by V. A. Stuart
Alex accepted the proffered hand. Less than half an hour later, with Ghulam Rasul and Partap Singh riding behind him, he set his face in the direction of Cawnpore and scarcely drew rein until the red glow of burning buildings, shining through the darkness, told him that he had reached his destination.
The burning buildings were civil and cantonment bungalows, he saw, as he approached cautiously, and there were a number of other fires in the native lines—the pattern of Meerut repeated, be reflected bitterly. Although the fires were dying down and he could hear no sound of shooting, which suggested that the mutineers had left on their way to Delhi. There was a guard of the Nana’s troops posted in front of the Bridge of Boats and, biding his escort wait under cover, Alex rode over to them alone, to find a score of men with muskets lining the bank.
“Halt!” their commander shouted. “Who comes?”
Alex gave his name. “I have business with General Wheeler,” he said crisply, deciding to treat them as friendly troops, despite the fact that he could see their fingers were on the triggers of the muskets levelled at him.
“No one enters,” the guard commander returned, his tone arrogant. He moved closer, covered by the muskets of his men, but he had taken only a half-dozen paces when he was thrust aside by a tall, white-robed figure in a green turban, whose signal to the guard to lower their muskets was obeyed instantly.
“So we meet again, Sheridan Sahib!” the newcomer observed, with apparent pleasure, and Alex found himself looking into the dark, enigmatically smiling face of the Moulvi of Fyzabad. “Is it your wish to return to Cawnpore?”
“I have said so, Moulvi Sahib.” Taken momentarily by surprise at the Moulvi’s unexpected appearance, Alex recovered himself quickly and his tone was crisp and authoritative. “Would you seek to prevent me?”
Ahmad Ullah shook his head. “Nay, not I, Sahib,” he answered, with mock humility. “Although I cannot promise that you will find it so easy to leave, should you desire to, but …” He called sharply to the guards, “Permit this Sahib to pass and his escort with him!” and stood aside, still smiling, to wave Alex and his two men on their way.
They entered the entrenchment a little later, to find the garrison at prayer and, when the service was over, Alex delivered his cryptic message to General Wheeler and went in search of Emmy. She heard his voice asking for her and came running joyfully to meet him, the baby in her arms.
“Oh, Alex!” She looked up at him, her eyes filled with tears and the lips she raised to his curving into a tremulous smile. “You came! I … I wanted you so much and you came. I … I had begun to fear that it was too late, I …” she choked on a sob. “But you are here! Oh, thank God, you are here!”
“I’ve come to take you to Lucknow,” Alex said, shaken by the depths of his own emotion. He held her to him, ignoring the burden she carried in his pleasure and relief at seeing her again. Then, remembering, he gently drew back the shawl in which the baby was wrapped and asked, controlling his voice with difficulty, “Is this our son, Emmy? What have you called him?”
“William Alexander,” Emmy answered proudly. “William, after William Beatson. I thought you would want that.”
“Yes,” Alex confirmed, his throat stiff as he studied the tiny, wizened face of his son. “Yes, indeed, darling, I—” he took a deep, uneven breath, shocked by the small creature’s frailty, yet anxious not to upset his wife by uttering any hint of criticism. “He’s so small, I can’t believe he’s real.”
“He was premature,” Emmy reminded him. She bit her lip and then unhappily voiced the fear that was now uppermost in her mind. “Alex, I do not think he could stand the journey to Lucknow—not yet, not till he is stronger. Will you … must you go back?”
Alex’s hesitation was brief. It was his duty to go back, he knew. He would lose his command if he did not. But he knew also, with clear, cold certainty, that he could not again leave the two people who meant more to him than life itself, whatever the cost might be. He had little faith in General Wheeler’s mudwalled and already overcrowded entrenchment, still less in the Nana Sahib’s professions of friendship, and yet … he smothered a sigh. He could resign his command. Partap Singh could take a message to Sir Henry, explaining the reason for his absence which, God willing, need only be temporary. He looked down into Emmy’s pale, anxious face and smilingly shook his head.
