Escape from Hell

by Stuart, V. A.

  “Thank God you’re here, sir!” he exclaimed. “We are at our last gasp. When the rebels seized the city, we feared that all was lost, sir, and—”

  Sir Colin Campbell rounded on him furiously. “How dare you suggest that any of Her Majesty’s troops are at their last gasp, sir?” he demanded. “Shame on you, sir!” Waving the abashed young officer contemptuously aside, he turned to one of his staff, a tall man in the uniform of Barrow’s Volunteer Horse. “Find yourself a fresh horse and ride back to Mungalwar, if you please, Colonel,” he requested, his tone crisp and decisive. “Tell General Grant that I want his heavy guns in position to cover this bridge before daylight—Captain Peel’s twenty-four-pounders, too, if it’s humanly possible. And warn Grant that I shall require his cavalry and horsed batteries to be ready to cross into Cawnpore at first light. I shall go across now to consult with General Windham and decide what’s to be done, but tell the Brigadier-General that I’ll rejoin him as soon as I can.”

  Dusk had fallen when Sir Colin led the way into the Cawnpore entrenchment but, despite the dim light, the men guarding the out-works recognised the small, bowed figure on the white horse and started to cheer. The welcome news of his arrival spread like wildfire and the cheering was taken up and echoed by those manning the batteries and the perimeter and even by the wounded as they lay, helpless, in the overcrowded hospital, on which the rebel battery in the churchyard had now ranged.

  Phillip, followed on the heels of the Commander-in-Chief’s aides, saw a white-haired officer in Irregular Cavalry uniform move forward to take his horse’s rein. Sir Colin dismounted, thanking him courteously for his assistance, to be assailed by a loud-voiced complaint as the white-haired officer, relinquishing the rein, planted his stout and perspiring body in the General’s path.

  “I wish to protest, sir, at the manner in which this defence has been conducted! Quite reckless and unnecessary risks have been taken by General Windham and men’s lives uselessly squandered. Indeed, sir, he—”

  Sir Colin cut him short, his tone icy. “And who, sir, might you be?” he asked, with dangerous calm.

  The white-haired officer held his ground. “My name is Cockayne, sir—Lieutenant-Colonel Cockayne, lately in command of the 21st Oudh Irregular Cavalry at Ghorabad. I—” Again Sir Colin cut him short.

  “Your regiment mutinied, did it not, Colonel?”

  Colonel Cockayne inclined his white head. “It did, sir. That is why I am here—I came to seek aid for the British garrison at Ghorabad, when I made my escape. My wife and daughter are with the garrison and all of them are in mortal danger. But I have been unable to obtain aid—there are not sufficient British troops, I am told. Yet General Windham squanders five hundred of them in this … damme, sir, in this insane attempt to engage a vastly superior enemy in open country, outside the city and his fortified entrenchment! I have the right to protest to you, sir, as Commander-in-Chief, when British lives are being sacrificed to no avail. With even half the men Windham has lost in the past three days, I could have saved my people in Ghorabad. Indeed, I could have brought aid to others who sorely need it and—”

  Sir Colin Campbell lost patience with him. “Be silent, sir!” he thundered. “I’ll thank you to keep your insubordinate opinions to yourself. Were it not for the fact that due allowance must be made in the light of your anxiety for your wife and family, I’d have you placed under arrest.”

  “But, sir … Sir Colin, I beg you to listen to me—”

  “Stand aside, Colonel Cockayne,” the General bade him, his tone one that brooked no further argument. “I have no time to listen to you. I have two thousand British lives in peril— wounded men and women and children from Lucknow for whom I’ve risked everything to save. And they will be in peril unless the Ganges bridge is held for long enough to enable me to bring them and my force across the river tomorrow.”

  Colonel Cockayne looked as if he were prepared to carry his protest a step further but the DAAG, Captain Hamilton, slipping quietly from his saddle, gripped him firmly by the arm and drew him back. “General Windham’s coming, sir,” he warned Sir Colin, and the Commander-in-Chief gave him a nod of approval and then walked, a trifle stiffly, towards the tall figure hurrying through the gathering darkness to meet him.

