Reminiscences of the Great Mutiny 1857-59 Part 5

[25] It may be necessary to remind civilians that the rifles of 1857 were muzzle-loading.

[26] It must always be recollected that this was the _second_ relief of Lucknow. The first was effected by the force under Havelock and Outram on the 25th September, 1857, and was in fact more of a reinforcement than a relief.

CHAPTER VII

BAGPIPES AT LUCKNOW--A BEWILDERED BaBOO--THE FORCED MARCH TO CAWNPORE--OPIUM--WYNDHAM'S MISTAKE

Since commencing these reminiscences, and more particularly during my late visit to Lucknow and Cawnpore, I have been asked by several people about the truth of the story of the Scotch girl and the bagpipes at Lucknow, and in reply to all such inquiries I can only make the following answer.

About the time of the anniversary dinner in celebration of the relief of Lucknow, in September, 1891, some writers in the English papers went so far as to deny that the Seventy-Eighth Highlanders had their bagpipes with them at Lucknow, and in _The Calcutta Statesman_ of the 18th of October, 1891, I wrote a letter contradicting this a.s.sertion, which with the permission of the editor I propose to republish in this chapter. But I may first mention that on my late visit to Lucknow a friend showed me a copy of the original edition of _A Personal Narrative of the Siege of Lucknow_, by L. E. R. Rees, one of the surviving defenders, which I had never before seen, and on page 224 the following statement is given regarding the entry of Havelock's force. After describing the prevailing excitement the writer goes on to say: "The shrill tones of the Highlanders' bagpipes now pierced our ears; not the most beautiful music was ever more welcome or more joy-bringing," and so on. Further on, on page 226: "The enemy found some of us dancing to the sounds of the Highlanders' pipes. The remembrance of that happy evening will never be effaced from my memory." While yet again, on page 237, he gives the story related by me below about the Highland piper putting some of the enemy's cavalry to flight by a blast from his pipes. So much in proof of the fact that the Seventy-Eighth Highlanders had their bagpipes with them, and played them too, at the first relief of Lucknow.

I must now devote a few remarks to the incident of Jessie Brown, which Grace Campbell has immortalised in the song known as _Jessie's Dream_.

In the _Indian Empire_, by R. Montgomery Martin, vol. ii. page 470, after denying that this story had its origin in Lucknow, the author gives the following foot-note: "It was originally a little romance, written by a French governess at Jersey for the use of her pupils; which found its way into a Paris paper, thence to the _Jersey Times_, thence to the London _Times_, December 12th, 1857, and afterwards appeared in nearly all the journals of the United Kingdom." With regard to this remark, I am positive that I heard the story in Lucknow in November, 1857, at the same time as I heard the story about the piper frightening the enemy's _sowars_ with his bagpipes; and it appears a rather far-fetched theory about a French governess inventing the story in Jersey. What was the name of this governess, and, above all, why go for its origin to such an out-of-the-way place as Jersey? I doubt very much if it was possible for the news of the relief of Lucknow to have reached Jersey, and for the said French governess to have composed and printed such a romance in time for its roundabout publication in _The Times_ of the 12th of December, 1857. This version of the origin of _Jessie's Dream_ therefore to my thinking carries its own refutation on the face of it, and I should much like to see the story in its original French form before I believe it.

Be that as it may, in the letters published in the home papers, and quoted in _The Calcutta Statesman_ in October, 1891, one lady gave the positive statement of a certain Mrs. Gaffney, then living in London, who a.s.serted that she was, if I remember rightly, in the same compartment of the Residency with Jessie Brown at the very time the latter said that she heard the bagpipes when dull English ears could detect nothing besides the accustomed roar of the cannon. Now, I knew Mrs. Gaffney very well. Her husband, Sergeant Gaffney, served with me in the Commissariat Department in Peshawur just after the Mutiny, and I was present as his best man when he married Mrs. Gaffney. I forget now what was the name of her first husband, but she was a widow when Sergeant Gaffney married her. I think her first husband was a sergeant of the Company's Artillery, who was either killed in the defence of the Residency or died shortly after. However, she became Mrs. Gaffney either in the end of 1860 or beginning of 1861, and I have often heard her relate the incident of Jessie Brown's hearing the bagpipes in the underground cellar, or _tykhana_, of the Residency, hours before any one would believe that a force was coming to their relief, when in the words of J. B. S. Boyle, the garrison were repeating in dull despair the lines so descriptive of their state:

No news from the outer world!

