HOW CLIVE DEALT WITH THE SPOILS OF PLASSEY: HIS DEALINGS WITH MIR
JAFAR; WITH THE PRINCES OF SOUTHERN INDIA; WITH THE DUTCH
The following morning Clive despatched Mr. Scrafton and Omar Beg[1]
to escort Mir Jafar to his camp. The time had arrived when one at
least of the spoils of Plassey was to be distributed.
[Footnote 1: Omar Beg was a confidential agent of Mir Jafar, attached
to Clive's person.]
Long previous to the battle Clive had received various proposals from
the three general officers who had commanded the three principal army
corps at Plassey. First, Yar Lutf Khan had made him a bid, his main
condition being that he should be proclaimed Subahdar.[2] Then Mir
Jafar outbad him, bringing with him Raja Dulab Ram, who would be
content with the office of Finance Minister under the Mir. It had
been arranged that whilst Mir Jafar should be proclaimed Subahdar of
the three provinces, he should confirm to the English all the
advantages ceded by Siraj-ud-daula in the preceding February; should
grant to the Company all the lands lying to the south of Calcutta,
together with a slip of ground, {108}600 yards wide, all round the
outside of the Maratha Ditch;[3] should cede all the French factories
and establishments in the province; should pledge himself that
neither he nor his successors in the office of Subahdar should erect
fortifications below the town of Hugli; whilst he and they should
give to, and require from, the English, support in case of
hostilities from any quarter. Mir Jafar covenanted likewise to make
very large payments to the Company and others under the name of
restitution for the damages they had suffered since the first attack
on Calcutta; others also under the title of gratification for
services to be rendered in placing him on the _masnad_.[4] In the
former category were reckoned one karor, or ten millions, of rupees
to be paid to the Company; ten lakhs to the native inhabitants of
Calcutta, seven lakhs to the Armenians. Under the second head
payments were to be made to the army, the squadron, and the members
of the Special Committee of Calcutta, to the extent noted below.[5]
[Footnote 2: Subahdar was the correct official title of the governor,
or, as he is popularly styled, the Nawab, of Bengal.]
[Footnote 3: It must be recollected that in those days the Marathas
were regarded as serious and formidable enemies. It was against their
depredations that the ditch round Calcutta, known as the 'Maratha
Ditch,' had been dug.]
[Footnote 4: _Masnad_, a cushion, signifying the seat of supreme
authority.]
[Footnote 5: The Squadron was to receive 2,500,000 rupees; the Army,
the same; Mr. Drake, Governor of Calcutta (the same who had quitted
Calcutta and his companions to take shelter on board ship at the time
of Siraj-ud-daula's attack), 280,000; Colonel Clive, as second in the
Select Committee (appointed before the war to negotiate with Mir
Jafar), 280,000; Major Kilpatrick, Mr. Watts, and Mr. Becher, as
members of the said Committee, 240,000 each. I may here state in
anticipation that, in addition to these sums, the following private
donations were subsequently given, viz.: to Clive, 1,600,000 rupees;
to Watts, 300,000; to the six members of Council, 100,000 each; to
Walsh, Clive's secretary and paymaster to the Madras troops, 500,000;
to Scrafton, 200,000; to Lushington, 50,000; to Major A. Grant,
commanding the detachment of H.M.'s 39th regiment, 100,000.]
{109}The first of these contracts, now become binding, was to be
carried out on the morning of the 24th of June, at the interview
between the two principal parties, Clive and Mir Jafar. It has
occurred to me that the reader may possibly care to know something
more, little though it be, of the antecedents of this general, who,
to his own subsequent unhappiness, betrayed his master for his own
gain.
Mir Muhammad Jafar was a nobleman whose family had settled in Bihar.
He had taken service under, had become a trusted officer of, Ali
Vardi Khan, the father of Siraj-ud-daula, and had married his sister.
On his death, he had been made Bakhshi, or Commander-in-chief, of the
army, and, in that capacity, had commanded it when it took Calcutta
in June, 1756.[6] Between himself and his wife's nephew,
Siraj-ud-daula, there had never been any cordiality. The latter, with
the insolence of untamed and uneducated youth, had kicked against the
authority of his uncle; had frequently insulted him; and had even
removed him from his office. Mir Jafar had felt these slights
bitterly. {110}Living, as he was, in an age of revolution, dynasties
falling about him, the very throne of Delhi the appanage of the
strongest, he felt no compunction in allying himself with the
foreigner to remove from the throne--for it was virtually a
throne--of Murshidabad the man who alternately insulted and fawned
upon him. Little did he know, little even did he reck, the price he
would have to pay. Fortunately for his peace of mind at the moment
the future was mercifully hidden from him. But those who are familiar
with the history of Bengal after the first departure thence of Clive
for England will admit that never did treason so surely find its own
punishment as did the treason of Mir Jafar.
[Footnote 6: There can be no doubt about this. 'About five o'clock
the Nawab entered the fort, carried in an open litter, attended by
Mir Jafar Khan, his Bakhshi or General-in-chief, and the rest of his
principal officers.' He was present when the English were brought
before the Nawab: vide Broome, p. 66. Orme, vol. ii. p. 73, makes a
similar statement.]
