The Heroic Garrison Read online

  Finally, after effecting a junction with the Residency, he would withdraw the garrison—commencing with the women and the sick and wounded—first to the Martiniere and the Dilkusha and then to the Alam Bagh, which would enable him to make a rapid dash to Windham’s aid in Cawnpore, should this be necessary in the event of an attack by the Gwalior Contingent . . . an attack he was fully expecting.

  The British commander-in-chief had a total force of 4,500, and opposed to him in Lucknow were, at the most conservative estimate, 60,000 trained sepoy troops but, his operational plan decided upon, he did not hesitate. The advance was ordered for daybreak on November 12 and, on the afternoon of the 11th, he reviewed his troops, who were drawn up in quarter-distance columns in the center of a vast brown plain, surrounded by trees.

  Mounted on a small white hack, the old general rode through the ranks. Divided into three nominal brigades of infantry and one of cavalry, with artillery, the Shannon seamen and marines and a small detachment of engineers, the force scarcely numbered one strong brigade.The infantry, consisting of the 93rd Highlanders, a wing of the 23rd, and one of the 53rd, the 8th, and the 75th— the last two much weakened by Delhi casualties—two companies of the 82nd, detachments of Lucknow regiments, and the 2nd and 4th Punjab infantry did not exceed 3,000. The cavalry brigade was, by comparison, stronger. Commanded by Brigadier Little, it was composed of two squadrons of the 9th Lancers, detachments of the 1st, 2nd, and 5th Punjab Cavalry and Hodson’s Horse, supplemented by two squadrons of the Military Train.

  The artillery included two companies of Garrison Artillery equipped with eighteen-pounder guns and mortars, one Royal, one Madras, two Bengal Horse Artillery batteries, and a Bengal Field Battery. The 250-strong Naval Brigade manned six 24-pounder guns and two howitzers with bullock draft and two rocket-tubes, mounted on light carts, with their own rifle company to act as escort.

  The commander-in-chief addressed each brigade in turn and he was received with thunderous cheers by the 93rd, the regiment he had so nobly commanded in the defense of Balaclava. Brave in their bonnets and tartan, the Highlanders welcomed their veteran commander as chief of their clan. All were in good heart and none needed to be reminded that the fate of the gallant Residency garrison now depended on their fighting prowess.

  Next morning, the main body began the advance and pitched camp that evening within sight of the Alam Bagh, after a spirited engagement with a two thousand-strong force of rebels, which ended when Hugh Gough—commanding the scarlet-turbaned Sikhs of Hodson’s Horse—charged and captured two guns. On the morning of the thirteenth, the fort of Jellalabad was seized and blown up, the Alam Bagh garrison relieved by the 75th to enable them to join the Relief Force and a strong reconnaissance made of the Char Bagh bridge. At 9 a.m. on the fourteenth the main column continued the advance, striking almost due east across a flat, cultivated plain, dotted with extensive clumps of trees and bordered on the north by the canal and flanked on the northeast by the River Gomti. They met no opposition until they reached the Dilkusha, the rebels having evidently expected them to follow Havelock’s route across the Char Bagh Bridge. After some heavy fighting, the Dilkusha Park was occupied and by noon the leading British troops had entered and cleared the great pile of buildings known as the Martiniere, from the roof of which a hurriedly erected semaphore signaled this news to the Lucknow Residency.

  Next day, these two positions were consolidated and, under constant enemy attack, the canal bank was cleared and supplies of ammunition and food brought up. Just before dark, the anxious defenders in the Residency saw the arms of the semaphore moving to spell out the welcome message from the commander-in-chief: “We shall advance tomorrow.” Their prayers, it seemed, were about to be answered . . .

  Early on the morning of Monday, November 16, the two generals, Outram and Havelock, with their staffs, ascended to the upper story of the Chutter Munzil Palace. From there, with the aid of telescopes, they were able to make out bodies of red-coated infantry moving toward the formidable walls of the Sikander Bagh, while the British artillery opened a heavy bombardment on the palace and its surrounding courtyards and gardens, which were crowded with rebel musketeers and matchlock men.