Days, weeks, and months have sped; Pent up within our battlements, We seem as living dead.

No news from the outer world!

Have British soldiers quailed Before the rebel mutineers?-- Has British valour failed?

If the foregoing facts do not convince my readers of the truth of the origin of _Jessie's Dream_ I cannot give them any more. I am positive on the point that the Seventy-Eighth Highlanders _had_ their bagpipes and pipers with them in Lucknow, and that I first heard the story of _Jessie's Dream_ on the 23rd of November, 1857, on the Dilkoosha heights before Lucknow. The following is my letter of the 18th of October, 1891, on the subject, addressed to the editor of _The Calcutta Statesman_.

SIR,--In an issue of the _Statesman_ of last week there was a letter from Deputy-Inspector-General Joseph Jee, V.C., C.B., late of the Seventy-Eighth Highlanders (Ross-s.h.i.+re Buffs), recopied from an English paper, contradicting a report that had been published to the effect that the bagpipes of the Seventy-Eighth had been left behind at Cawnpore when the regiment went with General Havelock to the first relief of Lucknow; and I write to support the a.s.sertion of Deputy-Inspector-General Jee that if any late pipe-major or piper of the old Seventy-Eighth has ever made such an a.s.sertion, he must be mad! I was not in the Seventy-Eighth myself, but in the Ninety-Third, the regiment which saved the "Saviours of India" (as the Seventy-Eighth were then called), and rescued them from the Residency, and I am positive that the Seventy-Eighth had their bagpipes and pipers too inside the Residency; for I well remember they struck up the same tunes as the pipers of the Ninety-Third, on the memorable 16th of November, 1857. I recollect the fact as if it were only yesterday. When the din of battle had ceased for a time, and the roll of the Ninety-Third was being called outside the Secundrabagh to ascertain how many had fallen in that memorable combat, which Sir Colin Campbell said had "never been surpa.s.sed and rarely equalled," Pipe-Major John McLeod called me aside to listen to the pipers of the Seventy-Eighth, inside the Residency, playing _On wi' the Tartan_, and I could hear the pipes quite distinctly, although, except for the practised _lug_ of John McLeod, I could not have told the tune.

However, I don't suppose there are many now living fitter to give evidence on the subject than Doctor Jee; but I may mention another incident. The morning after the Residency was evacuated, I visited the bivouac of the Seventy-Eighth near Dilkoosha, to make inquiries about an old school chum who had enlisted in the regiment. I found him still alive, and he related to me how he had been one of the men who were with Dr. Jee collecting the wounded in the streets of Lucknow on the 26th of September, and how they had been cut off from the main body and besieged in a house the whole night, and Dr. Jee was the only officer with the party, and that he had been recommended for the Victoria Cross for his bravery in defending the place and saving a large number of the wounded. I may mention another incident which my friend told me, and which has not been so much noticed as the Jessie Brown story. It was told to me as a fact at the time, and it afterwards appeared in a Glasgow newspaper. It was as follows: When Dr. Jee's detachment and the wounded were fighting their way to the Residency, a wounded piper and three others who had fired their last round of ammunition were charged by half-a-dozen rebel _sowars_[27] in a side street, and the three men with rifles prepared to defend themselves with the bayonet; but as soon as the _sowars_ were within about twenty paces of the party, the piper pointed the drones of his bagpipes straight at them and blew such a wild blast that they turned tail and fled like the wind, mistaking the bagpipes for some infernal machine! But enough of Lucknow. Let us turn to more ancient history. Who ever heard of a Highland regiment going into action without their bagpipes and pipers, unless the latter were all "kilt"? No officer who ever commanded Highlanders knew the worth of a good piper better than Colonel John Cameron, "the grandson of Lochiel, the valiant Fa.s.sifern." And is there a Highland soldier worthy of the name who has not heard of his famous favourite piper who was shot at Cameron's side when playing the charge, while crossing the Nive in face of the French? The historian of the Peninsula war relates: "When the Ninety-Second Highlanders were in the middle of the stream, Colonel Cameron's favourite piper was shot by his side. Stooping from his saddle, Fa.s.sifern tried to rescue the body of the man who had so often cheered the regiment to victory, but in vain: the lifeless corpse was swept away by the torrent. 'Alas!' cried the brave Cameron, das.h.i.+ng the tears from his eyes, 'I would rather have lost twenty grenadiers than you.'" Let us next turn to McDonald's _Martial Music of Scotland_, and we read: "The bagpipes are sacred to Scotland and speak a language which Scotchmen only know, and inspire feelings which Scotchmen only feel. Need it be told to how many fields of danger and victory the warlike strains of the bagpipes have led? There is not a battlefield that is honourable to Britain where their war-blast has not sounded! When every other instrument has been silenced by the confusion and the carnage of the scene, the bagpipes have been borne into the thick of battle, and many a devoted piper has sounded at once encouragement to his clansmen and his own _coronach_!"

