THE EVENTFUL ESCAPES FROM DELHI.
Remembering that in the month of May 1857 there was a very aged king
living in the great palace at Delhi; that the heir-apparent, his
grandson, resided in the palace of Kootub Minar, eight or nine miles
from the city; that the Moslem natives still looked up to the king with
a sort of reverence; and that his enormous family had become
dissatisfied with the prospective extinction of the kingly power and
name—remembering these facts, the reader will be prepared to follow the
fortunes of the Meerut mutineers, and to understand on what grounds the
support of the royal family was counted upon.
The distance to be passed over being forty miles, it was not till the
day after the outbreak at Meerut—namely, the 11th of May—that the three
mutinous regiments reached Delhi. The telegraphic wires were so soon
cut, and the dâks so effectually interrupted, that it is doubtful at
what hour, and to what extent, the transactions at Meerut became known
to Brigadier Graves, who commanded at Delhi. The position of that
officer was well calculated to produce uneasiness in his mind at a time
of insubordination and distrust; for he had no European regiments with
him. The garrison consisted of the 38th, 54th, and 74th native
regiments, and a battery of native artillery; the English comprised only
a few officers and sergeants of those regiments, the various servants of
the Company, and private traders within the city. The 54th and 74th had
not up to that time shewn any strong symptoms of disaffection; but the
38th, which had achieved a kind of triumph over the Marquis of Dalhousie
in 1852, in reference to the proposed expedition to Pegu, had ever since
displayed somewhat of a boastful demeanour, a pride of position and
influence. The three regiments and the artillery had their regular
quarters in the cantonment, about two miles north of the city: sending
into Delhi such companies or drafts as were necessary to man the
bastions, towers, magazine, &c. As the river Hindoun, a tributary to the
Jumna, crosses the Meerut and Delhi road near Furrucknuggur, about ten
miles from Delhi, it might be a fair problem whether the mutineers could
have been met and frustrated at the crossing of that river: the solution
of this problem, however, would necessarily depend partly on the time
available, and partly on the prudence of marching the Delhi force across
the Jumna at such a period, placing a broad river between the brigadier
and a city likely to be readily affected by notions of disaffection.
Whether influenced by want of time, want of due information, or by
strategical reasons, no such movement was made by him. The mutineers
would obviously cross the Jumna by the bridge of boats, and would then
pass southwestward into the city, or northwestward towards the
cantonment, or possibly both. A necessity arose, therefore, for adopting
defensive measures in two different quarters; and as the non-military
portion of the European inhabitants, especially women and children,
would be a source of much anxiety at such a time, the brigadier made
arrangements to accommodate them, or some of them, in the Flagstaff
Tower, a strong circular brick building on the heights near the
cantonment, a mile and a half north of the nearest or Cashmere Gate of
the city. The military commandant ordered out his regiments, drew forth
his guns, and delivered a pithy address, in which he exhorted the sepoys
to stand true to their colours, and repel the mutineers as soon as they
should appear. His address was received with cheers, the insincerity of
which was soon to be made manifest.
So many Europeans were cut and shot down at Delhi on this day of misery,
and so precipitate was the escape of others, that not one single person
was in a position to give a connected narrative of the dismal work.
Startling, indeed, were the sights and the sounds which riveted the
attention of the European inhabitants on this morning. A peaceful Sunday
had passed over in its ordinary way; for none knew what were the deeds
being perpetrated at Meerut. The native troops, it is true, were to some
extent cognizant of that movement, for the insurgents had unquestionably
arranged the outlines of a plan; and some of the European officers at
Delhi had observed, not without uneasiness, a change in the behaviour of
the sepoys at that station; nevertheless, to the Europeans generally,
this social avalanche was a wholly unexpected visitation. Resistance was
needed from those too powerless to resist effectually; and flight was
the only resource for many too weak, too young, too sick, to bear up
under such a necessity. All the letters, since made public, relating to
the sad events of that day, tend to shew how little the European
inhabitants of Delhi looked forward to such scenes. One lady, after a
hurried retreat, said: ‘We can hardly ourselves believe how we escaped.
The way in which poor helpless men, women, and children were slaughtered
without a moment’s warning was most dreadful. We were surprised on the
morning of the 11th of May (baby’s birthday) by a party of mutineers
from Meerut.’ It is evident that ‘baby’s birthday’ had dawned with much
happier thoughts in the poor mother’s mind, than were destined to remain
there. Another lady, with her husband and child, were just about to
leave Delhi for Calcutta; their dâk-passage was paid, and their
travelling arrangements nearly completed. Suddenly a messenger hastened
to their home to announce that the Meerut mutineers had crossed the
bridge, and were within the city walls; and very soon afterwards,
fearful sights told them that immediate escape was the only mode of
saving their lives. So it was all over the city; terror and blood began
the week, instead of peace and commerce.
The train of circumstances, as we have just said, having involved either
the death or the hasty flight of nearly all the English within the city
and the cantonment, it follows that the narrative of the day’s ruthless
work must be constructed from materials derived from various quarters,
each supplying some of the links. When Major Abbott of the 74th found
himself, on the next day, the senior officer among those who escaped to
Meerut, he deemed it his duty to write an account to Major-general
Hewett of the proceedings, so far as his sad tale could tell them. With
this we begin.
The city, according to Major Abbott’s narrative, was entered first by a
small number of the mutinous 3d native cavalry, who crossed by the
bridge of boats. While proceeding westward, they were met by a wing of
the 54th native infantry, under the command of Colonel Ripley. But here
a serious symptom at once presented itself; the 54th excused themselves
from firing on the mutineers, on the plea of their muskets not being
loaded; the guard of the 38th native infantry likewise refused, on some
pretence, to fire; and thus the insurgents were enabled to enter the
city by the Cashmere Gate. Captain Wallis, the field-officer of the
week, on ordering the men of the mainguard at the gate to wheel up and
fire, was met by insulting jeers; and he only desisted from importuning
them when he found the work of death going on in other quarters. Six
British officers of the 54th speedily fell, either killed or
wounded—namely, Colonel Ripley, Captains Smith and Burrowes, Lieutenants
Edwardes, Waterfield, and Butler. Major Abbott, willing to hope that his
own regiment, the 74th, was still faithful, hastened to the cantonment,
got as many of his men together as he could, and explained to them that
the time was come to shew their fidelity as true soldiers: he announced
his intention to go down to the Cashmere Gate, and called for volunteers
to follow him. All for a while went favourably; the men stepped up to
the front, loaded promptly, and marched off briskly after the major. On
arriving at the Cashmere Gate, the 74th took possession of the
mainguard, drawn up in readiness to receive any attack that might be
made. Affairs remained quiet near that gate until towards three o’clock,
when a heavy firing of guns, followed by a terrific explosion, announced
that fighting had been going on near the magazine, and that a vast store
of ammunition had been blown into the air. Whether this explosion had
been caused by friends or enemies was not at first known; but the news
soon spread abroad that a gallant artillery-officer, Lieutenant
Willoughby, had adopted this terrible mode of preventing an enormous
supply of warlike material from falling into the hands of the
insurgents.
