men changed the soaking clothes, and slept and rested while the generals
anxiously discussed the best plan for getting into Lucknow. There were
three ways to choose from, all full of danger and difficulty, but in the
end it was decided to force the passage of the Charbagh bridge over the
canal.
This the enemy had evidently expected, for they had erected across it a
barrier seven feet in height, with six guns, one a 24-pounder. Beyond
the bridge, along the canal, were tall houses, and from every window and
loophole a deadly fire would pour. And even supposing that the bridge
was carried, the troops would have to pass through narrow streets and
gardens and palaces, under showers of bullets at every step.
Yet this seemed the only way to Lucknow.
As for the sick and wounded, they were left with the stores and a guard
of three hundred men at the Alumbagh.
* * * * *
Breakfast was over by half-past eight on the morning of September 25,
when the order was given to advance. The first opposition met with by
the leading column, headed by Outram, was near the Yellow House, which
lay along the road to the bridge. Here Maude, one of the best officers
in the army, who was to win his V.C. that day, charged the two guns
whose fire was so deadly, and silenced them, and the troops went on till
they were close to the canal. Then Outram took the 5th Fusiliers and
bore away to the right in order to clear the gardens of the sepoys
hidden in them, and to draw off the attention of the enemy; lieutenant
Arnold, with a company of the Madras Fusiliers, took his station on the
left of the bridge with orders to fire at the houses across the canal,
and right out in the open facing the bridge was Maude, with two light
guns straight in front of the battery. In a bend of the road on one side
some of the Madras Fusiliers supported him, and on the other side, a
little way off, stood Neill and his detachment, waiting for the
diversion to be made by Outram's movement.
To Neill's surprise, not a trace of Outram was to be seen, and Maude
stood shelterless, his gunners falling before the continuous fire from
the bridge. Again and again the Fusiliers from behind filled their
places, only to be swept down like the rest, and now Maude and a
subaltern were doing the work.
'You must do something,' called out Maude to young Havelock; 'I cannot
fight the guns much longer.' Havelock nodded and rode through the fire
that was raking the road to Neill, urging him to order a charge. But
Neill refused. He was not in command, he replied, and could not take
such a responsibility. The young aide-de-camp did not waste time in
arguing, but hurried on to Fraser-Tytler, only to receive the same
answer. Then, turning his horse's head, he galloped hard down the road,
in the direction of the spot where his father was stationed. In a few
minutes he was back and, reining up his horse at Neill's side, while he
saluted with his sword, he said breathlessly:
'You are to charge the bridge, sir.'
It did not occur to Neill that there had not been time for young
Havelock to have reached his father's position and come back so soon,
and therefore that no such order could have been given by the general,
and was simply the invention of the aide-de-camp himself. Quite
unsuspiciously, therefore, he bade the buglers sound the advance, and
Arnold, with twenty-five of his men, rushed on to the bridge and were
instantly shot down. For fully two minutes Harry Havelock on his horse
kept his position in front of the guns with only a private beside him,
and the dead lying in heaps on all sides.
'Come on! Come on!' he cried, turning in his saddle and waving his
sword, while the fire from the houses was directed upon him, and a ball
went through his hat.
And they 'came on' with a rush, wave upon wave, till the guns were
silenced and the barrier carried.
The aide-de-camp had indeed 'done something.'
[Illustration: The young Aide-de-camp did not waste time in arguing.]
* * * * *
The 78th Highlanders held the bridge for three hours till the whole
force was over, and desperate fighting was going on all the time, for
the enemy was coming up in dense numbers. At length a detachment
advanced to a little temple further up the road, which was held by the
sepoys, and succeeded in turning them out. But once inside, the
Highlanders could only defend it with their swords, for the cartridges
were so swelled by exposure to the rain that they would not go into the
guns. After an hour, young Havelock, whose duty lay at the bridge, sent
up some fresh cartridges, and then Webster, who from the shelter of the
temple had been impatiently watching the action of three small cannon
which had been firing down the Cawnpore road, exclaimed:
'Who's for those guns?'
'I'm for the guns!' they all shouted, and the temple door was opened and
Webster leaped out, Macpherson, the adjutant, and the men following. The
guns when captured were thrown into the canal, where those of the
Charbagh bridge were already lying.
* * * * *
Perhaps the most trying part of the whole campaign was the advance
towards the residency through the narrow streets, where the very women
flung down stones, and from the roofs and windows a ceaseless fire
poured upon our men. Deep trenches had been cut along the cross-roads in
order to make the horses stumble, and the smoke was so thick that men
and beasts were nearly blinded. It was here that Neill fell, shot in the
head, and Webster found a grave instead of the Victoria Cross, which
would certainly have been given him. Then there was a rush forward, and
they were within the gates.
