THE EXTINCTION
It has been impossible to note all the minor operations in this
confused war, and the isolated risings of which here and there we have
caught glimpses through the clouds of smoke overhanging the main field
of action--a mere corner of India, yet a region as large as England.
Thrills of sympathetic disaffection ran out towards Assam on the one
side, and to Goojerat on the other; up northwards into the Punjaub, as
we have seen, then through the Central Provinces, down into Bombay, and
to the great native state of Hyderabad, where the Nizam and his shrewd
minister Salar Jung managed to keep their people quiet, yet reverses on
our part might at any time have inflamed them beyond restraint.
Among the protected or semi-independent Courts of Rajpootana and
Central India there were serious troubles. Scindia and Holkar, the
chief Mahratta princes, stood loyal to us; but their soldiery took the
other side. The most remarkable case of hostility here was that of the
Ranee or Queen of Jhansi, a dispossessed widow, who had much the same
grievance against the British Government as Nana Sahib, and avenged it
by similar treacherous cruelty. She managed to blind the small English
community to their danger till the Sepoys broke out early in June with
the usual excesses; then our people, taking refuge in a fort, were
persuaded to surrender, and basely massacred. After this version of the
Cawnpore tragedy on a smaller scale, the Ranee had seized the throne of
her husband's ancestors, to defend it with more spirit than was shown
by the would-be Peshwa.
The whole heart of the Continent remained in a state of intermittent
disorder, and little could be done to put this down till the beginning
of 1858, when columns of troops from Madras and Bombay respectively
marched northward to clear the central districts, and rid Sir Colin
Campbell of the marauding swarms that thence troubled his rear. The
Bombay column, under Sir Hugh Rose, had the harder work of it. Fighting
his way through a difficult country, he first relieved the English who
for more than seven months had been holding out at Saugor; then moved
upon Jhansi, a strongly fortified city, with a rock-built citadel
towering over its walls.
The Ranee was found determined to hold out, and on March 22nd a siege
of this formidable fortress had to be undertaken by two brigades of
European soldiers and Sepoys. At the end of a week, they in turn
became threatened by over twenty thousand rebels, under Tantia Topee,
advancing to raise the siege. Fifteen hundred men, only a third of them
Europeans, were all Sir Hugh Rose could spare from before the walls,
but with so few he faced this fresh army, that seemed able to envelop
his little band in far-stretching masses. Again, however, bold tactics
were successful against a foe that seldom bore to be assailed at an
unexpected point. Attacked on each flank by cavalry and artillery,
the long line of Sepoys wavered, and gave way at the first onset of
a handful of infantry in front. They fell back on their second line,
which had no heart to renew the battle. Setting fire to the jungle in
front of him, Tantia Topee fled with the loss of all his guns, hotly
pursued through the blazing timber by our cavalry and artillery.
Next day but one, April 3rd, while this brilliant victory was still
fresh, our soldiers carried Jhansi by assault. Severe fighting took
place in the streets round the palace; then the citadel was evacuated,
and the Ranee fled to Calpee, not far south of Cawnpore. Sir Hugh
Rose followed, as soon as he could get supplies, defeating Tantia
Topee once more on the road. Our most terrible enemy was the sun,
which struck down men by hundreds; the commander himself had several
sunstrokes, and more than half of one regiment fell out in a single
day. Half the whole force were in the doctor's hands; hardly a man
among them but was ailing. The rebels knew this weak point well, and
sought to make their harassing attacks in the mid-day heat. The want of
water also was most distressing at times; men and beasts went almost
mad with thirst, when tears could be seen running from the eyes of
the huge elephants sweltering on a shadeless plain, and the backs of
howling dogs were burned raw by the cruel sun.
But the work seemed almost done, and in confidence of full success Sir
Hugh Rose did not wait for the Madras column, which should now have
joined him, but could not come up in time. At Calpee, the arsenal of
the rebels, were the Ranee and Rao Sahib, a nephew of the Nana. This
place also was a picturesque and imposing fortress that might well have
delayed the little army. But the infatuated enemy, driven to madness
by drugs and fanatical excitement, swarmed out into the labyrinth of
sun-baked ravines before it, to attack our fainting soldiers; then they
met with such a reception as to send them flying, not only from the
field, but from the town, and their arsenal, with all its contents,
fell an easy prey to the victors. This march of a thousand miles,
though so briefly related, was distinguished by some of the finest
feats of arms in the whole war.