In the garb of old Gaul, with the fire of old Rome, From the heath-covered mountains of Scotia we come; Our loud-sounding pipe breathes the true martial strain, And our hearts still the old Scottish valour retain.

We rested at the Alumbagh on the 26th of November, but early on the 27th we understood something had gone wrong in our rear, because, as usual with Sir Colin when he contemplated a forced march, we were served out with three days' rations and double ammunition,--sixty rounds in our pouches and sixty in our haversacks; and by two o'clock in the afternoon the whole of the women and children, all the sick and wounded, in every conceivable kind of conveyance, were in full retreat towards Cawnpore.

General Outram's Division being made up to four thousand men was left in the Alumbagh to hold the enemy in check, and to show them that Lucknow was not abandoned, while three thousand fighting men, to guard over two thousand women and children, sick and wounded, commenced their march southwards. So far as I can remember the Third and Fifth Punjab Infantry formed the infantry of the advance-guard; the Ninth Lancers and Horse Artillery supplied the flanking parties; while the rear guard, being the post of honour, was given to the Ninety-Third, a troop of the Ninth Lancers and Bourchier's light field-battery, No. 17 of the Honourable East India Company's artillery. We started from the Alumbagh late in the afternoon, and reached Bunnee Bridge, seventeen miles from Lucknow, about 11 P.M. Here the regiment halted till daylight on the morning of the 28th of November, but the advance-guard with the women and children, sick and wounded, had been moving since 2 A.M.

As already mentioned, all the subaltern officers in my company were wounded, and I was told off, with a guard of about twenty men, to see all the baggage-carts across Bunnee Bridge and on their way to Cawnpore.

While I was on this duty an amusing incident happened. A commissariat cart, a common country hackery, loaded with biscuits, got upset, and its wheel broke just as we were moving it on to the road. The only person near it belonging to the Commissariat Department was a young _baboo_ named Hera Lall Chatterjee, a boy of about seventeen or eighteen years of age, who defended his charge as long as he could, but he was soon put on one side, the biscuits-bags were ripped open, and the men commenced filling their haversacks from them. Just at this time, an escort of the Ninth Lancers, with some staff-officers, rode up from the rear. It was the Commander-in-Chief and his staff. Hera Lall seeing him rushed up and called out: "O my Lord, you are my father and my mother! what shall I tell you! These wild Highlanders will not hear me, but are stealing commissariat biscuits like fine fun." Sir Colin pulled up, and asked the _baboo_ if there was no officer present; to which Hera Lall replied, "No officer, sir, only one corporal, and he tell me, 'Shut up, or I'll shoot you, same like rebel mutineer!'" Hearing this I stepped out of the crowd and saluting Sir Colin, told him that all the officers of my company were wounded except Captain Dawson, who was in front; that I and a party of men had been left to see the last of the carts on to the road; that this cart had broken down, and as there was no other means of carrying the biscuits, the men had filled their haversacks with them rather than leave them on the ground. On hearing that, Hera Lall again came to the front with clasped hands, saying: "O my Lord, if one cart of biscuits short, Major Fitzgerald not listen to me, but will order thirty lashes with provost-marshal's cat! What can a poor _baboo_ do with such wild Highlanders?" Sir Colin replied: "Yes, _baboo_, I know these Highlanders are very wild fellows when hungry; let them have the biscuits;" and turning to one of the staff, he directed him to give a voucher to the _baboo_ that a cart loaded with biscuits had broken down and the contents had been divided among the rear-guard by order of the Commander-in-Chief. Sir Colin then turned to us and said: "Men, I give you the biscuits; divide them with your comrades in front; but you must promise me should a cart loaded with rum break down, you will not interfere with it." We all replied: "No, no, Sir Colin, if rum breaks down we'll not touch it." "All right," said Sir Colin, "remember I trust you," and looking round he said, "I know every one of you," and rode on.