For the first few minutes the men did not know what they were saying or
doing, so great was the excitement on both sides; but soon it was plain
that the rescuing party were utterly exhausted, and needed rest, and
what food might be forthcoming, which was neither good nor plentiful.
Most of all they must have rejoiced in the possibility of changing their
clothes, stiff with mud and wet, for Havelock tells us that he himself
entered the city with one suit which had hardly been off his back for
six weeks.
* * * * *
Next day Outram resumed his proper position as commander, and Havelock
took a subordinate place as brigadier-general. But to him fell the task
of making up his despatches and recommending certain of his men for the
Victoria Cross. In this Havelock was especially begged by Outram to
mention his son Harry for his gallantry on the Charbagh bridge; corporal
Jakes, who was also worthy of the honour, had unhappily been killed
later in the day. Unluckily, young Havelock had, against his own will,
been previously recommended for the decoration by his father for an act
of extraordinary bravery, but one which he had no sort of right to
perform.
In the battle of Cawnpore young Havelock, then a lieutenant in the 10th
Foot, and aide-de-camp to his father, was sent to order the 64th, who
had been under a heavy fire all day, and were now lying on the ground,
to advance with some other regiments, and take a gun of twenty-four
pounds, which was sweeping the road in front. The 64th at once formed
up, but before they had started their major's horse was shot under him,
and he was forced to dismount. Harry Havelock, carried away by
excitement, never gave him time to get another, but calling on the men
to follow him, rode straight to the mouth of the gun and stayed there
till it was captured.
Now of course this was a deed of wonderful courage, and no man denied
it, but it is curious that so stern a supporter of discipline as
Havelock did not see that his son had put himself in a position where he
had no right to be, and in so doing had thrown a slur on the bravery of
the major, who except for the accident of his horse being shot would
have led the men himself. But Havelock, full of pride in his son's
action, insisted, to the great mortification of the 64th, on
recommending him for the Victoria Cross, though the young man himself,
when his excitement had calmed down, implored his father to leave out
his name, declaring that the recommendation would be put down to
affection. For a month he managed to delay the despatch, but in the end
it was sent and the Cross granted. Therefore Outram's recommendation
after the relief of Lucknow was disregarded, and only captain Maude's
V.C. is associated with the Charbagh bridge.
* * * * *
But although Havelock's force had successfully won its way into the
residency of Lucknow, the town was in no way 'relieved,' for the British
troops were few and the sepoys many. The besieging army crowded up as
before, and bored mines under the buildings, which kept our men
continually on the watch to hinder the town from blowing up. Every day
Havelock went round the entrenchments, and then he returned to the
house, to pass some hours in reading, for now that the frightful strain
of the last six weeks was over he felt tired and broken, and unfit for
work. Much of the time he spent in visiting the banqueting hall, which
had months before been made into a hospital for the soldiers, but there
was little that he or anyone else could do to help them, for all
medicines and bandages and food suited to sick people had been used up
long ago.
* * * * *
In this manner seven weeks went slowly by, while the garrison was
waiting for the arrival of sir Colin Campbell, commander-in-chief in
India, with an army of nearly five thousand men, a mere handful in
numbers compared with the enemy, but yet enough to compass what is known
in history as 'the second relief of Lucknow.' By November 9 news came
that the British troops had reached the Alumbagh, but it was absolutely
necessary that the commander-in-chief should know Outram's plans for the
defence of the city, and tell him the manner in which he himself
intended to attack.
How was this to be done? The country lying between the two generals was
covered with small detachments of sepoys carefully entrenched, and it
seemed impossible for any man to pass through them. Yet without some
knowledge of the sort and of the state of affairs in the residency the
relief expedition could not advance without frightful loss, and might
perhaps end in failure.
Then there entered the room where Outram and Havelock were gloomily
talking over the matter a man, Henry Cavanagh by name, who said that he
would undertake to get through the pickets of sepoys and carry any
message to the English camp. Outram was amazed. Brave though they all
were, not one soldier had volunteered for this forlorn hope, not because
they were afraid, but because if our maps and plans fell into the
enemy's hands, the destruction of our army would certainly follow; and
if a soldier could not do it, with all his experience of war, how could
this man, who knew nothing of soldiering, except what he had learned
during the siege? But when the general looked at Cavanagh's face his
doubts vanished.
Disguised as a native and speaking the language like one, Cavanagh made
his way slowly through the lines till the open plain was reached. Here
he breathed more freely, for, though many dangers awaited him, the worst
risks were over. Often he had seen suspicion in the eyes of the sepoys,
and felt that a terrible death was very near, but he had kept his head
and got through somehow. At length he was within the Alumbagh and could
speak with sir Colin face to face.
[Illustration: Often ... he had felt that a terrible death was very
near.]