“No,” be answered firmly, his mind made up. “My place is with you, my love—with you and William, now and always. We can stay here until it’s possible to take the child with us to Lucknow. We’ll be together, Emmy, until this is over.”
“That’s all I’ve ever wanted, Alex,” Emmy told him. Her eyes were sparkling now, bright with renewed hope, the tears gone. “To be with you, for as long as we both shall live. I can bear anything with you beside me, darling—even this place.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss his check and Alex saw that she was smiling.
GLOSSARY OF INDIAN TERMS
Achkan: knee-length tunic
Aista: slow
A-jao: go on
Ayah: female servant, children’s nurse
Baksheesh: tip (cash)
Bazaar: market
Bhisti: water-carrier
Brahmin: highest Hindu caste
Budmash: rogue, ruffian
Bunnia: merchant, grain-dealer, moneylender
Cantonment: European residences, usually bungalows
Chappatti: unleavened cake of wheat flour
Charpoy: string bed
Chit/Chitti: note or letter
Chokra: young boy
Chowkidar: nightwatchman
Chuddar: cloak
Dacoit: robber.
Daffadar (cavalry): sergeant
Dak/Dawk: post
Deen: faith
Doolie: covered litter
Durbar: reception, audience
Fakir: Hindu holy man, usually itinerant
Feringhi: foreigner
Gharry/Gharri: cart or carriage
Ghaut: river bank, edge. Also landing place, quay
Ghee: clarified butter
Ghusl-khana: bathroom
Goojur: inhabitant of so-called Goojur villages, robbers and thieves
Han: Yes
Havildar (infantry): Sergeant
Huhm/Hukum: order
Huzoor: Lord (literally “presence”)
Id: end of Ramadan
Jeldi: hurry
Jemadar: native officer
Ji-han: yes
Khansama: cook
Khitmatgar: butler, table servant.
Khuda hafiz: Go with God
Kotwal: police
Lal-kote: British soldier (literally “red coat”)
Lines: long row of huts, thatched and built of mud, for accommodation of native troops
Maidan: square, parade ground
Mali: gardener
Moulvi: Moslem teacher
Nahin: no
Paltan: Regiment
Pandy/Pandies: Mutineer(s)
Pie/Pice (plural): lowest coin in Indian currency
Poorbeah: inhabitant of Oudh
Punkah: ceiling fan, pulled from outside room by coolie, who had cord attached to his foot
Raj: rule
Ramadan: Moslem holy month marked by day-time fasting
Rissala: cavalry
Rissaldar: cavalry Sergeant-Major (Rissaldar-Major: R.S.M.)
Ryot: peasant cultivator, smallholder
Sepoy: infantry soldier
Sahib-log: European people
Sowar: cavalry trooper
Subadar: infantry Sergeant-Major
Subadar-Major:
Syce: groom
Talukdar: landowner
Thug/Thuggee: Highway robber, follower of the killer cult of Hindu goddess Kali
Tiffin: lunch
Tulwar: sword or sabre
Zamindar: peasant landowner
HISTORICAL NOTES
IN HIS admirably researched book, The Indian Mutiny in Perspective (Bell, 1931)
Lieutenant General Sir George MacMunn stated that: “The Indian Mutiny, even when it grew to rebellion, was not a war between British and Indian. Tens of thousands of Indian soldiers, from all parts of India, took part in its repression.”
It was, in fact, the mutiny of a single Presidency Army——the Sepoy Army of Bengal—which broke out at Meerut on 10 May 1857 and brought to an end the long rule of the Honourable East India Company. On 1 November 1858, when all but the last smouldering embers of revolt had been extinguished, the government of British India was assumed by the Crown. An amnesty was granted to all who had been in rebellion against the Company “except those who have been or shall be convicted of having directly taken part in the murder of British subjects. With regard to such, the demands of justice forbid the exercise of mercy.” The instigators of revolt were promised their lives but warned that they would not escape punishment and the amnesty was extended only until 1 January 1859.
In order to fully understand what caused a hitherto loyal and disciplined army of 150,000 men to break out in open mutiny, it is necessary to go back in history very briefly to the beginnings and subsequent expansion of the East India Company.
