Massacre at Cawnpore Page 6

  Fool that he had been to allow her to stay here, he reproached himself savagely. Thrice-damned, witless idiot, to imagine that the perils of the journey to Lucknow for their sickly child would be greater than those to which both the child and his mother were now exposed, behind the battered brickwork of the hospital! Why had he listened to Emmy’s pleas, why had he taken heed of her concern for the child? God in heaven, what was the life of the child compared with Emmy’s safety, her precious life? His only excuse was that he had not realised how inadequate Wheeler’s defences were, had not seen them until this morning. He had taken it for granted that, because Lawrence in Lucknow had prepared so well for a siege, Wheeler had prepared equally well. True, he had seen the first part of the entrenchment being built before he had left Cawnpore for Meerut, but it had not then been completed and it had not occurred to him that so experienced a campaigner as Sir Hugh Wheeler would fall so far short of the standard a virtual civilian had set in Lucknow. Now, like George Kempland, he …

  “Alex!” John Moore halted breathlessly beside him, his face red and blistered from the sun. Hopefully, Alex gripped his arm, buoyed up by the thought of action.

  “Are we to blow up those barrack blocks?”

  Moore shook his head. “No,” he said harshly. “I’ve just seen the station commander. No one is to leave the entrenchment— the general’s orders. No one, that is to say, except the outpickets and a burial party, after dark. There’ll be no burials, of course, that’s out of the question. The bodies will be”—there was a catch in his voice—“disposed of in the disused well, between Numbers Five and Six of the barrack blocks. Edward Montcrieff, the chaplain, will go with them.”

  They were both silent for a moment. Then Alex said flatly, “Yes, I see. Well, ours not to reason why but … suppose the enemy occupy Number Four Barrack? It’s within musket range, they could make things devilish hot for us—but you pointed that out, I imagine? If our drinking well comes under musket fire, there will be hell to pay and—”

  “I used every argument, Alex, and Francis Whiting backed me up. The brigadier wouldn’t listen. The railway gentlemen are in occupation of Numbers Five and Six, and he told me to leave it to Heberden and Latouche, who have apparently said they can hold both without military aid. The general has agreed to leave the barrack blocks to them, so …” Moore rolled down the sleeves of his filthy, dust-stained shirt, his face expressionless. “I must get back to my post. Four of my poor invalids are back in hospital with sunstroke … I saw your wife and mine, for a few minutes, when I helped to carry the men across. They’re both bearing up bravely and your Emmy sent you her love.”

  “Thanks, I … I’m glad to have news.”

  “I thought you would be. Well”—Moore braced himself— “I’ll be on my way. Brigadier Jack thinks they’ll attack us before nightfall, but I’m not so sure.”

  Alex found himself praying, as he stood behind the mud wall, watching the light fade and listening to the weary curses of his men—a brief, almost blasphemous prayer, that the mutineers would indeed launch an attack now, before it was too late. He knew that his prayer had been answered when Corporal Henegan called to him in a voice tense with pent-up eagerness, “They’re coming, sir, I think—the sepoys are coming!”

  They came, in the last of the fading light, in two lines, with the cavalry to the left and skirmishers, in extended order, spread out as a screen across their front. They came steadily, making no attempt at concealment, their native officers at their head, keeping them in well-disciplined alignment. Each manoeuvre was executed with parade ground precision; the scarlet-clad ranks wheeled and re-formed, obedient to British bugle calls and orders shouted in English as, from either flank, a field-gun battery moved smartly forward, unlimbered, and opened fire with grape and canister.

  Behind their shell-scarred ramparts, the British defenders waited in grim silence, broken only by the frightened chattering of some boys from the Christian Free School, who squatted behind the riflemen, ready to reload their weapons when the need for this should arise. Alex’s line had been augmented by half a dozen officers and two Madras Fusiliers, he saw, as he cautioned them to hold their fire, and he recognised Captain Whiting running past them, bent double, to take his place with one of two reserve gun-teams which Ashe had collected in the trench behind his guns. The fair-haired Kempland hurried after him, red of face and breathless after doubling across the compound.