  To assist the relieving force, Sir James Outram had ordered the defenders to occupy and hold the Hirun Khana and a building known as the Engine House, moving forward from their advanced position on the north-east side of the defensive perimeter. Mines had been laid beneath the wall separating the Hirun Khana from the British-held advance post, behind which two batteries of guns had been set up and these—with the destruction of the masking wall—would have a clear field of fire.While a fierce battle was being waged for possession of the Sikander Bagh, these mines were detonated, but the powder had become damp and only part of the wall was destroyed. Eventually a breach had to be blown in it by fire from Olpherts’ own guns, while Francis Maude—commanding a battery of six mortars and, like “Mad Jack” Olpherts, a veteran of Havelock’s Force—shelled the enemy’s opposing gun positions from the quadrangle of the Chutter Munzil.

  At last the wall crumbled under the pounding of Olpherts’s round shot and he was able to bring both the new batteries into action with telling effect, driving a number of rebels from the Hirun Khana and replying to fire from the Kaiser Bagh, in the courtyards and walled gardens of which most of the rebels’ heavy artillery was concentrated.

  By midday the Sikander Bagh had fallen to the furious assault of Campbell’s troops, led heroically by the 93rd. Leaving two thousand rebel sepoys dead and dying behind them, the Highlanders, with their Sikh comrades of the Punjab Infantry and the Queen’s 53rd, were seen to be advancing toward the one-time Mess House of the 32nd—the Koorshid Munzil—and the Moti Mahal across 1,200 yards of flat, open ground. Less than halfway to their objective, they were met by a withering fire from the Shah Nujaf, a domed mosque 100 yards to the right of the road. Seeing Peel’s naval siege train being brought to the front to cover the advance, Havelock obtained Outram’s permission to launch the defenders’ supporting attack. Descending from his observation post, he entered the quadrangle of the palace, where the storming column was already assembled and, at 3:30 p.m., gave the order for them to move out.

  Alex, acting as one of the little general’s aides, felt his heart lift as cheer after cheer greeted this most welcome of orders.The men of the old garrison, advancing shoulder to shoulder with the men of the first relief force, were worn out and close to starvation after the months of hardship they had endured; all looked like scarecrows in their tattered summer uniforms, but nothing could dampen their spirits. Bent on retribution and sensing victory, they charged with the bayonet and the mutineers abandoned their loopholes and their gun emplacements before the vengeful fury of their attack. The Hirun Khana, the Engine House, and the king’s stables were seized and, as darkness fell, Vincent Eyre’s guns were brought forward and, from newly constructed positions, they opened on the Kaiser Bagh.

  The Shah Nujaf had been defended stubbornly, and British and Sikh casualties were severe but, after Peel’s seamen gallantly dragged one of their twenty-four-pounders to within a few yards of its outer wall—laying the gun alongside, as if to engage an enemy frigate—a breach was finally made. The Highlanders, led by their brigadier, Adrian Hope, poured through it and, urged on by Sir Colin Campbell himself, they took mosque and garden at bayonet point, seeing, as they entered in the gathering darkness, the last of the white-robed rebel defenders fleeing for their lives.

  That night Campbell’s exhausted troops slept on the open ground, their old Chief with them, and early next morning they continued the advance, subjecting the mess house and its adjacent buildings to a three-hour bombardment. Despite strong enemy resistance and a hail of musketry fire from the roof and loopholed walls of the Tara Kothee Observatory on the opposite side of the road, the Mess House was stormed by a company of the 90th and a picket of the 53rd, supported by the battalion of detachments from the Alam Bagh garrison. They advanced in skirmishing order un
der cover of the naval guns, crossed the 12-foot-wide ditch and when, minutes later, the British flag was seen to be flying from one of its towers, the Residency defenders hailed its appearance with cheers.The flag was shot down, hoisted again, shot down, and hoisted for a third time and then, from their vantage point in the Chutter Munzil, Outram and Havelock saw Campbell and his staff—antlike figures at that distance—cross the road to the Moti Mahal and enter it, as the Tara Kothee was set on fire and abandoned by the rebels.

  Now only a few hundred yards and a series of courts and passages separated the two British forces and, despite the fact that the intervening space was under heavy fire from the Kaiser Bagh, Outram decided to cross it in order to welcome the commander-in-chief.Accompanied by a jubilant Havelock, he and Robert Napier, Vincent Eyre, young Harry Havelock—his wounded arm still in its sling—and Alex, with three other members of the staff, ran the gauntlet of fire.They were all on foot, and Henry Moorsom, who had made the perilous crossing a few minutes earlier, guided them to their destination, with the aid of two of Campbell’s officers who had returned with him.As they were traversing a narrow passage, with high walls on both sides, a shell burst so close to them that Havelock was thrown to the ground by the concussion.