But he is approaching now, with doubt and anxiety as to his
reception, the camp in which he is to receive from his confederate
the reward of treason, or reproaches for his want of efficient
co-operation on the day preceding. On reaching the camp, writes the
contemporaneous historian of the period,[7] 'he alighted from his
elephant, and the guard drew out and rested their arms, to receive
him with the highest honours. Not knowing the meaning of this
compliment, he drew back, as if he thought it a preparation to his
destruction; but Colonel Clive, advancing hastily, embraced him, and
saluted him Subahdar of Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa, which removed his
fears.' They discoursed then for about an hour. Clive pressed upon
him the great necessity of proceeding at once to {111}Murshidabad to
look after Siraj-ud-daula, and to prevent the plunder of the
treasury. The new Subahdar assented, and, returning to his army, set
out and arrived at the capital the same evening. Clive, having sent
friendly letters to the other chief conspirators, made a short march
of six miles to the village of Bapta, and encamped there for the
evening. At noon the day following he proceeded to Madhupur, whence
he despatched Messrs. Watts and Walsh, with an escort of 100 sipahis,
to arrange for the payments noted in a preceding page. These soon
found that the treasury was not at the moment equal to the demand.
They arranged accordingly that one moiety should be paid down: of
this moiety two-thirds in hard coin, one-third in jewels and plate;
that the second moiety should be discharged by three equal payments,
extending over three years.
[Footnote 7: Orme, vol. ii. p. 178.]
Whilst these negotiations were progressing, Clive, having ascertained
that the other chief conspirators had accepted the terms offered to
them, entered the city of Murshidabad (July 29), attended by 200
Europeans and 300 sipahis, and took up his quarters in the palace of
Muradbagh, his followers encamping in the garden attached to it. Here
he was waited upon by Miran, the eldest son of Mir Jafar, and with
him he proceeded to the Subahdar's palace, where Mir Jafar and his
principal officers were waiting to receive him. Clive, after saluting
Mir Jafar, led him to the _masnad_, and, despite some affected
unwillingness on the part of the Mir, seated him upon it, hailed him
with the usual {112}forms as Subahdar, offering at the same time a
nazar of 100 _ashrafis_.[8] He then, through an interpreter,
addressed the assembled nobles, congratulated them on the change of
masters, and urged them to be faithful to Mir Jafar. The usual
ceremonies followed, and the new ruler was publicly proclaimed
throughout the city.
[Footnote 8: The value of an _ashrafia_, at a later period called by
the English 'Gold Muhr,' was about 1_l_. 11_s_. 8_d_. A 'nazar' is a
gift offered and received when people of rank pay their respects to a
prince. It is more properly called 'Nazrana.']
It is impossible to quit this subject without recording, as briefly
as possible, the fate of the relative Mir Jafar had betrayed and
supplanted. Siraj-ud-daula, fleeing, as we have seen, from the field
of Plassey, had reached Murshidabad the same night. The next morning
the news of the total rout of his army reached him. He remained in
his palace till dusk, then, accompanied by his favourite wife, he
embarked on a boat, hoping to find refuge in the camp of M. Law, who
was advancing from Bhagalpur. But at Rajmahal the strength of the
rowers gave out, and the young prince rested for the night in the
buildings of a deserted garden. There he was discovered, and, taken
back, was made over to Mir Jafar. The interview which followed will
recall to the English historical student the scene between James II
and the Duke of Monmouth. There was the same vain imploring for life
on the one side, the same inexorable refusal on the other. That same
night Siraj-ud-daula was stabbed to death in his cell.
{113}Another scene, scarcely less revolting in its details, had
occurred the preceding day. I have mentioned the two treaties made by
the conspirators, the one the real treaty, the other a counterpart,
drawn up to deceive Aminchand. In the distribution of the plunder it
had become necessary to disclose the truth to the wily Bengal
speculator. For him there need be but little pity. Entrusted with the
secrets of the conspirators, he had threatened to betray them unless
twenty lakhs of rupees should be secured to him in the general
agreement. He was, in a word--to use an expression much in use at the
present day--a 'blackmailer.' Clive and the officers with whom he was
acting thought it justifiable to deceive such a man. The hour of his
awakening had now arrived. The two treaties were produced, and
Aminchand was somewhat brutally informed by Mr. Scrafton that the
treaty in which his name appeared was a sham; that he was to have
nothing. The sudden shock is said to have alienated his reason. But
if so, the alienation was only temporary. He proceeded on a
pilgrimage to Malda, and for a time abstained from business. But the
old records of Calcutta show that he soon returned to his trade, for
his name appears in many of the transactions in which the English
were interested after the departure of Clive.
