ROSS L. MANGLES, ESQ., V.C., BENGAL CIVIL SERVICE, ASSISTANT-MAGISTRATE
AT PATNA.
The town of Arrah, near which Mr. Mangles earned the Cross of Valour, is
about twenty-four miles from Dinapoor, from which it is separated by the
river Sone. It is the chief place in the district of Shahabad, and when
the 7th, 8th, and 40th Regiments of Bengal Native Infantry mutinied at
Dinapoor, on the 25th of July, 1865, they advanced against Arrah, where
they expected to meet with little resistance, as there were no European
troops at that station. It so happened, however, that the chief authority
was vested in Mr. Wake, the resident magistrate, who proved himself equal
to the occasion. He had not been trained to the profession of arms, but
he possessed that calm courage and undaunted energy which most of our
Indian civilians exhibited during the mutiny, and which contributed
largely to the re-establishment of our power. Familiar with the manners
and language of the natives, he had watched the progress of events with
an anxious eye, and already foresaw the storm that was about to break
forth; as he could not avert it, he prepared to meet it like a man. He
had already warned the authorities at Calcutta that the licentiousness
of the native press must sooner or later lead to an outbreak, and that
symptoms of disaffection had already begun to appear in his own district;
but the forces at Dinapoor, consisting of Her Majesty’s 10th Regiment,
two Companies of the 37th, and two Companies of Artillery, were deemed
sufficient to overawe the natives. They would have been so, if they had
been under the command of an efficient officer; but the major-general was
an old man, too infirm to be able to mount his horse without assistance,
and utterly unfit to cope with the difficulty. The consequence was that
the mutineers, who might easily have been disarmed or imprisoned, were
allowed to escape, and proceeded to plunder the neighbouring towns.
There were few Europeans left in the town of Arrah; the workmen who were
employed on the railway, frightened by the symptoms of mutiny around
them, and apprehensive for their own safety, had deserted the place
in the beginning of June; but Mr. Wake, who remained at the post of
danger, induced them by his example to return. He applied everywhere for
assistance, but no troops could be spared till the 11th of July, when he
received a small detachment of Sikh police from Patna.
On the evening of the 25th of July, intelligence reached Arrah that
the native regiments at Dinapoor had mutinied, and crossed the river
Sone. There was no time to be lost; the fifteen Europeans in Arrah had
to decide at once what course they were to pursue: in a few hours the
enemy would be upon them. There was not a single soldier in the place;
the local police had fled at the first intimation of danger; there was
no fort or stronghold where the Europeans could find refuge. No one
could have blamed them if they had consulted their safety in flight; but
that band of brave civilians scorned the idea, and resolved to remain
at their posts. Mr. Boyle, an engineer of the main-trunk railway, was
the only one amongst them who had made some preparations to meet this
emergency; he had anticipated the danger, and some weeks before had begun
to fortify with stones and timber a detached two-storied house, about
fifty feet square, which stood in the same compound as his bungalow,
and to collect a store of provisions. Mr. Boyle’s preparations for the
coming danger had been the source of many a joke to his less thoughtful
companions; but their levity gave place to gratitude on the 26th of July,
when the mutineers were upon them. The ladies and children had already
been sent away; the fifteen civilians who remained shut themselves up
in Mr. Boyle’s house, with the fifty Sikhs of Captain Rattray’s police
battalion. Their store of provisions was limited; their only weapons were
rifles, revolvers, and hogspears; but they had abundance of ammunition,
and an indomitable courage, which supplied every deficiency. On the
morning of the 27th the mutineers marched into the town, released the
four hundred prisoners in the gaol, and seized eighty thousand rupees
which they found in the treasury. They then concealed themselves among
the trees and buildings near Mr. Boyle’s house, where they kept up a
galling fire during the day, and invited the Sikhs to join them; but
these brave fellows had the virtue to refuse the bribes which they
offered. On the 28th they procured two small cannon, with which they
opened fire on the house, which was now riddled with balls; but its brave
defenders never dreamed of surrendering. One of the cannon was mounted
on the roof of Boyle’s bungalow, so as to enable the mutineers to fire
into the house at the distance of sixty yards. “Nothing,” says Mr. Wake,
“but the cowardice, ignorance, and want of unanimity of our enemies
prevented our fortification from being brought down about our ears.”