Before proceeding with the narrative of events in the city, it will be
necessary to describe more particularly the occurrence last adverted to.
There were two magazines, one near the cantonment, and a much larger and
more important one in the city. It was the last named that became the
scene of such desperate work. This magazine was an enclosure of
considerable size, about midway between the Selimgurh Fort and the
Cashmere Gate, almost close to the British residency. As a storehouse
filled with a greater quantity of guns, gunpowder, and ammunition, than
any other place in India, a struggle for its possession between the
British and the insurgents became inevitable: hence it arose that the
destruction of the magazine was an achievement worthy of record, no less
for its vast importance in relation to the ultimate fate of the city,
than for the cool heroism that marked its planning and execution. The
magazine contained no less than three hundred guns and mortars, twenty
thousand stand of arms, two hundred thousand shot and shell, and other
warlike stores. Lieutenant Willoughby was himself too severely wounded
by the explosion to write; but the details of this gallant affair have
been very exactly given by Lieutenant G. Forrest, who was
assistant-commissary of ordnance in Delhi at the time. Between seven and
eight o’clock in the morning of this eventful day, Sir Theophilus
Metcalfe, one of the civil servants of the Company, residing between the
city and the cantonment, came to the lieutenant, and requested him to go
to the magazine for the purpose of planting two guns on the bridge, as a
means of barring the passage of the mutineers. Arrived at the magazine,
they met Lieutenants Willoughby and Raynor, and several officers and
privates of the ordnance establishment. The three principals went to the
small bastion on the river-face, commanding a full view of the bridge;
there they could distinctly see the mutineers marching in open columns,
headed by their cavalry; and they also saw that the Delhi side of the
bridge was already in the possession of a smaller body of horse. Any
attempt to close or guard the city-gates was found to be too late; for
the mutineers were admitted, with great cheering, into the gate of the
palace. Lieutenant Willoughby, seeing the critical state of affairs,
returned quickly to the magazine, closed and barricaded the gates, and
prepared for defence. Conductor Crow and Sergeant Stewart were placed
near one of the gates, with lighted matches in their hands, in command
of two six-pounders double-charged with grape, which they were ordered
to fire if any attempt were made to force the gate from without. The
principal gate of the magazine was similarly defended by two guns, with
_chevaux-de-frise_ laid down on the inside. There were five other
six-pounders, and a twenty-four pounder howitzer, quickly placed at such
spots as might render them more readily available for defence—all
double-loaded with grape-shot. A more doubtful task was that of arming
the native artillerymen or ordnance servants within the magazine; for
they were in a state, not only of excitement, but of insubordination,
much more inclined to aid the assailants without than the defenders
within. This arming being effected so far as was practicable, a train of
gunpowder was laid down from the magazine to a distant spot; and it was
agreed that, on Lieutenant Willoughby giving the order, Conductor
Buckley should raise his hat as a signal to Conductor Scully to fire the
train and blow up the magazine with all its contents. Having done all
that a cool and circumspect leader could do to prepare for the worst,
Lieutenant Willoughby awaited the issue. Very soon, mutinous sepoys—or
rather the palace guards, who had not until that hour been mutinous—came
and demanded possession of the magazine, _in the name of the King of
Delhi_! No answer being vouchsafed to this demand, scaling-ladders were
sent from the palace, and placed against the wall of the magazine. This
decided the wavering of the native artillerymen; they all as with one
accord deserted, climbed up to the sloping roofs on the inside of the
magazine, and descended the ladders to the outside. The insurgents now
appearing in great numbers on the top of the walls, the little band of
Europeans commenced a brisk fire of grape-shot, which worked much
mischief among the enemy; although only nine in number, they kept
several hundred men at bay. At last, the stock of grape at hand was
exhausted, and the beleaguered garrison was shot at instead of shooting:
seeing that none could run to the storehouses for more grape-shot
without leaving to the mutineers freedom of entry by leaping from the
walls. Two of the small number being wounded, and the impossibility of
longer holding out being apparent, Lieutenant Willoughby gave the
signal; whereupon Conductor Scully instantly fired the train. An awful
explosion followed, amid the din and confusion of which, all who were
not too much injured made their way out of the sally-port, to escape in
the best manner they could. What was the number of insurgents killed and
wounded by the grape-shot discharges and by the explosion, no one knew;
some of the English officers estimated it at more than a thousand. It
was at the time hoped by the authorities that the whole of the vast
store of ammunition had been blown into the air, beyond the reach of the
mutineers; but subsequent events shewed that the destruction was not so
complete.[9]
To return to the agitating scenes within the city. Major Abbott,
immediately on hearing of the explosion at the magazine, found himself
placed in a painful position: urged to different courses by different
persons, and doubtful how long his own regiment would remain faithful.
He was requested by the commandant to send back two guns to the
cantonment, as a means of defence; while, on the other hand, he was
entreated by Major Paterson, and by the civil collector who had charge
of the treasury, to retain his small force for guarding the various
government establishments within the city. Major Abbott listened to this
latter suggestion for a time, but then made arrangements for sending off
the two guns to the cantonment. By this time, however, he found it was
of little consequence what orders he gave: the native troops were fast
getting beyond his control. The two guns, and some men of the 38th
regiment, returned; the gunners had deserted on the road, and the guns
had therefore been brought back again. A few of the native officers who
were still faithful now importuned him to leave the city as soon as
possible; he at first interpreted their request as an advice to hasten
to defend the cantonment; but soon found that it bore relation to his
own safety. Presently he heard shots whizzing in the mainguard. He asked
what they meant, and was told: ‘The 38th are shooting the European
officers.’ He then ordered about a hundred of his men to hasten with him
to the rescue; but they replied: ‘Sir, it is useless. They are all
killed by this time, and we shall not save any one. We have saved you,
and we are happy; we will not allow you to go back and be murdered.’ The
history of the Revolt presented many such incidents as this; in every
native regiment there were some men who wished to remain faithful, and
some officers who were favourites among them. The sepoys formed a ring
round the major, and hurried him on foot along the road leading to the
cantonment. He stopped some time at the quarter-guard, and sent a
messenger to the saluting tower to obtain information of the proceedings
in other parts of the city.