Nor was the dealing with Aminchand the only matter connected with the
distribution of the spoil which caused ill-feeling. There had been
much bitterness stirred up in the army by the fact that the
{114}sailors who had fought at Plassey should receive their share of
the amount promised to the navy in addition to that which would
accrue to them as fighting men. A mixed Committee, composed of
representatives of each branch of the military service, had decided
against the claims of the sailors to draw from both sources, and
Clive was appealed to to confirm it. But Clive, who, in matters of
discipline, was unbending, overruled the decision of the Committee,
placed its leader, Captain Armstrong, under arrest, and dissolved the
Committee. In a dignified letter Clive pointed out to the Committee
their error, and drew from them an apology. But the feeling rankled.
It displayed itself a little later in the acquittal of Captain
Armstrong by a court-martial. In other respects the distribution of
the money was harmful, for it led to excesses among officers and men,
and, consequently, to a large increase of mortality.
Meanwhile the new Subahdar began to find that the State-cushion was
not altogether a bed of roses. The enormous sums demanded by his
English allies, and by other adherents, had forced him, as soon as
Clive had left for Calcutta, to apply the screw to the wealthier of
his new subjects. Even his fellow-conspirators felt the burden. Raja
Dulab Ram, whom he had made Finance Minister, with the right to
appropriate to himself five per cent. on all payments made by the
Treasury, retired in dudgeon to his own palace, summoned his friends,
and refused all intercourse with Mir Jafar. The Raja of Purniah and
the Governor of {115}Bihar went into rebellion. The disaffection
reached even the distant city of Dhaka, where the son of Sarfaraz,
the representative of the ancient family ruling in Bengal, lived in
retirement and hope. Under these circumstances Mir Jafar, though he
well knew what it would cost him, made an application for assistance
to Clive.
The English leader had expected the application. He had recognized
long before that, in the East, power depends mainly on the length of
the purse, and that, from having exhausted his treasury, Mir Jafar
would be forced to sue to him _in forma pauperis_. Clive had studied
the situation in all its aspects. The blow he had given to native
rule by the striking down of the late Subahdar had rendered absolute
government, such as that exercised by Siraj-ud-daula, impossible.
Thenceforth it had become indispensable that the English should
supervise the native rule, leaving to the Subahdar the initiative and
the semblance. Clive had reason to believe that whilst Mir Jafar
would be unwilling to play such a role, he would yet, under pressure,
play it. He had seen that the new ruler was so enamoured of the
paraphernalia of power that, rather than renounce it, he would agree
to whatever terms he might impose which would secure for him nominal
authority. There was but one point regarding which he had doubts, and
that was whether the proud Muhammadan nobles to whom, in the days of
the glories of the Mughal empire, great estates had been granted in
Bengal, would tamely submit to a system {116}which would give to the
Western invaders all the actual power, and to the chief of their own
class and religion only the outer show.
The application from Mir Jafar, then, found Clive in the mood to test
this question. Mir Jafar had thrown himself into his hands; he would
use the chance to make it clear that he himself intended to be the
real master, whilst prepared to render to the Subahdar the respect
and homage due to his position. Accordingly he started at once
(November 17) for Murshidabad with all his available troops, now
reduced at Calcutta to 400 English and 1300 sipahis, and reached that
place on the 25th, bringing with him the disaffected Raja of Purniah.
His peace he made with the Mir Jafar; then, joined by the 250
Europeans he had left at Kasimbazar, he proceeded to Rajmahal, and
encamped there close to the army of the Subahdar, who had marched it
thither with the object of coercing Bihar.
This was Clive's opportunity. Bihar was very restive, and the
Subahdar could not coerce its nobles without the aid of the English.
Clive declined to render that aid unless the Subahdar should, before
one of his soldiers marched, pay up all the arrears due to the
English, and should execute every article of the treaty he had
recently signed. For Mir Jafar the dilemma was terrible. He had not
the money; he had made enemies by his endeavours to raise it. In this
trouble he bethought him of Raja Dulab Ram, recently his Finance
Minister, but whom {117}he had subsequently alienated. Through
Clive's mediation a reconciliation was patched up with the Raja. Then
the matter was arranged in the manner Clive had intended it should
be, by giving the English a further hold on the territories of the
Subahdar.
It was agreed that Clive should receive orders on the treasury of
Murshidabad for twelve and a half lakhs of rupees; assignments on the
revenues of Bardwan, Kishangarh, and Hugli for ten and a half: for
the payments becoming due in the following April, assignments on the
same districts for nineteen lakhs: then the cession of the lands
south of Calcutta, so long deferred, was actually made--the annual
rental being the sum of 222,958 rupees. These arrangements having
been completed, Clive accompanied the Subahdar to the capital of
Bihar, the famous city of Patna. There they both remained, the
Subahdar awaiting the receipt of the imperial patents confirming him
in his office; Clive resolved, whatever were the personal
inconvenience to himself, not to quit Patna so long as the Subahdar
should remain there. They stayed there three months, a period which
Clive utilized to the best advantage, as it seemed to him at the
moment, of his countrymen. The province of Bihar was the seat of the
saltpetre manufacture. It was a monopoly[9] farmed to agents, who
re-sold the saltpetre on terms bringing very large profits. Clive
proposed to the {118}Subahdar that the East India Company should
become the farmers, and offered a higher sum than any at which the
monopoly had been previously rated. Mir Jafar was too shrewd a man
not to recognize the enormous advantages which must accrue to his
foreign protectors by his acquiescence in a scheme which would place
in their hands the most important trade in the country. But he felt
the impossibility of resistance. He was a bird in the hands of the
fowler, and he agreed.