  Left to his own devices, Phillip went in search of the Shannon party, finding the young acting-mate, Henry Garvey, in charge of a battery of the fort’s eighteen-pounders. Firing from the fort had ceased with the coming of darkness and the men lay or squatted about their guns in a state of complete exhaustion, only rousing themselves when a petty officer and two cooks made their appearance with the grog ration and buckets of steaming coffee.

  “Mr Hay was wounded twice, sir,” Garvey explained, when they had exchanged greetings and both had been supplied with pannikins of coffee. “He’s in the hospital.”

  “How bad is he, Mr Garvey?” Phillip asked, sipping appreciatively at his coffee which the petty officer, unasked, had lashed liberally with rum.

  “He’s bad enough, sir, but out of danger, the surgeon told me this morning. He was hit a second time by a grapeshot which fortunately struck the buckle of his sword-belt—otherwise he’d have been killed.” The young mate hesitated and then said feelingly, “I can’t tell you how relieved we were to see Sir Colin ride in just now—it’s been touch and go here, believe me, sir. But how did you fare? I take it your return means that Lucknow was relieved?”

  Phillip nodded. He gave a brief account of the battle for the Residency and the final evacuation of the garrison, aware that the seamen were also listening eagerly. Then, moving out of earshot of them, he invited Garvey to tell his own story. “From what I’ve heard so far, Mr Garvey, things have been going badly here. Have they for you?”

  Henry Garvey’s expression was wry. “Frankly, sir, yes.” He described the movement of the defenders to the Calpee road camp and their first—and highly successful—brush with the Gwalior rebels at the Pandoo Nuddy Bridge, followed by the shock of learning that, instead of the three thousand they had expected, some twenty-five thousand insurgents were preparing to attack and drive them from Cawnpore.

  “We just weren’t prepared for that, sir,” he went on unhappily. “There had been no warning and it started a panic. It … to tell you the truth, our guns were … well, mishandled from then on. We were expected to move them about like nine-pounder field-guns and, on the first occasion that Mr Hay was hit, his gun was up with the skirmishers near the junction of the Delhi and Calpee roads. It was some distance ahead of mine and to my left, and we both came under fire from enemy guns at very close range—four hundred yards in Hay’s case, sir, and there were about fourteen of theirs to our six. We had Captain Greene’s battery to our right, two howitzers and two 9-pounders. We kept up our fire until we started to run out of ammunition, and then they launched an attack on our left flank, with about a couple of thousand infantry and some Irregular cavalry.”

  He paused, frowning, and Phillip prompted, “Well, what happened, Mr Garvey?”

  “The skirmishers were called in, sir,” Garvey told him bitterly. “And the order came to retire. Hay yelled out ‘Rear limber up!’ when a shrapnel shell burst right overhead which stampeded our bullocks and the drivers all deserted. Our supporting infantry and Captain Greene’s battery obeyed the order to retire, so we were left unsupported, without ammunition or limbers. The CRA, General Dupuis, ordered us to spike the guns and retire, because the enemy cavalry seemed to be preparing to charge us. With only 25 men, there wasn’t much else we could do. Mr Hay was hit spiking his gun—in the arm, sir, not severely—and he told me to get the men to fall back to the infantry’s new position, which we did and—”

  “Are you telling me that the guns are lost?” Phillip questioned sharply.

  “Oh, no, sir—we got them back!” Henry Garvey’s tone was indignant. “We knew what Captain Peel would say if we let them fall into the enemy’s hands! The cavalry thought better about charging us and Captain Greene had got hi
s nine-pounders in action again, so Mr Hay called for volunteers to bring them in. We managed to catch the bullocks and yoke them and then, with volunteers from the 88th, we gave ’em a bayonet charge and secured both guns. Young Harry Lascelles borrowed a rifle and bayonet from a wounded fellow and led the Connaught Rangers’ charge—he fairly put the fear of God into the darkies, sir, hacking away with his bayonet and yelling his head off!” Garvey’s haggard young face was lit by a reminiscent grin. “You should have seen him, all four-foot-nothing of him, surrounded by cheering Irishmen!” His grin faded. “That was when poor Hay was hit a second time and I had to have him carried in.”