The sun was now setting, and evening approaching, giving omen of a night
of danger and difficulty. Major Abbott espied two or three carriages
belonging to officers of his own regiment, going northward on the road
to Kurnaul; and on inquiry, he was told by the men at the quarter-guard:
‘Sir, they are leaving the cantonment; pray follow their example. We
have protected you so far; but it will be impossible for us to do so
much longer. Pray fly for your life!’ Willing as he was to remain at his
post to the last, the major felt that the men around him were so far
faithful as to deserve credence for what they had just uttered; and that
his own life, if now taken, would be sacrificed without in any way
contributing towards the retention of Delhi in British hands. He
therefore replied: ‘Very well; I am off to Meerut. Bring the colours;
and let me see as many of you at Meerut as are not inclined to become
traitors.’ Major Abbott and Captain Hawkey now mounted one horse and
started off after the carriages. They overtook some guns going the same
road; but after a progress of four miles, the drivers refused to go any
further, and insisted on driving the guns back again to Delhi. The
officers, thus entirely deserted by the native troops, having no
European troops with or near them, and being powerless to effect any
good, rode or drove off to seek safety in other directions.
Major Abbott afterwards learned at what point in the day’s proceedings
his own regiment, the 74th, first broke out in mutiny. As soon as the
explosion of the magazine was heard, he ordered Captain Gordon to take a
company with him, to see whether he could render any aid in that
quarter; the captain found, however, not only that his aid would be
useless, but that his men exhibited great unwillingness to move.
Somewhat later, several officers of the 74th were about to march out
with a detachment, when a ball whistled among them: Captain Gordon fell
dead. Another ball was heard, and Lieutenant Revely was laid low. It now
became a matter of life and death: each officer, without any imputation
of selfishness, looking after his own safety. Among others, Ensign Elton
made for the bastion of the fort, jumped over the parapet, descended
into the ditch, clambered up the counterscarp on the other side, ran
across the country to the cantonment, and then followed the road which
many of the other officers had taken. Captain Tytler, Captain Nicoll,
and some others, went towards Kurnaul; Major Abbott, Captains Hawkey and
Wallace, Lieutenant Aislabie, Ensign Elton, and Farrier-sergeant Law,
took the Kurnaul road for some distance, and then struck off on the
right to Meerut, where they arrived at eight o’clock in the evening of
Tuesday the 12th—thirty-six hours after the mutineers from Meerut had
reached Delhi.
[Illustration:
Escape from Delhi.
]
After stating that almost all the European inhabitants of Delhi had been
murdered, except those who had at once been able to effect their escape,
Major Abbott thus expressed the opinion which he formed during these two
days of terrible excitement, concerning the successive steps of the
mutiny at Delhi: ‘From all I could glean, there is not the slightest
doubt that this insurrection has been originated and matured in the
palace of the King of Delhi, with his full knowledge and sanction, in
the mad attempt to establish himself in the sovereignty of this country.
It is well known that he has called on the neighbouring states to
co-operate with him in thus trying to subvert the existing government.
The method he adopted appears to have been to gain the sympathy of the
38th light infantry, by spreading the lying reports now going through
the country, of the government having it in contemplation to upset their
religion, and have them all forcibly inducted to Christianity. The 38th,
by insidious and false arguments, quietly gained over the 54th and 74th
native infantry, each being unacquainted with the other’s real
sentiments. I am perfectly persuaded that the 54th and 74th were forced
to join the combination by threats that the 38th and 54th would
annihilate the 74th if they refused; or, _vice versâ_, that the 38th and
74th would annihilate the 54th. I am almost convinced that had the 38th
not been on guard at the Cashmere Gate, the results would have been very
different; the men of the 74th would have shot down every man who had
the temerity to assail the post.’ It may be that this officer, anxious
to lessen the dishonour of his own regiment, viewed somewhat too
partially the relative merits of the native troops; but it is
unquestionable that the 74th remained faithful much longer than the
38th. To what extent the King of Delhi was really implicated, neither
Major Abbott nor any other Englishman could at that time correctly tell.
It was not during the dire confusion of this terrible day that the
course of events in the streets and buildings of Delhi could be fully
known. The facts came to light one by one afterwards. When the 3d Bengal
troopers, who preceded the mutinous infantry in the march from Meerut,
arrived at the Jumna about seven in the morning, they killed the
toll-keeper of the bridge of boats, took the money found in his office,
and crossed the bridge. Arrived in Delhi, they hastened to the royal
palace, where they made some sort of announcement of their arrival and
its purport. Mr Simon Fraser, the commissioner for Delhi, Captain
Douglas, his assistant, and one or two other officials, hearing of this
movement, and seeing the approach of insurgent infantry on the other
side of the river, hastened to the palace to watch the conduct of the
royal personages at such a suspicious time. No sooner did they enter the
palace precincts, however, than they were shot down. Shortly afterwards,
the Rev. Mr Jennings, chaplain of the residency, was killed; as were
likewise his daughter and another lady near him—after, it is to be
feared, atrocities worse than death. It was seen that the insurgent
troopers were in a state of the greatest excitement and fury, as if they
had worked themselves up, by indulgence in the intoxicating _bang_, to a
level with their terrible plans. While the military operations, already
noticed, were going on at the Cashmere Gate, the magazine, and the
cantonment, all the ruffians of Delhi and the neighbouring villages,
eager for _loot_ or plunder, joined the insurgents. Every European
residence was searched: the troopers and sepoys seeking the lives of the
inmates; while the rabble followed, and swept off every shred of
property. Bungalows were fired one by one, until glaring sheets of flame
were visible in every direction. Bands of Goojurs—a kind of Hindoo gipsy
tribe—were lying in wait after nightfall all along the line of road
twenty miles out of Delhi, on the watch for refugees. It was a day of
jubilee for all the miscreants; they did not stay their hands when the
Europeans had been pillaged, but attacked the houses of all the Hindoo
bankers, carrying off great treasure. Some of the Europeans concealed
themselves for a time within the palace gardens—a vain refuge, for they
were all detected, tied to trees in a row, and shot or sabred by the
mutineers. Many of the troopers, during the savage scenes of these days,
pointed to the marks of manacles on their ankles; they were of the
eighty-five who had been put in irons at Meerut on the preceding
Saturday; and they now shewed how deep was the revenge which they
intended to take for that degrading punishment. The military officers
and their families were, from various causes, those whose fate became
more publicly known; but the number of civil servants, Christians of
humble grade, and half-castes, put to death, was very great. The
bank-clerks, with their wives and children, were murdered; and similar
scenes occurred at most of the public offices.
