We rested at the Alumbâgh on the 26th of November, but early on the 27th we understood something had gone wrong in our rear, because, as usual with Sir Colin when he contemplated a forced march, we were served out with three days' rations and double ammunition,—sixty rounds in our pouches and sixty in our haversacks; and by two o'clock in the afternoon the whole of the women and children, all the sick and wounded, in every conceivable kind of conveyance, were in full retreat towards Cawnpore. General Outram's Division being made up to four thousand men was left in the Alumbâgh to hold the enemy in check, and to show them that Lucknow was not abandoned, while three thousand fighting men, to guard over two thousand women and children, sick and wounded, commenced their march southwards. So far as I can remember the Third and Fifth Punjâb Infantry formed the infantry of the advance-guard; the Ninth Lancers and Horse Artillery supplied the flanking parties; while the rear guard, being the post of honour, was given to the Ninety-Third, a troop of the Ninth Lancers and Bourchier's light field-battery, No. 17 of the Honourable East India Company's artillery. We started from the Alumbâgh late in the afternoon, and reached Bunnee Bridge, seventeen miles from Lucknow, about 11 P.M. Here the regiment halted till daylight on the morning of the 28th of November, but the advance-guard with the women and children, sick and wounded, had been moving since 2 A.M.
As already mentioned, all the subaltern officers in my company were wounded, and I was told off, with a guard of about twenty men, to see all the baggage-carts across Bunnee Bridge and on their way to Cawnpore. While I was on this duty an amusing incident happened. A commissariat cart, a common country hackery, loaded with biscuits, got upset, and its wheel broke just as we were moving it on to the road. The only person near it belonging to the Commissariat Department was a young bâboo named Hera Lâll Chatterjee, a boy of about seventeen or eighteen years of age, who defended his charge as long as he could, but he was soon put on one side, the biscuits-bags were ripped open, and the men commenced filling their haversacks from them. Just at this time, an escort of the Ninth Lancers, with some staff-officers, rode up from the rear. It was the Commander-in-Chief and his staff. Hera Lâll seeing him rushed up and called out: "O my Lord, you are my father and my mother! what shall I tell you! These wild Highlanders will not hear me, but are stealing commissariat biscuits like fine fun." Sir Colin pulled up, and asked the bâboo if there was no officer present; to which Hera Lâll replied, "No officer, sir, only one corporal, and he tell me, 'Shut up, or I'll shoot you, same like rebel mutineer!'" Hearing this I stepped out of the crowd and saluting Sir Colin, told him that all the officers of my company were wounded except Captain Dawson, who was in front; that I and a party of men had been left to see the last of the carts on to the road; that this cart had broken down, and as there was no other means of carrying the biscuits, the men had filled their haversacks with them rather than leave them on the ground. On hearing that, Hera Lâll again came to the front with clasped hands, saying: "O my Lord, if one cart of biscuits short, Major Fitzgerald not listen to me, but will order thirty lashes with provost-marshal's cat! What can a poor bâboo do with such wild Highlanders?" Sir Colin replied: "Yes, bâboo, I know these Highlanders are very wild fellows when hungry; let them have the biscuits;" and turning to one of the staff, he directed him to give a voucher to the bâboo that a cart loaded with biscuits had broken down and the contents had been divided among the rear-guard by order of the Commander-in-Chief. Sir Colin then turned to us and said: "Men, I give you the biscuits; divide them with your comrades in front; but you must promise me should a cart loaded with rum break down, you will not interfere with it." We all replied: "No, no, Sir Colin, if rum breaks down we'll not touch it." "All right," said Sir Colin, "remember I trust you," and looking round he said, "I know every one of you," and rode on. We very soon found room for the biscuits, until we got up to the rest of the company, when we honestly shared them. I may add that bâboo Hera Lâll Chatterjee is still living, and is the only native employé I know who served through the second relief of Lucknow. He now holds the post of cashier in the offices of Messrs. McNeill and Co., of Clive Ghât Street, Calcutta, which doubtless he finds more congenial employment than defending commissariat stores from hungry wild Highlanders, with the prospect of the provost-marshal's cat as the only reward for doing his best to defend his charge.
