Brave British soldiers and the Victoria Cross / a general account of the regiments and men of the British Army, and stories of the brave deeds which won the prize "for valour"

by Unknown

CHAPTER XVI.
LIEUTENANT ANDREW CATHCART BOGLE, V.C., 78TH HIGHLANDERS (NOW CAPTAIN 10TH FOOT).

All our readers are more or less familiar with the distinguished part which the 78th Highlanders acted in the suppression of the Indian Mutiny. In our last chapter we showed how Henry Ward, a gallant private of this regiment, won the Victoria Cross by saving the life of the present Sir H. M. Havelock, then a lieutenant in the 10th Regiment, when he was severely wounded at the relief of Lucknow. The high opinion which the elder Havelock had formed of the Highlanders, when they were serving under him on the Euphrates during the Persian war, led him to rejoice when he found that they formed part of the moveable column with which he was to advance for the relief of Cawnpore. He thus alludes to them in one of his confidential reports:—“There is a fine spirit in the ranks of this regiment. I am given to understand that it behaved remarkably well at the affair of Rhooshab, near Bushire, which took place before I reached the army; and during the naval action on the Euphrates, and its landing here (in Persia); its steadiness, zeal, and activity under my own observation were conspicuous. The men have been subjected in this service to a good deal of exposure, to extremes of climate, and have had heavy work to execute with their entrenching tools, in constructing redoubts and making roads. They have been, while I had the opportunity of watching them, most cheerful, and have never seemed to regret or complain of anything but that they had no farther chance of meeting the enemy. I am convinced the regiment would be second to none in the service if its high military qualities were drawn forth. It is proud of its colours, its tartan, and its former achievements.”

The battle of Cawnpore, fought on the 16th of July, 1857, justified the opinion thus expressed, and proved that the wearers of the tartan were worthy of their predecessors who conquered at Maida and Assaye. Our victory was complete; but it failed to save the lives of the helpless women and children who had fallen into the hands of that bloodthirsty monster Nana Sahib, whose name will ever live in the annals of the Indian mutiny as the impersonation of all that is perfidious and cruel. He was the adopted son of Bajee Row, the Peishwa, or head of the ancient Mahratta confederacy, and proved himself worthy of such a father. Bajee Row, in 1818, endeavoured in the most treacherous manner to destroy Mr. Mountstuart Elphinstone, the British resident at his court; but, having failed in this attempt, he was driven from Poona, his capital, and, after being chased through the country for several months, was defeated at the battle of Kirkee. His power was thoroughly crushed, so that he might have been forced to surrender at discretion; but he was admitted to terms, and endowed with an annuity of 90,000l., which he lived to enjoy for thirty-two years. After his death his immense wealth was inherited by his adopted son, who had established himself at Bithoor, about sixteen miles from Cawnpore, and lived on terms of intimacy with the officers of the garrison, who never suspected his loyalty or good faith. For years he had contrived to dissemble the bitter spirit of hostility to the English which was rankling at his heart, and which sprang from no other cause than the withdrawal of the pension enjoyed by his father. When the native troops at Cawnpore began to exhibit symptoms of disaffection, he volunteered to aid Sir H. Wheeler in protecting the treasury from their rapacity, and his offer was accepted. It was only when the Sepoys broke into open mutiny that he threw off the mask, placed himself at their head, and ruthlessly butchered all the European and native Christians who had not been able to escape to the entrenchment. With his thirst for blood whetted rather than allayed by this carnage, he now closed round the entrenchment, the last refuge of the Europeans, and directed all his efforts to compel the gallant little garrison to surrender. Their heroic defence, protracted from day to day and from week to week, in the vain hope of relief, amid exposure, privation, and the incessant fire of the enemy’s artillery, is one of the most touching episodes in the history of British India, and cannot be read without a feeling of deep emotion. The men would rather have died sword in hand than negotiate with the murderer of the fugitives from Futtyghur; but their hearts were melted by the sufferings of the helpless women and children crouching in holes dug out beneath the walls of the entrenchment; and for their sakes, on the very day when Havelock assumed command of the column intended for their relief, they began to think of capitulating.