We very soon found room for the biscuits, until we got up to the rest of the company, when we honestly shared them. I may add that _baboo_ Hera Lall Chatterjee is still living, and is the only native employe I know who served through the second relief of Lucknow. He now holds the post of cas.h.i.+er in the offices of Messrs. McNeill and Co., of Clive Ghat Street, Calcutta, which doubtless he finds more congenial employment than defending commissariat stores from hungry wild Highlanders, with the prospect of the provost-marshal's cat as the only reward for doing his best to defend his charge.

About five miles farther on a general halt was made for a short rest and for all stragglers to come up. Sir Colin himself, being still with the column, ordered the Ninety-Third to form up, and, calling the officers to the front, he made the first announcement to the regiment that General Wyndham had been attacked by the Nana Sahib and the Gwalior Contingent in Cawnpore; that his force had been obliged to retire within the fort at the head of the bridge of boats, and that we must reach Cawnpore that night, because, if the bridge of boats should be captured before we got there, we would be cut off in Oude with fifty thousand of our enemies in our rear, a well-equipped army of forty thousand men, with a powerful train of artillery numbering over forty siege guns, in our front, and with all the women and children, sick and wounded, to guard. "So, Ninety-Third," said the grand old Chief, "I don't ask you to undertake this forced march, in your present tired condition, without good reason. You must reach Cawnpore to-night at all costs." And, as usual, when he took the men into his confidence, he was answered from the ranks, "All right, Sir Colin, we'll do it." To which he replied, "Very well, Ninety-Third, remember I depend on you." And he and his staff and escort rode on.

By this time we could plainly hear the guns of the Gwalior Contingent bombarding General Wyndham's position in Cawnpore; and although terribly footsore and tired, not having had our clothes off, nor a change of socks, since the 10th of the month (now eighteen days) we trudged on our weary march, every mile making the roar of the guns in front more audible. I may remark here that there is nothing to rouse tired soldiers like a good cannonade in front; it is the best tonic out! Even the youngest soldier who has once been under fire, and can distinguish the sound of a shotted gun from blank, p.r.i.c.ks up his ears at the sound and steps out with a firmer tread and a more erect bearing.

I shall never forget the misery of that march! However, we reached the sands on the banks of the Ganges, on the Oude side of the river opposite Cawnpore, just as the sun was setting, having covered the forty-seven miles under thirty hours. Of course the great hards.h.i.+p of the march was caused by our worn-out state after eighteen days' continual duty, without a change of clothes or our accoutrements off. And when we got in sight of Cawnpore, the first thing we saw was the enemy on the opposite side of the river from us, making bonfires of our spare kits and baggage which had been left at Cawnpore when we advanced for the relief of Lucknow! Tired as we were, we a.s.sisted to drag Peel's heavy guns into position on the banks of the river, whence the Blue-jackets opened fire on the left flank of the enemy, the bonfires of our spare baggage being a fine mark for them.

Just as the Nana Sahib had got his first gun to bear on the bridge of boats, that gun was struck on the side by one of Peel's 24-pounders and upset, and an 8-inch sh.e.l.l from one of his howitzers bursting in the midst of a crowd of them, we could see them bolting helter-skelter.

This put a stop to their game for the night, and we lay down and rested on the sands till daybreak next morning, the 29th of November.