About five miles farther on a general halt was made for a short rest and for all stragglers to come up. Sir Colin himself, being still with the column, ordered the Ninety-Third to form up, and, calling the officers to the front, he made the first announcement to the regiment that General Wyndham had been attacked by the Nânâ Sâhib and the Gwalior Contingent in Cawnpore; that his force had been obliged to retire within the fort at the head of the bridge of boats, and that we must reach Cawnpore that night, because, if the bridge of boats should be captured before we got there, we would be cut off in Oude with fifty thousand of our enemies in our rear, a well-equipped army of forty thousand men, with a powerful train of artillery numbering over forty siege guns, in our front, and with all the women and children, sick and wounded, to guard. "So, Ninety-Third," said the grand old Chief, "I don't ask you to undertake this forced march, in your present tired condition, without good reason. You must reach Cawnpore to-night at all costs." And, as usual, when he took the men into his confidence, he was answered from the ranks, "All right, Sir Colin, we'll do it." To which he replied, "Very well, Ninety-Third, remember I depend on you." And he and his staff and escort rode on.
By this time we could plainly hear the guns of the Gwalior Contingent bombarding General Wyndham's position in Cawnpore; and although terribly footsore and tired, not having had our clothes off, nor a change of socks, since the 10th of the month (now eighteen days) we trudged on our weary march, every mile making the roar of the guns in front more audible. I may remark here that there is nothing to rouse tired soldiers like a good cannonade in front; it is the best tonic out! Even the youngest soldier who has once been under fire, and can distinguish the sound of a shotted gun from blank, pricks up his ears at the sound and steps out with a firmer tread and a more erect bearing.
I shall never forget the misery of that march! However, we reached the sands on the banks of the Ganges, on the Oude side of the river opposite Cawnpore, just as the sun was setting, having covered the forty-seven miles under thirty hours. Of course the great hardship of the march was caused by our worn-out state after eighteen days' continual duty, without a change of clothes or our accoutrements off. And when we got in sight of Cawnpore, the first thing we saw was the enemy on the opposite side of the river from us, making bonfires of our spare kits and baggage which had been left at Cawnpore when we advanced for the relief of Lucknow! Tired as we were, we assisted to drag Peel's heavy guns into position on the banks of the river, whence the Blue-jackets opened fire on the left flank of the enemy, the bonfires of our spare baggage being a fine mark for them.
Just as the Nânâ Sâhib had got his first gun to bear on the bridge of boats, that gun was struck on the side by one of Peel's 24-pounders and upset, and an 8-inch shell from one of his howitzers bursting in the midst of a crowd of them, we could see them bolting helter-skelter. This put a stop to their game for the night, and we lay down and rested on the sands till daybreak next morning, the 29th of November.
I must mention here an experience of my own which I always recall to mind when I read some of the insane ravings of the Anti-Opium Society against the use of that drug. I was so completely tired out by that terrible march that after I had lain down for about half an hour I positively could not stand up, I was so stiff and worn out. Having been on duty as orderly corporal before leaving the Alumbâgh, I had been much longer on my feet than the rest of the men; in fact, I was tired out before we started on our march on the afternoon of the 27th, and now, after having covered forty-seven miles under thirty hours, my condition can be better imagined than described. After I became cold, I grew so stiff that I positively could not use my legs. Now Captain Dawson had a native servant, an old man named Hyder Khân, who had been an officers' servant all his life, and had been through many campaigns. I had made a friend of old Hyder before we left Chinsurah, and he did not forget me. Having ridden the greater part of the march on the camel carrying his master's baggage, Hyder was comparatively fresh when he got into camp, and about the time our canteen-sergeant got up and was calling for orderly-corporals to draw grog for the men, old Hyder came looking for me, and when he saw my tired state, he said, in his camp English: "Corporal sâhib, you God-damn tired; don't drink grog. Old Hyder give you something damn much better than grog for tired mans." With that he went away, but shortly after returned, and gave me a small pill, which he told me was opium, and about half a pint of hot tea, which he had prepared for himself and his master. I swallowed the pill and drank the tea, and in less than ten minutes I felt myself so much refreshed as to be able to get up and draw the grog for the men of the company and to serve it out to them while the colour-sergeant called the roll. I then lay down, rolled up in my sepoy officer's quilt, which I had carried from the Shâh Nujeef, and had a sound refreshing sleep till next morning, and then got up so much restored that, except for the sores on my feet from broken blisters, I could have undertaken another forty-mile march. I always recall this experience when I read many of the ignorant arguments of the Anti-Opium Society, who would, if they had the power, compel the Government to deprive every hard-worked coolie of the only solace in his life of toil. I am certainly not an opium-eater, and the abuse of opium may be injurious, as is the abuse of anything; but I am so convinced in my own mind of the beneficial effects of the temperate use of the drug, that if I were the general of an army after a forced march like that of the retreat from Lucknow to the relief of Cawnpore, I would make the Medical Department give every man a pill of opium and half a pint of hot tea, instead of rum or liquor of any sort! I hate drunkenness as much as anybody, but I have no sympathy with what I may call the intemperate temperance of most of our teetotallers and the Anti-Opium Society. My experience has been as great and as varied as that of most Europeans in India, and that experience has led me to the conviction that the members of the Anti-Opium Society are either culpably ignorant of facts, or dishonest in the way they represent what they wish others to believe to be facts. Most of the assertions made about the Government connection with opium being a hindrance to mission-work and the spread of Christianity, are gross exaggerations not borne out by experience, and the opium slave and the opium den, as depicted in much of the literature on this subject, have no existence except in the distorted imagination of the writers. But I shall have some more observations to make on this score elsewhere, and some evidence to bring forward in support of them.[28]
Early on the morning of the 29th of November the Ninety-Third crossed the bridge of boats, and it was well that Sir Colin had returned so promptly from Lucknow to the relief of Cawnpore, for General Wyndham's troops were not only beaten and cowed,—they were utterly demoralised.
