courage. But perhaps the scene of the finest acts of individual heroism
was the Cashmere Gate, where the third column, under Colonel Campbell,
had meanwhile also forced an entrance in the following manner: Covered
by the fire of the 60th Rifles, a party of sappers and miners advanced
at the double toward the Cashmere Gate. Lieutenant Home, with Sergeants
Smith and Carmichael, and Havildar Mahoo leading and carrying the
powder-bags, followed by Lieutenant Salkeld, Corporal Burgess, and some
others. They reached the gateway unhurt, and found that part of the
drawbridge had been destroyed; but passing by the precarious footing
supplied by the remaining beams, they proceeded to lodge their powder
against the gate. The wicket was open, and through it the enemy kept up
a heavy fire upon them. Sergeant Carmichael was killed while laying his
powder, but when this was at last laid, the advanced party slipped down
into the ditch to allow the firing party, under Lieutenant Salkeld,
to do its duty. While endeavouring to fire the charge, Lieutenant
Salkeld was shot through the leg and arm, and handed over the match to
Corporal Burgess, who fell mortally wounded just as he had successfully
done his duty. Then a terrific thunder-roar and explosion, scattering
large masses of masonry, and mangled human forms in all directions,
announced that these acts of heroism had been crowned with success.
Lieutenant Home now ordered Bugler Hawthorne to sound the regimental
call of the 52nd Regiment as the signal for the advance of the column;
and this was thrice repeated, lest, amid the noise and tumult of the
assault, the tones of the trumpet should not be heard. Then, after
having thus coolly blown his bugle, the brave Hawthorne turned to
Lieutenant Salkeld and bound up his wounds under a heavy musketry fire,
thus ensuring for himself the Victoria Cross, which was also conferred
on the few survivors of this “glorious deed--the noblest on record in
military history,” as Baird-Smith justly called it when bringing it
to the notice of his chief. “Salkeld mortally wounded,” said another
writer, “handing over the portfire and bidding his comrade light the
train, is one of those incidents which will remain till the end of time
conspicuous on the page of history.”
With a way thus opened up for it, Colonel Campbell’s storming column
now burst into the city, slaughtering all it met; and was only stopped
in its career of conquest when it reached the Chandnee Chouk, or
Piccadilly of Delhi, running right through the city from the Lahore
Gate to the Palace.
In the meantime Major Reid’s fourth column, whose task was to advance
against the Cabul Gate, had been less successful--had, in fact, come
to grief. For having to fight his way through some suburbs affording
splendid cover to the rebels, his men were very much cut up, and, on
the fall of their leader, had to retire. At one time it was gravely
feared that the enemy, elated with their success at this point, would
issue in overwhelming numbers and seek to turn the flank of the British
outside position and thus threaten the camp. But at the critical moment
Hope Grant brought up the Cavalry Brigade, which had been covering
the assaulting columns, and made the rebels pause. For two hours the
troopers, drawn up in battle array, sat like statues, while the ranks
were every minute rent by musket ball and grape. Not a man flinched
from his post, though under this galling fire for two hours. Of Tombs’
troop alone twenty-five men out of fifty, and seventeen horses were
hit. The 9th Lancers had thirty-eight men wounded, sixty-one horses
killed, wounded and missing, and the officers lost ten horses. Nothing
daunted by these casualties, these gallant soldiers held their ground
with a patient endurance, and on their commander praising them for
their good behaviour they declared their readiness to stand the fire
as long as ever he chose. Against such firmness the foe could make no
headway, and outside the city their counter-attack was at last foiled.
It would take a volume to describe the course and incidents of the
conquering career of the various storming columns which had forced
their way into the heart of the city; but let the following description
of the doings of Nicholson’s first column serve as a sample of the
fighting which had still to be done. The writer, Mr. Forrest, drew up
his narrative after visiting the spot in the company of Lord Roberts.
