Colin Campbell

By daybreak of the 16th the army was in motion. The enterprise before it was arduous in the extreme. After the subtraction of the details necessary to hold the Alumbagh, the Martinière, and the Dilkoosha, there were available for the relief operations only the Ninety-Third, part of the Fifty-Third, two weak Sikh regiments, two provisional battalions of detachments, and portions of the Twenty-Third and Eighty-Second regiments – in all not above three thousand bayonets. Opposed to this handful was a host of some sixty thousand armed men concentrated in a central position of great strength. The task would have been rash even to madness but for Campbell's great strength in artillery, on which he chiefly depended for overcoming the obstacles which interposed between him and the garrison he had come to relieve. That artillery comprised the gallant Peel's naval brigade, consisting of six 24-pounders, two 8-inch howitzers, and two rocket-tubes; the sixteen field-guns of Greathed's column, a heavy and a light field-battery and a mortar-battery of the Royal Artillery, one half field-battery of the Bengal Artillery, and two native Madras horse-artillery guns – in all thirty-nine guns and howitzers, six mortars, and two rocket-tubes.

The line of Campbell's advance was from his extreme right along the right bank of the river for about a mile, and then by a narrow and tortuous lane through thickly-wooded enclosures and between low mud-houses until the vicinity of the rear of the Secundrabagh should be approached. A strong advance-guard of cavalry with Blunt's troop of Bengal Horse Artillery and a company of the Fifty-Third led the way. Hope's and Russell's brigades followed, the ammunition and engineer park came next, and Greathed's brigade brought up the rear. After passing the village of Sultangunge the lane by which the force was advancing turned sharp to the left, when the rear of the Secundrabagh became immediately visible, from the loopholes in which and from the adjacent huts on either side of the lane came a brisk fire. The moment was extremely critical; for the movement in advance was checked, while the cavalry, jammed and helpless in the narrow lane, hindered the passage forward of the artillery and infantry. Sir Colin pushed to the front regardless of the enemy's fire, thrust the cavalry into the side alleys of the village, and ordered a company to line and cover the continuation of the lane passing along the west side of the Secundrabagh and debouching into the open space in its front. He himself then brought up to the front of the building two of Travers' 18-pounders, which promptly set about battering a breach in the south-west bastion of the Secundrabagh. Blunt's troop of horse-artillery came tearing up at a gallop through a heavy cross-fire till it reached the open space between that building and the serai a couple of hundred yards to the southward. Blunt gallantly maintained his fire in three different directions, sustaining heavy losses in men and horses. The Ninety-Third now coming up, three companies of that regiment cleared the serai and the adjacent buildings, drove out the enemy holding those positions, and pursuing the rebels across the plain seized and held the barracks while part of the Fifty-Third in skirmishing order connected that post with the main attack against the Secundrabagh. Sir Colin was near one of Blunt's guns when a bullet which had passed through a gunner struck him with great force on the thigh, but it did not penetrate and he escaped with a severe bruise.

While the 18-pounders were doing their work the infantry were lying down behind an embankment waiting impatiently till their time should come. After an hour's battering a Sikh native officer, without waiting for the word, sprang forward sword in hand followed by his men. Sir Hope Grant[4] states that the brave Sikh was outrun by Sergeant-Major Murray of the Ninety-Third. Mr. Forbes-Mitchell[5] says that the Sikh officer was killed on the way and that the two European officers of the Sikh regiment were wounded, misfortunes which caused a temporary halt on the part of the Punjaubis. "Then," according to Forbes-Mitchell, "Sir Colin called to Colonel Ewart, 'Ewart, bring on the tartan!'; his bugler sounded the advance, and the seven companies of the Ninety-Third dashed from behind the bank. It has always been a moot point who got through the hole first. I believe the first man in was Lance-Corporal Donnelly of the Ninety-Third, killed inside; then Subadar Gokul Singh, followed by Sergeant-Major Murray of the Ninety-Third also killed, and, fourth, Captain Burroughs[6] severely wounded."