Mr Farrington, deputy-commissioner, when at Jullundur two or three weeks
afterwards, received a written account from a native of the occurrences
at Delhi during the days immediately following the Revolt—an account
considered worthy of credence. A part of this narrative comprised the
following sad tale: ‘On the third day they [the mutineers] went to a
house near the mosque where some Europeans had taken refuge. As they
were without water, &c., they called for a subadar and five others, and
asked them to take their oaths that they would give them water, and take
them alive to the king: he might kill them, if he liked. On this oath,
the Europeans came out: the mutineers placed water before them, and
said: “Lay down your arms, and then you get water.” They gave over two
guns, all they had. The mutineers gave no water. They seized eleven
children—among them infants—eight ladies, and eight gentlemen. They took
them to the cattle-sheds. One lady, who seemed more self-possessed than
the rest, observed that they were not taking them to the palace; they
replied they were taking them by the way of Duryagunge (one of the gates
on the river-side of the city). Deponent says that he saw all this, and
saw them placed in a row and shot. One woman entreated to give her child
water, though they might kill her. A sepoy took her child, and dashed it
on the ground. The people looked on in dismay, and feared for Delhi.’
The imagination can, too truly, alas! fill up the deficient incidents in
this tale of treachery. Mr Farrington deemed his informant worthy of
reliance. He said: ‘The man has been with me. He speaks frankly, and
without fear. He is able, evidently, to narrate many a harrowing tale;
but I did not wish to hear any. He seemed really to recall with dismay
what he had witnessed.’
The aged but wretched king of Delhi—wretched in having the hopes of
earlier years revived, only to be crushed again—for a time distrusted
the mutineers; he entertained misgivings that all might not end well.
The shops and bazaars were being plundered; the king was in the palace;
and some of those around him urged that order could be restored only by
his assumption of the imperial purple. After three or four days, he went
in a kind of state through the city, advising or commanding the people
to re-open their shops, and resume their former commercial
dealings—advice more easily given than acted upon; for the devastation
had been terrible, striking grief into the more peaceful portion of the
native inhabitants. The king assumed command in the city; he named Mirza
Mogul commander-in-chief, and gave the title of general of cavalry to
Mirza Abu Bukur; he collected around him eight or nine thousand
mutineers and volunteers, who were posted at the several gates of the
city, or cantoned in the Duryagunge Bazaar. Additional guns were placed
on the ramparts; and the native sappers and miners were placed in
command of the cannon in the old fort of Selimgurh. The Company’s
treasury, one of the largest in India, is said to have been respected by
the mutineers to this extent—that they did not appropriate it among
themselves as spoil, but guarded it as belonging to their newly chosen
leader, the King of Delhi. To shew how perplexed the Calcutta government
must have been at the first news of these events, it may be mentioned
that the king’s name was adverted to as that of a friend rather than an
enemy. On the 14th of May, three days after the arrival of the Meerut
mutineers at Delhi, Mr Colvin, lieutenant-governor of the Northwest
Provinces, telegraphed from Agra to the governor-general as follows: ‘We
have authentic intelligence in a letter from the king that the town and
fort of Delhi, _and his own person_, are in the hands of the insurgent
regiments of the place, which joined about one hundred of the troops
from Meerut and opened the gates.’ Judged by the ordinary rules of
probability, it would appear that the mutineers first secured the person
of the king, and then compelled him to head them: the old man being
further urged by the entreaties and threats of his intriguing sons and
grandsons. It is difficult, under any other supposition, to account for
his transmission of a message of information and warning to the chief
British authority in those regions. On the 15th Mr Colvin sent a further
telegraphic communication to Calcutta, containing this information: ‘The
rebels have declared the heir-apparent king. They are apparently
organising the plan of a regular government; they still remain in the
place. Their policy is supposed to be to annex the adjoining districts
to their newly formed kingdom. They are not likely, therefore, to
abandon the country or leave Delhi; they have probably strengthened
themselves there. They may have secured fifty lacs of rupees [half a
million sterling].’ No further mention was here made of the old man; it
was a younger relation who had been set up as king; and this younger
prince may possibly have been the one whom the Marquis of Dalhousie had
insisted should be the heir-apparent, with such prospective limitations
of authority as the Company might hereafter declare to be expedient. The
ordinary motives which influence men’s conduct would be quite strong
enough to induce this prince to avail himself of any accidental or
unexpected means of insuring the crown without the limitations here
adverted to. Ambition was almost the only sentiment not absolutely
degrading left to the pensioned, sensual, intriguing dwellers in the
palace.
The details of this chapter have hitherto been confined chiefly to the
course of events within the city—as collected from the dispatches of
military officers, the letters from commissioners and other civil
servants of the Company, and the published statements of Europeans who
survived the dangers of the day. But we now come to adventures which,
politically of less importance, touch more nearly the hearts and
sympathies of those who would know how Englishmen, and more particularly
Englishwomen, bore up against the accumulated miseries that pressed upon
them. We have to accompany the fugitives to the fields and jungles, the
ditches and rivers, the swampy marshes and scorching sandy roads; we
have to see how they contended against privation and trial—on their way
forty miles in one direction towards Meerut, or eighty miles in another
towards Kurnaul. Many of the narratives of the fugitives, afterwards
made public, supply details not furnished in any official dispatches;
while they illustrate many points worth knowing—among others, the
greater hostility of the Mohammedan than the Hindoo natives near Delhi,
and the indications of individual kindness in the midst of general
brutality. A selection from these narratives will suffice for the
present purpose, shortened and thrown into a different form so as to
throw light on each other, and on the general events of the day. In most
cases, the names of the fugitives, especially of ladies, will be
withheld, from a motive which a considerate reader will easily
appreciate. This scruple must not, however, be interpreted as affecting
the authenticity of the narratives, which was verified only too
abundantly by collateral evidence.