The gallant defenders offered something more than a passive resistance;
every mine of the enemy was countermined; every new battery was met by
a fresh barricade. The Sikhs, inspired by the example of the Europeans,
vied with them in courage; when provisions ran short, they sallied forth
one night and brought in four sheep. One of them was dangerously wounded;
singular to relate, this was the only casualty that happened to the
little garrison; all the others escaped with slight scratches or bruises.
When the supply of water failed, the Sikhs dug a well underneath the
house, and continued their labour till they found a spring; in short,
the honours of the defence are equally divided between them and the
Europeans. For seven days and nights the siege went on, and the gallant
little band had to defend themselves against three thousand assailants.
They looked for assistance, but they looked in vain; the authorities at
Dinapoor seemed to have left them to their fate. They might have left
their stronghold with all the honours of war; the mutineers, weary of
the siege, and almost despairing of success, were willing to spare their
lives, but all their offers were contemptuously rejected. They would
never condescend to negotiate with rebels: they would rather fight it out
to the last.
We must now direct attention to the steps which had been taken for
the relief of the little garrison. As we have already mentioned,
Major-General Lloyd was in command at Dinapoor; it was unfortunate that
the control of military affairs, at such a moment, should have been
vested in one who was worn out with years and infirmities, and should
have been enjoying his well-earned pension at home. Arrah lay within his
district, and it was his duty to take measures for the relief of its
gallant defenders. This duty was peculiarly distasteful to a man whose
culpable irresolution had already led to such disastrous results, and for
two days nothing was done. Mr. Taylor, the civil magistrate at Patna,
within whose district Arrah was situated, assembled all the European
residents at his house as soon as he heard of the outbreak at Dinapoor,
and invited them to act with him in case of an attack. This took place
about one o’clock on the 25th; two hours afterwards a distant firing
announced that the mutineers were engaged with the European forces;
soon after, the report reached Patna that they had marched off in the
direction of Arrah. Mr. Taylor at once improvised an expeditionary
force of about one hundred men, made up of Sikhs, Nujeebs, recruits,
and volunteers, and despatched it that same day in the direction of
Arrah, to watch the movements of the mutineers. Mr. Mangles, who held
the appointment of assistant-magistrate at Patna, joined this expedition
as a volunteer, and accompanied them on their march till they were
recalled by the commissioner, who had received alarming reports from the
neighbouring stations, and deemed their presence necessary for the safety
of the principal town. On the day after the mutiny, Mr. Taylor wrote to
Major-General Lloyd, urging him to place a small body of European troops
at his disposal; but the latter refused to comply with his request, on
the ground that he had only six hundred soldiers under his command, and
that he could render no assistance. Knowing the urgency of the occasion,
Mr. Taylor resumed his application, and proposed to raise a corps of
volunteer cavalry among the officers and gentlemen of Patna and Dinapoor,
if the general would send two hundred men to co-operate with them for the
relief of Arrah.
The general had already made an unsuccessful attempt to rescue the little
garrison from their perilous position. He thought only of his own safety
till the 27th of July, when, feeling more reassured, he sent a detachment
of the 37th Regiment from Dinapoor toward Arrah, for the purpose of
dispersing the mutineers. The troops embarked on board the _Horungotta_
steamer, and might have reached Arrah in a few hours, but a sort of
fatality seemed to attend everything which the general undertook. After
three hours’ steaming, the _Horungotta_ ran aground, and as she could
not be got off the troops quickly returned to Dinapoor. The general was
now willing to accept Mr. Taylor’s proposal, and a second expeditionary
force, consisting of detachments of Her Majesty’s 10th, and 37th
Regiments, some native troops, and the corps of volunteer cavalry was
organized, and embarked on the evening of Tuesday, the 28th of July, on
board the steamer _Bombay_, which had arrived at Dinapoor in her downward
passage on the Ganges, and was detained for the public service. If the
defence of Arrah forms one of the brightest episodes in the history of
the Indian mutiny, the disaster which overtook this ill-fated expedition
may be regarded as one of its gloomiest pages: it was not the mere loss
of men at a critical juncture, though that was considerable; it was the
destruction for the moment of that _prestige_ which has almost invariably
followed our arms in India, and by which alone we have acquired our
ascendancy in that vast peninsula. The expedition was placed under the
command of Captain Dunbar, of the 10th Regiment. Mr. Mangles belonged to
the corps of volunteer cavalry. The mutineers, who were cognizant of all
their movements, had formed themselves into an ambuscade, and attacked
them on the night of the 29th of July. Our soldiers fought with their
usual gallantry, but were overpowered by superior numbers, and compelled
to retreat. Captain Dunbar was killed; only a few of his men effected
a retreat to the boats; the rest were butchered by the enemy, who gave