The foremost men climbed in through the narrow breach. The bulk of the Ninety-Third and the Sikhs entered by the great gate further left after its massive locks had yielded to many bullets, and they were followed by Barnston's battalion of detachments. The Fifty-Third broke in through a window to the right. The vast interior garden in which the deadly strife was proceeding rang with the clash of weapons, the crackle of musketry, the shouts and yells of the combatants. The scene baffled all description. The enemy, caught in a death-trap, fought with the courage of despair. The conflict raged for hours and the carnage was appalling. When the enclosure and buildings were finally cleared of their ghastly contents, no fewer than two thousand native soldiers were found to have been slain.

That Sir Colin's temper was apt to break out in sudden passion, he himself was very ready to admit; and if the passion were causeless, he was equally ready to make amends for the outburst. Forbes-Mitchell tells a story of him which illustrates both characteristics. Colonel Ewart, he says, in the fighting inside the Secundrabagh had captured a regimental colour from two native officers, both of whom he had killed notwithstanding that he had been himself severely wounded; and seeing that the fight was over, Ewart, bareheaded, covered with blood and powder-smoke, his eyes still flashing with the excitement of the fray, ran up to where Sir Colin sat on his gray charger outside the gate of the Secundrabagh and called out "We are in full possession of the place, sir! I have killed the two last of the enemy with my own hand, and here is one of their colours!" Sir Colin had been chafed by events, and he turned angrily on Ewart. "Damn your colours, sir!" he thundered – "it is not your place to be taking colours; go back to your regiment this instant!" Ewart turned away, much disconcerted by the reception given him by the Chief; but Forbes-Mitchell adds that he subsequently heard that Sir Colin sent for the colonel later in the day, apologised for his rudeness, and thanked him for his services.

Some distance beyond the Secundrabagh, and about one hundred yards right of the road towards the Residency, was the Shah Nujeef, a great mosque and tomb surrounded by a high loopholed wall fringed by trees, jungle, and enclosures. About midway between the two places lay a village to left of the road. Having drawn off his brigade from the Secundrabagh Hope cleared and occupied this village, while Peel brought up his heavy guns and placed them in battery within short range of the Shah Nujeef. The defence of that stronghold was most obstinate, the enemy maintaining from it a severe and incessant musketry-fire which cost Peel very heavy loss. The attack had lasted for nearly three hours, yet no impression had been made on the massive structure; and Peel was enduring a double cross-fire from the left bank of the Goomtee and from the Kaiserbagh in addition to the injury wrought him by the garrison of the Shah Nujeef. A gallant attempt made by Barnston's battalion of detachments to clear the outlying enclosures failed; Barnston was struck down, and the determined attempt then made by Wolseley to escalade could not succeed, for he and his men were raked by a storm of missiles, – grenades and round-shot hurled from wall-pieces, arrows and brickbats, burning torches of rags and cotton saturated with oil. A dangerous crisis was imminent. Retreat was not to be thought of, even had it been possible, which it was not. The veteran Chief was equal to the occasion. He sent orders to Middleton's light field-battery to advance, to pass Peel's guns on the right, and, getting as near as possible to the Shah Nujeef, to open a quick and well-sustained fire of grape. Peel, for his part, was to redouble his fire; and the Chief rode back to the village occupied by the Ninety-Third to tell his favourite regiment that no matter at what cost the Shah Nujeef must be taken, and since the place had withstood gun-fire the cold steel would have to play its part. Many words were not needed, for Sir Colin and the Ninety-Third understood each other; and so, announcing to the regiment that he would himself head its advance, he led it out from the village into the open, ready to press forward at the word.

