CHAPTER XVII
THE ARMY IN THE FAR EAST—1819–75
The minor wars outside the main peninsula of Hindostan have been caused either by the expansion of the Empire of India in the only possible direction—eastward—or for the purposes of colonisation or trade.
A series of points on the road to the Pacific were gradually obtained, usually by purchase, between 1786 and 1824, such as Penang, and the land opposite in the Straits of Malacca, with Singapore and Malacca farther south. These guarded the sea-road to China, with whom we were eventually to be engaged in war.
But before that happened, Alompra, King of Ava, had played into the hands of those who were willing to add still more realms to those already under the British flag. He had conquered much of the southern peninsula, and, fancying himself irresistible, had raided our Cachar territories which bordered on his. He had seized the island of Shapuree and driven out the British guard there. Reluctant as was the East India Company to engage in further war after the costly campaigns with the Mahrattas, they had little choice. Prestige is all-important with semi-barbaric nations, and force alone wins respect. So this first expansion of empire into the Burma-Siamese peninsula began as a punitive expedition.
It commenced with an outbreak of mutiny, which future events in India rendered ominous. The 47th Bengal Regiment refused to embark for Burmah, lest they should lose caste. It is possible that their scruples were sincerely conscientious, and their contract of enlistment does not seem to have contemplated their employment beyond the seas. It was bad management to select those whose religious antagonism might be roused; but the order had been given, and on the continued refusal of the men to embark, they were fired on by European infantry and artillery and massacred.
Then the expedition started, on a three years’ campaign, in which the 1st Royals, 13th, 38th, 41st, 44th, 47th, 54th, 87th, and 89th shared, as did also the forerunner of the present 102nd or 1st Battalion Royal Dublin Fusiliers, besides numerous regiments of Madras Sepoys.
There had been some skirmishing with the invaders of Cachar, in the north-west, where General Shuldham was on guard, but the physical difficulties of forest and mountain rendered military operations extremely difficult; so that the second step was the occupation of Arracan by General Richards, with the 44th, 54th, and seven Sepoy battalions. Little else was done in that province, and the troops suffered terribly from sickness. Soon after Rangoon was taken by Sir A. Campbell, who had the 13th, 38th, and 41st Regiments, with a large force of Sepoys, as well as the remains of the 44th and 54th line Battalions, and this formed the base of all the future operations. The war throughout was peculiar. The chief villages and towns were on or near the banks of the Irrawaddy and its tributaries, and the whole district was covered by dense forests and marshes through which ran poor tracks which could scarcely be deemed roads. The enemy fought with bravery, but rarely ventured to meet the invader in the open, basing their defence on skilfully constructed stockades, which they rapidly erected. The physical difficulties were great, and led to delay, which in its turn led to a steady decimation of the white troops. Between June 1824 and March 1825, out of an average force of about 2800 men nearly 1400 had died. It was jungle fighting under the most severe conditions, and the whole strategic plan of attack was the successive assault and possession of the chief towns until the capital itself was reached.
But little headway was made at first. The first attempts on Kemmendine and Donabu failed; raids on Tavoy, Mergui, Tenasserim, Martaban, and Yé succeeded. There were constant skirmishes round Rangoon, in which the 38th and 13th especially distinguished themselves; and as Havelock says, in his Memoirs of the Three Campaigns, the enemy “acquitted themselves like men. They fell in heaps under the bayonet.”
But until 1825 began, the only result of the operations had been the possession, more or less, of the coast line. Early in that year a famous Burmese general, one Maha Bandoola, who had marched through Arracan bearing with him heavy gold fetters wherewith to bind and make captive Lord Amherst, appeared before Rangoon. The “Lord of the golden foot” who ruled in Ava was exasperated at the capture of the place. His first order had been: “British ships have brought foreign soldiers to the mouth of the river. They are my prisoners. Cut me some thousand spans of rope to bind them.” The Burmese army therefore took up and entrenched a strong position at Kokaing, whence Rangoon was harassed; but, attacked in rear by Cotton with the 13th Regiment (which lost 53 men and 7 officers killed and wounded, out of a total of 220) and some Sepoys, and in front by Campbell with a force in which were the 38th, 41st, and 89th (recently arrived), the enemy, 25,000 strong, was badly beaten by about 1500 men, and fell back on Donabu. The 47th and Royals having arrived as reinforcements, Campbell pushed on toward Sarawak, but Cotton, attacking Donabu, was not in sufficient force to carry out his object; so the two wings united and attacked the place a second time, and after desperate fighting carried the defences of the town, and Bandoola was slain. He was a man of an inquiring disposition, and was anxious to see the properties of the common shell, one “with a very long fuse having been projected by the British. The live ‘creature’ was brought fizzing at a dreadful rate to him; and he, at some distance, surveyed with great curiosity the unfortunate men bringing the fiery fiend along. Another second or two and it burst, killing the carriers and every one beside it! Bandoola was thunderstruck, and for the whole of that day his courage left him.” The stockades were “made of solid teak beams about 17 feet high driven firmly into the earth. Behind this wooden wall the old brick ramparts of the place rose to a considerable height, affording a firm and elevated footing for the defenders. On the works were 150 cannon and several guns. A ditch surrounded them, and the passage of it was rendered difficult by spikes and great nails planted in the earth, by treacherous holes and other contrivances. Beyond the ditch were several rows of strong railings; but in front of all was the most formidable defence, an abattis of felled trees, thirty yards in breadth, extending quite round the works.”