no quarter. It was on this occasion that Mr. Mangles distinguished
himself by his humanity, and thus became entitled to wear the Queen’s
Own Cross. He had been wounded, and would have been justified, under the
circumstances, in consulting his own safety; but his generous heart
led him to think more of others than of himself. A soldier of the 37th
Regiment had been struck down by his side; wounded himself, and weak
with the loss of blood, he was induced, from a feeling of humanity, and
without any prospect of reward, to make an effort to save his life. If he
left him in the hands of the enemy, his fate was certain; the murderers
of helpless women and children would show no mercy: all this must have
been present to his mind, as he hurriedly bound up his wounds, careless
of the murderous fire to which he was exposed. Nor was this all. When
he had dressed his wounds, he raised him on his shoulders and carried
him for several miles, till they reached the boats in safety. When we
consider that almost the whole detachment were killed or wounded, their
escape seems to us to border on the miraculous, and no one will question
Mr. Mangles’ right to a place in Mr. Desanges’ Gallery, or grudge him
the Cross of Valour. The permanent record of his heroic conduct and
tender-hearted humanity may stimulate others to imitate his example, and
may thus exercise a beneficial influence on the rising generation. The
Victoria Cross was awarded to Mr. Mangles in the Government _Gazette_ of
the 6th of July, 1859, and Mr. Desanges’ pencil has conveyed to the minds
of thousands a more vivid conception of the act by which he gained it,
than we can expect to produce by this brief narrative.
We now turn from the disaster of the 29th of July, 1857, to relate
how a second and far more successful attempt was made to relieve the
beleaguered garrison. The name of Major Vincent Eyre will ever be
associated with this event, as the instrument, in the hands of a Higher
Power, for the rescue of those who must otherwise have perished. When the
mutiny broke out, this officer was recalled from Burwah, and embarked at
Calcutta for the Upper Provinces, on the 10th of July, having under his
command No. 3 Horse Field Battery, with the 1st Company 5th Battalion
Artillery attached. Allahabad was the rendezvous where the different
detachments of the relieving army were to assemble, and Major Eyre
reached Dinapoor on the evening of the 25th of July, the very day when
the three native regiments had broken into open mutiny. He lost no
time in placing himself and his men at the disposal of Major-General
Lloyd, and at his request landed three guns. Next morning these guns
were re-embarked, and Major Eyre resumed his voyage. As yet he knew
nothing of the beleaguered garrison at Arrah: he only heard of their
gallant defence on the 28th of July, on reaching Buxar, where the
greatest anxiety was felt for their safety. If he had consulted his own
feelings he would have hurried at once to their assistance; but a sort
of panic had broken out at Buxar, from the idea that the mutineers were
advancing to destroy the valuable stud property there, and he detained
the steamer till the following morning, when, finding that there was no
immediate danger, he started for Ghazeepoor, where a weak company of the
78th Highlanders had been stationed to overawe a half-mutinous native
regiment. On reaching that town on the afternoon of the 29th, he placed
himself in communication with Colonel Davies, of the 37th Regiment, who
was in command; and at his request landed two guns under the charge of
Lieutenant Gordon, Royal Artillery. He received in return a detachment
of twenty-five men of the 78th Highlanders to aid him in the relief of
Arrah; and the Honourable Captain Hastings, superintendent of the stud at
Buxar, who happened to be at Ghazeepoor, volunteered to accompany him.
The steamer anchored off Buxar at nine P.M. on the evening of the
29th, where Major Eyre found a detachment of 160 men of Her Majesty’s
5th Fusiliers, who had just arrived in the _James Hume_ steamer. They
were under the command of Captain L’Estrange, a gallant young officer,
who, on this and other occasions, greatly distinguished himself. The
5th Fusiliers had been stationed in Mauritius, and were on their way
to China; on landing at Calcutta, and hearing of the horrors of the
Indian mutiny, Lord Elgin at once placed them at the disposal of the
Governor-General, who lost no time in despatching them to the disaffected
districts. Captain L’Estrange, on learning what had occurred at Arrah,
entered warmly into Major Eyre’s projected enterprise, and no time was
lost in organizing a field force. On the morning of the 30th, three
guns and 150 men of the 5th Fusiliers were landed; the Highlanders
would willingly have joined them, but their presence was necessary at
Ghazeepoor, where they rejoined their company. During the day the little
army was reinforced by fourteen mounted volunteers, who were placed under
the command of Lieutenant Jackson, of the 12th Native Infantry. Captain
Hastings was appointed staff-officer of the force: his local knowledge
and unflagging energy enabled him, in the course of a few hours, to
procure the necessary carriage and commissariat supplies. Every moment
was precious; all were eager to start; no time was lost in extricating
the waggons from the hold of the steamer; the artillery ammunition-boxes
were mounted on light carts, which were found equally serviceable. India
was not re-conquered by ordinary routine: every leader had to exercise
his own judgment, and to trust in his own fertility of invention.