We select first a family of three fugitives to Kurnaul. The wife of an
officer of the 54th native regiment, in the forenoon of this eventful
Monday, hastened with her child to the Flagstaff Tower; where, in
accordance with the advice of the brigadier-commandant, many other
families had assembled. The gentlemen remained outside on guard; the
ladies assisted in loading the guns, and in other services towards the
common defence of all. Here they remained many hours, in all the horrors
of suspense; for the husbands and fathers of many were away, and their
fate unknown. At length came the news that the 38th had openly revolted;
that none of the native regiments at Delhi could now be depended upon;
and that the inmates of the tower ought to effect their escape as
speedily as possible. There had been one company of the 38th at the
Flagstaff Tower all day; and as the building was very strong, and armed
with two guns, the brigadier long deemed himself able to protect the
numerous persons there assembled; but as soon as the defection of the
main body of this regiment became known, all reliance on the smaller
corps was at an end. Such carriages and horses as could be obtained were
immediately put in requisition, and various parties hastened off, mostly
northward on the Kurnaul road. The small group whom we have here under
notice—namely, the officer with his wife and child, reached Kurnaul the
next day; but danger was all around, and the fugitives were forced to
continue their flight, as soon as they could obtain means of conveyance.
It is touching to read how ‘baby’ occupied the mother’s thoughts through
all this agitating escape. During a sojourn at a place called
Thwanessur, on the road between Kurnaul and Umballa, they stopped at the
assistant-commissioner’s house. ‘Before we had rested two hours we were
alarmed by being told that a regiment of sepoys was come to attack us;
we had to fly from the house and hide as best we could, under the
bushes, &c., in the garden; and I kept dear baby in my own arms the
whole time until morning.’ The alarm proved to be false, and the
fugitives proceeded. They arrived safely at Umballa on the morning of
Thursday the 14th, having left Delhi on Monday evening. That the brave
wife was ‘quite fatigued and worn out’ may well be conceived when she
adds, ‘for dear baby had never left me since we left Delhi.’
[Illustration:
Delhi from Flagstaff Tower.
]
This adventure, however, was far exceeded in length, in privation, in
strange situations, in hair-breadth escapes, by one which befell a party
of four persons—an officer of the 38th regiment, an army surgeon, and
their two wives: all of whom, in the wilderness of confusion, sought the
Kurnaul route rather than that to Meerut. These ladies were among the
many who sought refuge in the Flagstaff Tower. There they had the pain
of witnessing the sufferings of poor Colonel Ripley, who, as already
narrated, had been bayoneted by men of his own regiment, and had been
brought thither for succour; they tended him as women only can tend the
sick; but their ministrations were of brief avail. After hours of
suspense, in which small hope was mingled with large despair, the
necessity for escape became obvious. A little bitterness is expressed,
in the narratives of some of the fugitives, concerning the delay in
making any preparations for the escape of the women and children; and a
few of the head officers are blamed for supineness; but those who suffer
are not always, at the time, the best judges of the cause of their
sufferings. When evening approached, many of the native coachmen drove
away the vehicles belonging to the Europeans, and appropriated them,
thus leaving the women and children in dreadful perplexity how to reach
Kurnaul or Meerut. The two Englishwomen whose narrative we now follow
were among the last of those who left the city, when evening was
approaching. They were in a buggy, but had been parted from their
husbands during the confusion of the arrangements for departure, and one
of them had lost her little child. They drove on, with no male
protector, across rugged fields, fearful of the high road: treated
sometimes respectfully by the natives, but at other times robbed and
vilely addressed. Even the velvet head-dress of one of them was torn
off, for the value of the bugles that adorned it. A jewel-box had been
brought away in haste, as the only treasure preserved; and it became
every hour more uncertain whether this would be a prey to the spoilers.
Returning to the high road, the ladies met some gunners with two guns;
and as the men told them certain death would be the result if they took
the road to Kurnaul, they drove in another direction to the Company’s
garden outside Delhi. Here, marauding was everywhere going on; the poor
ladies soon had the misery of seeing their carriage, horse, jewel-box,
and most of their outer clothing reft from them. In the dead of the
night they ventured to a neighbouring village. The surgeon, husband to
one of the ladies, here managed to join them; but being enfeebled by
previous sickness, and wounded in the jaw during the day’s exciting
troubles, he was powerless as a defender, and—far from being able to
succour others—needed succour himself. During the next fifteen hours
were these three persons hiding in fields and huts, befriended by a few
natives, and conscious that roving sepoys were near, ready for murder or
pillage. Sallying forth again on the evening of Tuesday, they were
speedily stopped by six men, who robbed them of a further portion of
their scanty apparel, and only stopped short of murder when the
officer’s wife pleaded for mercy, on the ground that she was searching
for her husband and her child, both of whom had gone she knew not
whither. The three fugitives walked all that night, the wounded surgeon
dragging himself along. In the morning they were again accosted, and
only escaped death by the ladies yielding up a further part of their
attire, the only property they had left to give. During the remainder of
that day they crept on, obtaining a little food and water from some
villagers, who were, however, too much afraid of the sepoys to afford
the fugitives the shelter of a roof; and it was terrible work indeed to
roam along the roads with a burning sun overhead and burning sand under
foot. They sat down by a well-side, and drank some water; but rude
fellows accosted them, and after insulting the hapless women, compelled
them to withdraw. They next encountered a party of irregular horse, who
had not yet joined the mutineers; the men were at first inclined to
befriend them; but fears of the consequences supervening, they soon
deserted the fugitives. Here were these two Englishwomen, gently
nurtured, and accustomed to all the amenities of good society, again
compelled to wander like miserable outcasts, helping along a male
companion whose under-jaw had been shattered, and who was otherwise in a
weak state. They crawled on during another night, and then reached a
village, which, as they saw it was Hindoo, they did not scruple to
enter. Kindness was accorded to them for one whole day; after which the
humane natives, timid lest the sepoys should burn their village if they
heard of Feringhees having been harboured, declared they could no longer
afford shelter. Once more, therefore, were the fugitives driven forth:
having seen renewed symptoms that the sepoys, or rather the marauding
ruffians, would not scruple to murder them, if opportunity offered. They
had now been five days wandering about, and yet were only ten miles
distant from Delhi: so completely had each day’s plans been frustrated
by the events of the next day. Again they entered a friendly village,
and again were they compelled soon to depart, after receiving simple but
kind assistance. No villagers, it was found, were free from dread at
having assisted a Feringhee. Once they hid for shelter under a bridge;
but an armed ruffian detected them, and behaved so unbearably towards
the women that the surgeon, who was a Roman Catholic, took a gold cross
from his bosom, and gave it as the price of their freedom from further
molestation: a wounded, shattered, sinking man, he could not offer them
a strong arm as a shield from insult. On the night of the 17th, at a
little more than twenty miles from Delhi, they were glad to obtain the
shelter of an outhouse containing twenty cows, the only roof that the
owner dared to offer them. They made an attempt to have a letter
forwarded to Kurnaul, praying for assistance; but none in those parts
could be depended upon for faithfulness beyond an hour or two: so much
was there of treachery on the one hand, and timidity on the other. On
the 18th they heard that Major Paterson, of the 54th regiment, was in
the same village as themselves; and he, powerless to succour, contrived
to send a short message to them, written with a burnt stick on a piece
of an old broken pan. Shortly afterwards they were greatly astonished,
and not a little delighted, to see an officer, the husband of one of the
ladies, enter the village; but more like a naked savage, blistered from
head to foot, than like an English gentleman.
