When the bad news came about the outbreak at Mírath, I urged my parents to get me out to India, and suggested a transfer to the 7th Hussars. When the battery of Horse Artillery was sent out from Newbridge Barracks, my impatience became greater, and I wrote on the 7th August to an agent in London to endeavour to negotiate an exchange.
I got three months’ leave on private affairs, to join a Military College at Richmond, which had just been started, to prepare officers for the Senior Department, and went to my parents’ home in Essex to arrange matters. While I was there worse news was received from India, and my mother lent me money to try to effect an exchange. I had not succeeded, however, when I was recalled, and was back at Newbridge sitting on a Court Martial, on the 14th September, when I received a telegram asking if I wished to go to the 17th Lancers after the augmentation, which was always made when a Regiment was put under orders for India. This would put me under officers who had not joined when I became a Lieutenant, but I answered joyfully that I should be grateful. Early in October the transfer was approved, and that afternoon Tremayne accompanied me to Dublin, and introduced me to the Officer commanding the 17th Lancers.
That evening I crossed the Channel, and after spending four hours with my father and mother, went back to Dublin, and on the morning of the 7th, calling on Colonel Pack, Assistant Quartermaster-General, Embarking officer, asked him if it was necessary for me to embark that day, or if I should be safe for another twenty-four hours. I had not packed any kit, but I was afraid that if I did not get off with the Regiment I should be sent to the Depôt. Colonel Pack was most kind, and giving me the assurance I was safe, reminded me of the morning of the 11th April 1855, two years previously, when he heard Captain Peel send me with the message urging the immediate Assault on Sevastopol.
I spent the afternoon in packing my baggage, and saying good-bye to my comrades, and by dinner-time was nearly ready. I had arranged with the stationmaster to travel in a luggage train, which was due at Cork early next morning, a Sunday; but when my servant at ten o’clock went down for the car, he returned saying that the driver was so hopelessly drunk that he could not arouse him. I went down to the guard, consisting of twelve men, and leaving one sentry in Barracks, took the sergeant and the corporal and all the privates to the station, carrying my baggage, one box being very heavy, a Midshipman’s chest in which I had packed saddlery. Tremayne and another brother-officer, who had gone down to see me off, went out with me at nine o’clock to the Great Britain, an auxiliary screw steamship, in which I had previously sailed; but the sea was running so high that the captain of the tug refused to go alongside. I got on board however, safely in the evening, as the ship was weighing anchor.
CHAPTER XI
1858—CENTRAL INDIA
Cape Town—Bombay—Sir William Gordon—March to Máu—Hugh Rose and Robert Napier—Tantia Topi—Meer Umjid Ali—A loyal Sowar—The fate of a spy.
We made a fair passage of forty-two days to Cape Town, where our spirits fell on hearing Dihlí had fallen, and the confident predictions that the Mutiny would be suppressed before the ships reached Bombay, where we disembarked on the 21st December. I was left on board to hand over the equipment used by the Regiment. The men worked well, and we got the hammocks, blankets, etc., handed in before the last train left for the foot of the Ghaut, under Khandala, which was then the terminus. There I was again detailed to stay behind, to re-sort baggage; but I caught the Regiment up in its next day’s march, and with it arrived at Kirki.
The house accommodation of the Station, built for a battery of Horse Artillery and a Cavalry regiment, was insufficient, as there was already two-thirds of a Cavalry regiment in possession. The two Majors, Learmouth and Lieutenant-Colonel Morris, were kind enough to take me into a bungalow which they hired, where I had a bed and bath room for a nominal sum, my brother-Subalterns having for a time to live in tents.
I had been studying Hindustani since we had left the Island of St. Vincent, copying the alphabet[53] twenty-four times the first day, and on landing could speak a few words. Now established at Kirki with no horses, I was able to read for twelve hours daily, employing two Moonshees, or instructors, one in the forenoon, and the other in the afternoon.