Clive

by Robert Harvey

  Clive and his friends rushed to the roof of the hostel and observed the vessels weigh anchor and begin to move away from the coast, remaining within sight of the land. The watchers were transfixed by the spectacle. Over the next few hours the wind grew steadily stronger, and slowly transformed itself into a violent gale. Huge waves crashed up the beach and battered the very walls of the fort. The surf foamed out to sea, while dense sheets of rain concealed the distant craft bucking helplessly about in the distance.

  As Walsh, Clive and their friends celebrated on the roof, furious French soldiers below shouted at them to get off, waving their muskets. The writers drank themselves to sleep. The following morning the tempest had passed. The horizon was absolutely clear: there were no French ships to be seen. La Bourdonnais’s fleet had been mauled by the storm far more effectively than by any naval engagement, and had gone. Four ships had been sunk, four were dismasted, and another blown nearly to Ceylon. The French naval force on the Coromandel Coast had been cut by a third. If the English could only get reinforcements they would be safe.

  But the storm offered little cause for celebration. The French troops in Fort St George remained and, later the same day, their new commander rode in: François Dupleix, labouring under the mixed emotions of being rid of his rival, La Bourdonnais, but also having lost many ships.

  Small, vigorous and disdainful, with a dreamy expression that concealed a quick intellect and ability to take decisions, prone to middle-aged spread, Dupleix made a magnificent and haughty sight in his finery on his white horse. The gentlemanly occupation of Fort St George was over.

  The inhabitants of the town, including Clive, were brusquely ordered by the French troops into the square. Governor Morse and the senior traders of the town were surrounded by a large armed guard and marched away to be paraded in triumph through the streets of the French capital, Pondicherry, in an effort to impress upon the Indians the crushing of British arms.

  The French commanders asked the remaining British for their word that they would not bear arms against the French; if they gave it, they would be expelled from the fort and set free to fend for themselves as best they could. Clive and his headstrong companions flatly refused and were returned to the hostel under French guard.

  There were four inseparable companions now: Walsh, always languid and cheerful; John Pybus, quiet and sensible; a more recent arrival at Fort St George, Edmund (Mun) Maskelyne, easygoing, witty, convivial, given to irresponsible japes, intelligent, a cousin of Walsh; and the headstrong, determined Clive himself. They were about to embark on the first serious adventure of their lives.

  Once cooped up they immediately set about plotting their escape; all four were determined to fight the French. Observing how lightly they were guarded, by a single sentry who often left his post or dozed, they borrowed Indian clothing from their servants, darkened their faces and put on leggings to make their bare legs appear black. Clive wore the dress of his native servant.

  It was unprecedented for Europeans to debase themselves to the level of Indians, and they had little trouble when they took advantage of the sentry’s absence in crossing the confused citadel under occupation. As they glanced furtively about they observed the French ordering the Indians to loot Fort St George and pile up wooden furniture in preparation for setting fire to the fort. In the chaos Clive and his companions passed through the main gate with barely a second glance from the soldiers supposedly guarding it. They crossed the bridge in front of the portals.

  There, disaster struck. The Indian crowd beyond began to ‘jabber in their language’ at the party, quickly realising that they were not Indian. Clive and his friends hurriedly pushed through, fearful that a local would seek to ingratiate himself with the French by giving them away. Amid the babble, to which the French soldiers by the gate paid no attention, they slipped away into the darkness. It was night by the time they had put Fort St George behind them. Flames from the burning citadel illuminated the clear night sky behind them.

  The final destination of the four friends was Fort St David, the sole remaining British settlement in the Carnatic some 50 miles to the south across hostile country, beyond the French stronghold of Pondicherry. The journey was a long, circuitous one, skirting the French forces. It took all of three days, keeping to the main road when no one was about, hiding in ditches or marching parallel to it when they saw movement along it.

