolling back in blood.”

Still the struggle continued, but not for long. Nearly all the European officers were down, twenty were killed or wounded, and then the cavalry were let go. The enemy had held his ground for three hours, and then sullenly retired, beaten, but not subdued. “The victors followed closely, pouring in volley after volley, until tired of slaughtering; yet these stern, implacable warriors preserved their habitual swinging stride, and would not quicken it to a run, though death was at their heels.”59

One more fight at Dubba, and then the pacification of the province and the dispersion of robber bands was left to Sir Charles Napier. Scinde and Meerpore were added to the British dominions in India; and no finer or more loyal regiments have we now in the Indian army than the Belooch regiments, composed of the descendants of those men who fought us so gallantly at Meanee.

But the fighting of the year 1843 was not finished. The usual domestic disturbances as regards the succession, nearly as periodic in native states in those days as “the rains,” broke out in the Mahratta State of Gwalior. Of course, again we were “pledged” to somebody or something, and marched an army there to carry out our “pledge.” It is somewhat curious that, in thus assisting others, we always managed to get something, usually the whole thing, out of it! Sir Hugh Gough was despatched to pull this particular chestnut out of the Indian fire, and he carried out his instructions with the customary completeness.

One opponent, “the usurper” of course, took up a position at Maharajpore with 18,000 men, 3000 of which were cavalry, and 100 guns. Against him Gough employed an army, in the glories of which shared the 3rd, 39th, 40th, and 50th Regiments of the line, with sundry regiments of Sepoys, in all 14,000 men, with 40 guns. The 39th and 40th stormed the entrenchments with the bayonet and took the guns also. Crosses were made of their gun-metal afterwards,287 and were issued to the troops engaged, in commemoration of this act of daring. The cost had been 7 officers killed and a total loss of about 800 men. On the same day, General Grey similarly defeated 1200 Mahrattas at Punniar, a battle in which the 3rd and 50th took part, and bear these names, therefore, on the colours.

This terminated the war. For a brief space there was peace; but not for very long. The endless repetition of the same causes that brought about hostilities in the past history of British India is almost monotonous.

We were next to deal with the Sikhs in the Punjaub. Rungeet Singh, by way of being on friendly terms with his dangerous neighbour, died in 1839. Naturally, domestic disturbances followed, and in 1844 there was a child and a regency. There often was before these wars of ours. Sir Henry Hardinge had meanwhile become Governor-General, and with far-seeing wisdom introduced the railway, and promoted many measures which both lessened the friction between the military and civil departments of his rule, as well as introducing others which ameliorated the condition of the native as well as of the European soldier. He might have made his reign distinguished only by such useful and peaceful measures, but in this case, the Sikhs took the offensive and forced his hand. The child, Dhuleep Singh, the nominal head of the Punjaub, was too young to reckon as an active factor in the coming, or rather existing, complications at Lahore. His ambitious ministers or chieftains saw this, and thought the time had come for a war of rapine. This is what Hardinge had to face soon after he assumed the reins of command.

The Sutlej separated the two States and the two armies, and the Governor-General was reluctant to believe that the Sikhs would take the offensive. But they did, and crossed the river in December 1845 with 60,000 men, and so invaded British territory. To this there could be but one reply. Sir Hugh Gough, the Commander-in-Chief, hurried to the front, and with him went Sir Henry Hardinge, who was the political chief, but, by seniority, his military subordinate.

288 The opponents first met at Moodkee, on the 18th December 1845. Gough’s force had marched twenty-two miles. Be it remembered, again, that this was not when uniform was comfortable, and kit was carried, and ammunition and weapons were both light. Such a march nowadays would call for letters in the Times. Then it was different. The story of the army in the past is widely different from that of the army in the present, as far as marching, and in heavy marching order, is concerned. The loss in the campaigns before 1870, too, was excessive; but nobody dreamed of talking big about it. Now, a very small percentage of men hit is magnified, and all the papers talk of it.