When the Commander-in-Chief left Cawnpore for Lucknow, General Wyndham, known as the "Hero of the Redan," was left in command at Cawnpore with instructions to strengthen his position by every means, and to detain all detachments arriving from Calcutta after the 10th of November, because it was known that the Gwalior Contingent were in great force somewhere across the Jumna, and there was every probability that they would either attack Cawnpore, or cross into Oude to fall on the rear of the Commander-in-Chief's force to prevent the relief of Lucknow. But strict orders were given to General Wyndham that he was on no account to move out of Cawnpore, should the Gwalior Contingent advance on his position, but to act on the defensive, and to hold his entrenchments and guard the bridge of boats at all hazards. By that time the entrenchment or mud fort at the Cawnpore end of the bridge, where the Government Harness and Saddlery Factory now stands, had become a place of considerable strength under the able direction of Captain Mowbray Thomson, one of the four survivors of General Wheeler's force. Captain Thomson had over four thousand coolies daily employed on the defences from daybreak till dark, and he was a most energetic officer himself, so that by the time we passed through Cawnpore for the relief of Lucknow this position had become quite a strong fortification, especially when compared with the miserable apology for an entrenchment so gallantly defended by General Wheeler's small force and won from him by such black treachery. When we advanced for the relief of Lucknow, all our spare baggage, five hundred new tents, and a great quantity of clothing for the troops coming down from Delhi, were shut up in Cawnpore, with a large quantity of spare ammunition, harness, and saddlery; in brief, property to the value of over five lakhs of rupees was left stored in the church and in the houses which were still standing near the church between the town and the river, a short distance from the house in which the women and children were murdered. All this property, as already mentioned, fell into the hands of the Gwalior Contingent, and we returned just in time to see them making bonfires of what they could not use. Colonel Sir Robert Napier (afterwards Lord Napier of Magdala) lost all the records of his long service, and many valuable engineering papers which could never be replaced. As for us of the Ninety-Third, we lost all our spare kits, and were now without a chance of a change of underclothing or socks. Let all who may read this consider what it meant to us, who had not changed our clothes from the 10th of the month, and how, on the morning of the 29th, the sight of the enemy making bonfires of our kits, just as we were within reach of them, could hardly have been soothing to contemplate.
But to return to General Wyndham's force. By the 26th of November it numbered two thousand four hundred men, according to Colonel Adye's Defence of Cawnpore; and when he heard of the advance of the Nânâ Sâhib at the head of the Gwalior Contingent, Wyndham considered himself strong enough to disobey the orders of the Commander-in-Chief, and moved out of his entrenchment to give them battle, encountering their advance guard at Pândoo Nuddee about seven miles from Cawnpore. He at once attacked and drove it back through a village in its rear; but behind the village he found himself confronted by an army of over forty thousand men, twenty-five thousand of them being the famous Gwalior Contingent, the best disciplined troops in India, which had never been beaten and considered themselves invincible, and which, in addition to a siege train of thirty heavy guns, 24 and 32-pounders, had a well-appointed and well-drilled field-artillery. General Wyndham now saw his mistake, and gave the order for retreat. His small force retired in good order, and encamped on the plain outside Cawnpore on the Bithoor road for the night, to find itself outflanked and almost surrounded by Tântia Topee and his Mahrattas on the morning of the 27th; and at the end of five hours' fighting a general retreat into the fort had again to be ordered.