The cannonade had continued for more than three weeks, and of the 870 persons who survived, 330 were women and children. While they were still hesitating, a message was brought from Nana Sahib, offering the garrison a safe conduct to Allahabad, with permission to take their arms, baggage, and ammunition with them, on condition that they surrendered at once. Sir H. Wheeler, anxious if possible to save the women and children from that death which was already staring them in the face, reluctantly agreed to accept this offer: he seems to have done so contrary to his better reason, and almost with a presentiment of the calamity that was about to overtake them. But it seemed their only chance of safety, and a fearful responsibility would devolve upon him if he neglected or rejected it. The Nana took an oath on the waters of the Ganges, which to a Hindoo and a Brahmin is the most sacred and binding of all oaths, that he would carry out the terms of capitulation to the very letter; and it was scarcely conceivable that he could prove faithless to his engagement, and perjure himself. They knew nothing of his deep-rooted hatred of the English race, his long-cherished scheme of revenge, his burning thirst for human blood; they remembered only his pleasant parties at Bithoor, and imagined that from such a man they had nothing to dread. At first all seemed to be well: when they left the entrenchment, they found boats prepared to convey them to Allahabad, and the women and children were greeted with expressions of sympathy and solicitude, which were as sincere as the caresses the tiger bestows on its victims. No sooner were the whole party seated in the boats than three signal guns were fired, and a destructive fire was opened on the helpless fugitives from guns concealed along the bank, and the pieces with which the rebels were armed. The shrieks of despairing mothers, clasping their infant offspring to their breasts, and striving to shield them from the murderous fire, were heard amid the booming of the guns, the rattle of musketry, and the maddening yells of the inhuman fiends to whom the work of destruction was entrusted. It was a pre-concerted massacre: bands of native infantry and cavalry had been stationed on either bank of the river to cut off the retreat of those who tried to escape from the boats by swimming; only one or two contrived to elude their vigilance, and to reach a place of safety. Two hundred women and children were taken back to the town: with solemn hands and beating heart we draw the veil of silence over their fate. The well at Cawnpore can never be forgotten, and the feeling of confidence which we once reposed in the natives of India may not be restored for centuries.

After his victory of the 16th of July, Havelock allowed his exhausted troops to rest for the night on the field of battle, and entered the town the following morning. No language can describe the scenes of horror which greeted them on every side when they reached the entrenchment, and learned the hideous revelations of the slaughter-house and the well. It was enough to melt a heart of adamant; and we know that men, usually callous and indifferent to human suffering, cannot allude to what they witnessed on that day without a startled expression, as if the scene were still before them. Some will tell you, that for nights after they woke up in an agony of terror, so powerful was the impression left on their minds by that fearful spectacle. The floor of the slaughter-house was covered with blood; the lower part of the walls was marked with sword-cuts aimed at the helpless creatures crouching together on the ground; tresses of long hair were still adhering to the walls and pillars; articles of female attire were scattered about saturated with the blood of those who once had worn them; leaves of the Bible, of the Prayer Book, and of a work entitled “Preparation for Death,” were picked up on every side by the horror-struck soldiers. One man picked up a piece of paper with the words “Ned’s hair, with love,” written on it; on opening it he found a lock of boy’s hair; his mother had not parted with it till she parted with life. On the walls, written in pencil, or scratched in the plaster, were such inscriptions as these:—“Think of us;” “Avenge us;” “Your wives and families are here in misery, and at the disposal of savages;” “Oh, oh! my child, my child!” The last words are the most touching of all; there was no thirst for vengeance, no solicitude for self, in that mother’s breast; her only thought was of her child, and its impending fate. Well might one of the officers exclaim—“Oh! how thankful I am that I have no wife, no sisters out here!” One sickens and shudders at the very thought of such scenes: what effect must they have produced on those who actually witnessed them, who saw the blood-stained floor, and the limbs of murdered babes and women protruding from the well into which they had been thrown? The deepest emotions are those which can find no expression: few words were spoken; but as the Highlanders looked into one another’s faces, a strange expression came over them: the rugged brows were knit, the quivering lips were sternly compressed, and the fierce glare of the eye told of the conflicting passions within. There was unspeakable pity for those tender babes and women so cruelly murdered; but stronger and more overwhelming was the thirst for vengeance which found expression on many a battle-field, in the shout “Remember Cawnpore!” and in the deadly bayonet thrust. The deepest emotion was excited by the discovery of the body of Sir Hugh Wheeler’s daughter, for it was already whispered among the soldiers that this heroic woman had displayed the spirit of a Judith in avenging her insulted honour. The exact circumstances attendant on her death will never be known; but it is certain that by her example she taught her countrywomen to prefer death to dishonour. In one version of the story, she shot five Sepoys in succession with a revolver, and then threw herself into a well to escape from the others; in another version, she is said to have cut off the heads of no less than five men with a sword; while Mr. Shepherd, one of the survivors of the massacre, relates that, having been forced by a trooper of the 2nd Native Cavalry to accompany him to his hut, she rose in the night, seized his sword, killed him and three other men, and then threw herself into a well. It is certain that she behaved like a high-souled English gentlewoman, and there was something in the story of her fate that touched the heart of every soldier that entered Cawnpore. It has been related, that the Highlanders with reverent and loving hands committed her body to the dust; but, before doing so, removed the hair from her head, sent part of it to her relations, and divided the rest among themselves; counted every hair, and swore a solemn oath, that for every one a mutineer should die. We can understand the feeling which might have dictated such an oath; but the expression of it in the manner related, is too sensational and melodramatic for the stern, rugged nature of the Highlanders; it had no foundation in truth, and, like the story of Jessie Brown at Lucknow, was evidently got up for stage effect.

