India Under British Rule from the Foundation of the East India Company

by James Talboys Wheeler

Treachery.

Useless firing was a treachery that was new to sepoy regiments commanded by British officers, but it was common enough in Asiatic armies commanded by their own generals or princes. Mogul history abounds in stories of Asiatic officers corrupted by gold, and ordering their troops to fire on an enemy without bullet or ball. Such treachery was scarcely possible under European officers, and consequently the rebel sepoys loaded their muskets with cartridges, and then fired into the air.

Rebels in the palace.

It was soon evident that the king was making common cause with the rebels, for the sepoys from Meerut were pouring through the palace to join their comrades in the city. No Europeans arrived from Meerut, and the Delhi sepoys began to fraternise with the rebels.

British refuge.

Brigadier Graves rallied a few of his men who still remained faithful, and escaped to Flagstaff Tower. Here he found a large number of European ladies and children, and all the gentlemen who had been able to reach the place of refuge. A company of sepoys, and two guns served by sepoy gunners, still guarded the Tower, and had they remained faithful might have kept off the enemy. But the force on the Ridge was rapidly melting away. The hearts of all the sepoys were with the rebels. All were burning to join the scoundrels in the city in the work of plunder and destruction; and those who were posted at the Tower only waited for an opportunity to move off in the same direction.

Massacre of Europeans.

Meanwhile the old "king of Delhi" had connived at the slaughter of Europeans. Mr. Frazer, the commissioner of the Delhi division, and Captain Douglas, who commanded the palace guards, were cut down within the royal precincts. Mr. Jennings, the chaplain, and some ladies and children, numbering altogether about fifty souls, had taken refuge within the palace walls, in the hope of being protected by the royal pensioner against the mutinous sepoys. Had the ladies and children been admitted into the inner apartments, they would have been safe. But there was a rush of rebel sepoys into the presence of the old king to make their salams and hail him as their Padishah; and they loudly demanded the death of every European. The old king could not or would not interfere, and told the sepoys that he made the prisoners over to them, to do with them as they pleased. The unhappy victims were shut up in a dark room with coarse and scanty food. They were offered their lives on the condition that they became Mohammedans, and entered the service of the king as menials or slaves. One and all refused, and one and all were eventually butchered in the palace of Aurangzeb.

Flagstaff Tower.

The Europeans in Flagstaff Tower were in sore peril. Ladies were terrified and anxious for absent husbands, whilst children were clamouring for milk and food. The men were distracted by the suddenness of the danger, and the stories of murder and outrage that came from the city. All eyes were strained in the direction of Meerut. Every one longed for the arrival of European soldiers to relieve them from the agony of suspense, and quash the fearful rebellion that was surging up in Delhi.