Victoria’s Scottish Lion

by Greenwood, Adrian; Haythornthwaite, Philip;

  Beset by officers demanding the medal, Campbell invoked Clause 13 of the Victoria Cross Warrant, which allowed a commander to direct each regiment to elect four recipients: one officer, one NCO and two private soldiers. This clause was supposed to be applied when an entire corps had behaved with equal bravery, and where ‘no special selection can be made’. Campbell applied it to the whole army at Lucknow. Every regiment had to vote for four recipients, regardless. When the 9th Lancers pointed out that they had hardly engaged the enemy, Campbell nonetheless insisted, so they put forward the name of a native bheesti (water carrier). After Lieutenant-Colonel Leith Hay of the 93rd recommended four hard-fighting officers of his regiment, Campbell reiterated that he could only nominate one.133 It turned the award into a popularity contest. One officer complained that a quartermaster-sergeant got the medal because he doled out the grog.134 Another accused Campbell of trying ‘to lower and degrade the order’.135 He certainly seemed to try his best to make it unremarkable, by handing it out more lavishly than any other commander: there were 182 recipients of the award during the Indian Mutiny, one more than in the whole of the Second World War.*

  Aside from honours, Campbell’s troops were banking on Lucknow providing a healthy profit. When Outram’s men dashed through town in September they had little time to stop and plunder.136 In November, the spoils had been better, but still disappointing. Now, with every palace in their grip, Lucknow promised the British untold wealth, if only it could be pillaged methodically. But as with every other town Campbell had seen taken by storm, the rank and file were not about to leave looting to the authorities. What could not be pocketed was smashed. ‘For years past a painful conviction had pervaded the army that the Government had not behaved fairly to it in the matter of Prize,’ explained Outram, ‘a conviction which led to … the destruction, indeed, of all tangible property which could not be appropriated by the captors, who declared that “Government should make nothing by it”.’137 ‘Most righteous was it that war’s stern ploughshare should pass over the accursed city’, declared one military chaplain,138 and the destruction was indeed biblical. ‘No words can describe the scenes of havoc and desolation which successively startled one’s sight; never was a place more thoroughly “turned out o’ windows” than this one’, wrote Lieutenant Majendie:

  Smashed chandeliers; huge gilded picture-frames, with the pictures they contained hanging in tatters from them; magnificent mirrors against which our men had been having rifle practice; silk hangings torn to rags; rich sofas stripped of their coverings, and their very bowels ransacked in search of loot; the gilded legs of chairs wandering about quite separate from and independent of their seats; statues minus their heads; heads minus their noses; marble tables dashed to pieces; beds in the last stage of dismemberment; carriages without wheels; buggies with their panels smashed in … doors which had been broken through, or torn from their hinges; with here and there, to make the scene complete, a half-putrid corpse.139

  The Kaiserbagh became one ‘marvellous scene of blood and luxury’.140 ‘The rooms were so full that you could not take a step without smashing something underfoot, and before the prize agents came down you never saw such a wreck of vases, soup tureens, dishes, plates, cups and saucers, as was presented there’, recalled one officer. ‘You had to dive deep into the ruined heap to get at anything whole. We were washing out of fine china vases, and soldiers eating their dinners off kings’ plates.’141 Another soldier found a carriage:

  covered with thick plates of solid silver … the inside and cushions were covered with the richest white silk … About an hour afterwards I again passed this coach-house; the white silk had all been cut or torn off and carried away, nearly all the silver had disappeared, with the exception of one or two places where men were busily engaged hammering it off.

  ‘I entered a detached building in flames, which had been used as an armoury, and in spite of the great heat succeeded in bringing out a helmet of Damascus steel inlaid with gold’, wrote one sailor:

  I saw a room full of little cabinets, every cabinet was full of little drawers, and every drawer was full of little bottles containing scents and spices, some were liquid and some solid; some agreeable and some very nasty, some like pills and others like their concomitants, but as there were none that I liked, I left them for the next comer.

  He was more taken with a crown of ‘cardboard and red satin, stiffened with rusty wire and sewn all over with dull white beads’. Assuming it was either ‘for private theatricals or for a child’s toy, I tore off half a dozen of the beads which I put into my pocket as mementos of the day’. Back at camp he gave them away. ‘Imagine my astonishment when I was told that they were the most beautiful pearls. I afterwards received one of them back, and estimated, at a rough guess, that the whole crown must have been worth two thousand pounds.’142

