The Crimean War was ended; and two years later came the outbreak of the Indian Mutiny, with its awful carnage, its heaps of slain, its tortured women and children, its heroic determination, its dauntless courage. Then was seen a Continent, lost apparently in one day, won back to the British Crown by mere handfuls of indomitable men facing armed myriads. Such a tale had never been told before.
If Charlotte’s patriotism had been stirred by the Crimean struggle, this came nearer to her yet! She had five brothers, all in India, all more or less in daily peril. Mr. Henry Carre Tucker was Commissioner at Benares; Mr. St. George Tucker was at Mirzapore; Mr. William Tucker was in a less acutely unsafe position; Mr. Charlton Tucker, after seeing his Colonel shot down, was for weeks in hiding. All these escaped. But her early companion, Robert,—the father of her ‘Robins,’—was among the slain; and the three children, already long half-orphaned, became now wholly orphaned.
Robert Tucker’s remarkable powers, and his successes at Haileybury, have been earlier spoken about. Naturally of a serious and stern disposition, though not without lighter traits, he had been a good deal saddened by troubles, which no doubt resulted in the more complete dedication of himself and all that he possessed to the Service of his Divine Master. A short sketch of his life, written by his sister Charlotte, and published by the S.P.C.K., tells of his work at Futteypore, where for many years he was Judge.
About four years before the Mutiny he had written home about the ‘extraordinary success’ which was attending his Christian school, established and kept going by himself. On Sundays he was in the habit of regularly addressing a collected crowd of Natives; literally ‘the poor, the maimed, the halt, the blind’; and he did not teach them only, but also ministered liberally to their bodily needs.
In her little sketch Charlotte says of him,—‘Careless of his own comfort, restricting his personal expenses to a very narrow compass, he gave to the Missionary cause at the rate of forty pounds monthly, and one year even more’; adding that with ‘shrinking from ostentation’ he had never given his name on these occasions. And again—‘It was his deep and abiding sense of the debt which he owed to his Saviour, which made the Judge devote not only his substance but his heart and his soul to the Lord. How deep was the gratitude which he expressed in these words—“If every hair upon my head were a life, it would be too little to sacrifice to the Lord Jesus Christ!”’
A clue to many things in Charlotte’s own later life may be perhaps found here. There can be no doubt that the story of her brother’s self-denying life and tragical death made a profound impression upon her mind. His example, long after, was closely copied by this sister, when she too ‘restricted her personal expenses to a very narrow compass,’ precisely as he had done, and with the same object, that she might have the more to give away. Also his energy in teaching was reflected by her own burning desire, in old age, to speak on all occasions to the Natives of their deepest needs, and never to miss an opportunity of trying to lead some poor Hindu or Muhammadan to Christ, always with the vivid sense upon her, when she met man or woman, that the call to herself might come before they could meet again, and so a second opportunity might never recur. Another eighteen years had, however, yet to elapse before she would go out to India, to follow in his steps, and to render to Hindustan a loving return for this ‘year of horrors.’
In June 1857, like a thunder-clap, not indeed utterly unforeseen but practically unexpected by the majority of Englishmen, came the fearful outbreak; and for a while it did really almost seem that the British Raj in India was at an end. But those who thought so were soon to be undeceived.
When first the storm broke, Robert Tucker did not expect to be himself one of its earlier victims. His brother, Mr. St. George Tucker, says,—‘Robert was in high spirits when the Mutiny broke out. He wrote to me that he had seen a magnificent horse, and that if he could buy him, he could ride from Futteypore to Delhi, and soon finish the war. Robert was the Judge, and Sherer was the Magistrate. Sherer decided that all the Europeans must leave Futteypore and fly to Banda. Robert refused to leave Futteypore, and said that his duty required him to protect the Natives. The rest of the Europeans went off to Banda.’
Many Native Christians fled also,—among others a Native Catechist, Gopi Nath. He was taken by Muhammadans, imprisoned and cruelly treated; and he it was whose sinking courage was revived by the almost dying words of the English boy-officer, Arthur Cheek, the ‘Martyr of Allahabad.’