At five P.M. all was ready, and the little army commenced its march.
Officers and men were inspired by the same chivalrous spirit; no
knight-errant of old, hurrying to the rescue of injured innocence, could
have been more eager for the fray. Our soldiers have their faults, but
they cannot be taxed with inhumanity, or a want of sympathy with the
sufferings of others; and the gallant defence of the little garrison
had excited their sympathy as well as their admiration. After a march
of six miles, they were joined by four elephants, which Mr. Ban, Civil
Service, had induced the Dumraon Rajah, a native prince of doubtful
loyalty, to send. With all their zeal their progress was slow: the roads
were bad; the bullocks fresh from the plough; it was daybreak before they
reached their first encampment at Nya Bhojepoor, which is only fifteen
miles from Buxar. The enemy had despatched a mounted spy to watch their
movements, but the unerring aim of one of the volunteers closed his
eyes for ever. He was recognised as one of the confidential men of Koer
Singh, the brother of the Dumraon Rajah, who had always professed his
warm attachment to the British rule, and lived on terms of intimacy with
the English residents. He was a man of superior ability, and possessed
of great influence over the Rajpoots of Shahabad; but his affairs were
embarrassed, and his large estates heavily mortgaged. It was owing to
this circumstance, and Brahminical influence, that he proved a traitor to
our cause, and placed himself at the head of the mutineers at Dinapoor,
who proclaimed him King of Shahabad. It was he who instigated them to
revolt, and furnished them with boats to cross the river to Arrah, where
he was now conducting the siege in person. The death of the spy prevented
him from obtaining the information he so much desired.
The little army halted at their first encampment till the hottest part
of the day was over; at four P.M. they resumed their march, and on the
morning of the following day, the 1st of August, they reached the village
of Shahpoor, where they received letters from Buxar, conveying the first
intelligence of the destruction of Captain Dunbar’s expeditionary force
by the mutineers, who had entrapped them into an ambuscade. They learned,
at the same time, that several of the bridges between Shahpoor and Arrah
had been destroyed by the enemy in order to impede their progress; but
the gallant little band, though far inferior in numbers to the detachment
which had been cut off, resolved to proceed at all hazards. No time was
lost; no fear or anxiety was expressed; at two P.M. they were already
on the march. After advancing about four miles, they found a party of
hostile villagers in the very act of destroying one of the bridges they
had to cross, and an hour was lost in repairing it. They continued to
advance without further interruption till darkness closed upon them, when
they bivouacked for the night: a party of fifty of the 5th Fusiliers was
sent forward to guard a bridge leading to the native village near which
they were encamped. Meanwhile a party of mutineers had advanced from
Arrah, and taken up their position in a thick, extensive wood about a
mile from the village, with the intention of attacking them unawares,
and cutting them off as they had done in the case of the other rescuing
party. The line of march lay directly through this wood, which extended
on either flank. At daybreak, when they were close upon it, they heard
bugles sounding the assembly, and knew that the rebels were at hand.
Major Eyre was too prudent to neglect the warning which the enemy had
thus inadvertently given, and halted his force to reconnoitre. The
enemy now appeared in overwhelming numbers, and extended themselves
along the wood on either flank, with the evident intention of hemming
in and destroying the little band opposed to them. On perceiving this,
Major Eyre drew up his forces on the open plain to the right of the
road, in the hope that the enemy would venture forth to attack him, and
opened fire on them to the front and flanks with the three guns. They
had not the courage to attack him openly, but sought shelter behind the
broken ground between the two positions, where they could fire at our
men with comparative safety. On this Major Eyre sent forward a party
of skirmishers of the 5th Fusiliers to draw them from their positions,
and, after a brief resistance, they fell back upon the wood where
they had spent the night. The road, as we have already mentioned, lay
directly through the middle of this wood, and Major Eyre concentrated
his fire upon it with the view of forcing a passage. The enemy dispersed
themselves right and left, leaving the road clear, the baggage and guns
were moved forward under cover of the Enfield rifles, and our gallant
little army pushed through the wood before the enemy had time to close
their divided wings or renew the attack.