  “Steady, my boys!” Ashe shouted hoarsely. “Hold your fire till I give you the word. We’ve got to make every shot count—so let ’em come to us!”

  A bugle shrilled above the roar of the field-guns. The skirmishers took ground to right and left and the front line of the advancing infantry discharged their first volley in well-drilled unison … but too soon, Alex noted with relief, hearing the bullets spatter into the ground well short of their target. Still the British defenders made no answer … another thirty yards, he thought, assessing the range. The field-guns were blazing away with creditable speed, but their gunners were merely wasting ammunition —they were too far back for their fire to be effective. He put his telescope to his eye, focused it on the right-hand battery and saw, as he had expected, that they were limbering up, preparatory to moving forward in support of the infantry.

  So far it had been a perfectly executed movement, straight out of the textbook—a trifle cautious perhaps, but … suddenly, to his bewilderment, he realised that the line of red-coated sepoys had halted. Peering out between the sandbags of his observation post to ascertain the reason, he was astonished to see a body of horsemen, led by some of the Nana’s gaudily uniformed irregulars, start to surge forward across the infantry’s line of advance. A resplendent figure on a white Arab rode at their head, with tulwar drawn, urging them on and, guessing that it was Azimullah, the Nana’s impulsive young aide, Alex called out a warning to Ashe.

  “Action front—cavalry!” the artillery officer yelled at the pitch of his lungs. He stood waiting, his arm raised high above his head and, as the cavalry broke into a gallop, he brought it down smartly. “Fire!”

  The thud of hooves on the hard-baked sand was drowned by the crash of guns from within the entrenchment and Ashe’s nine-pounders, double-shotted with grape, did swift and terrible execution amongst men and horses. The sowars, who had clearly expected to dash straight into the entrenchment without meeting more than a token resistance, unable to slacken speed, could only close their ranks and come on. Ashe’s guns, quickly reloaded, got off two more rounds before they wheeled in confusion, to head for the triangular sector on the north face of the perimeter—the Redan—commanded by Major Vibart. There a blaze of artillery and small-arms fire, delivered at point-blank range, finally scattered them and they vanished into the smoke, beyond the line of Alex’s vision. When he glimpsed them again, they were galloping back towards their own lines in little semblance of order and, he thought exultantly, too badly mauled to be capable of rallying.

  Their charge had been a bad tactical error and their precipitate retreat had thrown the right flank of their infantry into a confusion which momentarily matched their own, but whoever was commanding the infantry did not lose his head. The sepoys dressed ranks and, once more in impeccable alignment, resumed their advance. Their second volley was delivered from much closer range and, as the musket-balls whined overhead like a swarm of angry bees, Alex bawled the order to his men to return fire.

  The British rifles spoke and spoke again with scarcely a pause and, with the range rapidly shortening, few missed their target. The native Christian boys scrambled pluckily for the discarded rifles, loading and ramming like veterans, and the men behind the parapet used their weapons to deadly effect, their weariness forgotten in the heat and stimulus of battle. The front line of sepoys faltered, as man after man went down under a raking hail of accurate and rapid fire; it reformed briefly, to advance a few more yards, only to break when the leading sepoys glimpsed the bristling bayonets and Alex, recklessly mounting the parapet, emptied h
is Adams pistol into their fleeing backs. His own men were cheering now and the second line of attackers, after getting off a ragged volley, hesitated and then joined their comrades in headlong and undisciplined retreat.

  “No guts! What did I tell you, lads—the beggars have no guts!” Corporal Henegan shouted derisively. A native officer, as if to challenge this accusation, put spurs to his horse and rode straight at him, sabre raised and lips drawn back in the ferocious parody of a smile. The corporal coolly capped his rifle, took aim and shot him down within twenty feet of the parapet. His foot caught in the stirrup-iron and his horse, bearing a charmed life, dragged him the length of Ashe’s sector before following the sepoys in their panic-stricken retreat.

  Darkness fell, with the habitual suddenness of the East and firing from the entrenchment petered out, cheers for their victory spasmodic and swiftly silenced, as the exhausted defenders let their weapons fall from their blistered hands and started grimly to count the cost of it.