When this long march was finished, and the alarm sounded, the dinner preparations were dropped, and the men of that time went to fight before feeding. And bloody was the contest. There were on the British side twelve battalions and some batteries. The Sikhs were so strong that to all intents and purposes the British army formed but one line to meet them. The infantry met them in front; the 3rd Light Dragoons, with the Second Brigade of cavalry, turned their left and swept along their line, while the rest of the cavalry threatened the right. Night only saved the Sikhs from actual disaster, and when the firing ceased, they fell back with a loss of 17 guns. On the attacking side 3850 Europeans and 8500 native troops, with 42 guns, had lost 84 officers and 800 men, and among the dead was Sir Robert Sale of Jellalabad. It was midnight when Gough returned to Moodkee camp, and the Sikhs to Ferozeshah, where they entrenched with 120 guns. This was the first phase of a long-continued struggle.

On the 19th, reinforcements reached the general, in the shape of more heavy guns, the 29th, the 1st European Light Infantry, and some Sepoys. Sir H. Hardinge then, waiving his official rank, elected to serve as second in command to the commander-in-chief.

Sir John Littler pushed up from Ferozepore and joined the army.

289 The total force was even now but 5674 Europeans and 12,053 native troops, with 65 guns, against 25,000 regulars, 10,000 irregular troops, and 83 guns. Then began a more desperate fight than Moodkee, the battle of Ferozeshah. It was to be a two days’ battle, and even lasted into the intervening night. There were but two lines, the second being formed of the small reserve under Sir Henry Smith and the cavalry. The artillery opened fire and closed up to within 300 yards of the enemy’s guns, and then the infantry charged and took them. Even then the Sikhs did not fall back. The troops formed up 150 yards from the enemy’s camp, and lay down in “contiguous quarter distance columns,” while the reserve at 10 p.m. occupied the village in front. The 62nd had suffered so severely that 17 officers out of 23 had been killed and wounded. The 3rd Dragoons charged in the dark and broke up the hostile camp, and lost 10 officers and 120 men out of 400 in doing so; while during the night the Sikh artillery opened fire, and the 80th charged and stopped it, and spiked three guns. Well might the general say “Plucky dogs, plucky dogs—we cannot fail to win with such men as these!” A more wonderful battle never was. Here, within 150 yards of one another, were 8000 British troops against an unknown number of enemies yet unbroken. All the Governor-General’s staff had been killed or wounded, but he wrote cheerfully to his family and described how “I bivouacked with the men, without food or covering, and our nights are bitter cold, a burning camp in our front, our brave fellows lying down under a heavy cannonade, mixed with the wild cries of the Sikhs, our British hurrah! the tramp of men, and the groans of the dying.” But hearts quailed not, and the wearied soldiers slept peacefully beside their arms and “wished for day.” They deployed at daylight for the third, last, and crowning incident.

And so the 20th December dawned. It sounds like the days of so-called chivalry to read that, at that close range, the Commander-in-Chief and the Governor-General of India placed themselves in front of the two wings of the line, “to290 prevent the troops from firing” until they closed! The left was attacked and turned; the enemy half, or more than half, beaten, fled, and left 74 guns behind him; but meanwhile there arrived to him a strong reinforcement under Tej Sing. He was threatened by the already exhausted cavalry, and refused close battle. So the field rested with the British, and on it lay 2415 men and 115 officers. Of the survivors many had been without food or water for forty-eight hours. These were the men who made the Empire; regiments like the 3rd Light Dragoons, the 50th, 62nd, 29th, and 53rd made the history of which their descendants reap the benefit.

The sympathy of Hardinge for his men is touching. He visited the wounded and cheered them. To a man who had lost an arm he pointed sympathetically to his own empty sleeve, and reminded him of Quatre Bras; to him who had lost a leg he told the story of how his own son had fought in that wondrous battle, and had done so without the foot he had lost in former fight. But all arch?ologists will recognise in him a confrère as the man who repaired and prevented from falling into decay the Taj Mahal at Agra.