An eventful tale had this officer to narrate. When the scenes of
violence on the 11th at Delhi had reached such a point that to remain
longer was to meet certain slaughter, he sent off his little boy with
friends towards Meerut, and saw his wife and her lady-companion start
for Kurnaul. After being robbed of his horse, and having three bullets
sent through his hat, and one through the skirt of his coat, he ran past
the blazing houses of the cantonment, and, being ill at the time, sank
down under a tree exhausted. A gang of ruffians found him, stripped him,
robbed him of everything, and endeavoured, Thug-like, to strangle
him—using, however, the sleeve of his own shirt instead of a silken
cord. Happily the choking was only partial; he recovered, staggered on a
mile or two, rested briefly in a hut, and then walked twelve miles to
Alipore in a broiling sun. He obtained a little water, a little bread,
and a few fragments of clothing, but was refused shelter. He wended his
painful way barefoot, keeping to ploughed fields as safer than the high
road, and reached a village where the headman gave him an asylum for
five days. During these days, however, he twice narrowly escaped death
from sepoys prowling about the village. On the sixth he received
information which led him to believe that his wife and her travelling
companions were within six or seven miles of him. He hastened on, with
swollen and blistered feet, wretched substitutes for raiment, and a
frame nearly worn out by sickness and anxiety; but a gleam of joy burst
upon him when at length he overtook the surgeon and the two wives,
though dismayed to see the plight to which they had been reduced. The
poor ladies he found to be, like himself, reft of everything they had in
the world except a few torn and toil-worn fragments of garments. The
surgeon had been less rudely stripped, simply because the clothes of a
wounded man were less acceptable to the spoliators. The fugitives, now
four in number, continued their journey, their feet pierced with thorns
and sharp stones, and the difficulty of carrying or dragging a wounded
man becoming greater and greater. The officer’s wife, having had no
head-covering for many days, felt the sun’s heat to be gradually
affecting her brain; she was thankful when a villager gave her a wet
cloth to bind round her temples. Matters now began to mend; the
villagers were less afraid of the Delhi sepoys; the vicinity of Kurnaul
exhibited less violence and marauding; horses and mules were obtained on
one day to take them to Lursowlie; and on the next a carriage was
provided for their conveyance to Kurnaul. How they got on from Kurnaul
to Umballa, and from Umballa to Simla, need not be told—the romance of
the incident was over when the three fugitives, two women and a wounded
man, were joined by a fourth; although much physical and mental
suffering had still to be endured. The little son of this lady, it was
afterwards found, had been carried by some friends safely to Meerut on
the 12th. The four fugitives, when they reached friendly quarters, were
poor indeed: no beggars could be more completely dependent on the
sympathy of those whom they now happily met.
Next we will follow the steps of some of those who chose Meerut rather
than Kurnaul as their place of refuge. Their adventures partake of a new
interest, because there was a broad and swift river to be crossed. A
young ensign of the 54th regiment, a stripling who had just commenced
military service under the Company, had a sad tale to tell, how the
European officers of his regiment had fallen almost to a man. He was in
the cantonment when the news arrived of the approach of the Meerut
mutineers; his regiment was ordered to hasten to the city; and he, like
other officers, was fain to hope that the men would remain true to their
colours. Leaving two companies to follow with two guns, the other eight
marched off to the city, distant, as has already been stated, about two
miles. Arriving at the mainguard of the Cashmere Gate, the regiment
encountered the mutinous 3d Bengal cavalry, who immediately shot down
nearly all the officers of the eight companies: the men of those
companies shewing, by a refusal to defend their officers, that they were
quite ready for revolt. The colonel, indeed, was bayoneted by one of his
own men after a trooper had shot him. In about half an hour the other
two companies arrived with the two guns; but as the few remaining
officers of the regiment knew not which of their men, if any, could be
depended on, they formed a kind of small fort or citadel of the
mainguard, into which they brought their few remaining companions one by
one. The poor youth, who had just commenced soldiering, and who had
never seen a dead body, was nearly overwhelmed with grief at the sight
of his brother-officers, with whom he had laughed and chatted a few
hours before, lying side by side dead and mutilated. The main body of
the regiment remained sullen, though not mutinous, until about five
o’clock in the evening; but then the spirit of evil seemed to seize
them, and they turned upon the Europeans near them, shooting
indiscriminately. The scene became agonising. Many women and children
had gone to the mainguard for security; and now they as well as the
officers found it necessary to flee for very life. Some ran, leaped,
clomb, until they got beyond the wall of the city; others waited to help
those who were weaker or of more tender years. Some of the ladies,
though wounded, lowered themselves by handkerchiefs into the ditch, from
embrasures in the parapet, and were caught by officers below; and then
ensued the terrible labour of dragging or carrying them up the
counterscarp on the other side of the ditch. (A ditch, in military
matters, be it remembered, is a dry, broad, very deep trench outside a
fortified wall, with nearly vertical sides, called the scarp and
counterscarp.) The young officer tells how that he and his male
companions would have made a dash towards Meerut, sword in hand, or have
sold their lives at once; but that their chief thoughts were now for the
women and children. What were the privations of such a company as this,
in fords and jungles, in hunger and nakedness, we shall presently see by
means of a narrative from another quarter.
