The Cannons of Lucknow (20 page)

The battle opened in fine style, Maude's guns throwing a hail of accurately placed shots, limbering up and pushing forward to resume the bombardment, supported by the Fusiliers skirmishing and the Highlanders and 64th in line. Alex, on the right flank of the advancing artillery, although able to take no active part in the action, had a grandstand view. Francis Maude, a lean, dapper figure in his grimy white uniform, was in his element, laying a gun here, waving his gunners on there, and, bringing them up to his favourite 700 yards' range, finally silencing the enemy's answering cannonade.

Havelock ordered the 64th off on their turning movement and the Fusiliers and the Highlanders hurled themselves against the earthworks with great gallantry, forced the gate at the point of the bayonet, and were into the town, driving all opposition before them. Unhappily the 64th had delayed to exchange shots with the defenders of a small building which they should properly have taken in their stride, and the main body of the defeated rebels was already streaming out, in a confused and jumbled mass of men and horses, across the causeway. Seeing this, Havelock despatched his son Harry—who had just remounted, after having his horse shot under him—with a brusque message to the 64th's Commanding Officer: “If you don't go at that village, I will send men that will, and put an everlasting disgrace on you!”

That morning at Unao the 64th had shown some hesitation in advancing to the attack; they had remained lying down under heavy fire until a big Irish private named Cavanagh had gone forward alone and died, cheering them on, and Havelock had expressed his dissatisfaction with them. Now, stung by his message, they made a dash for the causeway but reached it too late to cut off the rebels' retreat. The sepoys who had garrisoned the town made off, carrying their wounded with them, and leaving the inhabitants to their fate.

Disappointed, although their second victory had been gallantly and decisively won, the line was halted at the edge of the
jheel
and the exhausted men bivouacked where they stood, many of them on the causeway itself. Havelock rode across to inspect the piquets posted on the far side and, as he returned in the fading light, his horse having to step over the recumbent forms of sleeping soldiers, one of them roused himself and, recognising the horseman, jumped to his feet shouting, “Clear the way for the general!”

The cry passed down the line and, worn out though they were, the men started to cheer. “Clear the way for the general! It's the general, boys—give him a cheer and clear the way there!”

General Havelock beamed at them. “You've done that
well
already, men!” he answered. “You've done that very well.”

“And we'll clear it all the way to Lucknow, sir,” a husky young corporal promised. “God bless you, sir!”

Touched, the general thanked them and continued across the causeway. For him there was to be no sleep, however. In the building his staff had taken over as their headquarters, he pored over the list of killed and wounded and sick, appalled by the figures Harry set before him. He dictated an Order of the Day which was characteristic of him:

Soldiers, your general thanks you for your exertions today. You have stormed two fortified villages and captured nineteen guns. But he is not satisfied with all of you. Some of you fought as if the cholera had seized your minds as well as your bodies. There were men among you, however, whom he must praise to the skies. Private Patrick Cavanagh, 64th, was cut literally in pieces by the enemy, while setting an example of distinguished gallantry. Had he lived I should have deemed him worthy of the Victoria Cross. It could never have glittered on a more gallant breast.

This done, the general made a full report on the day to the Commander-in-Chief, ending:

The loss during the day's fighting was heavy—namely 100 men killed and wounded. They, with the sick, took up the whole of the sick carriage of the force. The loss of the enemy in killed and wounded was over 400, as nearly as can be estimated, but as I have no cavalry I can risk in pursuit, they carried off both dead and wounded and, though abandoning their guns, their horses, bullocks, and equipment generally, if not always, have escaped me.

He pleaded again for reinforcement by the two European regiments he had been promised and a battery of horse artillery, and continued:

We are now reduced to 1,000 European infantry and can place only 850 in line, our numerous sick, wounded, and baggage requiring strong guards in this country, where every village contains enemies, and we are diminishing daily from cholera, dysentery, and fighting.

