The Indian Mutiny of 1857/Chapter 27

by George Bruce Malleson

CHAPTER XXVII.

THE LAST EMBERS OF THE REVOLT.

In Haidarábád, throughout the Mutiny, the loyalty of the Nizam and of his able minister, Salar Jung, had been the surest guarantees of peace. In the early days of July 1857 the turbulence of the foreign troops in the service of the Nizam had caused an attack upon the Residency. But the able representative of British authority in that territory, Major Cuthbert Davidson, warned by Salar Jung, had time to make preparations which terminated not only in the discomfiture of the rebels, but in the capture and punishment of the leaders. Of the necessity of disarming one of the cavalry regiments at Aurangábád I have spoken in its place. But the aberration of the mutineers was but temporary. The men returned to their duty, and rendered, with their comrades in the contingent of the three arms, excellent service to the State. A little later, the Rájá of Shorápur, a Hindu tributary of the Nizam, broke out into treacherous revolt. But Major Davidson, acting in concert with Lord Elphinstone, called up from the Southern Maráthá country the column serving under Colonel Malcolm, whilst the Governor of Madras, Lord Harris, despatched to the spot a force under Major Hughes. The troops of the Haidarábád contingent, under Captain Wyndham, proceeded likewise to aid in the coercion of the deluded prince. The latter, after a vain attempt to lure Wyndham to his destruction, surrendered himself as a prisoner. There can be little doubt but that his mind was affected, for he committed suicide when it was announced to him that, after four years of detention, he would be allowed to resume his position.^[1]

Meanwhile, Sir Hope Grant, under orders from Sir Colin Campbell, had proceeded in carrying out his plan for the pacification of Oudh. I last quitted him near Lakhnao, on the 16th of May. From that date to the end of August he continued his operations, beating the rebels in every encounter, and finally halting at Súltánpur. There he thought it wise to suspend operations till the close of the rainy season. He resumed them in the middle of October.

Meanwhile, there had been some fighting in Rohilkhand. At Philibhít it became known that the rebels were concentrated in force at Nuriah. Thence they were dislodged by a force commanded by Captain Sam Browne, under circumstances of great gallantry, which gained for that officer the coveted cross. In the turbulent district of Ázamgarh, too, the rebels had again raised their heads. They were, however, cleared from the district by a force under Brigadier Berkeley, who, pushing his success, recovered Eastern Oudh as far as Súltánpur, where he touched Hope Grant's force. Rowcroft, meanwhile, with his own troops and the sailors of the Pearl brigade, had defeated the rebels at Amorhá and Harhá; Eveleigh had punished them between Husénganj and Mohan; Dawson had captured Sandélá. The British forces rested during two months of the rainy season, but that period was employed by sending Sikhs in steamers up the Ganges to clear the banks of that river.

In October operations were resumed. The rebels began by attacking Sandélá. They were held in check by Dawson until, first, Major Maynard, then Brigadier Barker, arrived and inflicted upon them a crushing defeat. In the same month Eveleigh defeated them at Míánganj, and Seaton near Sháhjahánpur, whilst the Rájá of Powain repulsed an attack made upon his fortified town. Sir Colin Campbell, now become Lord Clyde, then resolved to clear the entire province of rebels by acting by columns in all its districts simultaneously. Whilst one column, drawn from Rohilkhand, should clear the north-west of Oudh, and, sweeping all before it, should establish itself at Sítápur, four columns should clear the Baiswárá country, another column should guard the Duáb, another the Kánhpur road, whilst smaller columns, radiating from Lakhnao, Nuwábganj, Daryábád, and Faizábád should clear the districts around them.

This plan was acted upon with complete success. On the 3d of November, Wetherall, marching to join Hope Grant, stormed Rámpur Kasiá. Hope Grant, joining him there, moved against Améthí on one side, whilst Lord Clyde attacked it on another. The place surrendered on the 8th. The strong fort of Shankarpur was evacuated by Béní Mádhu, a noted rebel, on the night of the 10th, and occupied the next day. Eveleigh, following Béní Mádhu, caught him two days later at Dundiá Khérá, and defeated him, taking three of his guns. On the 24th that rebel was again encountered, this time by Lord Clyde, and completely defeated. In the meanwhile the strong places in Eastern Oudh had fallen in succession, and by the end of November that part of the province was completely subdued. Nor had the columns sweeping the north-western districts been less successful. Troup had cleared the ground as far as Sítápur; Gordon, Carmichael, and Horsford had done the same in the districts south of the Gogra, whilst Hope Grant, catching the rebels beaten by Rowcroft at Tulsipur, had swept them into Nipál. Then Lord Clyde, moving on Sikrórá, and in touch with Grant on the one side and Rowcroft covering Gorákhpur on the other, drove the Begum and Náná Sáhib before him from Bondí and Báhráitch, cleared the country between Nanpárá and the Gogra, then marching on Bánkí, close to the Nipál frontier, surprised and defeated the rebels, and swept the survivors into Nipál. Jang Bahádur, loyal to the core, informed the rebels who crossed that they must not look to him for protection. He even permitted British troops to come over and disarm any considerable body of rebels who might have sought refuge there.

Lord Clyde, rightly regarding the pacification of Oudh as completed, quitted the province, leaving it to Hope Grant to carry out such operations as might be necessary. What little remained to be done was then done thoroughly. Whilst Colonel Walker crushed, at Bangáon, the more hardened rebels, the survivors of the regiments which had perpetrated the Kánhpur massacre, Grant himself pursued the terrified remnant across the hills into Nipál. Dislodgment alone was necessary, for they had neither arms, nor money, nor food. Contenting himself with locating troops to prevent their return, Grant reported (May 1859) that Oudh was at last at peace. Thanks to the generous policy pursued by Lord Canning, in confiscating that he might restore with a clear title, Oudh has ever since remained a bulwark of British supremacy.

The pacification of Oudh was the closing act of the drama the curtain of which had been raised in 1857. In the interval Sir John Lawrence had, with characteristic energy, put down an attempted rising in the Gughaira district, turbulent even in the time of Akbar; his brother, George Lawrence, had dispersed the few malcontents, in Rájpútáná; the rebels had been crushed, though after a tedious and desultory warfare, in the Chutiá Nágpur districts; whilst Western Bihár had, as related, been pacified by the dispersion of the last adherents of the family of Kunwar Singh. When Sir Hope Grant finally cleared Oudh of the last remnants of the rebels,^[2] in May 1859, then, and then only, could it be said that the Mutiny had been absolutely stamped out.

1. Of this episode Colonel Meadows Taylor has written a most interesting account: Story of My Life.
2. It is believed that amongst these was Náná Sáhib. It was always a matter of regret that this man's fate was never certainly known. Many reports regarding him were circulated afterwards: that he had died in Nipál; later, that he had been seen in Gwáháro. But the uncertainty regarding his fate has remained to this day.