  ‘It is by no means safe work, this looting’, wrote Majendie. ‘The soldier who strolls so unsuspiciously into these little cottages, or tempting shops, runs a very good chance of never strolling out again.’143 Lucknow was still crawling with rebels. ‘Volumes might be written regarding loot in India, and how it was gotten,’ observed Maude. ‘De mortuis, etc, so we will not name them, but several of the foremost “loot wallahs” paid for it with their lives.’144 The prudent officer concentrated on the secondary market. Campbell’s cousin Sterling was ‘very fond of picking up “bargains” in the way of loot privately acquired’,145 and even at official sales it was a buyers’ market. Loot amassed by the prize agents was sold off at improvised auctions throughout the mutiny. In Delhi the auctioneer simply deposited a handful of valuables on a soup plate, passed it round for potential buyers to inspect, and then knocked it down to the highest bidder.146 It had been the same in Cawnpore that January: ‘We have auctions here every day of the property of rich rebels already suspended’, wrote one soldier. ‘Silver things go for a mere song, far under their weight in rupees, and I wish to goodness I had the money to invest.’147 Lucknow followed the same pattern, with ‘the sale by auction every morning … to an assembly of all sorts of native camp-followers only, with a sprinkling of non-combatant British officers, whose presence was not required at parade’, recalled Gordon-Alexander. ‘Not one of the assemblage to whom they were offered could afford to give a fiftieth part of their value … the valuable should have been sent to Calcutta, or, better still, to London, or wherever the best prices could have been realised.’148 Conscious of the lack of discerning buyers, Canning ensured that many of Delhi’s rare books and documents were bought by the Company, but most mutiny plunder went for a pittance.

  For Campbell, after fifty years of slim pickings, the mother lode beckoned. He was entitled to 2.5 per cent of everything,* if he could just stop his soldiers filching and wrecking it all. That was a tall order in such a large city. ‘When looting is once commenced by an army it is no easy matter to stop it’, wrote Wolseley. ‘Soldiers are nothing more than grown-up schoolboys.’149 Joining them were 100,000 camp followers under the most meagre control,** greedy for spoils. The prize agents Campbell appointed were ineffective. One man boasted that he was able to bring ‘away, among other things, a carriage, for the prize agents were not very active in their performance and everyone was allowed to bring away what he chose’.***150 ‘Although nothing appears in official records,’ suggested one historian, ‘it is almost certain that there was a gentleman’s agreement that Jung Bahadoor’s Gurkha troops would get their chance of plunder before the Prize Agents took over.’ If that was true, then the Punjabis failed to get the memo. ‘The Sikhs and Gurkhas were by far the most proficient plunderers’, explained Forbes-Mitchell. ‘They instinctively knew where to look for the most valuable loot. The European soldiers did not understand the business, and articles which might have proved a fortune to many were readily parted with for a few rupees in cash and a bottle of grog.’151 Another officer revealed:

  A Sikh sergeant will watch a party of Europeans enter a house for the purpose of plundering, a
nd immediately plant sentries all round, and as each man comes out, he is told that there are strict orders against looting, and that he must disgorge his plunder; this of course he does with a very bad grace, and walks away looking sadly crestfallen. As soon as the whole party have thus gone off, the sergeant calls in his sentries, divides the loot, keeping the lion’s share for himself, and they all go on their way rejoicing.’152

  Spurred into action, Campbell decreed, ‘The suppression of plunder and outrage’ was to be ‘enforced by the introduction of an hourly roll-call, by the prohibition, to even British soldiers, of wearing side arms, except on guard or duty, and the erection of triangles for the summary punishment of obstinate offenders’.153 Checkpoints were established and guards stationed around the principal treasures. Discipline was harsh. ‘I myself was on a court-martial which sentenced two men to be flogged for secreting one or two valuable Cashmere shawls, instead of handing them over’, wrote Gordon-Alexander.154 The prize agents became so zealous that they started confiscating goods from refugees returning home, resulting in an official complaint from Outram, requesting that they restrict themselves to just the palaces. Not that the common soldier benefited much from their diligence. ‘Before we left Lucknow the plunder accumulated by the prize agents was estimated at over £600,000, and within a week it had reached a million and a quarter sterling’, wrote Forbes-Mitchell. ‘What became of it all?’155 The Indian government maintained, since this was an insurrection rather than a war, that only ‘property neither claimed on behalf of the State, nor claimed and identified by individuals who may establish their loyalty’ could be considered prize;156 in other words, only as much loot as the Company was prepared to hand over. The result was predictable. ‘The official returns gave a little more than fourteen lakhs of rupees [£140,000],’**** explained Maude, ‘the share of each private soldier amounting to £3 15s.’157

  The British public in India was more concerned with the disappointing tally of dead natives. ‘All the civilians are open-mouthed against the Lucknow management and declare that Sir Colin has “botched” the whole affair’, reported Russell. ‘They say that … if matters had been well-managed we ought to have killed twenty thousand of them!’158 Campbell was being ‘taxed for not cutting the whole quarter of a million to pieces’, complained the Glasgow Herald. ‘It appears to us that it would be about as reasonable to reproach him for not having eaten them.’159 Nevertheless, reproach him they did, from the highest to the lowest. Government House had expected a substantial death toll so as to frighten the rebels into flight. ‘The chastisement thereby inflicted upon the loose bands of mutineers, rebels and plunderers, who were collected in and about the city, was not such as to expel them from the limits of the province’,160 Canning complained. The governor-general decided a hard heart was required. ‘The City lies at the mercy of the British Government’, he declared in a new proclamation:

  This resistance, begun by a mutinous soldiery, has found support from the inhabitants of the city … Many who owed their prosperity to the British Government … have ranged themselves with the enemies of the state. They have been guilty of a great crime, and have subjected themselves to a just retribution.