All night, Havelock wrestled with the problem of whether to retire to his starting point at Mungalwar to await the necessary reinforcements or to take the risk of going on. To go on would, in all probability, mean leaving his sick and wounded by the roadside and this he could not contemplate; in addition, as his son Harry pointed out, every
dhoolie
and sick cart was in use, which meant that none would be available for future casualties. To stay where he was, less than halfway to Lucknow, was out of the question, since his communication with Cawnpore would almost certainly be cut. He had barely men enough to hold the little town, and none at all that he could spare to guard the road. Prudence, humanity, and military experience alike told him that his only course was to retire—his Movable Column was too small, too poorly equipped, too vulnerable to go on. His men had fought with great tenacity and courage; they had been victorious and none would want to retire, now that they had come so close to their goal. Probably they would think him wrong if he ordered them to abandon the ground they had won and, in far-off Calcutta, he knew, there would be many all too ready to criticise his decision—to accuse him, even, of faint-heartedness. But he could not let such considerations weigh with him, the general told himself, and, his own mind made up at last, he sent for Colonel Tytler soon after dawn.

“Tytler,” he said, coming to the point without preamble, “In your opinion, what chance have we of effecting the relief of Lucknow if we push on at once?”

“In my view, General,” his Chief of Staff answered, without hesitation, “we have none at all, with our present resources. To make the attempt and fail would, I feel sure, seal the fate of the garrison. Colonel Inglis has said that he can hold out until the fifth of August; we have to some extent relieved the pressure on him by drawing troops away from the siege, and if we return to Mungalwar, they will almost certainly follow us. Provided the reinforcements reach us within the next few days, we shall still be in time to save Lucknow, and by going back now, we shall save our own sick and wounded.”

“My view is the same as yours,” Havelock told him. “Although whether it will be shared in Calcutta or, for that matter, in England is by no means certain!” He shrugged with weary resignation. “And our own men won't like it, poor fellows.”

“True, sir,” Tytler conceded. “But it would be no use attempting to fight our way into Lucknow with eight hundred Europeans when Inglis himself has warned that we shall require two or three thousand, if we are to have any chance of reaching the Residency at all! And even that supposes that we could cross the Sai at Bunni without loss, by a bridge we're told has been destroyed …” his smile was wry. “Shall I give the order to retire, sir?”

Havelock shook his white head. “No, I will give it myself, since the decision is mine. Fall the Column in at four o'clock this afternoon, if you please, and I will break the news to them then.”

At four, the Column was formed up, facing towards Lucknow, and Havelock, after a brief explanation of his reasons, gave the order to retire. The men's faces fell; there were murmurs of surprised and angry protest, and Alex, sitting his horse with the twenty of his troop who had been detailed to act as escort to the guns, heard several of them swearing in disbelief. But the order had been given and must be obeyed; dejected and sullen, they marched back across the battlefield they had contested the previous day and, after bivouacking overnight at Unao, reached Mungalwar in a deluge of rain, to find what shelter they could in the mud huts of the village. They were unmolested by the rebels but with every mile more men fell out, suffering from sickness and exhaustion, and when the Column finally halted, casualties from these causes outnumbered those inflicted in action against the enemy.

General Havelock, as weary and dispirited as the men he commanded, received a message from the Commander-in-Chief, sent by electric telegraph and forwarded from Cawnpore by Neill. This contained the heartbreaking news that the Dinapore sepoys were now in open revolt, for which reason the two British regiments he had been promised, the 5th Fusiliers and the 90th Foot, could not yet be sent to reinforce the Lucknow relief column. He had believed them to be already on their way upcountry, and the information that they were not coming was a shattering blow to him. It was followed by another. Late on the evening of 1st August, a personal letter from Neill was delivered to his Headquarters by a staff officer and he read it with growing anger.

I late last night received yours of yesterday,

his second-in-command had written, in a hasty, almost illegible scrawl.

I deeply regret that you have fallen back one foot. The effect on our prestige is very bad indeed. Your camp was not pitched yesterday before all manner of reports were rife in the city—that you had returned to get more guns, having lost all you took with you. In fact, amongst all the belief is that you have been defeated and forced back. It has been most unfortunate your not bringing any guns captured from the enemy. The natives will not believe that you have captured one. The effect of your retrograde movement will be very injurious to our cause everywhere.

White with fury at such gross insubordination, Havelock turned the page, to read that reinforcements—in the shape of a half-battery of Horse Artillery and a company of the 84th—had left Allahabad on their way to join him.