  “’Twas a rare trouncing we gave ’em, was it not, Michael me boy?” a husky Irish private of the Madras Fusiliers exulted. “Michael …” he got stiffly to his feet, glancing about him uncertainly. “Michael O’Neill, are ye there at all? Corporal, have yez seen me pal O’Neill? He’s a little feller, so he is, and a Blue Cap the loike o’meself. I seen him not ten minutes ago and—”

  A voice from the darkness of the trench answered him. “He’s here, mate—what’s left of him. Took a round-shot in the chest … and there’s two more poor fellows with him that won’t see another dawn. Doolie-bearers—over here, jeldi! We’ve two for you.”

  The butcher’s bill, Alex thought, as the wounded men were carried away, the bearers running over the rough, shell-pitted ground with scant regard for the moans of those to whom such jolting was unbearable agony. Always the butcher’s bill had to be paid. The rebels’ was, no doubt, heavier than their own—as the big Irish Blue Cap had put it, they had been given “a rare trouncing” but … he moved slowly down the line, sickened by what he saw.

  There were nearly four thousand rebels and more, probably, would join them from nearby stations like Sitapur and Adjodhabad, as the mutiny spread. Their losses would be replaced but every British soldier killed or wounded or falling sick within the entrenchment would place an intolerable burden on the few who were left to defend it—a burden they must contrive somehow to shoulder, if the women and children were to have any chance of survival.

  Alex sighed and stood back to allow a burial party to pass him. His sector had come off comparatively lightly, he realised, as he exchanged news with other officers—one killed and seven wounded, but only two of these seriously. Ashe had lost six of his gunners in the space of as many minutes, and Edward Vibart— holding the Redan on the north face—had been forced to depend on semi-trained volunteers to man the guns with which he had so successfully completed the route of the charging cavalry. And he had prayed, Alex remembered … he had actually prayed for the mutineers to launch an attack in the belief that it would raise morale! Well, perhaps it had done so but … there was a bitter taste in his mouth as he looked down at the body of Fusilier O’Neill lying, mutilated, at his feet.

  “They’re after puttin’ them down a well, they say, sorr—not buryin’ them.” O’Neill’s comrade was on his knees beside the body, his voice flat and controlled but, for all that, he sounded shocked. “With your permission, sorr, I’d loike to put him there meself. O’Neill was me front-rank man, ye see, and he’d have done as much for me, God rest his soul.” He crossed himself and rising, came awkwardly to attention, white-faced, his control slipping a little. “I’m two-seven-three Sullivan, Madras European’s, sorr.”

  “Very well, Sullivan,” Alex assented. “You can take him with the next party. On your way back, collect a man to help you and go to the commissariat godown by the quarter-guard. Ask whoever’s in charge to issue the rum ration for this sector and bring it up here—I’ll sign the authority as soon as I’m relieved.”

  He was on his way to the commissariat warehouse, with Whiting and Ashe, ten minutes later, when the sudden crackle of musketry coming, with uncanny accuracy from the right, sent all three of them running for cover. The shooting continued and, directed now at the well, it scattered a party of men who, by the light of hurricane lamps, were attempting to draw water. The three officers looked at each other in shocked dismay.

  “My God—that’s coming from the unfinished barrack block next to Number Five!” Francis Whiting exclaimed. “The swine must have slipped in unobserved, whilst the attack was being repulsed. If they keep our well under fire day and night, it’ll be all up with us. The one thing we can’t do without is water.”

  “Perhaps we can dislodge them.” Ashe moved to the corner of the warehouse and stood listening to the steady discharge of musketry, which was now being answered by the British defenders in Number Five Block in somewhat spasmodic fashion, as well as by a few riflemen who had hurriedly taken up positions on the south-west side of the entrenchment. “I don’t think, by the sound of it, that there can be all that many of them. Not more than half a company, anyway, but they’re spread out along the whole length of the building and keeping under cover of the walls. And they seem to have partially disabled our picket in Number Five, don’t they?” He hesitated, frowning. “Oh, heavens, what I’d give for the howitzer we had to leave behind us in Lucknow! Or even a couple of mortars … but still, if we moved Dempster’s gun from behind the pucca-roofed barrack and mounted it to the right of Number Five, we might be able to shift them.”