  As punishment, the whole of Oudh was to be confiscated, bar the estates of six minor landowners. Canning did not intend to keep these forfeit lands, but he wanted to play the magnanimous overlord. ‘Because the Natives of India, whilst they attach much weight to a distinct and actual order of the Government, attach very little to a vague threat’,161 the governor-general preferred to declare sequestration rather than merely threaten it. That Canning planned to hand back these appropriated estates was lost in the stentorian rhetoric. Even the most vengeful, bloodthirsty, hang-’em-first-and-ask-questions-later officers thought it ill advised. Canning’s ‘general policy, as regards Oudh’, reported Russell, ‘is looked upon by all men here, political and military, as too harsh and despotic’.162 It seemed destined to foster a guerrilla war. Outram cautioned that ‘as soon as the Chiefs and Talookdars become acquainted with the determination of the Govt. to confiscate their rights, they will betake themselves at once to their domains, and prepare for a desperate and prolonged resistance’.163

  When news of the proclamation reached London on 12 April, Ellenborough condemned it. ‘This decree, pronouncing the disinherison of a people, will throw difficulties, almost insurmountable, in the way of the re-establishment of peace’, he told Canning in a secret despatch. ‘We desire to see British authority in India rest upon the willing obedience of a contented people. There cannot be contentment where there is general confiscation.’ Regrettably, Ellenborough’s difference of opinion with Canning soon leaked. The British press felt the noble lord was being too forgiving, and despite a rigorous public defence of his actions, on 12 May Ellenborough was forced to resign. Fortunately, the prime minister, Lord Derby, reiterated his government’s disapproval of Canning’s decree, while the new Commissioner of Oudh convinced the landowners that it was all bluster and that their lands were safe. So, by 22 May, ‘with few exceptions, the larger Talookdars of Oudh have … by letter or vakeel [agent] or in person, tendered their allegiance’,164 making Campbell’s task a great deal easier. That said, the natives seemed beaten but not broken. ‘I was struck by the scowling, hostile look of the people’, remarked Russell. ‘The bunniahs [merchants] bow with their necks, and salaam with their hands, but not with their eyes.’165

  Canning now requested Campbell switch to subduing Rohilcund. Lucknow was a totem. With the city in British hands, honour was restored. Campbell, however, was hesitant. He preferred to ‘settle one province before we commit ourselves to a Campaign in another. At this moment we have War all round us, in this Province of Oudh, and the country is not ours ten miles from the City.’166 There was also the problem of the increasing heat. ‘It is difficult for anyone who has not experienced it, to conceive the ennui and irksomeness that takes possession of men who pass the hot season in tents in India’, wrote one naval chaplain:

  the excessive heat, the close confinement, the difficulty of getting books in camp … the hot winds, which carried clouds of broiling dust, the swarms of flies which crawl about, being too lazy to use their wings except when forcibly compelled, add to the inconvenience and monotony of a tent life.167

  It was worse for the wounded. ‘The heat aggravates every symptom and hurries off the victim’, observed another padre.168 ‘From the beginning of April to the middle of August is the period of the year when it is desirable that no one should be exposed except in the case of vital necessity’, Campbell told the governor-general. ‘We cannot expect more regiments from England and there will be, I am afraid, the greatest difficulty in completing those we now have to their proper establishment. If we are obliged to march our troops about during the hot winds we shall lose a great many.’169 All his generals ‘were exclaiming on account of the exhaustion of their troops and of the great difficulty of making further demands on them in consequence of the mentality caused by the hot season, in the midst of which the enemy was now operating at all points’, warned Campbell.170 ‘We lose more men by sunstroke, in carrying on operations at this season, than by fire of the enemy’, he explained. ‘Can you wonder that many just now long to find themselves again in the more moderate climate of their own country, and in the opportunity of being near to those they hold in affection?’171

  ‘If the Commander-in-Chief had had his own way he would then have gone into summer quarters and reserved the recovery of India for a great campaign in the next cold season’, wrote one civil servant.172 Campbell recommended the governor-general at least pause to issue ‘some notice to the Sepoys which may have the effect of dissolving the confederacy between the mutinous regiments … The punishment of the native insurgent army has already been very severe.’173 Canning refused. He insisted Rohilcund must be brought to heel, whatever the weather, so Campbell detailed three columns for the task. Walpole would advance from Lucknow, Penny* from Meerut and Jones from Rurkhi,
herding the rebels into Bareilly, the stronghold of rebel rajah Khan Bahadoor Khan.** Meanwhile, Napier would stay in Lucknow refining its defences while Grant organised an Oudh Field Force to ferret out the last mutineers there. As Campbell explained:

  If the enormous distances be taken into account, the great number of Columns prosecuting separate Campaigns … it is easy to Conceive the care, attention, and strictness required to produce concert amongst the columns and their leaders, and to induce the whole to work with harmony towards the general result.174