  Lascelles was a naval cadet, Phillip reminded himself, whom Captain Peel had deliberately left behind in the hope that he would be safer in Cawnpore than in the Lucknow column … He sighed, as Garvey continued his story.

  “Mr Hay’s gun, which was well and truly spiked, was ordered back to the fort,” he said. “And I was instructed to place mine at the entrance to the city, to cover our infantry’s withdrawal. I took all our Jacks with me, because we still hadn’t seen hide nor hair of our native bullock drivers, and I sent Lascelles and two of our slightly wounded men with the spiked gun. Harry Lascelles’s Irishmen had volunteered to escort him and I thought they’d be all right but—” he broke off, reddening.

  “But what, Mr Garvey?” Phillip asked

  “Well, sir, they capsized it in one of the narrow streets of the city,” Henry Garvey confessed. “The first I heard of it was when I’d seen Hay into hospital and was snatching a bite to eat. General Windham sent for me and told me I must recover the gun. He said that firing in the city had ceased and that the rebels had withdrawn. He promised me a strong escort but warned me that it might be an ugly job.”

  “And was it?” Phillip asked. The youngster had done well, he thought; he was only eighteen, promoted from senior midshipman, but he had taken command when Edward Hay had been incapacitated and had exercised that command with courage and good sense. And, it was clear, he had not lost his guns …

  Garvey grinned. “Not as ugly as I expected, sir. The worst part was getting the gun back on an even keel because we daren’t make a noise, for fear of bringing them down on us. We had to clear away a lot of stones and rubble before we could tackle the gun but our fellows were first-rate. They’d been in action since five in the morning and they were all pretty done up but when I said ‘Heave!’ they made an almighty effort and righted her, and we got back here without a shot being fired. Since then, we’ve been manning the batteries here, apart from one sortie, when we were ordered to support General Carthew’s piquet at the bridge.”

  He went into graphic detail and Phillip listened, a thoughtful frown creasing his brow. The boy was right, he decided— the military commanders had attempted to employ the naval twenty-four-pounders as light field-guns, with little regard for the sheer weight of each piece and the difficulty of manoeuvring twelve pairs of bullocks, even with their native drivers. Without them, the guns’ speed over rough ground would inevitably be greatly reduced since—according to Garvey— only the bare number of men required to work and fight each gun had been permitted to go out, the remainder of the seamen being ordered to assist in manning the fort’s batteries. But with a double crew, perhaps … His frown deepened.

  “It was the hottest fire I’ve ever been under,” Henry Garvey added, referring to his sortie in Brigadier-General Carthew’s support. “But there was the Brigadier, sitting his horse as cool as you please and refusing to take cover—he has more guts than any man I’ve ever seen, sir, honestly.” His voice was warm with admiration. “But I heard a little while ago that he’s being forced to withdraw because his position has become untenable—it was untenable when we were there and that was about three hours ago. He sent us back; from where we were, we couldn’t bear on any of the rebel batteries and the Brigadier was afraid they’d make a rush and cut us off. They … look, sir, below you—that’s Carthew’s advance guard, coming in now, with some of the wounded. Poor fellows, it’s not before time.”

  “What about the bridge, if Carthew withdraws?” Phillip questioned. He peered down anxiously from the embrasure at the shadowy, running figures below him. It was an orderly withdrawal, with no sign of panic but … A burst of rifle fire from somewhere near the bridgehead was echoed by a volley from the fort’s perimeter.

  “The guns behind the out-works can cover the approach to it,” Garvey said. “And we have riflemen posted along the perimeter; the rebel infantry won’t get on to the bridge, sir.” He barked an order to his own guns’ crew, as one of the hitherto silent nine-pounders posted in the out-works opened up. His seamen, moving like sleepwalkers, took up their position round their guns, silent, too exhausted even to grumble. After a while, the firing petered out and, when a procession of curtained doolies was followed into the entrenchment by a company of the 34th and six or seven mounted officers, Garvey permitted his men to stand down.

  “They’re in, sir,” he told Phillip, relief in his voice. In the wan glow of the newly risen moon, he pointed out a bareheaded officer in shirtsleeves, who was dismounting from his horse with the slow, stiff deliberation of one nearing the limit of physical endurance. “That’s General Carthew and it doesn’t look as if he’s been hit—which is nothing short of a miracle, sir, truly it is.”