The Madras column, under General Whitlock, had meanwhile had a less
glorious career. After overthrowing the Nawab of Banda, it marched
against the boy-Prince of Kirwi, a ward of the British Government,
who was only nine years old and could hardly be accused of hostility,
though his people shared the feelings of their neighbours. His palace
fell without a blow. Yet its treasures were pronounced a prize of the
soldiery, and the poor boy himself became dethroned for a rebellious
disposition he could neither inspire nor prevent. This seems one of the
most discreditable of our doings in the high-handed suppression of the
Mutiny.
Leaving Whitlock's men with their easily-won booty, we return to Sir
Hugh Rose, who now hoped to take well-earned repose. At the end of May
he had already begun to break up his sickly force, when startling news
came that the resources of the rebels were not yet exhausted. Tantia,
Rao Sahib, and the Ranee had hit on the idea of seizing Gwalior, and
turning it into a nucleus of renewed hostility. Scindia marched out to
meet them on June 1, but a few shots decided the battle. Most of his
army went over to the enemy, who seized his capital with its treasures
and munitions of war, and proclaimed Nana Sahib as Peshwa. The alarming
danger was that under a title once so illustrious, a revolt might
still spread far southwards into the Deccan through the whole Mahratta
country.
Without waiting for orders, broken in health as he was, Sir Hugh Rose
lost no time in starting out to extinguish this new conflagration. By
forced marches, made as far as possible at night, he reached Gwalior
in a fortnight, not without encounters by the way, in one of which
fell obscurely that undaunted Amazon, the young Ranee, dressed in
man's clothes, whom her conqueror judged more of a man than any among
the rebel leaders; the Indian Joan of Arc she has been called, and
certainly makes the most heroic figure on that side of the contest.
On June 19, her allies made a last useless stand before Gwalior. The
pursuers followed them into the city, and next day its mighty fortress,
famed as the Gibraltar of India, was audaciously broken into by a
couple of subalterns, a blacksmith, and a few Sepoys. The character of
the war may be seen, in which such an exploit passes with so slight
notice; and these rapid successes against mighty strongholds are a
remarkable contrast to the vain efforts of the mutineers to wrest from
us our poor places of refuge.
Tantia Topee was followed up beyond Gwalior, and once more defeated
with the loss of his guns, a matter of one charge, over in a few
minutes. But that by no means made an end of this pertinacious rebel,
who for the best part of a year yet was to lead our officers a weary
chase all up and down the west of Central India. Through jungles and
deserts, over mountains and rivers, by half-friendly, half-frightened
towns, running and lurking, doubling and twisting, along a trail of
some three thousand miles, he found himself everywhere hunted and
headed, but could nowhere be brought effectually to bay. Here and there
he might make a short stand, which always had the same result; and the
nature of these encounters may be judged from one in which, with eight
thousand men and thirty guns, he was routed without a single casualty
on our side.
The great object was to prevent him getting south into the Deccan and
stirring up the Mahrattas there to swell his shrivelled ranks, and
this was successfully attained. As for catching him, that seemed more
difficult. But at length he grew worn out. Such followers as were left
him slunk away to their homes, or split up into wandering bands of
robbers; the toils of the hunters closed round their slippery chief,
fairly driven into hiding. Betrayed by a rebel who thus sought to make
his peace with our Government, he was at length laid hands on in the
spring of 1859, to be speedily tried and hanged, the last hydra-head of
the insurrection.
For murderers like those of Cawnpore there was no pardon. But English
blood ran calmer now, and wise men might talk of mercy to the misguided
masses. The Governor-General had already earned the honourable nickname
of "Clemency Canning," given in bitterness by those not noble enough
to use victory with moderation. At the end of 1858, the Queen's
proclamation offered an amnesty to all rebels who had taken no part
in the murder of Europeans. This came none too soon, for the ruthless
severity with which we followed our first successes had been a main
cause in driving the beaten enemy to desperation, and thus prolonging a
hopeless struggle.