No one can read the story of the Sikh War without a feeling of pride for the men who did their duty so patiently, so bravely, and under such distresses. But they had still much to do with one of the bravest and most stubborn foes the British have ever had to face in Hindostan. For in January 1846 the Sikh Sirdars threatened Loodianah, and effected a passage of the Sutlej near that place, as well as at a point near where they had recrossed the river after their defeat at Ferozeshah. This latter passage, near Sobraon, formed by a bridge of boats, they had further covered by a well-constructed tête du pont.

Sir Harry Smith, a Peninsular veteran whose medal ribbon bore twelve clasps, marched to arrest the danger that threatened Loodianah, and thus eventually brought on the battle of Aliwal, as the Sobraon position brought on the battle that bears that name. In both the British were victorious, though with heavy loss.

291 The battle formation at Aliwal was typical, and is therefore worth recording. The front was covered by the cavalry in “contiguous columns of squadrons,” with two battalions of horse artillery between the Brigades. The infantry followed in “contiguous columns of brigades at deploying intervals,” with artillery in the spaces between brigades, and two eight-inch howitzers in rear. The right flank, as far as a wet nullah some distance off, was covered by the 4th Irregular Cavalry. There seems, therefore, to have been but one line, and this was fully capable of man?uvring. From the above line of columns it formed line with bayonets fixed and colours flying, the artillery forming three groups, one on either flank, the other in the centre. When the Sikhs threatened to turn the right of this line, it “broke into columns to take ground to the right and reform line with the precision of the most correct field-day,”60 and for a second time advanced.

The whole force was but 10,000 men against nearly 20,000 of the enemy, with 68 guns, but the position was gloriously carried, and the 16th Lancers and the 31st, 50th, and 53rd Regiments greatly distinguished themselves, the Lancers losing 100 men and 8 officers, while the total “bill” was 589 men; but the victory was most complete, and all the enemy’s stores were captured.

A short delay occurred before the next battle, that of Sobraon, as Sir Hugh Gough awaited his reinforcement by Sir Harry Smith, while Sir Charles Napier was assembling a third, or reserve army at Sukkur. But the brave Sikhs were still confident. The Sobraon entrenchments were strong, with a frontage of 3500 yards, and held 34,000 men and 70 guns on the left bank of the Sutlej, and on the other were some 20,000 more.

Sir Hugh did not hesitate, and advanced with 6533 Europeans and 9691 native troops, among which were the 10th, 29th, 53rd, and 88th Regiments of the line, and the 3rd Dragoons. The ford of Hurrekee on the left was watched by the 16th, and the division formed in three lines, with a292 brigade in each, and marched against the works at 3 a.m. on the 10th February, opening fire with a powerful force of artillery as soon as the morning mists rose. When the fire told, the assault was delivered, and with complete success. The European regiments had advanced without firing a shot until they had penetrated the works, “a forbearance much to be commended and most worthy of constant imitation, to which may be attributed the success of their first effort and the small loss they sustained,” and after two hours’ fighting the tête du pont was won, and the Sikhs, in recrossing the bridge of boats, suffered terrible loss from the fire of our Horse Artillery. But the victory had cost us dear. The 29th had lost 13 officers and 135 men; the 31st, 7 officers and 147 men; the 50th, 12 officers and 227 men; and the 10th, 3 officers and 130 men: while Sir Robert Dick, General Cyril Taylor, and General M’Laren among the leaders were also among the slain. On the other hand, the Sikhs had lost 14,000 men.

Sobraon was “the Waterloo of the Sikhs.” Their aims on our Indian possessions were completely frustrated. But the field army was too weak to do more than it had done, and though some of the enemy’s territory was “occupied,” the reins of government were still permitted to remain nominally in the youthful hands of Dhuleep Singh, until the time came for the annexation of the whole district of the Punjaub.

The final opportunity came three years later, in 1849, when the Marquis of Dalhousie was Governor-General.