Having failed in this their first attempt to intercept the army of
rescue, the mutineers fell back upon a village about two miles ahead,
where they destroyed a bridge, and took up a strong position among the
houses. Our men continued to advance along the road, which was a sort
of elevated causeway with partially inundated paddy-fields on either
side, till they were within a short distance of the bridge, when Major
Eyre halted for refreshment, and sent out scouts to search for a ford
across the river. During the engagement in the wood, the four elephants
sent by Dumraon Rajah, after disembarrassing themselves of the soldiers’
great coats and bedding with which they were loaded, went over to the
enemy; it seemed almost as if they were possessed with the same spirit
of disaffection as their master. The scouts returned without having
discovered a ford, and Major Eyre diverged from his line of march
toward the nearest point of the railway, which was only about a mile
from the village. While the infantry and baggage pushed forward in
this direction, the guns opened fire on the enemy, for the purpose of
distracting their attention from this movement. This ruse succeeded for a
time, but as soon as the enemy discovered that our men had changed their
line of march, they advanced in great strength to intercept them at the
angle of a wood close to the railway. The two armies pursued a parallel
course on the opposite sides of the stream till they reached the railway,
when Major Eyre attempted to dislodge the enemy from their position in
the wood. Greatly superior in numbers, and sheltered by the cover of the
wood, the mutineers fought with every advantage on their side; twice
they rushed forward to seize our guns, which, in the heat of combat,
were almost deserted; twice they were driven back by showers of grape.
Pressed by superior numbers, and encircled by a wall of fire, the brave
Fusiliers began to lose ground; it was one of those critical moments when
all depends on the decision of one man. If Major Eyre had hesitated for
a moment, the garrison at Arrah would have resisted in vain, and another
disaster overtaken our arms; but he proved himself equal to the occasion.
He knew that the British bayonet, wielded by manly British arms, has
often turned back the tide of victory, and retrieved the honours of the
day; when he gave the word “Charge!” the Fusiliers cleared the stream
with a ringing cheer; at a single bound they were in the midst of the
enemy, dealing death on every side. The mutineers were twenty times
their number; but though they had been a thousand times stronger the
result would have been the same: they have never been able to sustain a
hand-to-hand combat with the fierce Feringees. Panic-struck by the sudden
attack, they broke and fell back in the greatest confusion, while long
lines were opened through the retreating mass by the crushing fire of our
artillery. In a few moments all was over; the victory was complete; the
ground was strewn with dead and dying; but not one of the five thousand,
who an hour before threatened our little army with destruction, now
stood up to oppose their passage. Our soldiers obtained the victory,
but they fought for something more; they thought of the beleaguered
garrison at Arrah, of their gallant and long-protracted resistance, of
the fearful fate that awaited them if they suffered a repulse; all their
hearts throbbed with such thoughts as they bounded across the stream
with levelled bayonets, and carried everything before them. After these
defeats at the railway the mutineers fled precipitately to Arrah, where
they had barely time to remove part of their plunder to the jungle when
the victorious little army marched into the town.
They did not arrive a moment too soon; the house, so gallantly defended
for seven days and nights by sixteen Europeans and fifty Sikhs against
three regiments of mutineers and Koer Singh’s levies, was found to be
so effectually ruined, that a few hours’ delay must have completed its
destruction. The deliverance of the little garrison from the worst of
fates was little short of miraculous, and we can trace the working of a
Higher Power in arranging the different steps by which that deliverance
was effected. A leader less resolute and energetic than Major Eyre
would have quailed before the difficulties and dangers that opposed his
progress; nothing but their own unflinching fortitude could have enabled
the little garrison to hold out so long. For more than a week they were
harassed by the fire of the enemy, which was so close and continuous that
not a loophole could be approached with safety, and yet they inflicted
far more loss on their assailants than they suffered themselves. Only one
of them was severely wounded, while no less than fifty or sixty of the
enemy are believed to have fallen. This result is to be attributed to the
precautions they used for their own protection, and their superior skill
in the use of the rifle: the unerring aim of Mr. Littledale, a civilian,
inspired the mutineers with a salutary dread, and drove them to seek
shelter behind every available corner. The defence of Arrah must ever
occupy a conspicuous place in the annals of the Indian mutiny.
