The seven columns employed in scouring the jungle were broken up, and returned to their quarters; but the Camel Corps remained out still in pursuit of rebels.
Leaving a small detachment at Heerapore, the Camel Corps marched on December 11 to Shahgurh, nine miles, and leaving part of the Corps there, Colonel Ross with the remainder marched about sixteen miles further to the banks of the Dessaun river, where he encamped. Here he was joined by Captain Browne, the Assistant-Commissioner; and on the 12th, accompanied by him, marched at about seven in the morning. They had advanced some way when a shot was heard in front, and near a village about a quarter of a mile distant. Word was also passed from the front that rebels were in the village. Accordingly they pushed on with all speed, and soon spied a few mounted and some dismounted men in the jungle. After proceeding about a mile they came on a riding camel, belonging to the Assistant-Commissioner. Then the shot heard was explained: some rebels, headed by a noted miscreant, Dowlat Singh, had murdered the driver of the camel and the servant of the Commissioner riding behind him, whom he had sent forward with some despatches. Colonel Ross requested the Assistant-Commissioner to send forward a few mounted police, to keep on the track of the rebels, and to hold them in check till the Camel Corps came up, as these police could ride faster than the pace of the camels. But they soon returned, saying that the enemy were too many for them to approach them. If these men had done their duty the Camel Corps might have come up with them and caught many of the rebels. As it was, they were delayed for some time in passing two ravines, the banks of which were thickly covered with jungle. They followed them for a considerable distance, but could not come up with them. The Camel Corps proceeded to Marowra, where they encamped.
They continued engaged in this jungle warfare, or rather harassing of the rebels, till April 1860, when, returning to Agra by the same route by which they had moved to Saugor, they arrived there on April 30.
During the seven or eight months the Camel Corps were engaged in this service their duties were most harassing. They marched at short notices in every direction, wherever and whenever they had intelligence of an enemy; and almost always without the satisfaction of finding or engaging one. Often detachments of forty or fifty men were ordered to mount at a moment’s notice, and to ride thirty or forty miles as fast as they could, only to find that the enemy they expected to fight had fled before they approached his lair, or had scattered into jungle where it was hopeless to pursue.
Soon after their arrival at Agra they received information that the Camel Corps was to be broken up. They were disbanded on June 1. The company of the 3rd Battalion joined their Head-quarters at Agra, where the Battalion was quartered; the company of the 2nd Battalion proceeded by bullock-cart to Subathoo, where they joined Head-quarters of the Battalion on June 12. The men of the two Sikh companies were allowed to volunteer into any native corps they wished to join.
Colonel Ross, in alluding to his unsolicited and unexpected appointment to a Companionship of the Order of the Bath, assumes that it was meant as a recognition not only of his personal services, but of those of all who were in the Camel Corps; and adds this high testimony: ‘And well do they deserve this recognition of their services. For we had lots of hard, tedious work, and never once all the time I was in command had I to speak a second time to either officers or men. Each seemed to take pleasure in doing what he had to do, and in assisting me in every way.’[316]
FOOTNOTES:
[311] Now Brigadier-General John Ross, C.B., commanding Brigade in Bengal, and lately commanding a Brigade in the Malay Peninsula.
[312] This walking pace was fast for the camel, whose walk does not generally exceed three English miles an hour. The Heirie (or swift camel) can travel, at a trot, eight or ten miles an hour, and maintain this speed for many hours; but that pace is very rough and fatiguing to the rider (‘Illustrated Natural History,’ by the Rev. J. G. Wood, i. 706). We shall see hereafter what long and what rapid marches were made by the Camel Corps.