In the above formation we find the great error which has pervaded the service ever since—the supposition that companies of Native do not require as many officers as companies of European artillery; and while the establishment of officers of the latter was fixed at a proportion which shews that the wants of the branch were then better understood than they have been in later times, the former was left ridiculously unprovided with officers.
The officers of a company of artillery should be proportioned to the number of guns it is intended to man. No officer can do justice to more than two pieces; and as the companies were then adapted to eight field-pieces, four officers, with a fifth to command the whole, is the number which ought to have been present in the field. On this subject, however, it will be necessary to dwell more, as the successive changes pass under review.
CHAPTER II.
Reduction of Golundaz Battalion—Formation of Regiment into Two European Battalions with Ten Battalions of Lascars—Goddard’s Expedition—Popham’s Capture of Gwalior—Insurrection at Benares—Attacks on Pateeta, Luteefpoor, and Siege of Bidgegurh—Colonel Pearse’s Expedition to the Coast—Reduction of Golundaz Companies—Transport Train, Foundry, Powder-works—Reduction in Establishment—Pay—Artillery formed into One European Battalion of Ten Companies—Lascar Battalions abolished—Battalion Guns—Artillery formed into Three European Battalions, Lascars into Thirty Companies.
The formation detailed in the preceding chapter was not destined to remain, for in March, 1779, Lieutenant-General Sir Eyre Coote arrived from England with the commission of commander-in-chief, and soon after his arrival it was rumoured that he had brought authority to disband the golundaz.
From representations grounded in error and party views, alarm had been taken by the Court of Directors and the Government at the supposed danger of teaching the natives the use of artillery, and in August the golundaz were ordered to be disbanded, the men having the option allowed them of entering infantry regiments or joining the lascars.
To this corps, having been raised at his suggestion and disciplined by himself, Colonel Pearse was much attached, and, both on public grounds and private feelings, was averse to its being broken up. He unfortunately had many enemies in high rank in Calcutta;—the consequence of the feelings of rancour which had so long disturbed the settlement, and which were still kept up by Mr. Francis’s and General Clavering’s faction and Warren Hastings’s adherents. Among these was Colonel Watson, commanding the engineers, who vowed the overthrow of the golundaz, and, having considerable influence, urged Sir Eyre Coote to proceed in this ill-judged measure.
Those readers, who may recollect the golundaz at Cawnpore under Major Hay, may well conceive how deeply it must have wounded Colonel Pearse to see a similar corps sacrificed to jealousy and party views; and there is every reason to suppose that Colonel Pearse’s golundaz were equal to Major Hay’s, which is saying every thing, for there never was a corps better disciplined than the latter.
Colonel Pearse determined that the golundaz should not be reduced, if any exertions on his part could save them; and accordingly, as soon as the rumours reached him, addressed a letter to the commander-in-chief, in which he urged the necessity of employing native artillery, from the impossibility of keeping up sufficient European artillery for the service of our extended empire, liable to be attacked at both extremities, and at such a distance as to preclude the possibility of assistance. He combated the argument of danger from native artillerymen deserting and teaching their art to the golundaz of native powers, by proving that, at that time and previously, the native states had artillerymen not inferior to ours in the mere gun exercise and preparation of common stores, and that, were this not the case, the desertion of a few European artillerymen would render all precautions useless; that in reality for many years past there were thirty men nominally infantry, but in reality artillerymen attached to each battalion, for the service of the two field guns, which arrangement entailed the possibility of all the evils now feared, though without the advantages which a regular corps of native artillery would give. He deprecated the system of battalion guns as useless, the guns being without officers to manage them so as to produce the best effect, by attending to the advantages of ground and selection of ammunition best adapted to the occasion; the two European artillerymen detached with each battalion for this purpose being ignorant of the higher—the more scientific parts of the profession, which knowledge is confined in general to the officers; that it ruined the discipline of these men, who, though they went out good men, returned, in general, drunken vagabonds; that the lascars sent, though of the artillery, were only employed in dragging the guns, and were unarmed and undisciplined, but that they served for menial offices, which made them desirable to captains commanding the infantry battalions. He recommended that the guns should be collected in small brigades, or batteries, and brought to the points wanted, instead of being frittered away along the line; that the discipline of the men working them, from being under their own officers, would be better preserved, and that cannon would be better looked after, and their fire produce more effect in action, by being under the exclusive command of an officer bred up to the profession. He concluded by urging that, even should the artillery desert and take service with native powers, there was in reality little to fear, for though the country powers have infantry formed like ours, they are inferior in every respect: their irregularity of pay is the grand foundation of it; their want of sufficient instruction and of the essential knowledge of our discipline, will long keep them so; and such as their sipahis are to ours their artillery will be to our artillery, though the men should desert in equal proportion, which he did not think would occur, particularly if the golundaz had a small increase of pay over the infantry, which was the case in all other services.
On the receipt of the order, Colonel Pearse again attempted to prevent this ill-judged measure, by a respectful representation to Government, in which he pointed out that the European artillery numbered but 370 in all, of whom only 150 were at the presidency; that two ships of the season had come in without a single recruit; that it would therefore be impossible to complete the corps till the next year, and that, even, was doubtful, from the scarcity of recruits, his Majesty’s regiments being filled by pressing; that if an attack was made, the European artillery were insufficient even for the defence of Fort William, much more were they unable to furnish the detachments which would be necessary; that the golundaz were good artillerymen; the name and service the highest in repute among the natives; and that they would not, even if the pay were equal, enter the ranks of the lascars; so that raw and ignorant men must be enlisted for that class, who would require instruction, and, till they were taught, the presidency would be almost destitute of artillery. He submitted that, under these circumstances, the execution of the order should be delayed until the commander-in-chief could be consulted, lest any ill consequences should follow the immediate execution of it.