Middleton's battery came up grandly. With loud cheers, the drivers waving their whips, the gunners their caps, it galloped through the storm of fire to within pistol-shot of the wall, and poured in round upon round of grape. Peel, manning all his guns, worked them with swift measured energy. The Ninety-Third, with flashing eyes and ardent step, the Highland blood throbbing in every vein, came rolling forward in a great eager wave, the war-loving veteran of many battles riding at its head. As he approached the nearest angle of the enclosure the men began to fall fast, but without a check its foot was reached. There, however, the gallant Scots were brought to a stand in face of a loopholed wall twenty feet high. There was no breach and there were no scaling-ladders. Unable to advance and resolute not to retire, the Ninety-Third resorted to a stationary fire of musketry; but the garrison of the place had all the advantage and the assailants suffered severely. Of Sir Colin's staff both the brothers Alison were struck down, and many of the mounted officers, including Hope, his aide-de-camp, and his brigade-major, had their horses shot under them. The aspect of affairs had become exceedingly grave; the dusk was falling and the Shah Nujeef still remained untaken. Just at this critical moment Sergeant Paton of the Ninety-Third came running to Hope with the glad tidings that he had found a breach in the north-east corner of the rampart near the river. Hope quietly gathered a company and followed the sergeant through the jungle to where the latter indicated the narrow fissure he had discovered. He clambered up and then assisted Hope, Allgood, and others; the soldiers followed in single file. A body of sappers hurried up and enlarged the opening, and then the supports rushed in. The garrison, taken by surprise, glided away amidst the rolling smoke into the dark shadows of the night. The main gate was thrown open and at last the Shah Nujeef was in British possession.

Enough had been done for one day. The Shah Nujeef was garrisoned by the Ninety-Third, where also headquarters were established for the night. The roads and positions in rear of that advanced post were strongly held, and the wearied troops lay down to well-earned rest. The relief of the Residency, a few hours before problematical in the extreme, was now fairly assured. Taken between Campbell's batteries and Outram's cannon, the enemy could not long maintain themselves in the intervening buildings. In the early morning of the 17th Peel's heavy guns were already in steady action on the Mess House, a place of considerable strength, with a ditch twelve feet broad backed by a loopholed wall. For several hours it was bombarded, until, the musketry fire from it having been subjugated, about 3 P.M. it was successfully attacked by Captain Wolseley[7] with a company of the Ninetieth and a detachment of the Fifty-Third. As Wolseley's men, flushed with success, followed their gallant leader in pursuit of the fugitives across the open into the Motee Mahal, Lieutenant Roberts[8] raised the flag on the top of the Mess House, the specified signal which notified to the Residency garrison the near approach of the relieving force. On the 16th Havelock had made a sally the result of which was to give him the possession of the advanced posts of the Herrn Khana and the Engine House; and thus communication was opened between the two forces as soon as the Motee Mahal had been carried. The meeting of Sir Colin Campbell, Outram, and Havelock, commemorated in a well-known picture, marked the virtual consummation of the operations for the relief. That object had been accomplished at the cost of a loss of forty-five officers and four hundred and ninety-six men.

It still remained, however, to withdraw from Lucknow the garrison and its encumbrances. To effect this evacuation in security required the utmost vigilance on the part of the troops and the greatest nicety in their handling, for the enemy still held threatening positions in overwhelming strength, and the long line from the Residency to the Dilkoosha which had to be traversed by the garrison and its convoy, was exposed to hostile fire at many points. From the 17th until the evacuation on the night between the 22nd and 23rd, Campbell's force in effect constituted a huge outlying picket which could not be relieved until the ultimate withdrawal should have been effected. Sir Colin's first operation was to protect the left flank and left rear of his force by a chain of posts extending from the barracks to Banks' house, and this was accomplished after some sharp fighting. To protect the women and children from exposure to fire from the Kaiserbagh while crossing the open space between the Engine House and the Motee Mahal, a flying sap with canvas screens was constructed; and during the afternoon of the 19th their retirement as far as the Secundrabagh was accomplished in safety. They were received by Sir Colin at his headquarters near that building. To assure their safety he detained the ladies until nightfall, when he sent them on to the Dilkoosha in doolies. The Government treasure, the crown jewels of the King of Oude, and all the serviceable guns were then gradually sent out; and at midnight of the 22nd the withdrawal of the garrison began. In deep silence the original garrison quitted the Residency and passed through the advanced posts to the rear. Those in succession fell back until the ground had been abandoned as far as the Secundrabagh, where Hope's brigade was in position with fifteen guns. The troops were then drawn back across the canal, Sir Colin remaining with a detachment until the last gun was reported clear of the last village. Before dawn of the 23rd the whole force was in its assigned positions at the Dilkoosha and the Martinière. So adroit had been the arrangements that the enemy continued to fire on the positions for many hours after they had been relinquished. Thus terminated a series of difficult and delicate operations, the entire success of which was mainly owing to the steadfast adherence to Sir Colin Campbell's original design. Wisely planned and skilfully executed, it proved how much a comparative handful of disciplined soldiers could accomplish against stupendous odds and in difficult ground, under the guidance of a leader who combined great experience in war with the full possession of the confidence of his troops.