Intestine troubles, in due course and as usual, arose in Mooltan. There was the customary doubt as to the loyalty of some of the Sirdars of Mooltan. The European assistant resident and some others were murdered at Lahore; a sufficient cause for further war. Some insignificant skirmishes preceded the final and more important collisions. Mooltan was besieged by a force under General Whish, an operation shared in by the 10th and 32nd European Regiments, but the siege had to be abandoned. Lord Gough had meanwhile been assembling an army at Ferozepore, and the enemy were first293 seriously met at Ramnuggur, and fell back beaten; and then the siege of Mooltan was renewed. The heavy guns were soon brought up to within eighty yards of the walls, and the enemy’s principal magazine was blown up; but this did not affect the courage of the Moulraj, the defending Sikh general; and on the receipt of the letter demanding his surrender, “he coolly rammed it down his longest gun,” and sent the reply back to us thus.61 But his bravery availed nothing, and the place fell. On the other hand, Attock, held by an English garrison, was retaken.

The next battle was not judicious. Gough’s duty was to cover the siege of Mooltan, then proceeding, and when that fell, to advance offensively with all the force he could muster. As it was, weak in numbers and with a river between them and the enemy, he, on the 12th January 1849, reached the battlefield of Chillianwallah about dusk, with an army wearied by a long march. He did not even seriously reconnoitre the ford ways of the Chenab, but none the less despatched Thackwell with 8000 men, three horse and two field batteries, two eighteen-pounders, and the 24th and 61st Regiments, to cross the Ranekan ford, but finding it too difficult, he moved to that at Vizierabad by 6 p.m. Then he crossed by boats, but some regiments bivouacked on a sandbank in mid-stream, and all were wet, cold, and without food. Gough, meanwhile, was on the opposite bank, some miles away, near Ramnuggur, with a difficult ford in front of him, vigilantly watched by the Sikhs. But their leader saw the opportunity and seized it; he left a weak force to watch that ford, and marched against Thackwell. He hoped to beat the British in detail, and might have done so but for want of energy. He met them at Sadulapore, where an artillery skirmish followed, and finally Gough joined him, and at two o’clock halted before the enemy’s position at Chillianwallah, when the enemy’s advanced guns fired on him, and the attack was ordered. On the right was Gilbert’s Division, in which were the 29th and 30th, covered on the right by Pope’s Brigade with the 9th Lancers and 14th Light294 Dragoons. On the left was Campbell, with the 24th and 61st, covered by White’s Brigade of cavalry with the 3rd Dragoons and three horse batteries. Along the whole front was a dense mass of jungle so high as to conceal even the colours to the top of the staff. The battle was a scene of wild confusion, in which the staff direction was impossible. The cavalry on the right broke, and six guns were taken; five colours were left on the field, one being that of the 24th, and when the firing ceased, some 89 officers and 2357 men had been lost, and the army fell back, as did, on their side, the enemy too. The Sikhs had fought with their accustomed fierceness and bravery: said one officer, “They fought like devils”; but it is curious that the Sikhs alone did this, and, judging from another account, their opponents “fought like heroes!” The 3rd, 9th, and 14th cavalry regiments behaved well, as did the 10th, 29th, and 32nd Foot, with the native Indian regiments, but into the “Story of the Army” that of the army of the East India Company does not enter. It was another instance of where “the dauntless valour of the infantry rectifies the errors of its commanders, and carries them through what would otherwise be inevitable defeat and disgrace. But it redeems their errors with its blood; and seldom has there been more devotion, but, alas! more carnage, than on the hard-fought field of Chillianwallah, a field fairly won, though bravely contested by the Sikhs of all arms.”62