It was founded in the year 1600 by a group of merchant adventurers, to whom Queen Elizabeth I granted a fifteen-year charter (later renewed by James I) “for the purpose of trading into the East Indies.” Holding an initial capital of £30,000, subscribed in shares, the aim of the governor and 24 directors was simply to reap a profit for themselves and their shareholders. They had no wish to acquire territory, to exercise military power or to govern an alien race; still less had they any thought of founding an empire.
Circumstances, however, compelled John Company*—as it later became known—to recruit and train a mercenary native army commanded by British officers. This was intended for the defense of its factories and agents and the protection of its trading concessions, which were in constant danger from the treachery of native rulers and the rival territorial claims of the French who, all too frequently, were instigators of the treachery. The factories became forts and Robert Clive’s victory over Surajah Dowla† at the Battle of Plassey, on 23 June 1757, established the Company as a military power and dictated its future policy. Under Clive’s governorship, annual profits rose to £1,250,000, with dividends at 12 per cent.
As profits increased and more territory was acquired, by both conquest and treaty, the administration of British India became, in the view of the British Parliament, more than a commercial trading establishment could be permitted to undertake. The India Bill was introduced in 1794 in order to provide for a form of double government. To the Honourable Company’s two Courts of Directors and Proprietors was added a Board of Control, presided over by a cabinet minister, its members chosen by the British government but paid by the Company and with power to overrule the Directors on matters of political policy. These Courts were resident in London and represented in India by a governorgeneral, also appointed by Parliament, so that in effect the Company governed as an agent of the Crown.
British regiments were sent to serve with the Company’s troops and fought side by side with them in the numerous Indian wars in which they were almost continuously engaged during the first half of the nineteenth century. The Company possessed three Presidency Armies, those of Bengal, Madras and Bombay, each under its own commander-in-chief. Apart from a limited number of European regiments raised by the Company for service in India and a few battalions of artillery, the three Presidency Armies were composed entirely of native troops, under the command of British officers, who were trained and commissioned by the Company and from whose ranks political officers were selected for civil administrative duties.
Known to the Indians themselves as Shaitan ka hawa— The Devil’s Wind—the mutiny of the Bengal army was confined to that army. The mutineers received encouragement and active aid from a few chiefs and princes, who were driven to rebellion by a very real sense of grievance as a result of the Company’s policy of annexing (“annexation by right of lapse”) native states to which there was no direct heir. By means of this policy, implemented by Lord Dalhousie, governor-general from 1848 to 1856, 250,000 square miles were added to British Indian territory so that, by 1857, the Company held sway over some 838,000 square miles. Under the despotic Dalhousie, 21,000 plots of land, to which their owners could not prove documentary right of tenure, were confiscated; the States of Satara, Nagpur and Jhansi seized and the Punjab and Scinde conquered by force of arms. Finally the ancient kingdom of Oudh—from which the bulk of the sepoys of the Bengal army were recruited—was also annexed.
Added to the resentment, by princes and peasants, of the arbitrary seizure of their land, the root cause of the Mutiny was the fear—which rapidly became widespread among the sepoys—that their British commanders, on instructions from the Company, had embarked on a deliberate campaign aimed at destroying their caste system, with the ultimate intention of compelling the entire army to embrace the Christian religion. The issue of supposedly tainted cartridges, and the sepoys’ refusal to accept them, was the excuse for the outbreak which, by the time Lord Canning succeeded Dalhousie as governor-general, had become inevitable.
And the time was well chosen. In 1857 Britain was still recovering from the ravages of the Crimean War, was fighting in China, and had recently been fighting in Burma and Persia. As a result, India had been drained of white troops, the British numbering only 40,000—exclusive of some 5,000 British officers of native regiments—while the sepoys in the three Presidency Armies numbered 311,000, with the bulk of the artillery in their hands. The territory for which the Bengal army was responsible included all northern India, from Calcutta to the Afghan frontier and the Punjab.
