Siege of Delhi: perils of British.
§12. The British force reached the Ridge on the evening of the battle. It then numbered 4,000 troops, half Europeans and the other half Sikhs and Ghorkas. The city might have been taken by surprise at an earlier date, but the month's delay had elated the sepoys, and given them time to look to their defences. The British troops were encamped behind the Ridge, and were thus protected from the fire of the rebels. They were, however, the besieged rather than the besiegers. They were threatened on all sides, except the rear, by mutineers and rebels. The rear, however, was open to the Punjab, and all reinforcements and supplies were brought up from the Punjab. For weeks, and indeed for months, the British force could only hope to hold their position until reinforcements could arrive from Lahore or Calcutta. The city of Delhi was strongly fortified with walls and bastions loaded with cannon, and environed by a broad, deep ditch, filled from the river Jumna, which rendered it as impregnable as Babylon of old. It was impossible to storm such fortifications without a strong army of British soldiers and an adequate siege train, all of which were anxiously expected from the Punjab.
Strength of the rebels.
Meanwhile the rebels inside the walls of Delhi were being constantly reinforced by fresh bodies of mutineers. They were in possession of the arms, ammunition, and other stores, which had been collected in the British magazine for more than a generation. They were in receipt of daily supplies of provisions from the neighbouring villages, and it was impossible to cut off the convoys. A force of 4,000 men could scarcely be expected to environ a city seven miles in circumference, or even to approach within cannon shot of the walls.
Punjab and John Lawrence.
§13. Bengal was completely separated from Delhi by the disaffection which flooded the North-west Provinces. All hope of crushing the rebels at Delhi rested on the Punjab; and John Lawrence sent Europeans and Sikhs, siege guns and supplies of all kinds, as fast as they were available to the British force behind the Ridge. In June the "Punjab Guides" reached the Ridge, one of the best regiments in the Indian army. It belonged to the Punjab Frontier Force, which was recruited from the mountain tribes between the Punjab and Afghanistan, and trained and commanded by British officers.
Sikh hatred of Mohammedans.
In 1857 the Sikhs had learnt to respect their European rulers, who maintained order and law. They had no sympathy for the Mohammedans, nor for the king of Delhi. On the contrary, they remembered the murder of their Gurus and saints by Aurangzeb and his successors, and were burning to be revenged on Delhi and the Mogul. During the reign of Runjeet Singh they had outraged the Mohammedans of the Punjab by polluting their mosques and profaning the tombs of their holy men. Accordingly the Sikh warriors of the Khalsa, the very men who had fought against British supremacy at Chillianwalla and Goojerat, were now anxious to join the Europeans in putting down the revolt at Delhi and sacking the capital of Islam in India.
Mutinous spirit of sepoy garrisons.
John Lawrence had thus nothing to fear from the Sikhs. Nor had he anything to fear from the Mohammedans, for they were only anxious for protection against the Sikhs. The Hindus of the Punjab cared for no one but themselves; most of them were traders and money-lenders whose interests were bound up in the maintenance of British rule. The terror of the Punjab lay in the sepoy regiments of the Bengal army that garrisoned the country. The sepoys in the Punjab had no real ground for alarm at the greased cartridges; the issue had been stopped at the school of musketry at Sealkote, on the Cashmere frontier. But the contagion was as virulent as ever. They were maddened by the conviction that the British government was bent on destroying their religion and caste; and when they heard of the outbreak at Meerut and revolt at Delhi, they were bent on mutiny and massacre.