  He picked himself up, smilingly shook his head to the anxious inquiries, and continued on his way, heedless as always of his own danger. Met by Hope Grant in the Moti Mahal, the little general was heartily cheered by men of his old regiment, the 53rd. Moved to tears by the reception they accorded him, he told them huskily, “Soldiers, I am happy to see you. I am happy to think that you have got into this place with a smaller loss than I had.”

  “No smaller, I fear, sir,” Hope Grant informed him regretfully. “Our casualties are estimated at close to five hundred.”

  Sir Colin Campbell was waiting outside the mess house, separated from them still by 25 yards of rough, open ground.Almost as if they were aware of the presence of the three generals who had defeated them, the rebel gunners and musketeers in the Kaiser Bagh laid down a daunting curtain of fire, but, scorning their efforts to kill him, Sir James Outram led the way across and Havelock followed him at an unhurried walk. His son Harry, Robert Napier, and Outram’s A.D.C. Sitwell were hit and all three slightly wounded, but Outram and Havelock emerged unscathed from the barrage. As they approached him, Campbell courteously doffed his cap and extended his hand to each in turn.

  “How do you do, Sir James?” he—inquired gravely, and then Alex saw him wring his old Chief‘s hand. “How do you do, Sir Henry?” A smile of singular warmth lit his thin, austere face as he added, “Her Majesty has been pleased to create you a Knight Commander of the Bath and a major general, my dear Havelock ...may I offer my congratulations?”

  The thunder of the guns drowned Havelock’s reply, but for Alex the expression of gratified surprise on his was answer enough. It was, he thought, a fitting and well-deserved reward for a brave old soldier who had been prepared, if the service of his country required it, to die sword in hand.

  Some minutes later, while the three generals were engaged in earnest consultation, William Hargood of the Madras Fusiliers— Havelock’s A.D.C.—dashed across the shell-torn road to fling himself down at its verge, breathless and spent.

  “Would you please tell General Havelock that his son’s not seriously hurt, sir?” he requested Alex. “He’ll be anxious, I know and . . . I can hardly get my breath.”

  “Very gladly, my dear fellow,” Alex assented, and went forward to deliver this reassuring message. “Lieutenant Hargood has just come from your son, sir, and he says that his wound is not serious,” he informed Havelock.

  The little general permitted himself an exclamation of heartfelt relief. “Thank God for that!” he said, and then went on, his face suddenly tired and despondent. “We’re to evacuate the Residency, Sheridan. Tomorrow night, the commander-in-chief has decided, if arrangements can be made in time.”

  “The whole garrison, sir?” Alex questioned, conscious of a sinking of his heart. “Are we to abandon Lucknow completely?”

  General Havelock inclined his head. “It is a hard decision to accept, after so long and gallant a defense. Hard for us and,” he sighed, “harder still for the heroic garrison Sir Henry Lawrence entrusted with the defense of his Residency. But it is harsh necessity, alas! The women and children and the wounded will leave first. They are to be conveyed to the Dilkusha under cover of darkness and thence to the Alam Bagh and Cawnpore. Sir James Outram will remain with a holding force in the Alam Bagh . . . a small force only, to keep our lines of communication open, until we can return.As, please God, some of us will.” He repeated his sigh and added, with conscious bitterness, “This city has cost us too many lives to be abandoned completely, Sheridan. But your warning as to the Nana’s intentions has, unhappily, been borne out by Sir Colin Campbell’s spies. They report that he is moving on Cawnpore with Tantia Topi and the Gwalior troops, in addition to his own levies—which have been virtually doubled by the regiments fleeing from Delhi—and Windham’s been left with barely a thousand men.This force must return to his aid or we shall lose Cawnpore. Sir Colin himself admits that it is a desperate gamble, but he has no choice—he must take it. And the odds are slightly in our favor—so long as our combined force is not divided, we shall have sufficient troops to guard against any attack made on the column between here and Cawnpore. And if the chief can get there before Tantia Topi and the Gwalior rebels, he should be able to hold the place.”