[Footnote 9: The possession of this monopoly became the cause of the
troubles which followed the departure of Clive, and led to the
life-and-death struggle with Mir Kasim.]
At length (April 14) the looked-for patents arrived. Accompanying
that which gave to the usurpation of Mir Jafar the imperial sanction
was a patent for Clive, creating him a noble of the Mughal empire,
with the rank and title of a Mansabdar[10] of 6000 horse. The
investiture took place the day following. Then, after marching to
Barh, the two armies separated, the Subahdar proceeding to
Murshidabad; Clive, after a short stay at that place, to Calcutta.
[Footnote 10: For the nature of Mansab, and the functions of the
holder of a Mansab (or Mansabdar) the reader is referred to
Blochmann's _Ain-i-Akbari_. By the original regulations of Akbar, who
founded the order, the Mansabdars ranked from the Dahbashi, often
Commander-in-Chief, to the Doh Hazari, Commander of 10,000 horse, to
the Mansabdars of 6000 downwards. Vide _Ain-i-Akbari_ (Blochmann's),
p. 237 and onwards.]
Clive had returned to Calcutta, May 24, absolute master of the
situation. He had probed to the bottom the character of the Subahdar,
and had realized that so long as he himself should remain in India,
and Mir Jafar on the _masnad_, the English need fear no attack. But,
in the East, one man's life, especially {119}life of a usurper, is
never secure. In those days the risks he incurred were infinitely
greater than they are now. Clive had noted the ill-disguised
impatience of several of the powerful nobles, more especially that of
Miran, the son, and of Mir Kasim, the son-in-law, of the Subahdar. He
had left, then, the greater part of his English soldiers at
Kasimbazar, close to the native capital, to watch events, whilst he
returned to Calcutta to trace there the plan of a fortress which
would secure the English against attack. The fort so traced, received
the name of its predecessor, built by Job Charnock in the reign of
King William III, and called after him, Fort William.
Nearly one month later, June 20, there arrived from England
despatches, penned after learning the recapture of Calcutta, but
before any knowledge of the events which had followed that recapture,
ordering a new constitution for the administering of the Company's
possessions in Bengal. The text of the constitution, ridiculous under
any circumstances, was utterly unadapted to the turn events had
taken. It nominated ten men, not one of whom was competent for the
task, to administer the affairs of Bengal. The name of Clive was not
included amongst the ten names. It was not even mentioned.
Fortunately for the Company, the ten men nominated had a clearer idea
of their own fitness than had their honourable masters. With one
consent, they represented the true situation to the Court of
Directors, and then, with the same unanimity, requested Clive {120}to
accept the office of President, and to exercise its functions, until
the pleasure of the Court should be known. Clive could not but accede
to their request.
For, indeed, it was no time for weak administration and divided
counsels. Again had the French attempted to recover the position in
Southern India which Clive had wrested from them. Count Lally, one of
the brilliant victors of Fontenoy, had been sent to Pondicherry with
a considerable force, and the news had just arrived that he was
marching on Tanjore, having recalled Bussy and his troops from the
court of the Subahdar of the Deccan. With the news there had come
also a request that the Government of Bengal would return to the
sister Presidency the troops lent to her by the latter in the hour of
the former's need to recover Calcutta.
Clive felt all the urgency of the request; the possible danger of
refusing to comply with it; the full gravity of the situation at
Madras. He also was one of those who had been lent. If the troops
were to return, it was he who should lead them back. But he felt
strongly that his place, and their place also, was in Bengal.
Especially was it so in the presence of the rumours, already
circulating, of great successes achieved by Lally, and by the French
fleet. Such rumours, followed by his departure, would certainly
incite the nobles of Bengal and Bihar, with or without Mir Jafar, to
strike for the independence which they felt, one and all, he had
wrested from them.
Matters, indeed, in the provinces of Bengal and {121}Bihar had come
to bear a very threatening aspect. The treasury of Mir Jafar was
exhausted by his payments; his nobles were disaffected; the moneyed
classes bitterly hostile. Threatened on his northern frontier by a
rebellious son of the King of Delhi and by the Nawab-Wazir of Oudh,
Mir Jafar was in the state of mind which compels men of his stamp to
have recourse to desperate remedies. For a moment he thought
seriously of calling the Marathas to his assistance. Then the
conviction forced itself upon him that the remedy would be worse than
the disease, and he renounced the idea. At last, when the army of the
rebel prince had penetrated within Bihar, and was approaching Patna,
he resigned himself to the inevitable, and besought abjectly the
assistance of Clive.