  They walked chiefly by night, resting during the heat of the middle of the day. They skirted the main settlements and did not dare to ask for shelter; Pondicherry was given a wide berth. They were exhausted by the time they reached the fertile and wooded country further south. The sentries at Fort St David were incredulous when they challenged these ‘natives’ and were answered in impeccable English accents.

  CHAPTER 4

  Dupleix

  François Dupleix would not have cast a second glance at the smouldering eyes fixed upon him by the tall, well-built, determined-looking youth that had passed him in the square days before. The French commander, in his mid-forties at the time, at the height of his powers, was a formidable personality and one who believed that his most ambitious dream – establishing himself at the head of a French empire in India – was within his grasp.

  Dupleix’s personality was as complex as Clive’s. A man of considerable education and sophistication, literary and erudite, born of a civil service haute bourgeois background, he was typical of the higher kind of French government servant. He was the son of the director-general of the French East India Company. Studious and scientific as a boy, he had been sent to the east and the Americas at the age of 17, firing his imagination and ambition. By the age of only 23 he was on the governing council of Pondicherry. He was an excellent trader and administrator, if inclined to be a little severe with his men, and had a huge capacity for hard work. As an organiser, particularly in military matters, he was second to none. During this first campaign, the excellent state of French defences was rudely to expose the amateur nature of British preparations for war.

  In addition, Dupleix was flexible and practical; every time he suffered a setback, he did not panic, but moved on to an alternative plan, patiently reorganising his forces. An apparently stern and contemptuous man, he was nevertheless fond of partying and fripperies in private life. He was vainglorious to a degree that exceeded even Clive in later life: parties, fireworks and pomp attended his victories. The usual explanation – that such shows of splendour impressed Indian princes – was only half true: Dupleix appears to have had an unusual degree of folie de grandeur, and from an early stage harboured the ambition necessary to bolster his pretensions.

  He was encouraged in his vision by his wife, Johanna Begum, a remarkable beauty with ‘the eyes of a lemur’, who had Indian and Portuguese, as well as French, blood. Reputedly free in her relations with men, she was highly intelligent, conspiratorial and worked tirelessly for her husband’s interest, feeding his ambitions. At a time when Clive could hardly have imagined he was destined for anything more than life as a trader, Dupleix had conceived the idea of a French empire in India, with him as its viceroy.

  He came very close to succeeding and the British, through their lack of preparation and initial incompetence, to being driven out of India. That this did not happen was due to the emergence of a single English figure with a degree of boldness, leadership and guile that exceeded his: Robert Clive.

  Dupleix’s immediate problem, after securing and burning Fort St George, was not the British outpost at Fort St David, but a large army of some 10,000 men assembled by the Nawab of the Carnatic, Unwar Ud-Din, to press the French to honour their promise to hand over Madras to him. This powerful Indian prince was based at Arcot some 70 miles inland; he was himself a vassal of the formidable Nawab of the Deccan. The decision of his nominal French subjects suddenly to march on his English ones was dangerous and potentially threatening.

  Dupleix chose to meet the threat head on, sending 450 of his French forces equipped with two field guns as
well as muskets under the command of an able Swiss engineer, Captain Louis Paradis. In two brief engagements, the disciplined French force stood its ground, provoking confusion among the large Indian army with its swords, matchlocks, pistols and pikes. It was the first time a small European army had encountered a large Indian one in battle, and the lesson was not lost on Dupleix.

  * * *

  He now turned his attention to the last pocket of English resistance. He might have been forgiven, after the walkover at Fort St George, for believing Fort St David to be an easy prey. Yet the latter, although smaller, was a tougher proposition: although close to Pondicherry, it had stronger defences, was sited on a rise and was surrounded by an outer perimeter – the ‘Bounds Hedge’ – of spiky cactuses and other vegetation.

  Governor Hinde was a more practical, far-sighted man than Morse at Fort St George; he had laid up provisions for a six-month siege (including wine from Pondicherry) and had hired 2,000 Indians (‘sepoys’ – after the Persian word) to supplement his small garrison of 200 European soldiers and 100 half-castes. In addition, the Nawab of the Carnatic, smarting from betrayal and defeat by the French, had sent some 2,500 cavalry under the command of his younger son, the formidable Muhammad Ali, to help the British.