The return journey still lay before him, but now he knew better what he
was about, and reached the residency without accident. On November 14
the relieving force was to begin its advance on the town, and on the
15th the general signalled that the attack would begin next day.
This last fight was a desperate one for both sides, and continued far
into the night, while at the Kaiserbagh, or king's palace, the fire was
fiercest of all. The brave deeds that were done that day would fill a
volume, but at length it was over, and Lucknow once more flew the
British flag, planted on the highest tower of the mess house by the hand
of young Roberts.
* * * * *
Did Havelock, one asks oneself, know that this was his last fight also?
He had been present during the whole struggle, but when it was done sank
into the weakness which seemed daily to grow greater. The
commander-in-chief had informed him--probably by means of Cavanagh--that
on September 29 he had been gazetted major-general, and the somewhat
tardily bestowed honour filled him with pleasure. If he had been able to
see any English papers he would have known how eagerly the nation
followed his footsteps, and how warmly they rejoiced in his success.
* * * * *
The capture of Lucknow was only three days old when Havelock was taken
suddenly ill. In order to get him away from the close, infected air of
the town, he was carried in a litter to a quiet wooded place, called the
Dilkoosha, near a bend of the river Goomtee, where a tent was pitched
for him, but as the bullets of the enemy fell around him even here, a
more sheltered spot had to be found for him to lie. His illness did not
appear at first very serious, but he himself felt that he would not
recover. Perhaps he hardly wished to, for he had 'fought a good fight,'
and was too tired to care for anything but rest. His son, whose wound,
received on the day of the fight for the residency, was still unhealed,
sat on the ground by the litter, and gave him anything he wanted. For a
time he lay quiet, and in the afternoon of the 23rd Outram came to see
him, and holding out his hand, Havelock bade his friend good-bye.
'I have so ruled my life for forty years that when death came I might
face it without fear,' he said; and next morning death did come.
* * * * *
Marching on the 25th into the Alumbagh, the victorious army bore with
them Havelock's body, still lying in the litter on which he died. They
dug a grave for him under a mango tree, on which an H. was cut to mark
the place--all they dared do with hosts of the enemy swarming round
them, ready to offer insult to the dead who had defied them.
Thus Henry Havelock died and was buried, though the news did not reach
England for six weeks. So he never knew how the hearts of his countrymen
had been stirred by his courage and his constancy, and that his queen
had made him a baronet and Parliament had voted him a pension of
1,000 l. a year, which was continued to his widow and to his son. But
Guarded to a soldier's grave
By the bravest of the brave,
He hath gained a nobler tomb
Than in old cathedral gloom.
Nobler mourners paid the rite
Than the crowd that craves a sight.
England's banners o'er him waved--
Dead, he keeps the realm he saved.
CONSCIENCE OR KING?
Now we come to quite another sort of hero; a man who enjoyed every day
of his life, and loved books and music and pets of all sorts; who played
with his children and made jokes with them; who held two of the greatest
offices an Englishman can hold, yet laid his head on the scaffold by
order of the king, because his conscience forbade him to swim with the
tide and to take an oath that king demanded of him. If you try, you will
find that this sort of heroism is more difficult than the other. There
is no excitement about it, and no praise. Your friends talk of you with
contempt, and call you a dreamer and a man who sacrifices his family to
his own whims. And very often the family agree with him.
* * * * *
'Verily, daughter, I never intend to pin my soul to another man's back,
for I know not whither he may hap to carry it. Some may do for favour,
and some may do for fear, and so they might carry my soul a wrong way.'
These were the words of sir Thomas More to his favourite daughter when
she came to him in prison, urging him to do as his friends had done, and
swear to acknowledge the king as head of the church instead of the pope.
All his life he had 'carried' his own soul himself, and that was no
small thing to be able to say in the reign of Henry VIII., when men's
hearts failed them for fear, not knowing from day to day what the tyrant
might demand of them.
Thomas More came of a family bred to the law, and his father, afterwards
made a knight and a judge, seems to have been kindly and pleasant, and
like his son in many ways, especially in his fondness for children. He
set great store by books and learning, and taught Thomas to love them
too. The boy was born when the Wars of the Roses were just over, and the
country was beginning to settle down again. In London king Edward IV.
was still the favourite of the people, and after his death, in 1483,
Thomas, then five years old, happened to overhear a gentleman telling
his father that it was prophesied duke Richard of Gloucester would be
king. When the prophecy came to pass, and Richard snatched the crown for
himself, many besides little Thomas were filled with wonder. For Richard
had played his part so well that few guessed at what he really was, or
that the murder of his nephews would be nothing to him, if he could
mount the throne on their bodies.