When these reinforcements reach you,

Neill's final paragraph read,

you ought to advance again and not halt until you have rescued, if possible, the garrison of Lucknow. Return here sharp with them for there is much to be done, between this and Agra and Delhi.

Young Lieutenant Hargood of the Fusiliers, who had replaced Lieutenant Seton as his AFDC after Seton had suffered a severe wound at Unao, eyed his Chief apprehensively, fearing, from his expression, that an outburst was imminent. But General Havelock was not given to futile loss of temper in front of his subordinates, and, to Hargood's surprise, he said in a flat, controlled voice, “Be so good as to tell my son that I wish to see him, if you please.” When the AFDC had hurried off on his errand, the general turned to Lieutenant Simpson, who had brought the letter, and bade him wait outside.” There will be a reply. Kindly wait for it.”

Simpson saluted and withdrew. Left alone, Havelock reached for pen and paper and, his hand perfectly steady, wrote his answer.

There must be an end to these proceedings at once. I wrote to you confidentially on the state of affairs. You send me back a letter of censure of my measures, reproof, and advice for the future. I do not want and will not receive any of them from an officer under my command, be his experience what it may.

Understand this distinctly, and that a consideration of the obstruction that would arise to the public service at this moment alone prevents me from taking the stronger step of placing you under arrest. You now stand warned. Attempt no further dictation. I have my own reasons, which I will not communicate to anyone, and I alone am responsible for the course which I have pursued.

When his son Harry arrived breathless, the general placed both letters in his hand. “Read these,” he invited.

Harry read them, unable to contain his indignation.

“He'll communicate these—these entirely false accusations to Calcutta, Father,” he warned.

“I know it,” the general admitted. “But I can do nothing, save advise Patrick Grant of the true situation and let him judge for himself. If I take this Column—even with the paltry reinforcements they have sent me—to Lucknow I shall, in all probability, lose every man. If that is what Government requires of me, then I'll do it, Harry. But inevitably, if I do, the loss of this force in a fruitless attempt to relieve Colonel Inglis will bring about
his
fall.”

“Wait, Father,” Harry pleaded. “Wait at least until we hear when the regiments from Dinapore
are
to be sent.”

Next day a second telegraphic message from the Commander-in-Chief added to the general's despair.

Events in Bengal make it impossible to send up the 5th and 99th regiments, and it is certain that no other European regiments can reach Allahabad for two months …

this starkly informed him, and then, influenced, it seemed probable, by the opinion Neil had expressed to him, Sir Patrick Grant ended his message by urging an immediate attempt to relieve Lucknow.

The “paltry reinforcements”—a hundred men of the Queen's 84th, two 9-pounder guns of Captain Olpherts' battery, under Lieutenant Smithett, and two 24-pounder howitzers from Cawnpore—reached Mungalwar on 4th August. Havelock paraded them and congratulated them on having come into a camp of heroic soldiers, who had six times met the enemy and each time defeated him and taken his cannon, but, learning from Smithett that his native gun lascars had shown signs of disaffection, he had them disarmed and sent back to Cawnpore to work as labourers in Neill's entrenchment. That evening he despatched Ungud to Lucknow with a message saying he would make a second attempt to bring about the garrison's relief, and the Column marched to Unao. Receiving intelligence that Busseratgunj was again occupied in strength by the rebels, the advance was continued at first light.

Employing similar tactics to those which had been so successful on the previous occasion, Havelock once more drove a vastly superior force of rebels from their stronghold. This time the 84th were entrusted to perform the turning movement, and they did so with dash and courage, leading the British column in a gallant bayonet charge which took them across the causeway at the heels of their fleeing foe. The Horse Artillery galloped forward with a slender escort of Volunteer Cavalry and, unlimbering well ahead of the infantry, pounded a number of enemy camps situated in the plain beyond the causeway with grape and shrapnel. As their occupants abandoned their tents and took to flight, led by a large body of irregular cavalry, both Alex and Charles Palliser pleaded to be allowed to give chase with the Volunteers, only to receive a regretful refusal. Disconsolately they sat their horses, watching their enemy escape, and Lousada Barrow, who had conveyed their plea to the general, confessed to his own frustration.