The plan adopted was to make a regular attack upon the north-east angle of the citadel, and to expel the enemy only from so much of the suburbs as were actually required for the operations of the besiegers.
The portion of the suburbs so required consisted of some high brick-kilns; the cemetery of Moolraj’s fathers, called Wuzeerabad; and Moolraj’s own garden-house, Am Khas. To seize these positions was the object of the opening attack on the 27th of December. While one British column was effecting it, three others were ordered to make diversions for the purpose of distracting the enemy, with discretionary orders to follow according to the effect produced, even to the taking of the positions, if facilities offered. The third column was composed of the whole disposable force of the irregulars. Facilities did offer, and Brigadier Dundas captured, occupied, and crowned with guns some most important positions which commanded the city. The whole of the suburbs were now occupied by the British army, and it was resolved to take the city also. On this occasion Major Edwardes says that Lieutenants Lake, Pollock, Pearse, and Young all distinguished themselves, as did his writer, the brave Mr Quin, who led on the Sooraj Mookhee regiment; but the palm was carried off by a new volunteer, Mr McMahon, who had joined him only a few days before, and who now earned his title to be brought especially to notice by encountering in single combat the leader of the enemy’s infantry, a powerful Sikh, whom he killed with one blow which divided his head.
His men at last, thinking themselves responsible for his safety, made him prisoner, and brought him back, with bent and dripping sword, to where Major Edwardes and Sir Henry Lawrence were standing directing the movements of the troops.
On the 30th of December, a shell from a mortar laid by Lieutenant Newall, of the Bengal Artillery, pierced the supposed bomb-proof dome of the Grand Mosque in the citadel, which formed the enemy’s principal magazine, and descending into the combustibles below, blew the vast fabric into the air.
On the 2nd of January 1849, the breach in the Rhoonee Boorj or Bloody Bastion of the city was declared practicable, and a second at the Delhi gate was thought sufficiently good to allow of an attempt being made on it as a diversion. General Whish determined to try both; and a party from the Bengal division was told off for the Delhi gate breach, and one from the Bombay division for the breach at the Bastion. The irregular force was to assist both by a diversion on the left. The diversion was commenced at one p.m., and the assault, by a signal from the batteries, at three p.m. The storming party destined to attack the Delhi gate was led by a fine soldier, Captain Smyth, of the grenadier company of Her Majesty’s 32nd Regiment. Off they started with hearts beating high; but no sooner had they emerged from the suburbs, than they found themselves on the edge of a deep intervening hollow, after crossing which, under a heavy fire of matchlocks, they discovered, to their surprise, that the city wall in front, about thirty feet in height, was unbreached and totally impracticable. This disagreeable fact had hitherto been concealed by the hollow, both from the breaching-battery and the engineers. The gallant band had therefore to retire; and without loss of time they hurried round to the breach at the Bloody Bastion, to assist their more fortunate comrades in the city.
The Bloody Bastion was assaulted by three companies of the 1st Bombay Fusiliers, under Captain Leith.
They found the breach easy to be surmounted, but it was intrenched inside, and a most bloody struggle ensued, in which the brave Captain Leith was severely wounded, and had to be carried to the rear; but his place was at once taken by Lieutenant Grey, and the redcoats pushed onwards. The first to mount was Colour-Sergeant John Bennet, of the 1st Fusiliers, who, having planted the colours of Old England on the very crest of the breach, stood beside them till the flag and staff were riddled with balls. On rushed the Fusiliers; they remembered the legends of their ancient corps, and closing with the rebels, soon made the city of Mooltan their own. “Then arose from every crowded height and battery, whence the exciting struggle had been watched, the shouts of applauding comrades; and through the deafening roar of musketry, which pealed along the ramparts, and marked the hard-earned progress of the victorious columns through the streets, both friend and foe might distinctly hear that sound, never to be forgotten—the ‘Hurrah!’ of a British army after battle.”
No sooner did Moolraj discover that the city was captured, than, leaving three-fourths of his army to the mercy of the victors, he retired with 3000 picked men into the citadel, intending to hold out till he could make advantageous terms for himself. The garrison who could escape made the best of their way over the city walls, and fled to their homes. Never did a city present a more awful scene of retribution than did that of Mooltan. Scarcely a roof or wall which had not been penetrated by English shells; and whole houses, scorched and blackened by the bombardment, seemed about to fall over the corpses of their defenders. The citadel itself was now closely invested, and incessantly shelled, so that there was scarcely a spot within the walls where the besieged could find shelter. In this siege the bluejackets of Old England, as well as the redcoats, took a part. Commander Powell, of the Honourable East India Company’s Navy, at the head of a body of seamen, worked one of the heavy batteries from the commencement to the termination of the siege. “It was a fine sight to see their manly faces, bronzed by long exposure to the burning sun of the Red Sea or Persian Gulf, mingling with the dark soldiers of Hindoostan, or contrasting with the fairer but not healthier occupants of the European barrack. They looked on their battery as their ship, their eighteen-pounders as so many sweethearts, and the embrasures as port-holes. ‘Now, Jack, shove your head out of that port, and just hear what my little girl says to that ’ere pirate, Mol Rag’ (Moolraj?), was the kind of conversation heard on board of the sailor-battery by those passing.”
The citadel still held out, but by the 19th two breaches had been effected, and the assault was fixed for six a.m. on the 22nd. Before that hour the traitor sent in his submission, asking only for his own life and the honour of his women. The answer from General Whish was, that the British Government “wars not with women and children, and that they would be protected, but that he had neither authority to give Moolraj his life nor to take it.” Thus Moolraj was compelled to make an unconditional surrender. This second siege of Mooltan occupied 27 days, and the British loss was 210 men killed and 982 wounded. One of the last acts of the victors was to disinter the bodies of Agnew and Anderson, and to carry them to an honoured resting-place on the summit of Moolraj’s citadel, through the broad and sloping breach which had been made by the British guns in the walls of the rebellious fortress of Mooltan.