  Alex shook his head. “I doubt if you could. Those half-finished blocks may not have floors but they’re roofed and they stand forty feet high. The Pandies would put men up there to fire down on you while you were moving the gun—and even if you managed to get it in position, you’d make little impression on walls as thick and solid as those. Not with nine-pound shot, anyway. It’s going to take cold steel to shift the swine, I’m afraid.”

  “Cold steel, sir?” Ashe started at him. “Do you mean a raiding party?”

  “Yes, that’s what I mean. Captain Moore and I discussed the possibility of either blowing in the front wall of that block—to prevent the mutineers from occupying it—or of occupying it ourselves. But that was this morning … whatever we do now will be a trifle late, alas.” Alex joined the artillery officers at his point of vantage and stood for a moment, counting the musket-flashes which came from the newly captured building. “You’re right, Ashe—there aren’t all that many of them. I fancy a raiding party could work its way across from the rear of Number Five without being spotted. In fact, I’m sure it could … and with the railway fellows to provide covering fire and a few of your shells used as hand grenades and lobbed in through the windows, we could probably get rid of most of those rebels.”

  “The general has issued orders that only burial parties are to leave the entrenchment,” Captain Whiting reminded him apologetically. “Don’t misunderstand me, Colonel Sheridan—I’m as anxious as you are to drive the enemy out. But how is it to be done when the general—”

  “It has got to be done, with or without orders,” Alex retorted impatiently. “Number Four Block ought to have been provisioned and occupied this morning, dammit! That well is our life-line— the women and children can’t hope to survive if their water supply is cut off. Poor souls, they must be suffering enough already, without lack of water to add to the discomfort!”

  He was suddenly angry as the memories of Meerut, searing and bitter, came flooding back into his mind. The tragic loss of so many innocent lives, which had been the result of General Hewitt’s refusal to take action or to permit any of his subordinates to do so, was the most painful memory of all and it still ate into him like a canker. He recalled the impotent fury he had felt when Brigadier Archdale Wilson had hesitated, compelled to delay making the vital decision which might have saved Delhi because the orders of his superior—whether right or wrong—had to be obeyed without question. One of General He
witt’s orders had been that he was not to be disturbed, after he had retired to his quarters to compose his report … and Archdale Wilson had not even questioned that, although Meerut was going up in flames and the mutinous sowars of the Light Cavalry had already started on their way to Delhi.

  God in heaven, was it all to happen again? Was the disgraceful story of Meerut to be repeated here because the Company’s generals—the “grey-beard generals,” as the Moulvi of Fyzabad had so contemptuously called them—were too old, too set in their peacetime ways to be able to adjust to a crisis situation which demanded swift, courageous action? And because … Alex felt the sweat break out on his brow and cheeks. Because no subordinate officer dared question the orders they gave or the decisions they made, lest by so doing he jeopardise his own career. It was the system, the stern military code that was the very basis of discipline and he had lived most of his adult life believing in it. General Hewitt had used the system in order to cover his own deficiencies … but Sir Hugh Wheeler, surely, despite his seventy-odd years, was made of sterner stuff than the obese and senile Hewitt. He had to be—damn it, his record spoke for itself! His decision to defend this entrenchment, in preference to the Magazine, might well prove to be a costly error—perhaps even a disastrous one, as Captain Kempland feared—but at least Wheeler had made it clear that he intended to go down fighting.

  At this morning’s conference, the old general had shown himself bitterly disillusioned by the Nana Sahib’s betrayal but he had not attempted to shrink from his responsibilities. He had stated the reasons for his decision to defend the entrenchment and had admitted the possibility of error with courageous frankness; furthermore, he had shown himself to be approachable and willing to listen to suggestions from his juniors. Indeed, he had invited them—unlike Hewitt, who had turned a deaf ear to everyone— so that the chances were that he would listen now.