  On arrival at Fort St David, Clive had been confronted with the choice of continued idleness, a return to his profession as a writer (clerk) or enlistment. A natural fighter, prickly, young and still smarting from the humiliation of witnessing British defeat and enemy occupation, he and his friend Mun Maskelyne enlisted as soldiers – nominally a step downwards for one of the Company’s servants. His decision ensured that he would not have to watch again in frustration when the French attacked while incompetents manned the defences.

  The next few weeks were spent in rudimentary training, while scouts at the outer edge of the Bounds Hedge, which also protected the ‘black town’ of Cuddalore and the luxurious villas of the senior Company merchants, kept a watch on French movements; Clive was enthusiastic, determined and unflagging. It was a time of acute anxiety: the French were believed to be much stronger than they actually were, and their main base of Pondicherry was only 12 miles away. The elimination of the British presence in southern India was a real possibility. The garrison seemed set to repeat the fate of Governor Morse, paraded through the streets of Pondicherry in humiliation (although he was treated quite well afterwards). The best that could be expected was that the French would allow their defeated captives to return to Britain. Anxious appeals were made for the British fleet to return from Bengal.

  On 9 December, in the comparative cool of the Carnatic winter, the French forces, led by Dupleix, advanced from Pondicherry and within a day had broken the rough outer perimeter, driving the British back from the Bounds Hedge. After dark, Governor Hinde sent a company of Indian soldiers to attack the French camp, but they were driven off.

  At around seven the following morning, making short work of the outer defences, the French occupied the governor’s villa, the Garden House, just two miles from the fort itself. This was a magnificent two-storey building set in ample grounds, where they decided to bivouac for the night and prepare supper.

  Hinde despatched about half his forces in a desperate gamble to launch a joint attack with Muhammad Ali’s cavalry. The enemy were taken completely by surprise as the two forces sprung upon them, the Indians led by Muhammad Ali on an elephant. The French fled, leaving most of their belongings. Clive is not believed to have taken part in this attack. This successful sally did much to restore British morale: it showed that they were capable of fighting back after all. Remarkably, the French withdrew to Pondicherry.

  The next three months were spent preparing the defence of the fort – although Hinde had cause for anxiety as his provisions ran low. A further worry was that Dupleix had made his peace with the local ruler, the Nawab of the Carnatic, handing to him the over-lordship of Madras for a week, allowing him to fly his flag over the settlement, and showering presents upon him. The British could no longer count on the help of Muhammad Ali.

  On 11 March, Paradis, a much more effective field commander than Dupleix, led a large French force forward. This time the British, among them Clive, were ready and met them at the outer perimeter: after bitter exchanges of fire, the British were compelled to fall back that evening. The position, though not desperate, was serious.

  After a short night’s sleep, Clive awoke the following day to find the garrison in a state of high excitement. Rushing to a vantage point, he joined in the cheering that had broken out below: the sails of the English fleet, which had returned at last from Bengal, could be seen on the horizon. A few hours later, there was renewed cheering: Clive and his fellow soldiers, preparing for a renewed attack, could see the French withdrawing. With the arrival of the fleet, the tables had been turned: the British were now numerically superior to the French.

  The young man and his friends were exultant over the next few days, all the more so when he heard that Hinde had written to the Company directors in London: ‘Mr Robert Clive, Writer in the Service, being of a Martial Disposition, and having acted as a Volunteer upon our Late Engagement, we have granted him an Ensign’s Commission upon his application for the same.’

  Exhilaration soon turned to boredom: the weeks dragged past, then the months. The fleet lacked enough men to launch an attack on Pondicherry, although it deterred any further attack on Fort St David. The stalemate continued until the arrival in July 1748 of Major Stringer Lawrence, a professional military commander at last. A veteran of Culloden, he was a tubby, tough fighter, with a stubborn, irascible, yet benign expression, adored by his men with whom he enjoyed drinking off-duty. He was known affectionately by them as the Old Cock. Of no great intelligence or imagination, he was exactly what he seemed: an experienced, brave and professional soldier.