* * * * *
At that period boys were sent early to school, and after careful
inquiries, John More decided to put his son under the charge of one
Nicholas Holt, headmaster of St. Anthony's in Threadneedle Street, a
school founded by Henry VI. Here Thomas spent most of his time in
learning Latin, which it was necessary for a gentleman to know. Foreign
languages were very little studied; instead, Latin was used; hence
ambassadors addressed each other in that tongue, and in it men wrote
letters, and often books. Thomas, who had been accustomed all his life
to hear Latin quoted by his father and the lawyers who came to his house
in Milk Street, soon mastered most of the difficulties, knowing well
that he would be considered stupid and ignorant if when he left school
he should ever make a mistake in his declensions, or forget the gender
of a noun.
When John More was satisfied with his son's progress in Latin, he got
leave for him to enter, as was the custom, the house of cardinal Morton
as a sort of page. Thomas was then about twelve, quick and observant,
and though fond of joking, good-tempered and prudent, taking care to
hurt the feelings of nobody. Morton was both a clever and a learned man,
a good speaker and excellent lawyer, and the king, Henry VII.,
frequently took counsel with him and profited by his experience. On his
side, Morton took a fancy to the boy, whose sharp answers amused him.
His keen eyes noticed that Thomas, who, with the other pages, waited at
dinner upon the cardinal and his guests, listened to all that was being
said, while never neglecting his own especial duties.
'This child will prove a marvellous man,' Morton one day whispered to
his neighbour, and the neighbour lived to prove the truth of his words.
Thomas greatly enjoyed the two years he passed in Morton's house, and
made many friends, both amongst his companions and with the older men.
There was always something going on which pleased and interested him,
for he was very sociable, and liked, above everything, a 'good
argument.' At Christmas time all kinds of shows and pageants were to
take place, and the young pages could hardly sleep for excitement,
though their appetites never failed, and the huge pieces of pasty put on
their wooden or pewter plates disappeared surprisingly quick. Of course
they had no forks to help themselves with, but each boy possessed a
knife of his own, in which he took great pride, and a spoon made either
of horn or pewter. At Christmas they were given plenty of good things as
a treat, and the cardinal, like other great men, flung open his doors,
and feasted the poor as well as the rich. Then companies of strolling
players would come by, and beg permission to amuse the guests by their
acting. On this Christmas Day in 1490 the play was in full swing when
young Thomas suddenly appeared on the stage in the great hall, and began
to 'make a part of his own, never studying for the matter, which made
the lookers-on more sport than all the players beside.' It must have
been rather difficult for the poor actors to go on with their parts when
they did not know what the boy was going to say next; but Thomas seems
to have been as clever as he was impudent, and the play ended in
applause and laughter.
* * * * *
In those days boys grew into young men much earlier than they do now,
and set about earning their living, and even getting married, at an age
when to-day they would probably just be leaving a public school. So we
are not surprised at hearing that when Thomas was only fourteen he was
sent by cardinal Morton to Canterbury Hall, Oxford, a college which
afterwards became part of Christ Church, founded by Wolsey. The elder
More was a poor man, and Thomas was not his only child; five others had
been born to him, but, as far as we can gather, three of these died when
they were still babies. Thomas had been brought up from his earliest
years to do without many things which must have seemed necessaries to
the richer boys in Morton's house. But he cared little that his dress
was so much plainer than theirs, and that when he went home he had what
food was needful and no more. As long as he had books, and somebody to
talk to about them, he was quite happy, but even he found the fare of an
Oxford scholar rather hard to digest. However, throughout his life he
always made the best of things, and if he ever went to bed hungry, well,
nobody but himself was any the wiser. Law was the study his father
wished him specially to follow, but he was eager too to learn Greek,
which had lately been introduced into the University, and to improve his
Latin style. He also wrote verses, as was beginning to be the fashion
with young men, and worked out problems in arithmetic and geometry,
while, after his regular work was done, he would carry a French or Latin
chronicle to his small window, and pore over the history of bygone
times. In his spare moments he would play some old music on the flute or
practise on the viol.
* * * * *
After two years, when, according to his son-in-law Roper, 'he was both
in the Greek and Latin tongues sufficiently instructed, he was then, for
the study of the law of the realm, put to an Inn of Chancery, called New
Inn, where for his time he prospered very well, and from thence was
admitted to Lincoln's Inn, with very small allowance, continuing there
his study until he was made and accounted a worthy barrister.' Like the
other youths of his own age--Thomas was eighteen when he was admitted to
Lincoln's Inn--he attended classes where law was taught by professors,
or 'readers,' and took part in the proceedings of mock trials, old
French being the language used. When the trial was over, the reader and
other teachers gave their opinions as to the way in which the scholars
had pleaded, and pointed out the mistakes they had made. We may be sure
that young More delighted in this 'exercise,' and he evidently excelled
in it, for he was soon given a 'readership' himself.
* * * * *