Clive had resolved to help him when affairs in Southern India reached
a point which required his immediate attention. A letter from the
Raja of Vizianagram reached him, informing him that the effect of the
recall by Lally from Aurangabad of the troops under Bussy had been to
leave the Northern Sirkars[11] without sufficient protection; that he
and other Rajas had risen in revolt, and urgently demanded the
despatch thither of some English troops, by whose aid they could
expel the few Frenchmen left there. It was characteristic of Clive to
seize the points of a difficult situation. Few men who had to meet on
their front a dangerous invasion, would have dared to despatch, to a
distant point, the troops he {122}had raised to repel that invasion,
remaining himself to meet it from resources he would improvise. But,
without a moment's hesitation or a solitary misgiving, Clive
recognized that the opportunity had come to him to complete the work
he had begun, six years before, in Southern India; that a chance
presented itself to transfer the great influence exercised by Bussy
at the court of the Subahdar of the Deccan to his own nation. Leaving
to himself then the care of Bengal and Bihar he directed a trusted
officer, Colonel Forde, to proceed (October 12) with 500 Europeans,
2000 sipahis, and some guns to Vizagapatam, to unite there with the
Raja's troops, to take command; and to expel the French from the
Northern Sirkars: then, if it were possible, to assume at the court
of the Subahdar the influence which the French had till then
exercised. It is only necessary here to say that Forde, who was one
of the great Indian soldiers of the century, carried both points with
skill and discretion. He beat the French in detail, and compelled
them to yield their fortresses; and, when the Subahdar marched to
their aid, he succeeded, with rare tact, in inducing him to cede to
the English the whole of the territories he had conquered, and to
transfer the paramount influence at his court to the English. The
victories of Forde laid the foundation of a predominance which,
placed some forty years later on a definite basis by the great
Marquess Wellesley, exists to the present day. It is not too much to
assert that this splendid result was due to {123}the unerring
sagacity, the daring under difficult circumstances, of Robert Clive.
[Footnote 11: The districts of Ganjam, Vizagapatam, Godavari, and
Krishna.]
Meanwhile the solicitations of Mir Jafar increased in importunity.
Even the Great Mughal called upon Clive, as a Mansabdar, to assist
him to repress the rebellion of his son. Clive did not refuse. As
soon as his preparation had been completed, he set out, February,
1759, for Murshidabad with 450 Europeans and 2500 sipahis, leaving
the care of Calcutta to a few sick and invalids. He reached
Murshidabad the 8th of March, and, accompanied by the Mir Jafar's
army, entered Patna on the 8th of April. But the rumour of his march
had been sufficient. Four days before the date mentioned the
rebellious prince evacuated his positions before the city, and,
eventually, sought refuge in Bundelkhand. Clive entered Patna in
triumph; put down with a strong hand the disturbances in its
vicinity; and then returned to Calcutta, in time enough to hear of
the victorious course of Forde, although not of its more solid
result.
Before he had quitted Patna, Mir Jafar had conferred upon him, as a
personal jagir,[12] the Zamindari {124}of the entire districts south
of Calcutta then rented by the East India Company.
[Footnote 12: A jagir is, literally, land given by a government as a
reward for services rendered. A Zamindari, under the Mughal
government, meant a tract, or tracts of land held immediately of the
government on condition of paying the rent of it. By the deed given
to Clive, the East India Company, which had agreed to pay the rents
of those lands to the Subahdar, would pay them to Clive to whom the
Subahdar had, by this deed, transferred his rights. It may here be
added that the Company denied the right of Clive to the rents which
amounted to 30,000 pounds per annum, and great bitterness ensued. The
matter was ultimately compromised.]
Clive had scarcely returned to Calcutta when there ensued
complications with the Dutch.
During the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries Holland had posed in
the East as a rival, often a successful rival, of the three nations
which had attempted to found settlements in those regions. She had
established a monopoly of trade with the Moluccas, had possessed
herself of several islands in the vicinity of the Straits, had
expelled Portugal from Malacca (1641), from Ceylon (1658), from the
Celebes (1663), and from the most important of her conquests on the
coasts of Southern India (1665). In the beginning of the eighteenth
century the Dutch-Indian Company possessed in the east seven
administrations; four directorial posts; four military commands; and
four factories. The Company was rich, and had but few debts.
Amongst the minor settlements it had made was the town of Chinsurah,
on the Hugli, twenty miles above Calcutta. Chinsurah was a
subordinate station, but, until the contests between the Nawab and
the English, it had been a profitable possession. We have seen how,
under the pressure of Clive, Mir Jafar had made to the English some
important trade-concessions. It was certain that sooner or later,
these would affect the trade, the profits, and the self-respect, of
the European rivals of Great Britain. Prominent as traders amongst
these were the Dutch. Amongst {125}the changes which they felt most
bitterly were (1) the monopoly, granted to the English, of the
saltpetre trade; (2) the right to search all vessels coming up the
Hugli; (3) the employment of no other than English pilots. These
injuries, as they considered them, rankled in their breasts, and they
resolved to put a stop to them. To effect that purpose they entered
into secret negotiations with Mir Jafar. These, after a time, ended
in the entering into an agreement in virtue of which, whilst the
Dutch covenanted to despatch to the Hugli a fleet and army
sufficiently strong to expel the English from Bengal, the Subahdar
pledged himself to prepare with the greatest secrecy an army to
co-operate with them. This agreement was signed in November, 1758,
just after Clive had despatched Forde, with all the troops then
available, to the Northern Sirkars, but before his march to Patna,
recorded, with its consequences, in the preceding pages. The secret
had been well kept, for Clive had no suspicion of the plot. He knew
he had the Subahdar in the hollow of his hand, so far as related to
the princes of the soil; he knew the French were powerless to aid the
Subahdar: and he never thought of the little settlement of Chinsurah.