“On reaching the head of the street at the Cabul Gate, the enemy again
made a resolute stand, but were speedily driven forward. A portion of
the first column was halted here, and proceeded to occupy the houses
round the Cabul Gate, while the remainder continued the pursuit. As
the troops advanced up the Rampart Road, the enemy opened a heavy and
destructive fire from the guns on the road and a field-piece planted on
the wall. The English soldiers, raising a shout, rushed and took the
first gun on the road, but were brought to a check within ten yards of
the second by the grape and musketry with which the enemy plied them,
and by the stones and iron shot which they rolled on them. Seeking all
the scanty shelter they could find, the men retired, leaving behind
the gun they had captured. After a short pause they were re-formed,
and the order given to advance. Once again the Fusiliers, scathed with
fire from both sides, rushed forward and seized and secured the gun.
They plunged forward, and had gone but a few yards when their gallant
leader, Major Jacob, fell mortally wounded. As he lay writhing in agony
on the ground, two or three of his men wished to carry him to the rear;
but he refused their aid, and urged them to press forward against the
foe. The officers bounding far ahead of their men, were swiftly struck
down, and the soldiers, seeing their leaders fail, began to waver.
At this moment the heroic Nicholson arrived, and, springing forward,
called with a stentorian voice upon the soldiers to follow him, and
instantly he was shot through the chest. Near the spot grows a tall,
graceful tree, and Nicholson ordered himself to be laid beneath its
shade, saying he would wait there till Delhi was taken. But for once he
was disobeyed and removed to his tent on the Ridge.”
Had Nicholson been allowed to lie under the tree, he would have had to
wait several days yet before the capture of the city was completed. So
far the besiegers had done little more than effect a foothold within
its walls, and at a cost of 66 officers and 1,100 men in killed and
wounded--or about two men in nine. The bullets of the rebels had worked
sad havoc among the stormers, and what these bullets had spared drink
and debauchery threatened to destroy. For, knowing the weakness of the
British soldier for strong drink, the rebels had cunningly strewn the
deserted shops and pavements with bottles of beer, wine, and spirits;
and now there ensued scenes of revelry and abandoned indulgence in
liquor which recalled to mind the assault and capture of Badajoz. But
the demon of destruction filled the breast of the British soldier as
well as the demon of drink, and though, true to the injunction of his
commander, he spared, and was even kind to, women and children, he
slaughtered without mercy all the males who crossed his avenging path.
But if provocation be any excuse for massacre, or blood be the just
equivalent of blood, then certainly the British soldier in Delhi must
have had many apologists.
The task of carrying the rest of the town was carried out day by day
with skill and caution. From the first a continuous fire from our guns
was kept up on all the remaining strongholds of the rebels--the Palace,
Jumma Musjid, etc.; and at dawn on the 16th the magazine was stormed
and taken with but slight loss. The same day the rebels evacuated the
suburb Kissengunge. On the evening of the 19th the Burn Bastion was
surprised and captured by a party from the Cabul Gate, and early next
morning the Lahore Gate, to which the Engineers had sapped their way
through the adjacent houses, was taken, as well as the Garsten Bastion;
finally, on the same afternoon, the gates of the Palace, which had
witnessed the cruel murder of English officers, women, and children,
were blown in, and our troops raised a final shout of victory before
the throne of Bahadoor Shah. That shadow of a monarch had fled and
taken refuge in the tomb of the Emperor Humayoon, outside the city;
but here he was sought and found by Lieutenant Hodson, who, escorted
by only a few sowars, undertook the exceedingly dangerous task of
capturing the king.
The story of this capture, as told by one of Hodson’s comrades, reads
like a romance. After securing his captives, “the march towards the
city began--the longest five miles, as Hodson said, that he had ever
ridden; for, of course, the palkees only went at a foot-pace, with
his handful of men around them, and followed by thousands, any one of
whom could have shot him down in a moment. His orderly told me it was
wonderful to see the influence which his calm, undaunted look had on
the crowd. They seemed perfectly paralysed at the fact of one white
man carrying off their king alone. Gradually, as they approached the
city, the crowd slunk away, and very few followed up to the Lahore
Gate. Then Captain Hodson rode on a few paces, and ordered the gate
to be opened. The officer on duty asked simply as he passed what he
had got in his palkees. ‘Only the King of Delhi,’ was the answer, on
which the officer’s enthusiastic exclamation was more emphatic than
becomes ears polite. The guard were for turning out to greet him with
a cheer, and could only be repressed on being told that the king would
take the honour to himself. They passed up the magnificent deserted
street to the Palace Gate, where Captain Hodson met the civil officer,
and formally delivered over his royal prisoner to him. His remark was
amusing: ‘By Jove! Hodson, they ought to make you Commander-in-Chief
for this.’”