I must mention here an experience of my own which I always recall to mind when I read some of the insane ravings of the Anti-Opium Society against the use of that drug. I was so completely tired out by that terrible march that after I had lain down for about half an hour I positively could not stand up, I was so stiff and worn out. Having been on duty as orderly corporal before leaving the Alumbagh, I had been much longer on my feet than the rest of the men; in fact, I was tired out before we started on our march on the afternoon of the 27th, and now, after having covered forty-seven miles under thirty hours, my condition can be better imagined than described. After I became cold, I grew so stiff that I positively could not use my legs. Now Captain Dawson had a native servant, an old man named Hyder Khan, who had been an officers'

servant all his life, and had been through many campaigns. I had made a friend of old Hyder before we left Chinsurah, and he did not forget me.

Having ridden the greater part of the march on the camel carrying his master's baggage, Hyder was comparatively fresh when he got into camp, and about the time our canteen-sergeant got up and was calling for orderly-corporals to draw grog for the men, old Hyder came looking for me, and when he saw my tired state, he said, in his camp English: "Corporal _sahib_, you G.o.d-d.a.m.n tired; don't drink grog. Old Hyder give you something d.a.m.n much better than grog for tired mans." With that he went away, but shortly after returned, and gave me a small pill, which he told me was opium, and about half a pint of hot tea, which he had prepared for himself and his master. I swallowed the pill and drank the tea, and _in less than ten minutes_ I felt myself so much refreshed as to be able to get up and draw the grog for the men of the company and to serve it out to them while the colour-sergeant called the roll. I then lay down, rolled up in my sepoy officer's quilt, which I had carried from the Shah Nujeef, and had a sound refres.h.i.+ng sleep till next morning, and then got up so much restored that, except for the sores on my feet from broken blisters, I could have undertaken another forty-mile march. I always recall this experience when I read many of the ignorant arguments of the Anti-Opium Society, who would, if they had the power, compel the Government to deprive every hard-worked _coolie_ of the only solace in his life of toil. I am certainly not an opium-eater, and the abuse of opium may be injurious, as is the abuse of anything; but I am so convinced in my own mind of the beneficial effects of the temperate use of the drug, that if I were the general of an army after a forced march like that of the retreat from Lucknow to the relief of Cawnpore, I would make the Medical Department give every man a pill of opium and half a pint of hot tea, instead of rum or liquor of any sort! I hate drunkenness as much as anybody, but I have no sympathy with what I may call the intemperate temperance of most of our teetotallers and the Anti-Opium Society. My experience has been as great and as varied as that of most Europeans in India, and that experience has led me to the conviction that the members of the Anti-Opium Society are either culpably ignorant of facts, or dishonest in the way they represent what they wish others to believe to be facts. Most of the a.s.sertions made about the Government connection with opium being a hindrance to mission-work and the spread of Christianity, are gross exaggerations not borne out by experience, and the opium slave and the opium den, as depicted in much of the literature on this subject, have no existence except in the distorted imagination of the writers. But I shall have some more observations to make on this score elsewhere, and some evidence to bring forward in support of them.[28]

Early on the morning of the 29th of November the Ninety-Third crossed the bridge of boats, and it was well that Sir Colin had returned so promptly from Lucknow to the relief of Cawnpore, for General Wyndham's troops were not only beaten and cowed,--they were utterly demoralised.