It is an officer of the 38th who shall now tell his tale—how that his
own personal troubles, when alone, were slight compared with those which
he had afterwards to bear in company with other fugitive Europeans. This
officer states that, while the refugees were anxiously watching the
course of events at the Flagstaff Tower, they were momentarily expecting
aid from Meerut. They could not believe that Major-general Hewett would
have allowed the mutineers to march from Meerut to Delhi without either
making an attempt to intercept them, or following on their heels; and
their disappointment in this particular led to some of the unfavourable
comments made on that general’s line of conduct. The officer of the
38th, whose narrative is now under notice, shared the difficulty of all
the others in endeavouring to keep the men at their duty; and he speaks
of the terrible sight, more than once adverted to, which met his eye at
the mainguard inside the Cashmere Gate: ‘By the gate, side by side, and
covered by pretty ladies’ dresses taken from some house, as if in
mockery, lay the bodies of poor Captain Smith, Burrowes, Edwardes, and
Waterfield, and the quarter-master-sergeant; some lying calm as shot
dead, and others with an expression of pain, mutilated by bayonets and
swords.’ When all became hopeless within the city, and the brigadier had
given orders to retire, the officers made a show of bringing off their
regiments as well as their families; but it was only a show; for such of
the men as had remained faithful up to this time now fell away, and the
Europeans found themselves compelled to escape as best they could. The
officer hastened to the cantonment, disconsolate and helpless, but
having no immediate idea of escape. With the colonel of the same
regiment, however, he was urged to adopt that course, as the cantonment
itself was now in a blaze. The two ran off in the dead of the night
towards the river, crouching beneath trees when enemies seemed near;
they forded the Jumna Canal, slaking their parched lips as they waded or
swam; and they tore off the brighter parts of their glittering
accoutrements, to prevent betrayal. In the morning, faint and hungered,
they took refuge in a hut while a body of sepoys was searching around,
as if for victims. A few Hindoo peasants discovering them, told them
where they could hide in a tope of trees, and brought them chupatties
and milk. Being able to ford across a narrow branch of the Jumna soon
afterwards, they concealed themselves in the wild jungle; and there, to
their joy and surprise, they found others of their friends in the same
kind of concealment—joy damped, it is true, at the thought of educated
English men and women crouching among long jungle-grass like savages or
wild beasts. On counting numbers, they found they were thirteen, eight
gentlemen and five ladies and children; and as they had several guns and
swords among them, they took heart, and prepared to struggle against
further difficulties.
To bring up the two parallel threads of the story, the escapes of the
larger party, comprising the women and little ones, must now be told. In
the afternoon of the preceding day, after arrangements had been made for
conveying the ladies on gun-carriages from the city to the cantonment,
the natives who had been trusted with this duty turned faithless, and
the Europeans within the Cashmere Gate, finding themselves shot at,
sought to escape beyond the walls in any way they could. One after
another, women and children as well as men, leaped over into the ditch,
scrambled up the other side, and ran off towards the house of Sir T.
Metcalfe. One lady, the mother of three daughters who had to share in
the flight, was shot through the shoulder, yet still kept on. The native
servants—in the absence of their master, who afterwards had his own tale
to tell of jungle-life and narrow escapes—gave them a little food; but
just before the house was about being fired by the insurgents, the
fugitives left it, and succeeded in fording the narrow stream to the
spot mentioned above. When the thirteen had told their adventures, and
formed a plan, they started anew, and sought a spot where they could
ford the majestic Jumna. The officer must here tell the story of this
perilous fording: ‘Our hearts failed, and no wonder, where ladies were
concerned, as we looked at the broad swift river. It was getting dark,
too. Two natives went across. We watched them anxiously wade a
considerable portion of the river; then their heads alone appeared above
water. It was our only chance of life, and our brave ladies never
flinched. The water was so deep, that where a tall man would wade, a
short man would be drowned. I thought it was all over when, on reaching
the deep water with Mrs —— on my left arm, a native supporting her on
the other side, we were shot [drifted] down the river; however, by
desperate efforts and the assistance of another native, we reached the
bank in safety. I swam back once more for another of our party; and so
ultimately we all got safe over. It was a brave feat for our ladies to
do.’ But so it was throughout these terrific scenes: the heroism, the
patience, the long-suffering endurance of these gentlewomen, bore up to
the last; feebleness of frame was vanquished by nobility of spirit; and
the men were often kept in heart, though deeply pained, by the
uncomplaining perseverance of their gentle companions in misery. Our
fugitives passed a wretched night after this fording of the Jumna,
crouching in the jungle, with no sound ‘but the chattering of their
teeth.’ The next day threw them into the hands of a large band of
ruffians; and as the guns of the officers had been rendered useless by
wet, the consequence was direful: the whole party were stripped and
robbed, and then left without food, without clothing, without resource,
to wander whither they could. With naked feet, and skins blistering in
the sun, they toiled on. ‘How the ladies stood it,’ says the officer
whose narrative we are following, ‘is marvellous; they never murmured or
flinched, or distressed us by a show of terror.’ Fortunately, a fakeer,
in a Hindoo village, ventured to give them shelter; they remained three
days, obtaining a little food, but nothing more. A German zemindar or
landowner, who had been so long in India as to be hardly distinguishable
from a Hindoo, hearing of their plight, sent for them, gave them some
rough cloth to huddle on as substitutes for garments, and caused a
message to be sent to Meerut, which brought relief to them; and they
reached that town in seven days after leaving Delhi—worn out in mind and
body, haggard, lame, penniless, but thankful that their lives had been
spared.