On the afternoon of the 24th, just as the life was quitting the worn frame of the noble Havelock, the relieving force with its unwieldy convoy began its march to the Alumbagh, its rear covered by Outram's division which closed up next day. It was not until midday of the 27th that Sir Colin, leaving Outram at the Alumbagh with four thousand men and twenty-five guns, put in motion towards Cawnpore his own vast miscellaneous column of soldiers, women and children, sick and wounded, guns, treasure and material. When the camp at Bunnee was reached in the evening, the sound of heavy firing was heard in the direction of Cawnpore. For several days all communication with Windham had been cut off; and when it was known that a cannonade had been heard at Bunnee on the previous day, the conclusion became inevitable that the Gwalior Contingent had caught at the opportunity to assail the feeble garrison of Cawnpore. The apprehension of this had been haunting Sir Colin ever since the rupture of communications some days back; but nevertheless it must be said that there had been a certain measure of deliberation since the accomplishment of the relief. The weakness of Windham's resources and the disastrous consequences of his being overwhelmed by numbers, occasioned very serious disquietude. Cawnpore and the bridge over the Ganges in hostile possession, it was but too obvious that Campbell's force with its huge and helpless convoy would be gravely compromised. A night-march made by such troops as could be spared from escort-duty might have saved some valuable hours, but the force did not resume its progress until the morning of the 28th. The thunder of the cannon waxed louder as the column advanced; and note after note from Windham, delivered by panting messengers, gave ominous intimation how greatly endangered had become the situation at Cawnpore.

Leaving the infantry to hurry forward with the convoy and heavy guns, Sir Colin pushed on rapidly with the cavalry and horse-artillery. Leaving those in the Mungulwar camping-ground he galloped on to Cawnpore with his staff. Near the bridge an officer reported to him that "Windham's garrison was at its last gasp." His soldierly nature chafed by the flaccid despondency which tone and expression alike disclosed, the hot old Chief spurred his horse across the bridge and rode straight for the entrenchment. As he passed, some men whom he had commanded in the Crimea recognised through the gloom the familiar face and figure; and cheer on cheer was raised as the word passed like lightning that the Commander-in-Chief had arrived. No more caitiff babble now of the garrison being "at its last gasp!" The feeling was universal that with Sir Colin's arrival disaster was no longer to be dreaded; and the situation was already retrieved in spirit.

Windham had not followed the instructions given him by the Commander-in-Chief before the latter crossed into Oude. He had loyally forwarded to Sir Colin the reinforcements as they arrived, until the communications were cut off between him and his Chief. Left then to his own resources both moral and material, and aware that a rebel force of trained soldiers, fourteen thousand strong with some forty guns, was daily drawing nearer and nearer, he abandoned the defensive prescribed to him, and on the 24th of November he pushed some six miles out into the country with his mixed force of detachments, numbering all told less than fourteen hundred men with eight guns. Accepting his challenge, Tantia Topee, the rebel general, and the only real soldier the mutiny produced, threw forward his advanced guard into a strong position lining the dry bed of a nullah. That position Windham on the morning of the 26th carried at the first rush; but he found it necessary to withdraw in face of the main body of the rebels, and he fell back nearer to his base. At noon next day, skilfully withholding his infantry, the rebel general opened a heavy cannonade on Windham's front and flanks. For five hours the British troops held their ground staunchly against overwhelming odds, but at length they were forced to retreat. This movement through narrow streets and broken ground was attended by considerable disorder, and the camp-equipage had to be abandoned. Reluctant to withdraw into the entrenchment, Windham during the night between the 27th and 28th still held with his right the broken and wooded ground between the city and the river, while his left stretched into the plain beyond the canal. The fighting, renewed on the morning of the 28th, proved disastrous to the attenuated forces of the defence. Walpole on the left held his ground and even took the offensive, and Carthew gallantly maintained his position on the right until it became quite untenable. But the retirement of the latter gave possession to the enemy of the Church and Assembly Rooms containing the stores and baggage of the Commander-in-Chief's army, which Windham had omitted to remove within the cover of the entrenchment. Gradually the hostile batteries closed in around Windham's last defensive position near the bridge head, and directed their fire also on the bridge itself. A sally was made which for a time gave promise of a retrieval, but it was ultimately repulsed with heavy loss and great discouragement. By nightfall the garrison had been obliged to take shelter in the entrenchment; and when Sir Colin rode into the work it had become the mark for the cannon-balls and even the musketry-fire of the victorious rebels.

