After the death of the celebrated Runjeet Singh, the state of our North-West Frontier, bordering on the seat of commotion, and ultimately bitter war, in Afghanistan, was far from settled, and it was contemplated that the Sikhs might interrupt our communication with our troops, so fearfully extended from any base of operations, and with the country of this doubtful ally intervening. Under these circumstances, I placed my ready services at the disposal of Lord Auckland and the Commander-in-Chief. Soon after this the insurrection at Cabool commenced. Poor Elphinstone and I had been friends for years,[125] and I had frequently impressed upon him the difficulty of his position, the probability of an attempt on the part of the restless and independent-spirited Afghan to shake off that yoke so injudiciously imposed upon him (especially as our rupees were no longer so lavishly, so indiscreetly scattered to acquire an ascendency which, if necessary to acquire at all, should have been acquired by the sword, and maintained by the sword, sheathed in inflexible and uncompromising justice, equity, dignity, and honour), and the necessity of his ever considering himself in the greatest danger when he felt the most secure; but I must not set my foot on a field which to describe would require volumes. The war broke out. The energy of a Wellington or a Napoleon would have saved the destruction of that force; it was perfectly practicable, as I then pointed out. The Lieutenant-Governor and I were in hourly communication; I showed the military steps we ought to pursue, and he urged them on the Government, and offered to bear any responsibility with the Commander-in-Chief. Lord Auckland was a sensible but timid man, and the Commander-in-Chief, ever most judiciously and correctly averse to the occupation of Afghanistan, was reduced to defensive measures at the moment when the most vigorous and initiative steps ought to have been taken with the velocity of lightning. The moment was lost. If time, that irrecoverable engine in war, is neglected, disaster, as in this instance, must ensue. Before the outbreak at Cabool, when my dear friend Elphinstone, from the dire misfortune of sickness, was compelled to request his relief, the Lieutenant-Governor urged the Government and Lord Auckland to send me up. I offered my services on the condition that I had the supreme and uncontrolled military authority from the source to the mouth of the Indus and was aided by a civil servant; and Mr. George Clerk, the Political Agent for the Punjaub, a man of first-rate abilities and activity, most popular among the Sikhs, whose country and resources intervened between our distant operations and their base, offered nobly (for we were personally strangers) to serve with and under me.
Sir Jasper Nicolls, why I do not to this moment know, was opposed to my being employed, although Lord Auckland wished it, and Major-General Pollock was gazetted by the Government—“by the express recommendation of the Commander-in-Chief”—but only to the command of the Upper Indus, not the Lower, where Major-General Nott was senior officer. Consequently, when these two officers’ forces united, they were like the Corps d’Armée of Napoleon in Spain, jealous of each other, the junior[126] was disobedient to the senior, and that ensemble, on which success in war hinges, was lost.
The only reason I could ever suppose influenced Sir Jasper Nicolls in his reluctance to employ me—for I know he had the highest opinion of my activity—is that he apprehended, if I once got the command, the wealthy Persia would have been attempted, and my progress alone interrupted by the Caspian Sea. His thought day and night was to get back the army from its advanced and dangerous position. Whereas had the troops been rushed to the scene of action, as they might have been (for on the commencement of the outbreak, the Khyberies were with us), and Brigadier Wyld’s Brigade moved by forced marches to Jellalabad, other troops rapidly following in succession, and when Wyld arrived at Jellalabad, the whole of the weakly men, women, stores, etc., been securely placed in a small Place d’armes constructed for the purpose during Wyld’s approach, while General Sale’s and Wyld’s forces combined precipitated themselves on Cabool, the force then would have been saved, the spirits of the troops would have been sustained by the knowledge of succour approaching, the enemy proportionately depressed. Thus a want of exertion and decision in rendering support caused a disaster and a loss England never before sustained. It is needless here to enter into dates, number of marches, etc.; the thing I have described was a simple matter of activity and well within the scope of possibility. As soon as he arrived, Lord Ellenborough saw the necessity of withdrawing the troops from Afghanistan, but was precipitate in availing himself of the period so to do—which certainly was not at the moment when our military prowess, the prestige of our arms, and our national character for supremacy required to be re-established. A government proposed by the Afghans should have been set up by us; then the sooner we abandoned a nominal conquest, the better for the true interests of British India. So astonished was I at the immediate withdrawal, that I wrote the Memorandum No. 1. In the meanwhile the Governor-General had left it optional to General Nott to retire by Guznee, but had issued several peremptory orders to Pollock to retire. When Nott, however, proposed his forward movement, Pollock was also directed to move. I then wrote the Memorandum No. 2, and as the campaign developed, No. 3.[127] The moment the Afghans were assailed and the invasion pursued, they quailed immediately, and did not evince the courage and perseverance in the cause of their country of the Swiss and Vendeans. If they had done so, the three divisions of Pollock and Nott and England, moving as they were upon the falsest of military principles, would have been sacrificed; but in all wars the folly of one party is exceeded by that of the other, and that which is the least culpable succeeds. This example of the want of union and energy on the part of the Afghans shows how easy it would have been to have crushed the insurrection by adopting vigorous measures at the moment.