In the month of June, 1759, just following the return of Clive to
Calcutta, the Mir Jafar received from the Dutch a secret intimation
that their plans were approaching maturity. He stayed then but a
short time at the English seat of government, but returned
{126}thither in October, to be at hand when the expected crisis
should occur. Meanwhile rumours had got about that a considerable
Dutch fleet was approaching the Hugli, and, in fact, a large Dutch
vessel, with Malayan soldiers, did arrive at Diamond Harbour. Clive
had at once demanded from the Dutch authorities an explanation, at
the same time that he innocently apprised Mir Jafar of the
circumstance, and of the rumour. The Dutch authorities explained that
the ship had been bound for Nagapatnam, but had been forced by stress
of weather to seek refuge in the Hugli.
In October, whilst Mir Jafar was actually in Calcutta, the Dutch made
their spring. It was a very serious attack, for the Dutch had four
ships, carrying each thirty-six guns; two, each carrying twenty-six;
one, carrying sixteen, and had on board these 700 European soldiers
and 800 Malays: at Chinsurah they had 150 Europeans, and a fair
number of native levies: behind them they had the Subahdar. To meet
them Clive had but three Indiamen, each carrying thirty guns, and a
small despatch-boat. Of soldiers, he had, actually in Calcutta and
the vicinity, 330 Europeans, and 1200 sipahis. The nearest of the
detachments in the country was too distant to reach the scene of
action in time to take part in the impending struggle. There was aid,
however, approaching, that he knew not of.
Clive revelled in danger. In its presence his splendid qualities
shone forth with a brilliancy which {127}has never been surpassed.
His was the soul that animated the material figures around him. His
the daring with which he could inspire his subordinates; imbue them
with his own high courage; and make them, likewise, 'conquer the
impossible.'
His conduct on the occasion I am describing is pre-eminently worthy
of study. A short interview with Mir Jafar filled his mind with grave
suspicions. He did not show them. He even permitted Mir Jafar to
proceed to Hugli to have an interview with the Dutch authorities. But
when the Subahdar despatched to him from that place a letter in which
he stated that he had simply granted to the Dutch some indulgences
with respect to their trade, he drew the correct conclusion, and
prepared to meet the double danger.
In his summary of the several courses he would have to adopt he
dismissed altogether the Subahdar from his mind. Him he feared not.
With the Dutch he would deal and deal summarily. He had already
despatched special messengers to summon every available man from the
outposts. He now called out the militia, 300 men, five-sixths of whom
were Europeans, to defend the town and fort; he formed half a troop
of volunteer horsemen, and enlisted as volunteer infantry all the men
who could not ride; he ordered the despatch-boat to sail with all
speed to the Arakan coast, where she would find a squadron under
Admiral Cornish ready to send him aid; he ordered up, to lie just
below the fort, the three Indiamen of {128}which I have spoken: he
strengthened the two batteries commanding the most important passages
of the river near Calcutta, and mounted guns on the nascent Fort
William. Then, when he had completed all that 'Prudentia' could
suggest, the rival goddess, 'Fortuna'[13] smiled upon him. Just as he
was completing his preparations, Colonel Forde and Captain Knox,
fresh from the conquest of the Northern Sirkars, arrived to
strengthen his hand. To the former Clive assigned the command of the
whole of his available force in the field: to the latter, the charge
of the two batteries.
[Footnote 13: 'Nullum numen abest si sit Prudentia; nos te, Nos
facimus Fortuna, deam.' _Juvenal_.]
Up to that period the Dutch had endeavoured to pose as peaceful
traders. But no sooner had their negotiations with Mir Jafar been
completed, and they had received his permission to ascend to
Chinsurah, than they threw off the mask, and sent an ultimatum to
Clive threatening vengeance unless the English should renounce their
claim of the right of search, and redress the other grievances they
enumerated. Clive replied that in all his actions he had been guided
by the authority vested in him by the Subahdar, the representative of
the Great Mughal; that he was powerless in the matter; but that if
they would refer their complaints to the Subahdar, he would gladly
act the part of mediator. The Dutch commander, however, paid no heed
to this somewhat vague reply, but acted as though it were a
{129}declaration of war. For, on receipt of Clive's letter he
attacked and captured seven small vessels lying off Falta, among them
the despatch-boat above referred to, tore down the English colours,
and transferred the guns and material to their own ships. Then,
having plundered the few houses on the riverbanks, he continued his
upward course, with his ships, although, from the want of pilots,
their progress was necessarily slow.