The loss of the latter, some 4000, with 49 of their guns spiked, had been heavy too, and they had fought with all the bravery of, and in a manner somewhat similar to, the Highlanders who drew sword and fought for the “Pretender” when the “embers of the Civil War” died out. In the hand-to-hand fighting, they had caught the bayonet with the left hand, to cut at its holder with the right with the sword. They had received lance-thrusts on their shields, to return the attack when the lance was thrown aside or broken; they had laid themselves down when the cavalry charged, to rise when the horsemen passed, and attack them295 shield and sword in hand. Between the fighting of the Scots in 1745 and that of the Sikhs in 1849 there was no real difference as far as pluck and courage went. But the spirit of our gallant and stubborn adversaries was not broken yet. Mooltan fell. They met us again at Gujerat, but the previous encounters had created in them a feeling of despair. Hitherto the Sikhs had been the attacking side when the battle was being formed. Now it was otherwise. They fought on the defensive and were badly beaten; the 9th, 3rd, and 14th British cavalry Regiments, and the 10th, 29th, 60th, and 61st line Regiments shared in the last fight against the Sikhs, as did the European Regiments of the Bombay and Bengal armies. Though said to be 34,000 men strong, with an Afghan detachment of 1500 men and 59 guns, the Sikhs’ army, as such, ceased to be, and its guns, camp equipage, and baggage became the spoil of the victors. “God has given you the victory,” was the despairing cry of many a dying Sikh.

The loss on the British side was small, 29 officers and 671 men; and the final result was the unconditional surrender of the enemy, and the annexation of the Punjaub to the Indian Empire of Great Britain.

Throughout, Gough had pressed his infantry into the fight before the artillery had sufficiently “prepared” the position. He was so excitable under fire, that the story is told that his staff, knowing his “passion for employing infantry before the guns had done their work, induced the gallant veteran to mount by means of a ladder—the only means of access—to the top storey of an isolated building which commanded a complete view of the battlefield. They then quietly removed the ladder, and only replaced it when the artillery had done its work.”63

Nothing of grave military importance occurred in India after the defeat of the Sikhs and the annexation of the Punjaub in 1849, for some years. But shortly after the close of the Crimean campaign occurred a petty war with Persia, which had inclinations towards a Russian friendship, if not an alliance. A rebellion had broken out in Herat, and the296 Persians laid siege to it; whereupon Dost Mahomed, who had become Ameer of Afghanistan on the deposition of our own nominee Shah Sujah, moved from Cabul to Candahar. Troubles had occurred with the Heratees in 1837, when Persia was persuaded by Russia to make a very imaginary claim to the possession of Afghanistan, and had, also with Russian aid, besieged Herat; but the Governor-General of India despatched Pottinger, a young officer of artillery, to aid in the defence, which was successful. Russian influence here, and its supposed influence with Dost Mahomed at Cabul, were among the causes which, as already pointed out, brought on the first Afghan war.

In 1853 there had been a convention between the British minister and the Shah as regards Herat, and this Persian siege was contrary to its provisions. General Outram was despatched in command of an expedition which contained two regiments of the British army in its composition, the 64th and 78th; but the bulk of the force was necessarily made up of native Indian troops of the Bombay army. Landing near Bushire, there was an “affair” at Reshire on the 9th December 1856, and another at Bushire the next day, where the entrenched Persians were defeated by a brilliant bayonet charge. At Kooshab, in February 1857, the 3rd Bombay Cavalry broke a Persian square; while at Barajzoom, Mohummerah, and Ahwaz were other minor engagements, which speedily led to peace.

The names of Persia, Reshire, Kooshab, and Bushire are borne on the colours of the 64th; and Persia, Kooshab, on those of the 78th for their conduct in these somewhat uninteresting operations.

Now began to arise an ominous war-cloud, which for a time threatened to burst with such violence as to sweep away altogether the British rule in India. It might have been foreseen had people cared to take the trouble. The attributed and immediate cause of rebellion was no new thing. There had been a precedent already as far back as 1806, in the history of the 69th Regiment of the line, two companies of which were garrisoned at Vellore, with a297 battalion of Sepoys. Sir John Craddock, who commanded in Madras, had, with the best intentions, introduced a lighter headdress than the turban, but which had some leather fittings to it which the natives assumed were “unclean”; while a new “turn-screw” had a cross-top, which again might have been assumed by ill-affected persons to represent the emblem of Christianity. There were always, then as now, men who looked on a rebellion as a means of getting plunder and advancement, and many of the adherents of Tippoo Sahib were still living, and by no means loath to stir up discord. In this case they succeeded, though fortunately the incipient mutiny spread no farther than Vellore. But there the Sepoys attacked the European cantonment, and shot or bayoneted 113............