Next day Hodson returned for the king’s sons, but to them he was
less merciful. “I came,” he wrote, “just in time, as a large mob had
collected and were turning on the guard. I rode in among them at a
gallop, and in a few words I appealed to the crowd, saying that these
were the butchers who had slaughtered and brutally ill-used helpless
women and children, and that the Government had now sent their
punishment. Seizing a carbine from one of the men, I deliberately
shot them one after another. I then ordered the bodies to be taken
into the city, and thrown out on the ‘Chiboutra,’ in front of the
‘Kotwalie,’ where the blood of their innocent victims could still be
traced. The bodies remained before the Kotwalie until this morning,
when, for sanitary reasons, they were removed. Thus in twenty-four
hours, therefore, I disposed of the principal members of the house of
Timur the Tartar. I am not cruel, but I confess I did rejoice at the
opportunity of ridding the earth of these wretches.”
This summary act of vengeance aroused much difference of opinion as to
its justice and humanity, but Hodson himself wrote: “I am too conscious
of the rectitude of my own motives to care what the few may say, while
my own conscience and the voice of the many pronounce me right.”
That same night the toast of “Her Majesty the Queen,” proposed by the
conqueror of Delhi, was drunk with all honour in the Dewan-i-Khas by
the headquarters staff. Never had the old building re-echoed with any
sound half so fine. The cheer was taken up by the gallant Goorkhas of
the Sirmoor Battalion who formed the General’s personal guard, and was,
indeed, soon re-echoed all over India, all over the English world.
Thus, then, ended this famous siege, one of the greatest and most
memorable in the history of England--a siege which, out of an effective
force that never amounted to 10,000 men, entailed a loss of 992 killed
and 2,845 wounded, apart from all those who died from disease and
exposure; but a siege, at the same time, which added an imperishable
leaf to England’s laurel crown, and enabled her to retain her imperial
hold on Hindostan.
[Illustration: THE VICTORIA CROSS.]
[Illustration: _Gislikon by A: J: Butler_]
“What battle is this?” we can conceive our readers asking; “and where
is Gislikon?” The form of the name may put some on the right track.
In one of the most frequented regions of Switzerland “-ikons” are as
common as “-inghams” in England, and no one who has travelled over any
of the railways about Zürich or Lucerne can have failed to notice some
instance of the odd-looking termination. Switzerland is indeed the
country to which we are going, and among those of our readers who have
already visited that “playground of Europe,” we will venture to say
that at least one-half have been close to, if they have not actually
passed over, the field on which the battle that we are going to
describe was fought. For Gislikon lies not more than six miles from the
top of the world-famous Rigi; it is a station on the not less famous
St. Gotthard railway.
Having got so far, we are prepared for further inquiries, not unmixed
with incredulity. It is hard for us to realise that a battle has been
fought in Switzerland during the last fifty years. One can almost
as easily imagine a battle in England as in that prosperous little
country, which many of us look upon as almost an appendage to England,
and associate with nothing more serious than holidays and hotels and
mountain-rambles. The better-informed have heard of cantons, and
probably think that they are something equivalent to English counties
or French departments; while they suppose that the country called
“Switzerland” has always been much where it is now, with the same
frontier and the same territory. How many, we wonder, realise when they
cross the well-known Gemmi Pass from Leukerbad to Kandersteg that they
are passing from one sovereign State, with its own laws, into another,
and that while the State into which they are going, Bern, has been part
of the Confederation which is now called Switzerland for more than 500
years, the one which they are leaving, Valais, only became so at a
date when Mr. Gladstone was already six years old? So it is, however,
and men much younger than Mr. Gladstone can remember a time when Bern
and Valais were actually at war with each other, just as, a few years
later, Pennsylvania and Louisiana were at war. Happily, in the case of
Switzerland the war was quickly finished, lasting hardly as many weeks
as the greater conflict lasted years, and involving, as we shall see, a
far smaller loss of life and property than many wars which have had far
less important results. It is probably not too much to say that had the
battle not been fought where it was, or had the issue been different,
there would now be no Switzerland at all on the map of Europe.