  It was the right—indeed, the only—decision, Alex recognized, although for the defenders it would be a bitter and painful one. The commander-in-chief adhered to it, refusing a plea from Brigadier Inglis that he be left, with a single regiment, to continue the defense of the Residency. During the next two days, the route for the withdrawal was reconnoitered and troops and guns posted so as to cover it against attack. At noon on November 19, a long procession of doolies containing the disabled and the women and children—many of them on foot—left the Residency through the Bailey Guard gate, and passing through the Furhut Buksh and Chutter Munzil Palaces, crossed the open ground to Martin’s House protected by a flying sap, and after a brief halt at the Moti Mahal, tramped wearily on to the Sikander Bagh. They remained there until nightfall and then, under cover of darkness, all were safely conveyed to the Dilkusha Park.

  Captain Peel’s naval guns kept up a furious bombardment of the Kaiser Bagh, day and night, as if with the aim of breaching its walls preparatory to an attack, while secretly the garrison of the Residency made preparations for their withdrawal. Guns, ordnance stores, grain, and government treasure were all removed to the Dilkusha unobserved by the rebels, whose entire attention was concentrated on defending the Kaiser Bagh against the expected attack. By November 22, three wide breaches yawned in its walls, and at a little after 11 p.m., the order came for the withdrawal of the fourteen outpost garrisons.This was obeyed in disciplined silence, and by midnight, all was in readiness for the evacuation of the Residency itself.

  General Outram stood with Brigadier Inglis at the Bailey Guard gate as the garrison marched past; when all were reported to have gone, Inglis closed the gate, and covered by the guns of the rear-guard, the column gained the Sikander Bagh and then moved on to the Dilkusha Park without a shot being fired at them.Absent from the brief ceremony at the Bailey Guard, Havelock was already at the Dilkusha. Stricken by an acute attack of dysentery, he had been carried there in a doolie the previous day, and in the ordinary soldier’s tent which had been pitched for him, the little general—whose name was already a household word in far-off England—fought his last battle. His small, wiry body had been so weakened by exposure and the near-starvation rations on which the garrison had existed that, inevitably, this was a losing battle. He died on the morning of November 24, and the soldiers he had so often led to victory bore his body to the Main Bagh where, next day, his simple funeral service was conducted.* On Outram’s arrival with the rear-guard, the walled palace was occupied by a
force of four thousand men of all arms and twenty-five guns, and he was left in command to hold a front of three miles in length and keep Lucknow’s rebels in check.

  On November 27, in a 10-mile-long convoy, the Residency garrison, with its women and children, and sick and wounded— numbering almost two thousand—and native camp followers, escorted by three thousand troops, set their faces toward Cawnpore. The column reached Bunni that evening, and as camp was made, the sound of prolonged and heavy gunfire was heard, muted by distance but plainly coming from the direction of Cawnpore. The march was resumed next day, and with Cawnpore still thirty miles away, Alex—riding with the cavalry advance guard—was filled with a sense of deep foreboding.

  With every mile the thunder of the distant guns grew louder and the speed of the march was increased. Weary and footsore, the infantry pressed doggedly on; the travel-worn doolie-bearers and the heavily laden coolies could scarcely stagger under their burdens; men, horses, and bullocks dropped from exhaustion, and the sick and wounded died, tried beyond endurance, their pleas for water ignored, since no halt could be called. News of the attack on Cawnpore was received at noon, when a native cossid delivered a letter written in Greek characters and addressed to the commander-in-chief. It was dated two days previously and urgently requested assistance; two later messages confirmed that General Windham was under attack by an estimated 20,000 insurgents and being hard pressed, and the last stated baldly that he had been obliged to abandon the city and fall back to his entrenchment.

  Sir Colin Campbell waited no longer. Leaving the convoy to follow with its escorting infantry, he led the cavalry and artillery forward. On reaching Havelock’s old camping ground at Mungalwar, he left Brigadier Hope Grant to pitch camp there and galloped on, his escort covering the four miles to the river bank in a straggling line, their horses blown and jaded. Alex, plying his spurs remorselessly, reached the river with the general’s staff and had to suppress a gasp of dismay when he saw that the city of Cawnpore was an inferno of smoke and flames, clear proof—if proof were needed—that the Nana was showing no mercy to its inhabitants.The swollen Ganges, gilded by the rays of the setting sun, lay before them, and across its wide expanse, a dark shadow could just be seen. He breathed a heartfelt sigh of relief. The bridge of boats was safe . . . they could reach the beleaguered garrison, so long as that remained intact and in British hands.