Clive, on hearing of these demonstrations, prepared to act on the
instant. First, he sent a despatch to the Subahdar, telling him that
the quarrel between the two European nations must be fought out
alone, adding, however, to test Mir Jafar, a paragraph to the effect
that the Subahdar would convince him of his sincerity and attachment
if he would directly surround their (the Dutch) subordinates, and
distress them in 'the country to the utmost.' Then he ordered Forde
to occupy Barnagar on the left bank of the Hugli, five miles from
Calcutta; to cross thence with his troops and four field-pieces to
Shirirampur, nine miles distant; to be ready, either there or beyond
it, to intercept the Dutch troops, in the event of their trying to
reach Chinsurah by land. Then, learning that the Dutch ships had
progressed as far as the Sankral reach, just below the fire of the
English batteries, and were landing their troops with directions to
march directly on Chinsurah, he issued orders for immediate action.
Recognizing on the instant that, by landing, the {130}enemy's troops
had severed themselves from their base--the ships--he despatched Knox
to join Forde, and sent information to the latter of the probable
route the enemy's troops would take, leaving it to him to deal with
them as he might consider advisable. Then he sent orders to Commodore
Wilson, the senior of the captains of the Indiamen, to demand from
the Commander of the Dutch squadron a full apology for the insults he
and his subordinates had been guilty of, the return of the
individuals and of the plunder he and they had taken, and their
immediate departure from the Hugli. Failing prompt compliance with
all these demands, Wilson was to attack the enemy's squadron.
The scene that followed deserves to rank with the most glorious
achievements of English sailors. The three captains were all built in
the heroic mould. Not one of them felt a doubt of victory when they
were ordered to attack a squadron in all respects more than double in
numbers and weight of metal to their own. It must suffice here to
say[14] that, the proposal of the English Commodore having been
refused by the Dutch, the English captains bore down upon the enemy;
after a contest of little more than two hours, captured or sank six
of their ships; the seventh, hurrying out to sea, fell into the hands
of two ships of war, then entering the river. Well {131}might the
victors exclaim, in the language of our great national poet:--
'O, such a day,
So fought, so followed, and so fairly won,
Came not till now to dignify the times,
Since Caesar's fortunes.'
[Footnote 14: For a detailed account of this action see the author's
_Decisive Battles of India_.]
This success left the Dutch soldiers, then on their way to Chinsurah,
absolutely without a base. They could only find safety in success,
and success was denied them. They were first repulsed by Forde in an
attack they made on a position he had taken at Chandranagar, and the
next day almost destroyed by the same gallant officer, joined by
Knox, in a battle at the village of Biderra, nearly midway between
Chandranagar and Chinsurah. Few victories have been more decisive. Of
the 700 Europeans and 800 Malays landed from the ships, 120 of the
former and 200 of the latter were left dead on the field; 300, in
about equal proportions, were wounded; and the remainder, with the
exception of 60 Dutch and 250 Malays, were taken prisoners. Forde had
under his command on this eventful day (November 25) 320 Europeans,
800 sipahis, and 50 European volunteer cavalry. The previous day,
reckoning that he would have to fight the enemy with his inferior
numbers, he had sent a note to Clive asking for implicit
instructions. Clive, who was playing whist when the note reached him,
knowing with whom he was dealing, wrote across it, in pencil: 'Dear
Forde, Fight them immediately: I will send you the order {132}in
Council to-morrow,' and sent back the messenger with it.
The two victories were in all respects decisive. Never again did the
Dutch trouble the tranquillity of India. Mir Jafar was cowed. Three
days after the victory of Biderra, his son, Miran, arrived from
Murshidabad with 6,000 horse, for the purpose, he explained, of
exterminating the Dutch. Clive, always merciful in victory, gave to
these, against their baffled confederate, the protection which he
considered due to a foe no longer to be dreaded.
Clive now regarded the British position in Bengal so secure that he
might return to England to enjoy there the repose and the position he
had acquired. He had compressed into three years achievements the
most momentous, the most marvellous, the most enduring, recorded in
the history of his country. Landing with a small force below Calcutta
in the last days of 1756, he had compelled the Subahdar, who had been
responsible for the Black Hole tragedy, though guiltless of designing
it,[15] to evacuate Calcutta, to witness without interfering his
capture of Chandranagar. Determined, then, in the interests of his
country, to place matters in Bengal on such a footing that a
repetition of the tragedy of 1756 should be impossible, he resolved
to replace Siraj-ud-daula, himself the son of a usurper, by a native
chieftain {133}who should owe everything to the English, and who
would probably allow himself to be guided by them in his policy. To
this end he formed a conspiracy among his nobles, fomented discontent
among his people, and finally forced him to appeal to arms. At
Plassey Clive risked everything on the fidelity to himself of the
conspirators with whom he had allied himself. They were faithful. He
gained the battle, not gloriously but decisively, and became from the
morrow of the victory the lord paramount of the noble whom he placed
then on the _masnad_. Possibly it was partly policy which impelled
him to give his nominee no chance from the beginning. Certain it is,
that Mir Jafar was, from the moment of his accession, so handicapped
by the compulsion to make to his allies enormous payments, that his
life, from that moment to the hour of his deposition, presently to be
related, was not worth living. The commercial concessions which Clive
had forced from him gave the English an _imperium in imperio_. But
the Subahdar was in the toils. When invasion came from the north he
tried his utmost to avoid asking for the aid of Clive. But Clive,
who had sent his best soldiers to conquer the Northern Sirkars,
and to establish permanent relations with the Subahdar of the
Deccan--relations which secured to England a permanent predominance
in the most important districts of southern India--was indispensable.