* * * * *
Before describing the battle, we must give some account of the events
which led to it. The years of peace which followed the battle of
Waterloo, were by no means years of domestic tranquillity for most
of the Continental States. The various absolute governments had been
thoroughly frightened by the events of the French Revolution, and
ruled more absolutely than ever. The rearrangement of Europe also,
which followed the fall of Napoleon, had, in many cases, produced much
discontent; and, in one way or another, every country was going through
a critical period. Kings were driven from their thrones; men were
constantly punished for the mere expression of their opinions; secret
societies were formed, and assassinations were frequent.
Switzerland, too, had its troubles, though as the form of government
in every canton was already republican, these took the shape rather
of fights between contending parties than of rebellion followed by
repression. One great cause of difference was to be found in the
various views as to a revision of the “Federal Pact,” or treaty, which
governed the relations of the States to the Confederation, the Liberals
wishing to see these drawn closer, while the Conservatives favoured
cantonal independence. Other differences were due to local causes.
Thus in Schwyz a serious quarrel arose over the use of the common
pastures. The wealthier men who could keep cows were thought to have
unfair privileges over those who had only sheep and goats. The former
were known as “horn-men,” the latter as “hoof-men.” They represented
the Clerical (or Conservative) and Liberal parties respectively, and
the Federal Diet had, in 1838, to interfere to keep the peace between
them. The comparative strength of parties varied very much in the
different States, and even in the same State sudden changes of feeling
were not infrequent. Moreover, matters were complicated by religious
differences. Some of the cantons were Catholic, some Protestant, while
in others the population was more or less evenly divided between
the two forms of faith. It by no means followed that the political
divisions went on the same lines as the religious; and in almost every
canton there were representatives of both parties. Lucerne was the
most powerful of the Catholic cantons, and until 1841 had been on the
Liberal side, and in favour of a revision of the Federal Pact. In that
year, however, the Government was utterly overthrown at the polls, and
the Clerical party came into power, headed by Constantine Siegwart,
an able and ambitious man, who had formerly been strong on the other
side. The neighbouring canton of Aargau, which was divided between
Catholics and Protestants, and which had only joined the Confederation
in 1803, had in the previous year found it necessary to suppress its
monasteries, which had fomented opposition to the Government. Lucerne
made a strong effort to persuade the Federal Diet to treat this as a
breach of the Constitution, according to which all religions were to
be respected; and Aargau, although many of the Catholic inhabitants
were in favour of the suppression, only escaped stronger measures by
consenting to restore some of the monasteries. This business, which
was not finally settled till 1843, embittered the feeling between the
two cantons, and in Switzerland generally. Seven cantons--Lucerne,
Uri, Schwyz, Unterwalden, Zug, Fribourg, and Valais--made a formal
protest against the decision of the Diet to leave Aargau alone; and
subsequently formed themselves into a separate league, “for the
protection of the Catholic religion.” This league was known as the
_Sonderbund_.
[Illustration: AT BERN.]