When the Commander-in-Chief left Cawnpore for Lucknow, General Wyndham, known as the "Hero of the Redan," was left in command at Cawnpore with instructions to strengthen his position by every means, and to detain all detachments arriving from Calcutta after the 10th of November, because it was known that the Gwalior Contingent were in great force somewhere across the Jumna, and there was every probability that they would either attack Cawnpore, or cross into Oude to fall on the rear of the Commander-in-Chief's force to prevent the relief of Lucknow. But strict orders were given to General Wyndham that he was _on no account_ to move out of Cawnpore, should the Gwalior Contingent advance on his position, but to act on the defensive, and to hold his entrenchments and guard the bridge of boats at all hazards. By that time the entrenchment or mud fort at the Cawnpore end of the bridge, where the Government Harness and Saddlery Factory now stands, had become a place of considerable strength under the able direction of Captain Mowbray Thomson, one of the four survivors of General Wheeler's force. Captain Thomson had over four thousand _coolies_ daily employed on the defences from daybreak till dark, and he was a most energetic officer himself, so that by the time we pa.s.sed through Cawnpore for the relief of Lucknow this position had become quite a strong fortification, especially when compared with the miserable apology for an entrenchment so gallantly defended by General Wheeler's small force and won from him by such black treachery. When we advanced for the relief of Lucknow, all our spare baggage, five hundred new tents, and a great quant.i.ty of clothing for the troops coming down from Delhi, were shut up in Cawnpore, with a large quant.i.ty of spare ammunition, harness, and saddlery; in brief, property to the value of over five _lakhs_ of rupees was left stored in the church and in the houses which were still standing near the church between the town and the river, a short distance from the house in which the women and children were murdered. All this property, as already mentioned, fell into the hands of the Gwalior Contingent, and we returned just in time to see them making bonfires of what they could not use. Colonel Sir Robert Napier (afterwards Lord Napier of Magdala) lost all the records of his long service, and many valuable engineering papers which could never be replaced. As for us of the Ninety-Third, we lost all our spare kits, and were now without a chance of a change of underclothing or socks. Let all who may read this consider what it meant to us, who had not changed our clothes from the 10th of the month, and how, on the morning of the 29th, the sight of the enemy making bonfires of our kits, just as we were within reach of them, could hardly have been soothing to contemplate.

But to return to General Wyndham's force. By the 26th of November it numbered two thousand four hundred men, according to Colonel Adye's _Defence of Cawnpore_; and when he heard of the advance of the Nana Sahib at the head of the Gwalior Contingent, Wyndham considered himself strong enough to disobey the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, and moved out of his entrenchment to give them battle, encountering their advance guard at Pandoo Nuddee about seven miles from Cawnpore. He at once attacked and drove it back through a village in its rear; but behind the village he found himself confronted by an army of over forty thousand men, twenty-five thousand of them being the famous Gwalior Contingent, the best disciplined troops in India, which had never been beaten and considered themselves invincible, and which, in addition to a siege train of thirty heavy guns, 24 and 32-pounders, had a well-appointed and well-drilled field-artillery. General Wyndham now saw his mistake, and gave the order for retreat. His small force retired in good order, and encamped on the plain outside Cawnpore on the Bithoor road for the night, to find itself outflanked and almost surrounded by Tantia Topee and his Mahrattas on the morning of the 27th; and at the end of five hours' fighting a general retreat into the fort had again to be ordered.

The retiring force was overwhelmed by a murderous cannonade, and, being largely composed of young soldiers, a panic ensued. The men got out of hand, and fled for the fort with a loss of over three hundred,--mostly killed, because the wounded who fell into the hands of the enemy were cut to pieces,--and several guns. The Rev. Mr. Moore, Church of England Chaplain with General Wyndham's force, gave a very sad picture of the panic in which the men fled for the fort, and his description was borne out by what I saw myself when we pa.s.sed through the fort on the morning of the 29th. Mr. Moore said: "The men got quite out of hand and fled pell-mell for the fort. An old Sikh _sirdar_ at the gate tried to stop them, and to form them up in some order, and when they pushed him aside and rushed past him, he lifted up his hands and said, 'You are not the brothers of the men who beat the Khalsa army and conquered the Punjab!'"

Mr. Moore went on to say that, "The old Sikh followed the flying men through the Fort Gate, and patting some of them on the back said, 'Don't run, don't be afraid, there is nothing to hurt you!'" The fact is the men were mostly young soldiers, belonging to many different regiments, simply battalions of detachments. They were crushed by the heavy and well-served artillery of the enemy, and if the truth must be told, they had no confidence in their commander, who was a brave soldier, but no general; so when the men were once seized with panic, there was no stopping them. The only regiment, or rather part of a regiment, for they only numbered fourteen officers of all ranks and a hundred and sixty men, which behaved well, was the old Sixty-Fourth, and two companies of the Thirty-Fourth and Eighty-Second, making up a weak battalion of barely three hundred. This was led by brave old Brigadier Wilson, who held them in hand until he brought them forward to cover the retreat, which he did with a loss of seven officers killed and two wounded, eighteen men of the Sixty-Fourth killed and twenty-five wounded, with equally heavy proportions killed and wounded from the companies of the Thirty-Fourth and Eighty-Second. Brigadier Wilson first had his horse shot, and was then himself killed, while urging the men to maintain the honour of the regiment. The command then devolved on Major Stirling, one of the Sixty-Fourth, who was cut down in the act of spiking one of the enemy's guns, and Captain M'Crea of the same regiment was also cut down just as he had spiked his fourth gun. This charge, and these individual acts of bravery, r.e.t.a.r.ded the advance of the enemy till some sort of order had been re-established inside the fort. The Sixty-Fourth were then driven back, and obliged to leave their dead.