A week was spent in restoring the country around Arrah to order; martial
law was proclaimed; the people were disarmed; about thirty wounded
Sepoys, and several native officials who had aided the mutineers, were
hanged. Meanwhile Major Eyre had applied to the authorities at Dinapoor
for some reinforcements to enable him to follow up his victory, and on
the 8th of August a detachment of two hundred men of the 10th Regiment,
under the command of Captain Patterson, arrived at Arrah. This regiment
had suffered severely on the occasion when Mr. Mangles so greatly
distinguished himself, and the men were burning with the desire to avenge
their comrades, and obliterate the remembrance of that disaster. Major
Eyre was not the man to balk them in their purpose; he resolved to lead
them at once against Judgespoor, the stronghold of Koer Singh, where
he and the mutineers had taken shelter. He was joined by eight of the
garrison of Arrah, and the fifty Sikhs who had shared in the defence
under the command of Mr. Wake, and by a further reinforcement of one
hundred of Rattray’s Sikhs, under Lieutenants Roberts and Powers. The
attack on Judgespoor was generally considered to be a dangerous, if not a
desperate undertaking, but at two P.M. on the 11th of August, Major Eyre
marched forth from Arrah with the certainty of victory.
After a march of eight miles they reached an open plain, where they
bivouacked for the night. The following morning they resumed their march,
and found the road more difficult as they advanced. At ten o’clock
they halted an hour for refreshment. Two miles farther on they came in
sight of the enemy, who had taken up a strong position in the belt of
jungle surrounding Judgespoor, with a river in their front. In their
centre was the town of Dulloor, before which some breastworks had been
raised; between it and our army was a native village, occupied by an
advanced picket, which soon retired before the fire of our skirmishers.
The mutineers lay so close in the jungle and broken ground as to be
almost invisible; but a few discharges of grape made them shift their
position more to the right. Now was the time for the 10th to wipe out the
remembrance of the ambuscade, and such was their impatience that almost
before the order to charge could reach them they rushed forward with a
cheer, and charged to within sixty yards of the enemy, who broke and fled
for refuge to the town of Dulloor, and the adjacent jungle. Meanwhile
their left and centre had been repulsed by the detachment of the 5th
Fusiliers under Captains L’Estrange and Scott, who now took part in the
pursuit.
During the engagement Koer Singh’s irregular lines on the left had moved
round, and were threatening our right wing under cover of the jungle
and broken ground, but they were checked by the fire of the Sikhs and
volunteer yeomanry, and of a howitzer under the skilful management of
Staff-Sergeant Melville, Royal Artillery. After an hour’s resistance the
whole body of the enemy fell back on Judgespoor, pursued by our men, who
captured two guns during their flight, and followed them up to the walls
of the stronghold, which consisted of an extensive mass of buildings,
protected by lofty walls with loopholes for musketry, and capable of
offering a protracted resistance if properly defended. The mutineers were
seized with such a panic that they offered no resistance, and our men
entered Koer Singh’s fortress in triumph at one P.M., where they found
ample accommodation and refreshment after their rapid march. Koer Singh
had evacuated his stronghold only one hour before the triumphant entry
of our men, and fled in the direction of Jutoorah, seven miles to the
south, where he had another fortified residence in the jungle. He was
pursued by eighty men of the 5th Fusiliers, under Captain L’Estrange,
and the Volunteer Yeomanry, who, on reaching Jutoorah, found that he
had continued his flight towards Sasseram with the remains of the 40th
Regiment of Native Infantry, who alone of all the rebel army still
continued to share his fortunes. Captain L’Estrange not having sufficient
forces to follow up the pursuit, contented himself with destroying the
place, and then returned to Judgespoor. Our troops found abundance of
provisions there; the stores of grain alone would have sustained twenty
thousand men for six months; they were distributed among the starving
villagers, who had been plundered by Koer Singh and his followers. At two
P.M. on the 15th of August, Judgespoor was evacuated, and the stronghold,
including a new Hindoo temple, on which large sums had been expended, was
blown into the air. Major Eyre then advanced as far as Peeroo in pursuit
of Koer Singh, when he received instructions from Sir James Outram to
return to Arrah, and to join the force which was now on its march for
the relief of Lucknow. Major Eyre’s battery and the detachment of the
5th Fusiliers shared in all the honours and dangers of that successful
enterprise, and suffered severely while forcing their way into the town.
The gallant L’Estrange, whose name has occurred so often in the course of
this narrative, and who was known to us as a young officer of superior
intellect and studious habits, was mortally wounded; three of his brother
officers shared the same fate. Mr. Mangles still survives to enjoy the
reward which he earned by his courage and humanity.
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