  Fifty years old and of humble origins, also in Shropshire, he seems to have taken a shine to the youthful but higher-born Clive from the first: he immediately set about strengthening the defences of the fort and training the troops. The days of inaction for Clive and Mun Maskelyne were over. Lawrence was too experienced not to realise that they would have to wait for reinforcements before launching any attack on the French.

  * * *

  Nearly eight months later, support arrived at last from England: Admiral Edward Boscawen reached Fort St David with a large flotilla carrying twelve companies of troops, half untrained. The garrison was swollen to 4,000 Europeans and 20,000 Indians. The British were now in a dominant position, with the opportunity not just to reverse their recent humiliation at the hands of the French, but to expel the latter from India.

  After so many months of apprehension, the garrison at Fort St David was now exultant. The English could break out of their enforced state of inertia in that cramped enclave and inflict upon the French the drubbing they deserved. Boscawen, confident, prissy, wrong-headed and haughty, made it plain that he would advance immediately; Lawrence pleaded with him in vain to show caution. A couple of days later the British moved forward to engage the French head on.

  A small French fort stood between them and Pondicherry. Boscawen ordered his forces to lay siege to it. Day after day this continued, while the tiny French garrison held out doggedly. A senior British officer was killed. Then disaster struck: Lawrence, leading an assault, was captured by a French party of soldiers and taken to Pondicherry. After eleven futile days this tiny obstruction of no strategic significance was taken for the loss of the best British commander on the ground.

  Boscawen then spent several days building up the fort’s defences before moving on to the main French garrison at Pondicherry. Clive was to write later despairingly:

  How very ignorant we were of the art of war in those days. Some of the engineers were masters of the theory without the practice, and those seemed wanting in resolution. Others there were who understood neither, and yet were possessed of courage sufficient to have gone on with the undertaking if they had known how to go about it. Th
ere was scarce an officer who knew whether the engineers were acting right or wrong, till it was too late in the season and we had lost too many men to begin an approach again.

  Boscawen, deprived of Lawrence’s advice, dug in at a position ‘fraught with every disadvantage that could attend a siege’: on one side there was marshland, on the other open space, making the British vulnerable to French fire. The English heavy guns could not be brought up for days, while the fleet was kept away from Pondicherry by strong winds.

  Dupleix supervised the defence, and is said to have bravely encouraged his men from the ramparts (contrary to the allegation that he was a cowardly leader), while Madame ran her network of scouts reporting on the British position. Enemy fire was accurate and in several sorties from the town, the French inflicted serious injuries. The British cannonades caused some damage but failed to inflict many casualties.

  Dupleix’s deputy, Paradis, launched a major assault on the British position in October. Clive was holding a trench, in command of one of three forward platoons. The other two broke ranks and fled as the French attacked, while Clive kept his men steady. As an eyewitness described it: ‘All the company’s troops had an affection for this young man, from observing the alacrity and presence of mind which always accompanied him in danger; his platoon, animated by his exhortation, fired again with new courage and great vivacity upon the enemy.’

  The French infantry reached shelter only ten yards from Clive’s position, and rained fire down on his men, piercing his hat and coat, but failed to draw blood. Although his men were pinned down, Clive ran back to get ammunition. The French at length withdrew.

  As the raiding party pulled back towards Pondicherry, Paradis was fatally shot. This to some extent made up for the loss of Lawrence. But the monsoon broke soon afterwards. Dense rains and fierce winds swept the British position. The fleet was forced to retire. Boscawen raised the siege on 6 October, and the troops marched sodden and dejected back to Fort St David. In Pondicherry, loud cheers could be heard from the battlements. The Te Deum was celebrated and wild parties were held at which Dupleix and Madame regaled their friends with champagne and party games.