While I was away the Commanding officers had been to see the Brigadier, and pointing out that such incessant marching was having a prejudicial effect on the men’s health, begged that he would go on as soon as the troops had eaten. This decision was announced to me when I came back later to have some food, and I asked my General what he proposed to do when we came on the enemy’s Piquet; but he determined to go forward, and so at midnight we moved off. When we were 3 miles south of Barode we were fired on, and turning back to the General, who rode 100 yards behind me, I asked him what he would do. He was then sorry he had not accepted my suggestion, and asked what I advised, and I said, “Lie down until daylight:” and so we did. I brought twelve men of the Highlanders up to the head of the column in place of the few Lancers who had been there, enjoining the Sergeant that the sentry should awake me when he saw the first streak of the false dawn.[71] I awoke about half an hour before it appeared, witnessing a strange sight. There was not one single man in the little Force awake. The Sergeant and the twelve Highlanders were sleeping soundly; every Lancer had his arm through his horse’s rein, which was standing with drooping head; and the drivers were stretched alongside the gun teams. Kicking the Sergeant and the Piquet up, I bade them run down the column and awake the men, and we advanced. Three-quarters of a mile distant, in a large group of trees, we saw camp fires, and I rode with an orderly of the 17th Lancers into the grove, which was occupied by camp followers, whose only anxiety was to escape. Disregarding them, the column pressed on, following a cloud of dust which marked Tantia’s retreat. He had camels and elephants, and the latter certainly must have moved earlier or we should have overtaken them.
When we had gone about 6 miles and I was ahead guiding the column, the horse of one of the rebels putting his feet inside the standing martingale, came down in front of me, and I told Trumpeter Brown[72] to shoot him. Presumably the Trumpeter had not much confidence in his skill, for he would not fire until he had placed the pistol close to the rebel’s head. Eventually Brown fired, and the man ducking his head the bullet missed him, and I peremptorily forbidding another shot, let the man run off into a field of jowarry, his horse still remaining cast on the road. He must have escaped, for when we returned in the afternoon the horse was gone.
Two miles farther on we were hurrying through a village with high mud walls, and a roadway so narrow as only just to take the guns. The leading gun detachment was in front, and the Squadron 17th Lancers half a mile out on either flank, and had dropped somewhat behind, as the guns followed a track, and the Lancers were moving through poppies, which being in full bloom and high, were tiring to the horses. The 150 Highlanders were as near behind the battery as they could keep.
I did not know at the time how ill the Brigadier was, suffering from a disease from which he died a few months afterwards; but on this occasion, when in actual presence of the enemy, he came out grandly as a leader of men. As he, Captain Paget, and I rode out of the village, there were 2000 horsemen drawn up 700 yards from us in one long line, and on seeing the gun they cheered, and advanced at a slow trot. I turned to General Somerset and said, as I put my hand over my sword, “We have only to die like gentlemen to which he replied, “Die? Not at all. Paget, gallop.” Captain Paget always talked in a drawling voice, and on this occasion he did not quicken his intonation, as he ordered, “Leading gun—gallop.” And gallop it did for 100 yards, and came into action, thus enabling the remaining three guns to emerge from the village. The Rebel horsemen were within 400 yards of us as the first gun was fired; the projectile, a round-shot, hit the horse of the leader, killing it, the rider and horse turning a somersault. This caused a delay. Three or four men jumping off their horses, picked up their leader, who was a man of note. The second round was high, but the third and fourth shot found the target, causing the line to halt, and now to my intense relief I saw coming through the village the leading camels.
Riding up to the first man, I said, “Jump off.” The kilted Highlander had come 150 miles on a baggage-camel with rough paces, and had lost skin; his feelings caused him to border on the insubordinate, as he replied, “Na, na; I winna brak ma neck.” It was no time to argue, and jumping off my horse I pulled at the nose string of the camel and brought him down, and the Highlander then slid off, quickly followed by others, and in much less time than it takes to tell the story, a dozen men were standing on each side of the guns. While I was forming them up, we heard a cheer, and saw the Squadron 17th Lancers, divided into two troops, with about half a mile interval, bring their lances down, as they galloped at the enemy, who, demoralised by our Artillery fire, turned and fled. So far as I recollect, we had only one man speared.
We moved on after the Rebels, for we had seen nothing of their treasure, which we wanted less for our pockets than to break up their Force, realising that when Tantia could no longer pay his men handsomely they would disperse. We had gone 10 miles from Barode when on approaching a low range of hills we came on hard soil and lost the trail (pag). I asked the General if he would follow the track while I rode to a village in a gap in the hills half a mile to our left for information, and I trotted off, followed by an orderly of the 17th Lancers, while the column proceeded at a walk. Just before I reached the village I came to some sandy soil, and tracing without difficulty camels and elephants, sent the orderly back to ask the General to turn the column.
I saw the chief man of the village and asked him for chupattis (bread), as I had had nothing to eat since a scanty meal on the previous evening. I did not at first realise I had shut my eyes, but when I looked at my watch I found I had been asleep for half an hour, sitting alongside my horse. Most of the people were on a high hill which overlooked the village, and shouting to them, I asked which way the English Force had gone. They replied it had followed the main track, outside the range of hills which formed a basin, at one entrance of which their village stood. I asked if I could save distance by riding across the valley to another pass which I could see a mile on, and they answered in the affirmative. Mounting, I rode on, followed by a horsekeeper of the Artillery, who was riding bareback on a horse which was too exhausted for draught.
We had gone a few hundred yards, when a man came from behind a hut, so neatly dressed as to make me think he was one of the Bombay Native Infantry, some of whom were following us, but 60 miles in the Rear. I approached him to ask how he got up, when he came to “the charge,” and I then saw he was one of the rebels. I was about to attack him, as the horsekeeper shouted to me, “Enemy’s Cavalry in front,” and looking ahead I saw a Squadron of the Gwáliár Contingent coming through the pass for which I was making. I reflected that if the man fired, and missed me, the Squadron would catch me, unless indeed our column was close behind it, and so saying to the Rebel, “Not just now,” as he went into a hut, I rode on, with much anxiety as to whether the Squadron I saw, which was crossing my front without regarding me, was the first or last of the Rebel Cavalry in the pass, where, however, I met the Advance guard of the 17th Lancers. The General after some discussion decided he would return to Barode, where we arrived at five o’clock on the evening of the 1st January, having marched—if direct distances from village to village only are counted—171 miles since the morning of the 27th.
When I had obtained a guide to lead the column by the nearest track to Barode, taking an orderly I went off to look for the Sepoy whom I had not ventured to fight half an hour earlier. I found the hut without difficulty in which he had disappeared, and having dismounted, approached, feeling sorry I had come, when I saw that I had to go down on my knees to get through the door, and was considerably relieved when I found the place empty.