Strange as these escapes and perils were, they were eclipsed in
individual daring and fertility of resource by one which remains to be
told, and which may form the last of this little group of painful
narratives. Mr Batson, surgeon of the 74th regiment, was unheard of
during so long a time after the events at Delhi on the fatal Monday that
he was given up for lost; but in a letter which he wrote to announce his
safety, he detailed such a series of adventures as appear to belong
rather to romance than to real life—Defoe-like, but entirely true
instead of fictitious. And here it may be again remarked that these
narratives must not be suspected of boastful exaggeration; there were
links which connected all the eventful stories into one chain—each
receiving corroborative strength from the others. Mr Batson states that
when it was found that the three regiments at Delhi refused to act
against the mutineers from Meerut, and that when such of the women and
children as could be collected were placed in the mainguard and the
Flagstaff Tower, he went to Brigadier Graves, volunteering to convey a
letter to Meerut, in hope of obtaining the aid of European troops. His
offer being accepted, he took leave of his wife and three daughters in
the Flagstaff Tower, went to his house, dressed himself like a native
fakeer or mendicant devotee, and coloured his face, hands, and feet. Off
he set on his perilous errand. He first tried to cross the Jumna by the
bridge of boats, but found it broken. Then he ran to the cantonment, and
endeavoured to cross by a ferry near that spot, but found the insurgent
cavalry and the neighbouring villagers plundering and marauding. Next he
hastened across the parade-ground, and, after escaping two or three
shots, was seized by some of the villagers and stripped of every bit of
his fakeer clothing. On he ran again, in his now truly forlorn state,
towards the Kurnaul road, hoping to overtake some of the officers who
were escaping by that route; but before he could do so, two of the
insurgent troopers intercepted him. Just as they were about to cut him
down with their drawn swords, his tact and knowledge saved him. Being
familiar both with the Hindostani language and with the Mohammedan
customs, he threw himself into a supplicating position, and uttered the
most exalted praises of the great Prophet of Islam: begging them to
spare his life for the sake of the Moslem. Had his assailants been
infantry sepoys, he would probably not have attempted this manœuvre, for
most of them were Hindoos; but knowing that the cavalry sowars were
chiefly Mohammedans, he made the venture. It succeeded. Whether they
knew him as a fugitive Englishman, is not certain; but they let him go,
saying: ‘Had you not asked for mercy in the name of the Prophet, you
should have died like the rest of the Kaffirs [infidels].’ After running
another mile—at once shivering with nakedness and burning with
excitement—he encountered some Mussulman villagers, who rushed upon him,
crying: ‘Here is a Feringhee; kill the Kaffir! You Feringhees want to
make us all Christians!’ They dragged him to a village, tied his hands
behind him, and sent one of their number to a house hard by to get a
sword, with which to despatch him. At this critical moment some
excitement—the nature of which Mr Batson could not understand—caused
them all to leave him, and he ran off again. He fortunately fell in with
some smiths who had been employed in the Delhi magazine, and who were
willing to save him; they urged him not to go forward, or the villagers
would certainly murder him. They took him to a hut, gave him an article
or two of apparel, and fed him with milk and bread. He tried to sleep,
but could not; he lay awake all night, restless and excited. In the
morning he bethought him of informing his protectors that he was a
physician, a doctor, a ‘medicine-man;’ and this proved to be an aid to
him; for the villagers, finding that he could answer questions relating
to maladies, and was familiar with their religion, language, and
customs, began to take much interest in the Feringhee doctor. He found
that two officers were in hiding at no great distance, but he could
reach neither of them. To get to Meerut in time to deliver his message
was of course now out of the question: all that Mr Batson could do was
to secure his own safety. More perils were in store for him. The
villagers of Badree were informed that if they harboured any Feringhees,
the now triumphant King of Delhi would direfully punish them; they
became alarmed, and hid him in a small mango tope. ‘Here,’ the surgeon
says, ‘I was left night and day alone. I was visited at night by some
one or other of the villagers, who brought me bread and water in a
ghurrah. I am unable to describe my feelings during this trying time. I
was all day in the sun, in the extreme heat, and alone at night, when
the jackals came prowling about and crying. It is only God and myself
know what I have endured. After five nights and days in this tope of
trees, I was again taken back to the village and concealed in a bhoosa
house. I was here shut in for twenty-four hours; the heat and
suffocation I cannot find language to describe. I do not know which was
the greatest misery, the tope of trees in solitude or the bhoosa
kotree.’ At length the villagers, afraid to keep him any longer,
dismissed him—enabling him to dress himself up again as a fakeer.
Tramping on from village to village, he acted his part so well as to
escape detection. He gave himself out as a Cashmerian; and although one
of the villagers suspected his European origin by his blue eyes, he did
not betray him. He observed from village to village—and the fact is
worthy of note in relation to the causes and details of the Revolt—that
the Mohammedans were much more savage than the Hindoos in their
expressions and threats against the Feringhees. The further he proceeded
from Delhi, the less did Mr Batson find himself involved in danger; and
he was fortunately picked up by Captain M^cAndrews and Lieutenant Mew of
his own regiment. He had been out no less than twenty-five days,
wandering from village to village, from tope to tope; suffering
privations which none but himself could know, and not even he adequately
describe. One great anxiety gnawed him the while—the fate of his family:
one great joy awaited him—his family escaped.
[Illustration:
Elephant and State Howdah.
]
Here this chapter may close. We have seen that on the morning of Monday
the 11th of May, the European inhabitants of Delhi arose from their beds
in peace; and that by the close of the same day there was not a single
individual of the number whose portion was not death, flight, or
terrified concealment. So far as the British rule or influence was
concerned, it was at an end. The natives remained masters of the
situation; their white rulers were driven out; and a reconquest,
complete in all its details, could alone restore British rule in Delhi.
At what time, in what way, and by whom, that reconquest was effected,
will remain to be told in a later portion of this work. Much remains to
be narrated before Delhi will again come under notice.
-----
Footnote 8:
_Quarterly Review_, No. 204.
Footnote 9:
Rightly did the governor-general, when officially informed of this
achievement, speak of ‘the noble and cool soldiership of the gallant
defenders’ of the magazine: ‘The governor-general in council desires
to offer his cordial thanks to Lieutenants Raynor and Forrest, and the
other survivors among the brave men mentioned in this report, and to
express the admiration with which he regards the daring and heroic
conduct of Lieutenant G. D. Willoughby and the warrant and
non-commissioned officers by whom he was supported on that occasion.
Their names are Lieutenants Raynor and Forrest, Conductors Shaw,
Buckley, Scully, Sub-conductor Crow, Sergeants Edwards and Stewart.
The family of the late Conductor Scully, who so devotedly sacrificed
himself in the explosion of the magazine, will be liberally provided
for, should it be ascertained that they have survived him.’
[Illustration:
LUCKNOW.
]