Events now began to move rapidly. In May, 1844, fighting took place in
Valais, not far from the spot where tourists now go to see the “Gorge
of the Trient,” and the Liberals, who had been in power until the
previous year, were driven out, not without bloodshed; the leaders only
escaping by swimming the Rhone. About the same time Lucerne called in
the Jesuits to direct education in the canton. There has always been
in Switzerland a good deal of suspicion of this order, who have been,
rightly or wrongly, believed to exercise a considerable underhand
influence in politics; indeed, the recent conflict in Valais was
thought to have been instigated by them; and though they already had
a footing in some cantons, their introduction into what was at this
time the leading State of the Federation was viewed with alarm, even
by many Catholics and Conservatives; while it grievously offended
all the cantons in which there was a Liberal majority. Matters were
not improved when the Lucerne Government seized and imprisoned its
leading opponents. In the following winter and spring armed bands of
irresponsible volunteers from Aargau, Bern, and other cantons, with
some exiles from Lucerne, made attempts to invade that State. In the
second and more serious of these 3,600 men, under Colonel Ochsenbein
(who, a year or two later, was President of the Diet), succeeded, on
March 31st, 1845, in getting within a few miles of the city of Lucerne,
but were beaten back by the cantonal troops, with a loss of 140 killed
and 1,800 prisoners. Herein they got no more than they deserved; but
the Lucerne Government put itself in the wrong by the extreme severity,
amounting to a Reign of Terror, with which it now proceeded to treat
its opponents, and by the undisguised manner in which it promoted the
organisation of the separate league. The Government also began to
intrigue with foreign powers, especially France and Austria, obtaining
arms from the former and money from the latter. Three thousand muskets
with ammunition which the Austrians attempted to forward from Milan,
were impounded by the authorities of Canton Ticino; and so audacious
were the Lucerne Government grown, that they actually complained of
this as a violation of State rights.
It was obvious that the remaining fifteen cantons, comprising nearly
five-sixths of the whole population, could not long tolerate the
presence of this hostile league in their midst. A glance at the map
will show that of the seven cantons composing it, one, Fribourg,
lies apart, while the others stretch continuously from the extreme
south-west of Switzerland, near Chamonix, away to the Lake of Zürich.
Not only do they divide the Confederation almost in two, but they hold
three out of the five main roads which lead through Switzerland into
Italy, including the two which at that time were, and probably still
are, by far the most frequented--the Simplon and the St. Gothard.
Moreover, the attitude of the Great Powers showed plainly that the very
existence of Switzerland as a separate and independent nation was at
stake. None of the Continental Governments had any love for the little
State, which, besides showing that men could live and thrive under a
republican constitution, was always ready to offer shelter to those of
their subjects whose political views made residence in their native
countries unsafe. Accordingly, we find the Protestant King of Prussia
no less anxious than the Protestant M. Guizot, Minister of Louis
Philippe, for the success of the Catholic Sonderbund; while Austria and
Sardinia, who a few months later were to be at each other’s throat,
agreed at least in sending help to Lucerne.
[Illustration: LUCERNE AND SURROUNDING DISTRICT.]
The task of the loyal cantons was not easy. In several of them
parties were very evenly divided. The only central authority at this
time consisted of the Federal Diet, in which every canton, no matter
what its size, had an equal representation, while the members were
only deputies, bound to vote as the majority of their State directed
them. The important canton of St. Gallen, the fifth in numbers, and
one of the wealthiest, was long in deciding. The Catholics form
about three-fifths of the population there, and it was not till May,
1847, that the local elections resulted in a Liberal majority, and
consequently the return of a Liberal member to the Diet. On July
20th the Diet was at last able to pass a resolution calling upon the
Sonderbund to dissolve itself, as being in contravention of the Federal
Constitution. The next three months were spent in efforts to bring this
about peaceably, but the leaders had gone too far to retreat. They
relied, also, not merely on the intervention of the Great Powers, but
on their own favourable position in a district almost inaccessible
from most sides, on the ancient reputation of the so-called “Forest
Cantons”--Schwyz, Uri, Unterwalden, and Lucerne, which had been the
original cradle of Swiss liberty.
[Illustration: AT FRIBOURG.]
On October 29th the Sonderbund deputies offered to dissolve their
league, but only on conditions which were equivalent to a concession by
the other side of all the claims to assert which the league had been
formed, and on the rejection of these terms by the majority, they left
the Diet, Bernard Meyer, the deputy from Lucerne, calling upon God
to decide between them. “You had better not speak of God,” exclaimed
the deputy from Catholic Solothurn; “this business is not His, but
the Devil’s work.” On November 4 the Diet finally resolved that the
Sonderbund be put down by force of arms, that the frontiers of the
seceding cantons be occupied, and all intercourse with them be broken
off.