It must be confessed with shame, that not only in the heat of combat,
but in deliberate savagery excited by the licence of revenge, and with
formal mockeries of justice, too many Englishmen gave themselves up
to a heathen lust for bloodshed. Hasty punishment fell often on the
innocent as well as the guilty, meted with the same rough measure to
mutinous soldiers and to those whose crime, as in Oudh, was that of
defending their country against an arrogant and powerful oppressor. The
mass of the natives could hardly help themselves between one side and
the other; and if they did sympathize with their own countrymen, was it
for the descendants of Cromwell, of Wallace, of Alfred, to blame them
so wrathfully?
Heavy could not but be the punishment that visited this unhappy land.
Not a few of the mutineers were spared in battle to die by inches in
some unwholesome jungle, or slunk home, when they durst, only to meet
the curses of the friends upon whom they had brought so much misery,
and to be at a loss how to earn their bread, pay and pension having
been scattered to the winds of rebellion. The sufferings of the civil
population, even where they had not risen in arms, were also pitiable;
and if hundreds of homes in England had been bereaved, there would be
thousands of dusky heathen to mourn their dear ones. The country was
laid waste in many parts; towns and palaces were ruined; landowners
were dispossessed, nobles driven into beggary among the multitude of
humbler victims, whose very religion was insulted to bring home to them
their defeat. A favourite mode of execution was blowing prisoners away
from the mouth of guns, through which they believed themselves doomed
in the shadowy life beyond death; and where they came to be hanged,
the last rude offices were done by the eternally profaning touch of
the sweeper caste. The temples on the river-side at Cawnpore had been
blown up, as a sacrifice to the memory of our massacred country-people.
The mosques and shrines of Delhi were thrown open to the infidel.
Immediately after its capture, there had even been a talk of razing
this great city to the ground, that its magnificence might be forgotten
in its guilt.
The old king had paid dearly for that short-lived attempt to revive the
glories of his ancestors. Tried by court-martial, he was transported
to Rangoon, where he soon died in captivity. Certain other potentates
were punished, and some rewarded at their expense, for varying conduct
during a crisis when most of them had the same desire to be on the
winning side, but some played their game more skilfully or more luckily
than others. Nana Sahib, the most hateful of our enemies, escaped the
speedy death that awaited him if ever he fell into British hands. He
fled to the Himalayas with a high price on his head, and his fate was
never known for certain; but the probability is that long ago he has
perished more miserably than if he had been brought to the gallows.
The Power which had set up and pulled down so many princes became
itself dispossessed and abolished through the upheavings of the
Mutiny. In England, it was felt on all hands that such an empire as
had grown out of our Eastern possessions, should no longer be left
under the control of even a so dignified body as the East India
Company. The realm won by private or corporate enterprise was annexed
to the dominions of the British Crown; and on Nov. 1, 1858, the same
proclamation which offered amnesty to the submissive rebels, declared
that henceforth the Queen of England ruled as sovereign over India.
In 1877, Queen Victoria was proclaimed Empress at Delhi, amid an
imposing assemblage both of actual rulers and of gorgeous native
potentates bearing time-honoured titles, who thus fully acknowledged
themselves vassals of the Power that in little more than a century had
taken the place of the Great Mogul.
Our rule in India has now become marked by a feature almost new
in the history of conquerors. We begin to recognize more and more
clearly that we owe this subjugated land a debt in the elevation of
her long-oppressed millions. With this duty comes a new source of
danger. By the very means we take here to raise up a sense of common
welfare, and through the destruction of those petty tyrannies that
hitherto held apart the elements of national life, we are teaching the
agglomeration of races to whom we have given a common name to look on
themselves as one people, still too much differing from us in interests
and sympathies; and it is to be feared that their growth in healthy
progress does not keep pace with the hot-headed and loud-tongued
patriotism of some who, in the schools of their rulers, have learned
rather to talk about than to be fit for freedom. Though such noisy
discontent is chiefly noted among the classes least formidable in arms,
while the more warlike seem not unwilling to accept our supremacy,
if ever another rebellion took place, we should have to deal with a
less unorganized sentiment of national existence, and perhaps with the
deeper and wider counsels, for want of which mainly, we have seen how
the Mutiny miscarried, that else might have swept our scanty force out
of India. On the other hand, in such a future emergency, we should have
the advantage both of the improved scientific arms, so decisive in
modern warfare, the use of which we now take more care to keep in our
own hands, and of those better means of communication with the East,
gained within the lifetime of our generation. In less than a month, we
could throw into India as many English soldiers as, in 1857, arrived
only in time to stamp out the embers of an almost ruinous conflagration.