This then was the state of matters when we reached Cawnpore from Lucknow. The whole of our spare baggage was captured: the city of Cawnpore and the whole of the river-side up to the house where the Nana had slaughtered the women and children were in the hands of the enemy; but they had not yet injured the bridge of boats, nor crossed the ca.n.a.l, and the road to Allahabad still remained open.

We marched through the fort, and took up ground near where the jute mill of Messrs. Beer Brothers and Co. and Joe Lee's hotel now stand. We crossed the bridge without any loss except one officer, who was slightly wounded by being struck on the s.h.i.+n by a spent bullet from a charge of grape. He was a long slender youth of about sixteen or seventeen years of age, whom the men had named "Jack Straw." He was knocked down just as we cleared the bridge of boats, among the blood of some camp-followers who had been killed by the bursting of a sh.e.l.l just in front of us.

Sergeant Paton, of my company, picked him up, and put him into an empty _dooly_ which was pa.s.sing.

During the day a piquet of one sergeant, one corporal, and about twenty men, under command of Lieutenant Stirling, who was afterwards killed on the 5th of December, was sent out to bring in the body of Brigadier Wilson, and a man named Doran, of the Sixty-Fourth, who had gone up to Lucknow in the Volunteer Cavalry, and had there done good service and returned with our force, volunteered to go out with them to identify the brigadier's body, because there were many more killed near the same place, and their corpses having been stripped, they could not be identified by their uniform, and it would have been impossible to have brought in all without serious loss. The party reached the brigadier's body without apparently attracting the attention of the enemy; but just as two men, Rule of my regiment and Patrick Doran, were lifting it into the _dooly_ they were seen, and the enemy opened fire on them. A bullet struck Doran and went right through his body from side to side, without touching any of the vital organs, just as he was bending down to lift the brigadier--a most extraordinary wound! If the bullet had deviated a hair's-breadth to either side, the wound must have been mortal, but Doran was able to walk back to the fort, and lived for many years after taking his discharge from the regiment.

During the time that this piquet was engaged the Blue-jackets of Peel's Brigade and our heavy artillery had taken up positions in front of the fort, and showed the gunners of the Gwalior Contingent that they were no longer confronted by raw inexperienced troops. By the afternoon of the 29th of November, the whole of the women and children and sick and wounded from Lucknow had crossed the Ganges, and encamped behind the Ninety-Third on the Allahabad road, and here I will leave them and close this chapter.

FOOTNOTES:

[27] Native cavalry troopers.

[28] See Appendix D.

CHAPTER VIII

ANECDOTES--ACTION WITH THE GWALIOR CONTINGENT--ITS DEFEAT--PURSUIT OF THE NaNa--BITHOOR--JOHN LANG AND JOTEE PERSHaD

So far as I now remember, the 30th of November, 1857, pa.s.sed without any movement on the part of the enemy, and the Commander-in-Chief, in his letter describing the state of affairs to the Governor-General, said, "I am obliged to submit to the hostile occupation of Cawnpore until the actual despatch of all my inc.u.mbrances towards Allahabad is effected."

