“We would not die in that man’s company,
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
. . . . . . . . . \
Then shall our names,
Familiar in their mouths as household words,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember’d
From this day to the ending of the world;
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me,
Shall be my brother.”
ORIGIN—CHANNEL ISLANDS—INDIA—CEYLON—1778–1799.
The history of the clans presents no more splendid illustration of that
devotion which bound the clansman to his chief, and of the happy
relationship implied therein, than is afforded in the circumstances
attendant upon the origin of the Seventy-second Highlanders. The Earl of
Seaforth, chief of the Mackenzie, had, as a leader in the rebellion of
1715, been banished from his country, his title attainted, and his
estates forfeited, yet, withal, 400 of his late followers and tenants
remitted to him in his exile a large portion of the rents they might
have been liable for had he retained the estate. This most generous
testimony of respect and practical expression of sympathy to the father
was gratefully remembered by the son, and, notwithstanding the changes
which, passing over the face of society, had swept away the old
institution of clanship, induced the grandson, who, restored by purchase
to the family property, and by his acknowledged loyalty, to the honours
of the Earldom of Seaforth, in return for these favours, volunteered to
raise a regiment for the Government. His appeal to his clansmen was
amply successful. The Mackenzies and Macraes, rallying around him as
their chief, gave thereby most hearty and flattering testimony to their
own loyalty to the King, and unimpaired attachment to the family of
Seaforth, which had so long and worthily presided over them.
Accordingly, 1130 men were assembled and enrolled in the regiment—then
known as the Seventy-eighth—at Elgin, in 1778. Marched to Edinburgh, it
was thence removed to the Channel Islands, where its firm attitude,
remarkable in such young soldiers, so won the confidence of the
islanders, and encouraged the militia, as, together with our
Highlanders, enabled them successfully to resist an attempted
debarkation of French troops on the island of Jersey.
A sister regiment to the Seventy-first, the Seventy-second
(Seventy-eighth) was ordered to follow it to India in 1781, in
fulfilment of the original purpose for which both corps had been raised.
The transport service of those times was miserably inefficient,
especially when compared with the leviathan ships and floating
palaces—the Scotias, Persias, and Great Easterns—which in our day are,
by a patriotic public, ever at the command of our Government for any
sudden emergency. A voyage in a troop-ship eighty years ago ofttimes
consumed more of life than the battle-field; was more fatal than the
dreaded pestilence which lurked in the swamps of the Indies; nay, in
some cases was as cruel in its miseries as the horrors of the Black Hole
of Calcutta. The passage of the Seventy-second Highlanders to India
proved to be such. Two hundred and forty-seven men perished on the
voyage, which was protracted to nearly ten months; and when the regiment
did arrive at Madras, only 369 men were mustered as fit for duty. One
transport having parted from the fleet in a gale, was placed in imminent
peril, being destitute of charts, and her commander utterly unfit for
his position, having hitherto trusted to keep his vessel in the track of
the fleet. By the wise precautions of Sir Eyre Coote, although the
requirements of the service were urgent and entailed an immediate
advance, the Seventy-second regiment was not immediately hurried into
action, but time was allowed it to recruit its strength. In consequence
of these measures, the regiment was soon able to appear in the field
with upwards of 600 men.
Hyder Ali, who, by usurpation, had arisen from being a mere soldier of
fortune to be the dreaded tyrant of the Mysore, allied with France and
Holland, threatened to expel the British from the Indian continent.
“’Tis true that we are in great danger,
The greater, therefore, should our courage be.”
These words of wisdom, from the glowing pen of Shakspere, worthy his
mighty soul, bespeaking in every lineament the true undaunted spirit of
a son of Albion, were acted out to the letter in the bold advance of the
British against this formidable coalition. Our army, under Major-General
Stuart, comprised the Seventy-third (afterwards the Seventy-first), the
Seventy-eighth (afterwards the Seventy-second), and the
One-hundred-and-first regiments, with a considerable body of native
troops and Hanoverians. The strong fortress of Cudalore was the first to
challenge the assault. Defended by a veteran garrison of French, under
General Bussy, it needed the utmost gallantry of our Highlanders—“the
ardour and intrepidity giving presage of the renown they afterwards
acquired”—to force the enemy’s lines, and ultimately compel him to
relinquish the external defences of the place and retire more
immediately within the fortress. Amongst the prisoners was Colonel the
Chevalier de Dumas, conspicuous as “the bravest of the brave,” also “a
wounded young serjeant of very interesting appearance and manners, who
was treated with much kindness by Lieutenant-Colonel Wagenheim,
commanding the detachment of Hanoverians. Many years afterwards, when
the French army entered Hanover, General Wagenheim attended the levée of
General Bernadotte, who referred to the circumstance at Cudalore in
1783, and added—‘I am the individual, who, when a young serjeant,
received kindness from you in India.’” The death of Hyder Ali, and the
withdrawal of France, occasioned the breaking up of this formidable
league against the British power in India, and for a moment the sun of
peace smiled upon our war-worn soldiers.
The new Sultan of the Mysore, as capricious as his father and
predecessor, broke off the negotiations which had promised a continued
and favourable peace. In consequence, the Seventy-eighth
(Seventy-second) advanced, with the army under Colonel Fullerton,
against the almost impregnable fortress of Palghantcherry, which was won
mainly by the daring of the Honourable Captain Maitland and a company of
the regiment, who, taking advantage of a violent storm, when the enemy,
seeking shelter from the pitiless rain, had left unguarded the covered
way, and thereby affording an opportunity which, improved by Captain
Maitland and his company, gave such a footing within the walls as
terrified the defenders into a speedy surrender. This success was
followed by the fall of Coimbatore, and might probably have been crowned
in the capture of Seringapatam, had not peace interfered, postponing the
fate of the capital for ten years.