But we must hurry on from these maddening scenes to the battle of Oude, where Captain Boyle, then a lieutenant in the 78th Highlanders, gained the Victoria Cross. The victory of Cawnpore failed to produce that feeling of elation among our soldiers which usually accompanies such an event. The following day a deep silence reigned throughout the encampment, broken at intervals by the melancholy wail of some Highland dirge as the dead were conveyed to their last home; for cholera had begun to decimate our little army, and proved a more formidable foe than the mutineers in arms against us.

As the Nana had still a considerable army under his command, it was considered probable that an attempt would be made to regain Cawnpore, and General Havelock marched his troops on the morning of the 18th of July to a position west of the town, where he was safe from attack, and could intercept the enemy if they tried to advance from Bithoor. By selecting volunteers from the infantry he was enabled to increase his irregular horse from nineteen to sixty, and this small troop rendered important services during the remaining part of the campaign. Dreading that his men might give way to intemperance, he caused the commissariat to buy up all the intoxicating liquors that were to be found in the town, and to give out only such quantities as might be taken with safety. On the morning of the 19th, he learned from the spies who had been sent out to watch the movements of the enemy, that their army was broken up; the Sepoys, seized with a sudden panic, had deserted their ranks, and sought for safety on the other side of the river; the Nana himself had fled from the field on a swift elephant, accompanied by a few of his followers, and never halted in his flight till he reached the kingdom of Oude. On receiving this intelligence, General Havelock despatched a party of his men to take possession of Bithoor; no resistance was offered by the enemy, and the greater part of the plunder which had been carried off from Cawnpore was recovered. That town was not left defenceless; a field-work was constructed, and a small garrison of 300 men was left to occupy it. Having completed his arrangements, he prepared, on the morning of the 21st of July, to advance to the relief of Lucknow. The passage of the Ganges was a most difficult undertaking; the river, swollen by the heavy rains, was more than 1600 yards wide; the bridge of boats had been destroyed by the rebels; the boatmen had disappeared, and it would have been dangerous to entrust the transit of the men to inexperienced hands. After some delay and difficulty, a number of the old boatmen were tempted to return by the promise of pardon for their past misconduct, and additional pay; and in four days the whole of our troops found themselves on the Oude bank of the Ganges, where the general, who had superintended the embarkation in person, joined them. The gallant Neil was left to hold Cawnpore during his absence, and displayed an energy which inspired the minds of the disaffected with terror; he had only three hundred men under his command, but with this little force he restored the prestige of our army throughout the surrounding districts by capturing many rebels, and recovering public property, and by organizing a body of irregular cavalry, which kept the road open between Cawnpore and Allahabad. In addition to this, he had charge of all the sick and wounded who had been left behind; but this heroic man, whose career was soon to be cut short at Lucknow, was indefatigable in the discharge of his numerous duties. It is the characteristic of such men as Havelock, that they can impart to others something of that dauntless courage and unflagging energy by which they themselves are animated.