As stated in the last chapter, when our tents came up our camp was pitched (as near as I can now make out from the altered state of Cawnpore), about the spot where Joe Lee's hotel and the jute mill of Messrs. Beer Brothers and Co. now stand. St. Andrew's day and evening pa.s.sed without molestation, except that strong piquets lined the ca.n.a.l and guarded our left and rear from surprise, and the men in camp slept accoutred, ready to turn out at the least alarm. But during the night, or early on the morning of the 1st of December, the enemy had quietly advanced some guns, unseen by our piquets, right up to the Cawnpore side of the ca.n.a.l, and suddenly opened fire on the Ninety-Third just as we were falling in for muster-parade, sending round-shot and sh.e.l.l right through our tents. One shrapnel sh.e.l.l burst right in the centre of Captain Cornwall's company severely wounding the captain, Colour-Sergeant M'Intyre, and five men, but not killing any one.

Captain Cornwall was the oldest officer in the regiment, even an older soldier than Colonel Leith-Hay who had then commanded it for over three years, and for long he had been named by the men "Old Daddy Cornwall."

He was poor, and had been unable to purchase promotion, and in consequence was still a captain with over thirty-five years' service.

The bursting of the sh.e.l.l right over his head stunned the old gentleman, and a bullet from it went through his shoulder breaking his collar-bone and cutting a deep furrow down his back. The old man was rather stout and very short-sighted; the shock of the fall stunned him for some time, and before he regained his senses Dr. Munro had cut the bullet out of his back and bandaged up his wound as well as possible. Daddy came to himself just as the men were lifting him into a _dooly_. Seeing Dr.

Munro standing by with the bullet in his hand, about to present it to him as a memento of Cawnpore, Daddy gasped out, "Munro, is my wound dangerous?" "No, Cornwall," was the answer, "not if you don't excite yourself into a fever; you will get over it all right." The next question put was, "Is the road clear to Allahabad?" To which Munro replied that it was, and that he hoped to have all the sick and wounded sent down country within a day or two. "Then by----" said Daddy, with considerable emphasis, "I'm off." The poor old fellow had through long disappointment become like our soldiers in Flanders,--he sometimes swore; but considering how promotion had pa.s.sed over him, that was perhaps excusable. All this occupied far less time than it takes to write it, and I may as well here finish the history of Daddy Cornwall before I leave him. He went home in the same vessel as a rich widow, whom he married on arrival in Dublin, his native place, the corporation of which presented him with a valuable sword and the freedom of the city. The death of Brigadier-General Hope in the following April gave Captain Cornwall his majority without purchase, and he returned to India in the end of 1859 to command the regiment for about nine months, retiring from the army in 1860, when we lay at Rawul Pindee.

But I must return to my story. Being sh.e.l.led out of our tents, the regiment was advanced to the side of the ca.n.a.l under cover of the mud walls of what had formerly been the sepoy lines, in which we took shelter from the fire of the enemy. Later in the day Colonel Ewart lost his left arm by a round-shot striking him on the elbow just as he had dismounted from his charger on his return from visiting the piquets on the left and rear of our position, he being the field-officer for the day. This caused universal regret in the regiment, Ewart being the most popular officer in it.

By the evening of the 3rd of December the whole of the women and children, and as many of the wounded as could bear to be moved, were on their way to Allahabad; and during the 4th and 5th reinforcements reached Cawnpore from England, among them our old comrades of the Forty-Second whom we had left at Dover in May. We were right glad to see them, on the morning of the 5th December, marching in with bagpipes playing, which was the first intimation we had of another Highland regiment being near us. These reinforcements raised the force under Sir Colin Campbell to five thousand infantry, six hundred cavalry, and thirty-five guns.

Early on the morning of the 6th of December we struck our tents, which were loaded on elephants, and marched to a place of safety behind the fort on the river bank, whilst we formed up in rear of the unroofed barracks--the Forty-Second, Fifty-Third, Ninety-Third, and Fourth Punjab Infantry, with Peel's Brigade and several batteries of artillery, among them Colonel Bourchier's light field-battery (No. 17 of the old Company's European artillery), a most daring lot of fellows, the Ninth Lancers, and one squadron of Hodson's Horse under command of Lieutenant Gough,[29] a worthy pupil of a famous master. This detachment of Hodson's Horse had come down with Sir Hope Grant from Delhi, and served at the final relief of Lucknow and the retreat to the succour of Cawnpore. The headquarters of the regiment under its famous commander had been left with Brigadier Showers.