  It probably was but what, Phillip wondered uneasily, was likely to be Sir Colin Campbell’s reaction to the bridge piquet’s withdrawal—now, of all times, when that slender line of anchored boats stretching across the Ganges was the only link between his Lucknow column and Cawnpore? It was to be hoped that young Henry Garvey was right concerning the rebel infantry’s chances of seizing the bridge before Hope Grant could bring his cavalry and horse artillery across. The Pandies were not noted for their courage, it was true but … He smothered a sigh. There were still those two batteries of heavy calibre guns, mounted beyond the fort’s range, whose now desultory thunder warned that some of them were continuing their endeavours, even in darkness, to sever the link. When the moon rose to its full height, the danger of their hitting their target would increase and, with the coming of daylight—if Peel’s guns had not arrived to silence them—the risk would be doubled.

  Garvey, as if reading his thoughts, offered confidently, “Those twenty-four-pounders are firing at extreme range, sir, and they were making pretty poor practise when I was watching them from the bridgehead this afternoon. I fancy they’ll give up soon—they don’t usually waste shot after dark.”

  But they could move in closer with the darkness to aid them, Phillip reflected and, once they realised that Brigadier Carthew’s piquet had been withdrawn, it would be surprising if they failed to take advantage of its absence. A plan of action was beginning to form in his mind and he glanced, with narrowed eyes, into the night sky. They would need Sir Colin’s approval, of course, but … He turned again to Garvey.

  “I endeavoured to spot their position when we crossed the bridge,” he said. “But it was dusk and Sir Colin wasn’t wasting any time. You’ll have had a better opportunity to observe them this afternoon, I imagine; can you pinpoint them accurately, Mr Garvey?”

  The young acting-mate did not disappoint him. “Oh, yes, sir,” he answered readily. “We hadn’t much else to do, since our gun couldn’t bear on any of their batteries, so I set the cadets to making sketch maps and working out ranges. I thought it would keep them up to the mark and it did—Teddy Watson produced a beauty. I’ve got it somewhere.” He fumbled in his pockets and brought out a crumpled sheet of paper, which he offered apologetically. “I’m afraid it’s only in pencil, sir, and it’s got a bit smudged.”

  “This will do admirably,” Phillip assured him. “You are certainly keeping the cadets up to the mark. Mr Watson shows talent.”

  By the spluttering light of the battery lantern, he studied the neatly drawn sketch. As he had earlier surmised, to bring a gun to bear on either of the enemy batteries would require it to be positioned on the bri
dge itself or, better still, on the nearer of the two small islands in midstream. Once there, a certain amount of cover for the gun’s crew could be provided by riflemen, strategically posted in the fort’s out-works and— he checked Cadet Watson’s sketch map—by a nine-pounder already mounted on the perimeter, which could be swung round. It would be a fairly lengthy task to haul one of the Shannon’s twenty-four-pounders into position on the island if bullocks were employed and it would have to be done silently but … Phillip’s brain was racing now, as he examined the possibilities. Garvey had already proved—when he and his gunners had retrieved their damaged weapon from the native city the previous night—that a well-trained crew could work swiftly and efficiently in darkness, without attracting unwelcome attention from the enemy. And with a double crew …

  “Mr Garvey, how many fit men have you?” he asked.

  “Counting the Marines’ party, sir, I have 42.” Garvey’s round, powder-grimed face betrayed his inner excitement but he was too well disciplined to ask questions. “They’ve eaten, sir,” he added. “I sent them for dinner when we withdrew from the bridgehead. Mr Lascelles and Mr Watson are sleeping—I told them to go off duty; I thought they’d earned a rest, poor little devils. But,” he added eagerly, “I can have them called if you need them, sir.”

  “Not yet,” Phillip answered. “I have to speak to the Commander-in-Chief first.” It was a pity, he thought regretfully, that only one of the Shannon’s heavy guns was serviceable. Sir Colin Campbell might have reservations on that account, but unfortunately there was no time now to rebore the gun poor Hay had been ordered to spike. He asked about gun-cattle and ammunition supplies and then mentioned the spiked gun. Once again Acting-Mate Garvey surprised him.