His assistance, given in a manner which could not fail to impress the
natives of India--for the enemy fled at his approach--riveted the
{134}chains on the Subahdar. Then came the invasion of the Dutch. For
the first time a superior hostile force of Europeans landed on the
shores of British India. The Subahdar, anxious above all things to
recover his freedom of action, promised them his assistance. Clive
shone out here, more magnificently than he had shone before, as the
undaunted hero. Disdaining to notice the action of the Subahdar, he
gave all his attention to the European invaders; with far inferior
means he baffled their schemes; and crushed them in a manner such as
would make them, and did make them, remember and repent the audacity
which had allowed them to imagine that they could impose their will
on the victor of Kaveripak and Plassey. He had made the provinces he
had conquered secure, if only the rule which was to follow his own
should be based on justice, against the native rulers; secure for
ever against European rivals assailing it from the sea.
[Footnote 15: Siraj-ud-daula had given instructions that the
prisoners should be safely cared for, and had then gone to sleep. It
was the brutality of his subordinate officers which caused the
catastrophe.]
That, during this period, he had committed faults, is only to say
that he was human. But, unfortunately, some of his faults were so
grave as to cast a lasting stain on a career in many respects worthy
of the highest admiration. The forging of the name of Admiral Watson,
although the name was attached to the deed with, it is believed, his
approval,[16] was a crime light in comparison with the purpose for
which it {135}was done--the deceiving of the Bengali, Aminchand. It
is true that Aminchand was a scoundrel, a blackmailer, a man who had
said: 'Pay me well, or I will betray your secrets.' But that was no
reason why Clive should fight him with his own weapons: should
descend to the arena of deceit in which the countrymen of Aminchand
were past-masters. Possibly the atmosphere he breathed in such
society was answerable, to a great extent, for this deviation from
the path of honour. But the stain remains. No washing will remove it.
It affected him whilst he still lived, and will never disappear.
[Footnote 16: In his evidence before the Committee of the House of
Commons Clive said regarding the fictitious treaty: 'It was sent to
Admiral Watson, who objected to the signing of it; but, to the best
of his remembrance, gave the gentleman who carried it (Mr.
Lushington) leave to sign his name upon it.']
Then again, as to his dealings with Siraj-ud-daula and Mir Jafar. The
whole proceedings of Clive after his capture of Calcutta prove that
he intended to direct all his policy to the removal of that young
prince from the _masnad_. Some have thought that the Black Hole
tragedy was the cause of this resolve. But this can hardly be so, for
Mir Jafar, the commander-in-chief of the army which seized Calcutta
in 1756, was equally implicated in that transaction. The suggestion
that Siraj-ud-daula was intriguing with the French at Haidarabad is
equally untenable, for Clive knew he had little cause to fear their
hostility. Clive not only expelled that prince, but, by his policy,
his extortions, his insistance to obtain control of the saltpetre
traffic, rendered it impossible for his successor to govern. Success
attended his policy so long as he remained on the spot to control his
subordinates, but it was inevitable that, sooner or later, there
would come {136}a revulsion. The warlike natives of Bihar had not
been conquered, and they knew it. They had helped Clive, not that
they should become subject to the foreigner from the sea, but that
they might have a native ruler whom they trusted, in place of one
whom they disliked. When they realized that the result of this change
was not only subjection to the islanders, but impoverishment to
themselves, they broke into what was called rebellion, and showed on
many a bloody field that it was not they, only Siraj-ud-daula, who
had been conquered at Plassey.
This was the most dangerous legacy of the policy and action of Clive.
He recognized its shadowy existence. He wrote to his successor, Mr.
Vansittart, when he transferred to him his own office, that the only
danger he had to dread in Bengal was that which might arise from
venality and corruption. He might have added that the spoils of
Plassey had created a state of society in which those vices were
prominent; that the saltpetre monopoly, with the duties and
exemptions which had followed its acquisition, had confirmed them.
The Subahdar himself recognized the new danger which would follow the
departure of Clive. In his mind he was the moderator who, satisfied
himself, would have stayed the hands of others. To quiet the
newcomers there would be fresh rapacity, more stringent despoilings.
He felt, to use the expression of the period when Clive quitted
Bengal, that 'the soul was departing from the body.'
Clive made over charge to Mr. Holwell, of Black {137}Hole notoriety,
pending the arrival of Mr. Vansittart, the 15th of February, 1760.
With the sanction of the Court he had nominated Major Calliaud to be
Commander of the Forces. Four members of his Council retired about
the same time as himself.
{138}