In any case, the conscience of England has set up a new standard to
judge its achievements--by the good we can do to this great people, and
not by the gain we can wring from them, the honour of our mastery must
stand or fall.
The work of education may well be longer and harder than that of
conquest. The conduct of our countrymen here causes yet too much shame
and doubt in thoughtful minds. But when we see the spirit in which many
of India's rulers undertake their difficult task--the patient labours
of officials, following the pattern of men like Outram, Lawrence,
Havelock, the devotion to duty that often meets no reward but an early
grave--we take hope that their work may after all weld into strength a
free, prosperous, and united nation. And though we wisely forbear to
force our faith upon these benighted souls, it rests with ourselves
in time, through the power of example, to win a nobler victory than
any in the blood-stained annals of Hindostan. Missionary teachings can
little avail, if Christians, set among the heathen in such authority
and pre-eminence, are not true to their own lessons of righteousness.
Standing beside that proudly-mournful monument which now crowns the
ridge of Delhi, and raises our holiest symbol over the once-rebellious
city, every Englishman should be inspired to a braver struggle than
with armed foes, that, mastering himself, he may rightly do his part
towards planting the Cross--not in show alone, but in power--above the
cruel Crescent and the hideous idols of an outworn creed!
APPENDIX
CHIEF DATES OF INDIAN HISTORY
Alexander the Great's Invasion of India B.C. 327
Slave Kings of Delhi A.D. 1206-90
Tamerlane's Invasion 1398
Vasco de Gama's Voyage 1498
Baber founds the Mogul Empire 1526
Akbar's Reign 1556-1605
East India Company Incorporated 1600
Sivajee becomes King of the Mahrattas 1674
Death of Aurungzebe 1707
Nadir Shah plunders Delhi 1739
Clive's Defence of Arcot 1751
Battle of Plassey 1757
War with Hyder Ali 1780
Trial of Warren Hastings 1788-95
Storming of Seringapatam 1799
Battle of Assaye 1803
Overthrow of the Mahrattas 1818
First Burmese War 1824
Capture of Bhurtpore 1827
Lord William Bentinck's Governorship 1829
Disasters in Afghanistan 1841
Conquest of Scinde 1843
First Sikh War 1845
Second Sikh War 1848
Conquest of Pegu 1852
Annexation of Oudh 1856
The Sepoy Mutiny 1857
Outbreak at Meerut May 10
The Mutineers seize Delhi May 11
General Anson marches against Delhi May 25
Mutiny at Lucknow May 30
" " Cawnpore June 4
" " Jhansi June 5
" " Allahabad June 6
Battle of Budlee-Ka-Serai June 8
Panic Sunday at Calcutta June 14
Mutiny at Futtehgurh June 18
Massacre at Cawnpore June 27
Sir H. Lawrence defeated at Chinhut June 30
English Retreat into Agra Fort July 5
Havelock advances from Allahabad July 7
Nana Sahib routed before Cawnpore July 16
Mutiny at Dinapore July 25
Storming of Delhi Sept. 14
Surrender of the King Sept. 21
Havelock's Relief of Lucknow Sept. 25
Sir Colin Campbell marches to Lucknow Nov. 9
Residency of Lucknow evacuated Nov. 22
Tantia Topee defeated at Cawnpore Dec. 6
1858
Lucknow finally taken March 21
Taking of Jhansi April 3
Battle of Bareilly May 5
Battle before Calpee May 22
Scindia defeated by the Rebels June 1
Gwalior taken June 19
The Queen's Proclamation Nov. 1
1859
Tantia Topee taken April 15
The Queen proclaimed Empress of India 1877
THE END
Richard Clay & Sons, Limited,
London & Bungay.