On the morning of the 29th Sir Colin's artillery on the left bank, aided by that of the entrenchment, gradually beat down the fire which the enemy were directing on the bridge; and the crossing of the troops then began. The passage of the vast convoy lasted unceasingly for thirty-six hours. As the women and children, the sick and wounded crossed, the interminable cortège swept by the rampart of the fort and encamped on the plain among the mouldering remains and riddled walls of the weak shelter wherein Wheeler's people had fought and died. Day after day the enemy cannonaded Sir Colin's camp, but effective reprisals had to be postponed until the convoy of families and wounded which had started for Allahabad on the night of December 3rd should have been far enough on the journey to be safe from danger at the hands of the rebels. Meanwhile, the communications having been restored, the current of reinforcements was resumed, and the eager soldiers needed only to recover the fatigue of their march.

The enemy, whose forces were now increased to some twenty-five thousand men, had their left strongly posted in the broken ground of the old cantonments between the city and the river. Cawnpore itself was occupied; and its face towards the canal, opposite the advanced posts of the British camp, was thickly lined with troops. The hostile right was behind the canal on the southern plain, the Calpee road covered by the camp of the Gwalior Contingent. To fall on the enemy's right and prevent assistance being rendered it by their left, was the governing idea of Sir Colin's plan of attack. He determined to throw the whole weight of his force on the rebel right on the plain, to strike at the camp of the Gwalior Contingent, establish himself on its line of retreat, and having thus separated it from the Bithoor force constituting the rebel left, to effect the discomfiture of both bodies in detail. The troops at his disposal amounted to five thousand infantry, six hundred cavalry, and thirty-five guns.

At 10 A.M. of the 6th, while the troops of Sir Colin's left were being formed in order of battle on either side of the Grand Trunk Road, Windham opened a fire of heavy artillery from the entrenchment upon the enemy's right between the city and the river, with the object of concentrating their attention on that quarter and of masking the main point of Campbell's attack. When this cannonade slackened Greathed, moving up to the line of the canal, engaged the enemy holding the edge of the city with a heavy musketry-fire for the purpose of detaining them in that position. On Greathed's left Walpole with his riflemen and the Thirty-Eighth crossed the canal, skirted the southern edge of the city, then bringing forward his right shoulder, swept across the plain towards the enemy's camp. Simultaneously the columns of Hope and Inglis, forming in successive lines further to the left under cover of the heavy artillery and preceded by the Sikhs and the Fifty-Third, drove the enemy across the canal, followed them up closely, and pressed eagerly forward upon the camp of the Gwalior Contingent, hurling back the foe in utter confusion. A battery galloping to the front poured round after round of grape into the tents, which were speedily cleared. So complete was the surprise, so sudden the onslaught, that the chupatties were found baking on the fires, the bullocks stood tied beside the carts, the sick and wounded were lying in the hospitals. By noon the enemy were in full flight by the road to Calpee. Such was the demoralisation that a pursuit by Sir Colin, his staff and personal escort, along with Bourchier's field-battery, sufficed to keep the fugitives on the run; for the cavalry which was intended to cut off the enemy's retreat had missed its way, and only joined in the pursuit some miles beyond the abandoned camp. Gun after gun was captured in the chase. Sir Colin maintained the pursuit with the cavalry and the horse-artillery along the Calpee road for fifteen miles, capturing seventeen guns with their ammunition waggons and a great booty of material. The Gwalior Contingent, for the time being, was utterly discomfited.