In January, 1816, the head-quarters were removed to Hyderabad, where they remained nine mouths, and afterwards returned to Masulipatam, where Captain Chadwick had arrived, with forty-six recruits, from England, in the preceding August.

1817

During the period the regiment was stationed at Masulipatam and Hyderabad, it performed much severe duty in consequence of the numerous incursions into the British territories of the barbarous hordes of predatory horsemen, called Pindarees, whose plundering enterprises, executed on swift horses, were conducted so as to baffle the efforts of the troops sent to intercept them. In 1817, the right wing at Masulipatam furnished detachments in the field under Captains Williams, Morrice, and Creagh, in the Ganjam district, on the banks of the Kistna, and towards Vizagapatam; the left wing was also frequently called out; but the movements of the Pindarees were performed with so much celerity, that few of these plunderers were captured.

Two of the Nizam’s sons rebelled, put several of his adherents to death, and threatened to depose their father; when the left wing of the Eighty-sixth, a battalion of sepoys, and two guns, were ordered to enter the city of Hyderabad, preceded by two battalions of the Nizam’s regular infantry under European officers, with two six-pounders. The Nizam’s battalions were attacked by the insurgents in a narrow street, and overpowered, with the loss of fifty officers and soldiers and one gun. The light company of the Eighty-sixth, with sixty pioneers under Lieutenant James Creagh, being in advance recovered the gun, and covered the removal of the killed and wounded to a square, where the two native battalions had retreated and taken post. On the appearance of Europeans, the insurgents dispersed; the rebel Princes surrendered and were sent prisoners to the fort of Golconda, when order was restored.

The left wing marched for Masulipatam during the hot season, which occasioned several deaths. On one occasion, Lieutenant Taylor and two soldiers were interred with difficulty, from the decomposed state of their bodies, although they had been dead only a few hours. On another occasion the guides led the column by a wrong road, occasioning a long and harassing march, which proved fatal to several men.

1818

The flank companies marched from Masulipatam in January, 1818, under Captain Michael Creagh, and with two troops of native cavalry and a company of sepoy grenadiers, proceeded to Datchapilly, on the borders of the Nizam’s dominions, to protect the frontiers from the depredations of the Pindarees.

Orders for the return of the regiment to England were issued in 1816, but countermanded in consequence of the hostile conduct of the Pindarees: they were repeated in April, 1818, when the regiment commenced its march for Madras, and when within one stage of that place, the route was changed to Wallaghabad. Previous to embarking the regiment was inspected by Major-General Brown, commanding the centre division, who expressed in orders,—“To Colonel Hastings Fraser, his greatest approbation of the good conduct and discipline of the regiment since it had been under his command in the centre division, in the attainment of which he had been so ably supported by the officers of the corps.”

While the regiment was waiting to embark, the “Orlando” frigate arrived at Madras, from Ceylon, with an application from the governor, General Sir Robert Brownrigg, for immediate aid to suppress the hostile aggressions of the Kandians inhabiting the interior of the island; the mortality among the European troops, employed in the interior, being so great, as to render further aid indispensable. The flank companies of the Eighty-sixth were completed to one hundred rank and file each, and embarked on board the frigate to proceed on this service[10]; they landed at Trincomalee on the 12th of September, and made preparations for penetrating the interior, during which time Major Marston was taken ill.

From Trincomalee the flank companies of the Eighty-sixth sailed, on the 18th of September, under Captain M. Creagh, and landing on the 21st, encamped near the fort of Batticoloe, where the sick men of the Nineteenth and Seventy-third Regiments, sent from the interior, were dying fast; a hundred had been buried close to the tents of the Eighty-sixth, and several deaths occurred daily.