In 1790, the unprovoked aggressions of Tippoo Saib, the ambitious Sultan
of the Mysore, upon the Rajah of Travancore, an ally of the British,
occasioned the renewal of the war. Still associated in a common glory
with their brethren of the Seventy-third (Seventy-first) Highlanders,
the Seventy-eighth (Seventy-second) advanced with the army under
Major-General Medows, which, obtaining possession unopposed of
Coimbatore and capturing Dindigal, proceeded against the powerful
fortress of Palgkantcherry, which, notwithstanding Tippoo Saib’s utmost
efforts to relieve it, was surrendered to the flank companies of the two
Highland regiments, under Lieutenant-Colonel Stuart.
Aware of his own inferiority in the field, the Sultan dared not hazard a
battle, but omitted no opportunity to harass and annoy our army wherever
superior knowledge of the country, position, or overwhelming numbers
gave him the advantage. The arrival of Colonel Maxwell’s reinforcements
from the Bengal Presidency occasioned the addition of the Seventy-fourth
regiment to the Highland brigade; and, on General the Earl Cornwallis
assuming the command in 1791, he approved this arrangement by retaining
in one brigade the Seventy-first, Seventy-second, and Seventy-fourth
Highlanders.
Out-man[oe]uvred by the British commander, an entrance was obtained
through an unguarded defile into the enemy’s territory. The siege of
Bangalore was the immediate result, which, despite its powerful
fortifications and the menacing attitude of the Mysore army, which
anxiously strove to relieve it, was gallantly won by storm in March,
1791. Having witnessed the fall of this chief city of his empire, the
Sultan precipitately retreated, closely pursued by the Highland brigade.
The British army thereafter advanced against Seringapatam. Alarmed for
the safety of his capital, Tippoo ventured to try the fate of battle.
Defeated, he failed to arrest our progress, all seemed lost, when
unfortunate circumstances interposed on his behalf, and a second time
rescued the doomed city from our grasp. Several minor enterprises
beguiled the time ere the march upon Seringapatam might be resumed.
Savendroog was successfully stormed, and the strong fort of Outra-Durgum
was captured, chiefly through the heroic ardour of two companies of the
Seventy-second, who, having possessed themselves of the town, pursued
the fugitives to the rock upon which the fort stood. We quote from
Lieutenant Campbell’s Journal:—“Lieutenant MʻInnes, senior officer of
the two Seventy-second companies, applied to Captain Scott for liberty
to follow the fugitives up the rock, saying he should be in time to
enter the first gateway with them. The Captain thought the enterprise
impracticable. The soldiers of MʻInnes’s company heard the request made,
and not doubting of consent being given, had rushed towards the first
wall, and were followed by MʻInnes. The gate was shut: but Lieutenant
MʻPherson arrived with the pioneers and ladders, which were instantly
applied, and our people were within the wall, as quick as thought, when
the gate was unbolted and the two companies entered. The enemy,
astonished at so unexpected an attempt, retreated with precipitation.
MʻInnes advanced to the second wall, the men forced open the gate with
their shoulders, and not a moment was lost in pushing forward for the
third wall; but the road, leading between two rocks, was so narrow that
only two could advance abreast; the pathway was, in consequence, soon
choked up, and those who carried the ladders were unable to proceed; at
the same time, the enemy commenced throwing huge stones in numbers upon
the assailants, who commenced a sharp fire of musketry, and
Lieutenant-Colonel Stuart, who had observed from a distance this
astonishing enterprise, sent orders for the grenadiers not to attempt
anything further. Lieutenant MʻPherson forced his way through the crowd,
causing the ladders to be handed over the soldiers’ heads, from one to
another, and before the colonel’s orders could be delivered, the gallant
Highlanders were crowding over the third gateway. The enemy fled on all
hands; the foremost of our men pursued them closely, and gained the two
last walls (there were five walls to escalade) without opposition. The
garrison escaped by the south-east side of the fort, over rocks and
precipices of immense depth and ruggedness, where many must have lost
their lives. By one o’clock, our two companies were in possession of
every part of the fort, and MʻInnes had planted the colours on the
highest pinnacle, without the loss of a single man. The Kiledar and two
of his people were taken alive. Colonel Stuart declared the business to
be brilliant and successful, beyond his most sanguine hopes.”
In 1792, the advance upon Seringapatam was renewed. In the glorious
events of the siege, the Seventy-second bore a most conspicuous part,
and largely contributed to the attainment of the victory which destroyed
the power of the Sultan, and made him a suppliant for peace.
Scarcely had one enemy been overcome, ere a new one appeared—the French,
hurled into fatal antagonism with us because of the unhappy avowal of
sentiments subversive of good order. Accordingly, in 1793, the
Seventy-second was engaged in the siege of Pondicherry—the principal
Indian colony of France; which fell into our hands rather from a mutiny
among its defenders than our own efforts. It is related by Lieutenant
Campbell, that “the moment the piper began to play, the fire from the
enemy slackened, and soon after almost entirely ceased. The French all
got upon the works, and seemed astonished at hearing the bag-pipe.” The
Dutch having allied themselves with the French, paid the penalty of
their folly in the loss of many of their most valuable colonies,
conquered by the British. Ceylon, the principal, perhaps the most
valuable of them, was in consequence assailed by our Indian army,
including the Seventy-second regiment, which, capturing Trincomalee,
Batticaloe, Manaar, and Colombo, reduced the island under British
dominion. This was the closing achievement, for the present, of the
regiment in India. Returning from Ceylon to Pondicherry, thence removed
to Madras in 1798, it was ordered home, and landed at Gravesend. These
many and distinguished services are commemorated in the word
“Hindoostan,” now borne by Royal authority upon its colours and
appointments.
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