Excitements of a Frontier Station In the autumn of 1851 an officer—Captain Frank Grantham, of the 98th Foot—was riding with a young lady on the Michni road, not far from the Artillery quarter-guard, when he was attacked by five hill-men. Grantham was wounded so severely that he died in a few days, the horses were carried off, but the girl was allowed to escape. She ran as fast as she could to the nearest guard, and told her story; the alarm was given, and the wounded man was brought in. The young lady was called upon shortly afterwards to identify one of the supposed murderers, but she could not recognize the man as being of the party who made the attack; nevertheless, the murderer's friends were afraid of what she might remember, and made an attempt one night to carry her off. Fortunately, it was frustrated, but from that time, until she left Peshawar, it was considered necessary to keep a guard over the house in which she lived.

From all this my readers may probably think that Peshawar, as I first knew it, was not a desirable place of residence; but I was very happy there. There was a good deal of excitement and adventure; I made many friends; and, above all, I had, to me, the novel pleasure of being with my father.

1853
My Father's Staff It was the custom in those days for the General commanding one of the larger divisions to have under him, and in charge of the Head-Quarter station, a senior officer styled Brigadier. Soon after I went to Peshawar, Sydney [Cotton][2] held this appointment, and remained in it for many years, making a great reputation for himself during the Mutiny, and being eventually appointed to the command of the division. The two senior officers on my father's staff were Lieutenant [Norman][3] and Lieutenant [Lumsden],[4] the former Deputy Assistant-Adjutant-General and the latter Deputy Assistant-Quartermaster-General. The high opinion of them which my father had formed was subsequently justified by their distinguished careers. Norman, with sixteen years' service, and at the age of thirty-four, became Adjutant-General of the Army in India, and a year or two later Secretary to Government in the Military Department. He finished his Indian service as Military Member of Council. Lumsden became Quartermaster-General, and afterwards Adjutant-General, the two highest positions on the Indian staff.

There was a separate mess for all the staff officers, and I remember a curious circumstance in connexion with that mess which, unless the exception proves the rule, is strong evidence against the superstition that thirteen is an unlucky number to sit down to dinner. On the 1st January, 1853, thirteen of us dined together; eleven years after we were all alive, nearly the whole of the party having taken part in the suppression of the Mutiny, and five or six having been wounded.

From the time of my arrival until the autumn of 1853, nothing of much importance occurred. I lived with my father, and acted as his Aide-de-camp, while, at the same time, I did duty with the Artillery. The 2nd Company, 2nd Battalion, to which I belonged, was composed of a fine body of men, who had a grand reputation in the field, but, being somewhat troublesome in quarters, had acquired the nickname of 'The Devil's Own.' Because of the unusually good physique of the men, this company was selected for conversion into a Mountain Battery, which it was thought advisable to raise at that time. I was the only subaltern with this battery for several months, and though my commanding officer had no objection to my acting as A.D.C. to my father, he took good care that I did my regimental duty strictly and regularly.

A Flogging Parade One very painful circumstance stamped itself on my memory. I was obliged to be present at a flogging parade—the only one, I am glad to say, I have ever had to attend, although the barbarous and degrading custom of flogging in the army was not done away with until nearly thirty years [later].[5] A few years before I joined the service, the number of lashes which might be given was limited to fifty, but even under this restriction the sight was a horrible one to witness. The parade to which I refer was ordered for the punishment of two men who had been sentenced to fifty lashes each for selling their kits, and to a certain term of imprisonment in addition. They were fine, handsome young Horse Artillerymen, and it was hateful to see them thus treated. Besides, one felt it was productive of harm rather than good, for it tended to destroy the men's self-respect, and to make them completely reckless. In this instance, no sooner had the two men been released from prison than they committed the same offence again. They were a second time tried by Court-Martial, and sentenced as before. How I longed to have the power to remit the fifty lashes, for I felt that selling their kits on this occasion was their way of showing their resentment at the ignominious treatment they had been subjected to, and of proving that flogging was powerless to prevent their repeating the offence. A parade was ordered, as on the previous occasion. One man was stripped to the waist, and tied to the wheel of a gun. The finding and sentence of the Court-Martial were read out—a trumpeter standing ready the while to inflict the punishment—when the commanding officer, Major Robert Waller, instead of ordering him to begin, to the intense relief of, I believe, every officer present, addressed the prisoners, telling them of his distress at finding two soldiers belonging to his troop brought up for corporal punishment twice in a little more than six weeks, and adding that, however little they deserved such leniency, if they would promise not to commit the same offence again, and to behave better for the future, he would remit the flogging part of the sentence. If the prisoners were not happy, I was; but the clemency was evidently appreciated by them, for they promised, and kept their words. I did not lose sight of these two men for some years, and was always gratified to learn that their conduct was uniformly satisfactory, and that they had become good, steady soldiers.

The Commissioner, or chief civil authority, when I arrived at Peshawar, was Colonel Mackeson, a well-known frontier officer who had greatly distinguished himself during the first Afghan war by his work among the Afridis and other border tribes, by whom he was liked and respected as much as he was feared. During Shah Shuja's brief reign at Kabul, Mackeson was continually employed on political duty in the Khyber Pass and at Peshawar. On the breaking out of the insurrection at Kabul, he was indefatigable in forwarding supplies and money to Sir Robert Sale at Jalalabad, hastening up the reinforcements, and maintaining British influence in the Khyber, a task of no small magnitude when we remember that a religious war had been proclaimed, and all true believers had been called upon to exterminate the Feringhis. While at Peshawar, as Commissioner, his duties were arduous and his responsibilities heavy—the more so as at that time the Afghan inhabitants of the city were in a dangerous and excited state.

Mackeson's Assassination On the 10th September, 1853, we were horrified to learn that Mackeson had been murdered by a religious fanatic. He was sitting in the verandah of his house listening to appeals from the decisions of his subordinates, when, towards evening, a man—who had been remarked by many during the day earnestly engaged in his devotions, his prayer-carpet being spread within sight of the house—came up and, making a low salaam to Mackeson, presented him with a paper. The Commissioner, supposing it to be a petition, stretched out his hand to take it, when the man instantly plunged a dagger into his breast. The noise consequent on the struggle attracted the attention of some of the domestic servants and one of the Native officials. The latter threw himself between Mackeson and the fanatic, and was himself slightly wounded in his efforts to rescue his Chief.

Mackeson lingered until the 14th September. His death caused considerable excitement in the city and along the border, increasing to an alarming extent when it became known that the murderer had been hanged and his body burnt. This mode of disposing of one of their dead is considered by Mahomedans as the greatest insult that can be offered to their religion, for in thus treating the corpse, as if it were that of (by them) a hated and despised Hindu, the dead man is supposed to be deprived of every chance of paradise. It was not without careful and deliberate consideration that this course was decided upon, and it was only adopted on account of the deterrent effect it would have upon fanatical Mahomedans, who count it all gain to sacrifice their lives by the murder of a heretic, and thereby secure, as they firmly believe, eternal happiness, but loathe the idea of being burned, which effectually prevents the murderer being raised to the dignity of a martyr, and revered as a saint ever after.

It being rumoured that the Pathans intended to retaliate by desecrating the late Commissioner's grave, it was arranged that he should be buried within cantonment limits. A monument was raised to his memory by public subscription, and his [epitaph][6] was written by the Governor-General himself.