The Punjab had only lately been subdued and there was a constant threat of border raids by the Afghan tribes, so that most of the available British regiments* were stationed at these danger points and on the Burmese frontier, with 10,000 British and Indian troops in the Punjab alone. The 53rd Queen’s Regiment of Foot was at Calcutta, the 10th at Dinapur—400 miles up the River Ganges—the 32nd Foot was at Lucknow and a newly raised regiment, the Company’s 3rd Bengal Fusiliers, at Agra. Thirtyeight miles away there was a strong European garrison, consisting of the 60th Rifles—1,000 men—600 troopers of the 6th Dragoons, a troop of horse artillery, and details of various other regiments—2,200 men in all. Stationed with them were three native regiments, the 3rd Light Cavalry and the 11th and 20th Bengal Native Infantry, under the command of 75-year-old Major-General William Hewitt, whose division included Delhi.
On the face of it, Meerut seemed the most unlikely station in all India to become the scene of a revolt by native troops, and the outbreak, when it came, took everyone—not least the commanding general and his brigadier—so completely by surprise that they did virtually nothing to put it down, with the result that Delhi was lost.
There had, of course, been warnings but for the most part, these were ignored or treated with scorn and disbelief. The officers of the Bengal native regiments continued, until the last, to place the most implicit trust in the loyalty of the sepoys they commanded. But Sir Henry Lawrence, who was later to defend Lucknow against the insurgents, writing in the Calcutta Review in 1843, had pointed out how easily a hostile force could seize Delhi, adding: “And does any sane man doubt that 24 hours would swell the hundreds of rebels into thousands, and in a week every ploughshare in Delhi would be turned into a sword? …” These words were to prove prophetic, fourteen years afterwards, when Delhi and the last of the Moguls—82-year-old Shah Bahadur—became the focal point of the Great Mutiny.
The first tangible warning came early in 1857, with the incident of the greased cartridges. The new Enfield rifle, which had proved its superiority in the Crimea, was ordered to be issued to the army in place of the out-dated Brown Bess musket. Both were muzzle-loaders, but the cartridge of the new weapon included a greased patch at the top which—like the earlier, ungreased type—had to be torn off with the teeth. The greas
ed patch was used to assist in ramming home the bullet, which was a tight fit in the rifle barrel. It had apparently not occurred to the Ordnance Committee in England or, indeed, to anyone in India, that the composition of the greased patch and the instruction to bite through it might offend against the religious scruples of high caste Hindu sepoys, of whom there were a great many in the Bengal army.
At the arsenal at Dum Dum, near Calcutta, a lascar of humble caste was abused by a Brahmin sepoy of the 34th Native Infantry. The man retaliated with the claim that the new Enfield cartridges were smeared with the fat of the cow (sacred to Hindus) and of the pig (considered unclean by Muslims). Biting it, the lascar jeered, would destroy the caste of the Hindu and the ceremonial purity of the Muslim. The story spread like wildfire throughout the native regiments. The men were assured that they could grease the cartridges with their own ghee, or tear them by hand, but the paper in which they were wrapped had a suspiciously greasy appearance and the sepoys refused to accept them.
Already fearful that it was the intention of their British rulers to destroy the caste system in order that the army might be unwillingly converted to Christianity, some sepoys who had been detailed for service in Burma, refused to go. To “cross salt water”—that is to say, to travel by sea—also entailed loss of caste, and a new form of the military oath, which made the sepoy liable for service overseas, added fuel to the flames of discontent and suspicion.
Religious leaders of both the Hindu and the Muslim faiths, conscious that their own power was waning under British rule, fanned the flames assiduously. Fakirs and holy men traveled from garrison to garrison; an ancient prophecy was revived and whispered among them. The Battle of Plassey had been fought in 1757 and John Company, the prediction ran, would last for exactly a hundred years, so that this year would see its fall. Small, unleavened cakes of wholemeal flour, called chappaties, were distributed throughout the country, from village to village with the cryptic message, “From the North to the South and from the East to the West,” and each headman was told to keep two and make six more chappaties, which were to be sent on with the same message. Others were sent on with the still more cryptic message “Sub lal hojaega.” (“Everything will become red”). It was predicted that a comet would be seen in the eastern sky when the moment for action had come.