But to revert to my own command. If the Governor-General had selected me and given me the authority I desired, viz. the whole line of the Indus, with the aid of Mr. Clerk (whose popularity with the Sikh Government and nation was so great that the resources of the Punjaub would have been at his command, and consequently at my disposal for the use of the army, which stood so much in need of them), I would have waged war upon a great scale upon the Afghan, razed his forts and fortresses from one end of his country to the other, established a government, remained in the country until order, rule, and authority were firmly established; then when the invincible character of our arms had been maintained, marched out of the country triumphantly, and not have sneaked out of it, as we did, with our tail down, like a cur before a hound. That our national character for consistency, equity, and superiority has suffered by this melancholy attempt on Afghanistan is daily experienced throughout India. Would Scinde, Bundelkund, and Gwalior have dared to resist us but for the example afforded them in Cabool, that British troops could be not only beaten, but annihilated? The whole of the transactions of this period afford such a lesson to all Governors and Military Commanders, it is to be hoped posterity will never forget them. First principles in government and war can never be departed from: though success at the onset may attend irregularity, in the end disaster will assuredly prove that consistency, rule, and the true principles of strategy are indispensable to the achievement of conquest. To buy the good-will of the influential men of nations is folly and extravagance and the most temporary authority that can be attained. Conquest must be achieved by force of arms, by the display of irresistible power; then held by moderation, by a progressive system of amelioration of the condition of the people, by consistency and uncompromising justice. In this way the great movers of mankind, Fear and Self-interest, perpetuate subjection.
CHAPTER XLI.
SIR HUGH GOUGH SUCCEEDS SIR JASPER NICOLLS AS COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF IN INDIA—AFFAIRS IN GWALIOR—BATTLE OF MAHARAJPORE—HARRY SMITH MADE K.C.B.
At this period [1843] the time of command of Sir Jasper Nicolls expired, and Sir Hugh Gough, the hero of Barossa and of China, was appointed Commander-in-Chief. Headquarters was at the time in the Himalaya Mountains at Simla, and, Sir Hugh having expressed a wish that I should meet him, I and my dear wife started in the middle of the rainy and unhealthy season on the 18th July for Calcutta by dâk.[128] By this slow process you are carried at the rate of three and a half miles an hour in a sort of wooden box called a palanquin. You railroad flyers would regard it as slow indeed for a journey of 1300 miles. We reached Allahabad, and from thence proceeded by steamboat and found my new Commander-in-Chief. The parting with Sir J. Nicolls was as painful as affectionate. With every member of his highly educated and accomplished family we were on the most intimate and friendly terms, and he was kind enough by letter to say that he ever regarded me as a “most upright, straightforward gentleman and soldier.” On parting, I could not fail to express regret that he had not appointed me to command in Afghanistan, the only time I ever agitated the subject. His answer was, “My reasons then are fully in force now, but it was no want of the highest opinion of your abilities.” I shall ever entertain the highest respect for Sir Jasper Nicolls as a most shrewd and sensible man, laborious at papers, expressing himself by letter in as few words as the Duke himself, and possessing a clear and thorough knowledge of the affairs of India and its army. In his great error of command—I allude to Afghanistan—there he was ever consistent, always opposed to the occupation of that country, so distant from our resources, so ruinous to our Treasury, but, though right in principle, he should have yielded to the force of circumstances at the moment, restored the fight, and ultimately given back the country to its lawful owners.
We were both received by Sir Hugh Gough and family with every demonstration of a wish to cultivate that mutual friendship and good understanding which education dictates and the good of our service and the rules of the social compact demand. We were only in Calcutta from the 1st to the 12th September, but twelve more laborious days we never passed, what with an excess of correspondence, the meeting with innumerable old friends, the formation of new, the fêtes to the new Commander-in-Chief, a great military dinner to Lord Ellenborough, etc., and, added to it all, the muggy heat and damp of Calcutta. The twelve days accordingly appeared to us almost months, from excitement and fatigue mental and bodily.