In March, the reinforcements arrived from Bombay, and an attack on the French settlement of Chandernagore was resolved on; it was attacked both by land and from the river, the chief attack being made by the ships of war; the artillery had but a comparatively small part to play.
The political events which followed, and the intrigues which led to our subsequent hostilities with Sooraj-ul-Dowlah, it is not our province to detail. We purpose only to relate events with which the corps is connected, and accordingly we next join Clive on the 21st June at Cutwah. With his little army, we find 100 artillerymen, eight 6–pounder guns, and two howitzers, commanded by Captain Jennings. In the council of war which sat, Captain Jennings’s vote was given for an immediate attack (as recorded in the Life of Clive, while in Sir Eyre Coote’s evidence before the Secret Committee, the names and votes of the members are found very differently recorded. Sir Eyre Coote’s is more probably the correct list, as he spoke from memoranda); the majority were for delay, but Clive, after dissolving the council, followed the dictates of his own bold spirit, and directed the army to cross the river, which was done, and by midnight of the 22nd, the army had reached Plassey.
The next day the battle took place; it was chiefly a distant cannonade. The guns were placed three on each flank of the Europeans, and the remainder about 200 yards in advance of the left division of sipahis, sheltered by some brick-kilns, to check the fire of the enemy’s guns, manned by the French party, and posted at a tank in front. The shot from the British guns which missed those opposed to them, took effect on the bodies of cavalry and infantry in the rear. The cannonade was sustained till noon, when rain falling damaged the enemy’s ammunition, and forced them to slacken their fire. The English fire continued, and Major Kirkpatrick, advancing with a party, drove the French from the tank, and the English guns were pushed on.
Meer Jaffier, with his troops, at this time advanced, intending to join the British, but was opposed and driven back by a party and the fire of a field-gun, under Mr. Johnston, a volunteer.
The whole of the guns now cannonaded the enemy’s camp from the high banks of the tank; the enemy came out, and Clive advanced, posting half his troops and guns at a smaller tank in advance, and the rest on a rising ground about 200 yards to their left; the French field-pieces renewed their fire, and the enemy’s cavalry prepared to charge, but were always driven back by the quick firing of the English field artillery; the enemy beginning to draw off, the whole British army advanced, and driving them from a redoubt and mound, part of the intrenchment of their camp, about five in the afternoon completed the victory which laid the foundation of our Eastern empire.
The volunteer, Mr. Johnston, above noticed, was one of the fugitives collected at Fultah. His name is mentioned among those saved at Dacca; he not improbably belonged to the artillery, and was employed as a clerk in some confidential office, for, in a letter dated in 1765, from himself to Lord Clive, he endeavours to exculpate himself from a charge of disclosing confidential transactions from his office, preferred against him by Governor Drake. In this letter, he mentions his having been “remanded to the artillery, his former” occupation, and serving with the army till 1765, when he returned to Calcutta; the date of his removal is, however, uncertain.[[5]]
A detachment was sent forwards towards Patna, under Major Coote, consisting of 230 Europeans, 300 sipahis, 50 lascars, and two 6–pounders, but much delay occurred in starting, owing to the debaucheries ensuing on the plunder gained at Plassey. It was protracted by a mutinous spirit on the way, so that the French party had, by the time they arrived, rendered their position at Patna too strong, and the detachment returned to Cossimbazaar in September. The remainder of the army was removed to Chandernagore.
Towards the close of the year 1757, a second advance, with a stronger party, and Clive at its head, was made, and an arrangement satisfactory to the British having been concluded, he returned to Moorshedabad in May, 1758.
His first care was to organize the army, and in doing this, the coast army was taken as a model; a company of artillery was raised in Fort William, 29th June, from the men who had served at Plassey. Lieutenant Jennings was promoted to its captaincy, and this may be considered as the first company of the present establishment, and bears at present, after many changes of numbers in the successive formations of the regiment, the denomination of 1st company, 4th battalion.
A second company was raised at Cossimbazaar on the 19th September, the party mentioned above as being left there most probably having been incorporated in it: Captain Broadbridge or Broadburn, from the Royal Artillery, was its captain.