For a while it seemed to Havelock that his whole mission had been a failure; and indeed he is said never to have recovered the two shocks that followed so close on each other, though there was no time to think about his feelings or indulge regret. Like Lawrence, he must 'try to do his duty,' and the first thing was to put the town in a state of defence lest the Nana should return, and sternly to check with the penalty of death the plundering and drunkenness and other crimes of his victorious army. Then, leaving Neill with three hundred men in Cawnpore, he prepared to cross the Ganges, now terribly swollen by the late rains, into the kingdom of Oude, of which Lucknow is the capital.
Not for a moment did Havelock make light of the difficulties that lay before him. They would have been great enough with a large force, and his was now reduced to twelve hundred British soldiers, three hundred Sikhs, and ten guns, while cholera had begun to make its appearance. However, the passage had to be made somehow, and there must be no delay in making it.
First, boats were collected, and as the boatmen secretly sided with the sepoys, the hundreds of little craft generally to be seen on the river had vanished. At length about twenty were found concealed, and as the Ganges was dangerous to cross in its present state, the old boatmen were bribed, by promises of safe-conduct and regular pay, to pilot the troops to the Oude bank. Even under their skilled guidance the river was so broad that a boat could not perform the passage under eight hours, and a week passed before the whole force was over and encamped on a strong position in Oude.
Well, they were at last on the same side as Lucknow—that was something; but they still had forty-five miles to march, wide rivers to cross, and Nana to fight, and Havelock knew that the sepoy general had an instinct for war as keen as his own. But Lucknow must be relieved, and the sooner the work was begun the better.
Two days after the landing of the British a battle was fought at Onao against the steady, well-disciplined soldiers of Oude, whose gunners were said to be the best in India. The fighting was fiercer than any Havelock had yet experienced, but in the end the enemy was beaten back and fifteen guns taken. The next day there was another battle and another victory, but the general had lost a sixth of his men and a third of his ammunition—and he had only gone one-third of the way. Nana Sahib was hovering about with a large body of troops, ready to fall on him; how under the circumstances was it possible for him to reach Lucknow?
Therefore, with soreness of heart, he gave the order to fall back till the reinforcements which he had been promised came up, and to send the sick and wounded, of which there were now many, across to Cawnpore.